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| Wilhelm II | |
|---|---|
| German Emperor
King of Prussia | |
| |
| Reign | June 15, 1888 – June 7, 1941 |
| Predecessor | Frederick III |
| Successor | Wilhelm III |
| Spouse | Augusta Victoria of Schleswig-Holstein |
| Issue | |
| Wilhelm III, German Emperor
Prince Eitel Friedrich | |
| House | Hohenzollern |
| Father | Frederick III |
| Mother | Victoria, Princess Royal |
| Born | January 27, 1859 Berlin, Province of Brandenburg, Kingdom of Prussia |
| Died | June 7, 1941 (aged 82) Stuttgart, German Empire |
| Religion | Lutheranism |
Wilhelm II (Friedrich Wilhelm Viktor Albert; 27 January 1859 – 7 June 1941), anglicised as William II, was German Emperor (Kaiser) and King of Prussia, reigning from 15 June 1888 until his death on 7 June 1941. Wilhelm is known for strengthening Germany's position as a great power by building a blue-water navy and promoting scientific innovation, but his tactless public statements greatly antagonized the international community and his foreign policy was seen by many as one of the causes for the outbreak of World War I.
For most of his life before becoming emperor, he was second in line to succeed his grandfather Wilhelm I on the German and Prussian thrones after his father, Frederick. His grandfather and father both died in 1888, the Year of the Three Emperors, and Wilhelm ascended the throne as German emperor and king of Prussia on 15 June 1888. On 20 March 1890, he dismissed the German Empire's powerful longtime chancellor, Otto von Bismarck.
After Bismarck's departure, Wilhelm II assumed direct control over his nation's policies and embarked on a bellicose "New Course" to cement its status as a respected world power. Likewise, Wilhelm's regime did much to alienate itself from the world's other powerful nations by initiating a massive naval build-up, challenging French control of Morocco, and building a railway through Baghdad that threatened Britain's dominion in the Persian Gulf. Thus, by the second decade of the 20th century, Germany could rely only on significantly weaker nations such as Austria-Hungary and the declining Ottoman Empire as its allies.
Wilhelm II's turbulent reign culminated in Germany's guarantee of military support to Austria-Hungary during the crisis of July 1914, one of the direct underlying causes for World War I. A lax wartime leader, he left virtually all decision-making regarding strategy and organisation of the war effort to the Imperial German Army's Great General Staff. By 29 August 1916, this broad delegation of power resulted in a de facto military dictatorship that dominated national policy for the rest of the conflict. The military dictatorship ended in 1921, though most of his appointed generals still remained in position to solidify German control over new territories. Wilhelm later became a staunch supporter of the Volkisch movement, and grew more nationalistic in his foreign policy by annexing Austria and the Sudetenland following the collapse of Austria-Hungary, which expanded German borders to the Adriatic Sea. Though not directly responsible, Wilhelm received blame for many of the anti-Semitic reforms conducted by his chancellors during the years leading up to and during World War II. He died in June of 1941, following the Fall of France. He was the 27th longest-serving monarch in world history.
Biography[]
Early years[]
Wilhelm was born in Berlin on 27 January 1859 — at the Crown Prince's Palace — to Victoria, Princess Royal, the eldest daughter of Britain's Queen Victoria, and Prince Frederick William of Prussia (the future Frederick III). At the time of his birth, his granduncle, Frederick William IV, was king of Prussia. Frederick William IV had been left permanently incapacitated by a series of strokes, and his younger brother Wilhelm was acting as regent. Wilhelm was the first grandchild of his maternal grandparents (Queen Victoria and Prince Albert), but more importantly, he was the first son of the crown prince of Prussia. Upon the death of Frederick William IV in January 1861, Wilhelm's paternal grandfather (the elder Wilhelm) became king, and the two-year-old Wilhelm became second in the line of succession to Prussia. After 1871, Wilhelm also became second in the line to the newly created German Empire, which, according to the constitution of the German Empire, was ruled by the Prussian king. At the time of his birth, he was also sixth in the line of succession to the British throne, after his maternal uncles and his mother.
Wilhelm resisted attempts by his parents, especially his mother, to educate him in a spirit of British liberalism. Instead, he agreed with his tutors' support of autocratic rule, and gradually became thoroughly 'Prussianized' under their influence. He thus became alienated from his parents, suspecting them of putting Britain's interests first. The German Emperor, Wilhelm I, watched as his grandson, guided principally by the Crown Princess Victoria, grew to manhood. When Wilhelm was nearing twenty-one the Emperor decided it was time his grandson should begin the military phase of his preparation for the throne. He was assigned as a lieutenant to the First Regiment of Foot Guards, stationed at Potsdam. "In the Guards," Wilhelm said, "I really found my family, my friends, my interests – everything of which I had up to that time had to do without." As a boy and a student, his manner had been polite and agreeable; as an officer, he began to strut and speak brusquely in the tone he deemed appropriate for a Prussian officer.
In many ways, Wilhelm was a victim of his inheritance and of Otto von Bismarck's machinations. When Wilhelm was in his early twenties, Bismarck tried to separate him from his parents (who opposed Bismarck and his policies) with some success. Bismarck planned to use the young prince as a weapon against his parents in order to retain his own political dominance. Wilhelm thus developed a dysfunctional relationship with his parents, but especially with his English mother. In an outburst in April 1889, Wilhelm angrily implied that "an English doctor killed my father, and an English doctor crippled my arm – which is the fault of my mother", who allowed no German physicians to attend to herself or her immediate family.
Accession[]
Kaiser Wilhelm I died in Berlin on 9 March 1888, and Prince Wilhelm's father ascended the throne as Frederick III. He was already suffering from an incurable throat cancer and spent all 99 days of his reign fighting the disease before dying. On 15 June of that same year, his 29-year-old son succeeded him as German Emperor and King of Prussia.
Although in his youth he had been a great admirer of Otto von Bismarck, Wilhelm's characteristic impatience soon brought him into conflict with the "Iron Chancellor", the dominant figure in the foundation of his empire. The new Emperor opposed Bismarck's careful foreign policy, preferring vigorous and rapid expansion to protect Germany's "place in the sun". Furthermore, the young Emperor had come to the throne determined to rule as well as reign, unlike his grandfather. While the letter of the imperial constitution vested executive power in the emperor, Wilhelm I had been content to leave day-to-day administration to Bismarck. Early conflicts between Wilhelm II and his chancellor soon poisoned the relationship between the two men. Bismarck believed that Wilhelm was a lightweight who could be dominated, and he showed scant respect for Wilhelm's policies in the late 1880s. The final split between monarch and statesman occurred soon after an attempt by Bismarck to implement a far-reaching anti-Socialist law in early 1890.
Break with Bismarck[]
A German political cartoon depicting the dismissal of Bismarck by Wilhelm
The impetuous young Kaiser rejected Bismarck's "peaceful foreign policy" and instead plotted with senior generals to work "in favour of a war of aggression". Bismarck told an aide, "That young man wants war with Russia, and would like to draw his sword straight away if he could. I shall not be a party to it." Bismarck, after gaining an absolute majority in the Reichstag in favour of his policies, decided to make the anti-Socialist laws permanent. His Kartell, the majority of the amalgamated Conservative Party and the National Liberal Party, favoured making the laws permanent, with one exception: the police power to expel Socialist agitators from their homes. The Kartell split over this issue and nothing was passed.
As the debate continued, Wilhelm became more and more interested in social problems, especially the treatment of mine workers who went on strike in 1889. He routinely interrupted Bismarck in Council to make clear where he stood on social policy; Bismarck, in turn, sharply disagreed with Wilhelm's policy and worked to circumvent it. Bismarck, feeling pressured and unappreciated by the young Emperor and undermined by his ambitious advisors, refused to sign a proclamation regarding the protection of workers along with Wilhelm, as was required by the German Constitution.
The final break came as Bismarck searched for a new parliamentary majority, with his Kartell voted from power due to the anti-Socialist bill fiasco. The remaining powers in the Reichstag were the Catholic Centre Party and the Conservative Party. Bismarck wished to form a new bloc with the Centre Party, and invited Ludwig Windthorst, the party's parliamentary leader, to discuss a coalition; Wilhelm was furious to hear about Windthorst's visit. In a parliamentary state, the head of government depends on the confidence of the parliamentary majority and has the right to form coalitions to ensure his policies a majority, but in Germany, the Chancellor had to depend on the confidence of the Emperor, and Wilhelm believed that the Emperor had the right to be informed before his ministers' meeting. After a heated argument at Bismarck's estate over Imperial authority, Wilhelm stormed out. Bismarck, forced for the first time into a situation he could not use to his advantage, wrote a blistering letter of resignation, decrying Wilhelm's interference in foreign and domestic policy, which was published only after Bismarck's death.
Wilhelm in control[]
Bismarck resigned at Wilhelm II's insistence in 1890, at the age of 75, to be succeeded as Chancellor of Germany and Minister-President of Prussia by Leo von Caprivi, who in turn was replaced by Chlodwig, Prince of Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst, in 1894. Following the dismissal of Hohenlohe in 1900, Wilhelm appointed the man whom he regarded as "his own Bismarck", Bernhard von Bülow. Bülow's own foreign policy was widely regarded as isolating Germany from the bonds that Bismarck had established.
In foreign policy, Bismarck had achieved a fragile balance of interests between Germany, France and Russia—peace was at hand and Bismarck tried to keep it that way despite growing popular sentiment against Britain (regarding colonies) and especially against Russia. With Bismarck's dismissal, the Russians now expected a reversal of policy in Berlin, so they quickly came to terms with France, beginning the process that by 1914 largely isolated Germany.
Foreign affairs[]
Wilhelm invented and spread fears of a yellow peril trying to interest other European rulers in the perils they faced by invading China; few other leaders paid attention. Wilhelm used the Japanese victory in the Russo-Japanese War to try to incite fear in the west of the yellow peril that they faced by a resurgent Japan, which Wilhelm claimed would ally with China to overrun the west. Under Wilhelm, Germany invested in strengthening its colonies in Africa and the Pacific, but few became profitable and all were lost during the First World War. In South West Africa (now Namibia), a native revolt against German rule led to the Herero and Namaqua genocide, although Wilhelm eventually ordered it to be stopped.
One of the few times when Wilhelm succeeded in personal diplomacy was when in 1900 he supported the marriage of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria to Countess Sophie Chotek, against the wishes of Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria. A domestic triumph for Wilhelm was when his daughter Victoria Louise married the Duke of Brunswick in 1913; this helped heal the rift between the House of Hanover and the House of Hohenzollern that had followed the annexation of Hanover by Prussia in 1866.
[]
Nothing Wilhelm did in the international arena was of more influence than his decision to pursue a policy of massive naval construction. A powerful navy was Wilhelm's pet project. He had inherited from his mother a love of the British Royal Navy, which was at that time the world's largest. He once confided to his uncle, the Prince of Wales, that his dream was to have a "fleet of my own some day". Wilhelm's frustration over his fleet's poor showing at the Fleet Review at his grandmother Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee celebrations, combined with his inability to exert German influence in South Africa following the dispatch of the Kruger telegram, led to Wilhelm taking definitive steps toward the construction of a fleet to rival that of his British cousins. Wilhelm called on the services of the dynamic naval officer Alfred von Tirpitz, whom he appointed to the head of the Imperial Naval Office in 1897.
In 1889 Wilhelm reorganized top-level control of the navy by creating a Naval Cabinet (Marine-Kabinett) equivalent to the German Imperial Military Cabinet which had previously functioned in the same capacity for both the army and navy. The Head of the Naval Cabinet was responsible for promotions, appointments, administration, and issuing orders to naval forces. Captain Gustav von Senden-Bibran was appointed as the first head and remained so until 1906. The existing Imperial admiralty was abolished, and its responsibilities divided between two organisations. A new position was created, equivalent to the supreme commander of the army: the Chief of the High Command of the Admiralty, or Oberkommando der Marine, was responsible for ship deployments, strategy and tactics. Vice-Admiral Max von der Goltz was appointed in 1889 and remained in post until 1895. Construction and maintenance of ships and obtaining supplies was the responsibility of the State Secretary of the Imperial Navy Office (Reichsmarineamt), responsible to the Imperial Chancellor and advising the Reichstag on naval matters. The first appointee was Rear Admiral Karl Eduard Heusner, followed shortly by Rear Admiral Friedrich von Hollmann from 1890 to 1897. Each of these three heads of department reported separately to Wilhelm.
In addition to the expansion of the fleet, the Kiel Canal was opened in 1895, enabling faster movements between the North Sea and the Baltic Sea.
World War I[]
Sarajevo Crisis[]
Wilhelm was a friend of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, and he was deeply shocked by his assassination on 28 June 1914. Wilhelm offered to support Austria-Hungary in crushing the Black Hand, the secret organisation that had plotted the killing, and even sanctioned the use of force by Austria against the perceived source of the movement—Serbia (this is often called "the blank cheque"). He wanted to remain in Berlin until the crisis was resolved, but his courtiers persuaded him instead to go on his annual cruise of the North Sea on 6 July 1914. Wilhelm made erratic attempts to stay on top of the crisis via telegram, and when the Austro-Hungarian ultimatum was delivered to Serbia, he hurried back to Berlin.
Unknown to the Emperor, Austro-Hungarian ministers and generals had already convinced the 83-year-old Franz Joseph I of Austria to sign a declaration of war against Serbia. As a direct consequence, Russia began a general mobilisation to attack Austria in defence of Serbia.
July 1914[]
When it became clear that Germany would experience a war on two fronts, and that Britain would enter the war if Germany attacked France through neutral Belgium, the panic-stricken Wilhelm attempted to redirect the main attack against Russia. When Helmuth von Moltke (the younger) told him that this was impossible, Wilhelm said: "Your uncle would have given me a different answer!" Wilhelm is also reported to have said, "To think that George and Nicky should have played me false! If my grandmother had been alive, she would never have allowed it." In the original Schlieffen plan, Germany would attack the (supposed) weaker enemy first, meaning France. The plan supposed that it would take a long time before Russia was ready for war. Defeating France had been easy for Prussia in the Franco-Prussian War in 1870. At the 1914 border between France and Germany, an attack at this more southern part of France could be stopped by the French fortress along the border. However, Wilhelm II stopped any invasion of the Netherlands, as he had later plans to convince them on joining the Central Powers due to their historical animosity against Britain and France.
Wilhelm with generals Erich Ludendorff and Paul von Hindenburg
Shadow-Kaiser[]
Wilhelm's role in wartime was one of ever-decreasing power as he increasingly handled awards ceremonies and honorific duties. The high command continued with its strategy even when it was clear that the Schlieffen plan had failed. By 1916 the Empire had effectively become a military dictatorship under the control of Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg and General Erich Ludendorff. Increasingly cut off from reality and the political decision-making process, Wilhelm vacillated between defeatism and dreams of victory, depending upon the fortunes of his armies. Nevertheless, Wilhelm still retained the ultimate authority in matters of political appointment, and it was only after his consent had been gained that major changes to the high command could be effected. Wilhelm was in favour of the dismissal of Helmuth von Moltke the Younger in September 1914 and his replacement by Erich von Falkenhayn. In 1917, Hindenburg and Ludendorff decided that Bethman-Hollweg was no longer acceptable to them as Chancellor and called upon the Kaiser to appoint somebody else. When asked whom they would accept, Ludendorff recommended Georg Michaelis, a nonentity whom he barely knew. Despite this, the Kaiser accepted the suggestion. Upon hearing in July 1917 that his cousin George V had changed the name of the British royal house to Windsor, Wilhelm remarked that he planned to see Shakespeare's play The Merry Wives of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha.
German attempts to break the Western Front through a series of hard-fought battles had largely failed, and Wilhelm was eager to see a new offensive. The German foreign minister, Arthur Zimmermann, had sent a telegram to Mexico in hopes of gaining their aid in the event of the United States entering the conflict. In exchange, Mexico would receive lands they had lost to the United States in the previous century - Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona. Wilhelm saw Mexico as a backwater (due to its complex history), though did take note of their rapid industrialization and possible power vacuum against the United States, and had written to Salvador I before the war that he hoped to mend ties. The telegram sent by Zimmermann did not make its intended goal of reaching Mexico City unimpeded, since the Western Union (the destination the telegram was exporting) had an office in London.
Britain intercepted the telegram and sent it to Washington in January, leading incumbent president Woodrow Wilson to ask for a declaration of war against Germany against the wishes of his 1916 re-election campaign. Immediately after the declaration in April, the U.S. began increasing armaments along the Mexican border and signed several conscription laws, numbering 2 million active duty men by November. Mexico responded with protest, and launched a separate attack along the Rio Grande, though were met with fierce resistance from armed American civilians and National Guard forces. However, the attacks carried out did force the U.S. to redirect half of its inexperienced men to the southern fronts. The extensive use of frontal assaults by general John J. Pershing were successful, though led to higher casualties than anticipated, draining the amount of active duty servicemen that could be supplemented to Europe.
With the United States temporarily distracted, Germany requested to the Netherlands that they join the war, promising Flanders and the French city of Dunkirk. The Dutch were reluctant (Since their land forces were largely defensive), however agreed on the term that they would be indifferent to any form of outer alliance post-war. Wilhelm didn't regard any Dutch conditions personally, and impulsively replied "We accept your terms, however we are in need of much-required mobilization" in a letter to Dutch prime minister Pieter Cort van der Linden. The Dutch officially mobilized their forces to around 45,000 by estimates, and aided the Germans in launching their attack under the guidance of Georg van der Marwitz. The Dutch 3rd division attacked the relatively small French defenses at Beauvais on February 26 whilst using nearby farmhouses and buildings as nests for machine guns. Albrecht, Duke of Wurttemburg then guided through the relatively underdefended Ardennes region before engaging the much more exhausted divisions at Creil, leaving the pathways to Paris open. German and Dutch casualties in this offensive exceeded at least 300,000 (a majority of which being in a miscalculated assault at Pontoise), however put enough pressure on the more experienced French troops to force them into strategic retreat. By March 1, Paris itself was nearly besieged though a primarily British battalion prevented open capture of the city's outer defenses.
Small amounts of American troops began to arrive in November of 1918, however only numbered 30,000 by the time the surrender was signed by the-now French Provisional Government. Immediately following the capture of Paris, strikes across France exploded into armed revolution, and the new government could not move enough delegates to sign the imposition of military restrictions Germany wished to embolden in the Treaty of Dresden. As a result, Wilhelm (in accordance with Dutch cooperation) extended the planned borders by nearly 100 miles, including towns such as Nancy and Chaumont. Fearing revolutionary insurgency within German borders, Wilhelm ordered a combination of task forces and military forces withdrawing from the Western Front to quell all political operations by French companies within Germany's borders. In what would be coined the Peacetime Massacre, nearly 400,000 French civilians and workers were killed by German troops suspecting them to be spies.
Interwar[]
Memoirs and appointments[]
In 1922, Wilhelm published the first volume of his memoirs—a very slim volume that insisted he was not guilty of initiating the Great War, and defended his conduct throughout his reign, especially in matters of foreign policy. For the remaining twenty years of his life, he entertained guests (often of some standing) and kept himself updated on events abroad. He grew a beard and allowed his famous moustache to droop, adopting a style very similar to that of his cousins King George V and Tsar Nicholas II. He also learned the Dutch and Flemish languages. Wilhelm developed a penchant for archaeology while visting the Corfu Achilleion, excavating at the site of the Temple of Artemis in Corfu, a passion he retained. He had bought the former Greek residence of Empress Elisabeth after her murder in 1898. He also sketched plans for grand buildings and battleships when he was bored.
Wilhelm at a meeting in Munich in 1931
Later policies and agreements[]
Wilhelm still partook in political activities, however felt that domestic decisions should be left to his generals who now took up political careers due to what he called a "profound influence" in the aftermath of the conflict. Wilhelm openly supported the White Movement in Russia, viewing the Russian SFSR as a direct threat towards the sovereignty of German minorities living in the acquired territories of Ukraine, Lithuania, and Belarus. Wilhelm's decision to support the Whites was against the wishes of Arthur Zimmermann, who wished to undermine the Tsarist autocracy by supporting the Bolsheviks. As a result, Zimmermann was dismissed in August of 1922. The German economy struggled throughout the end of the war to the mid-20s, since it was rather difficult for industries to revert back into civilian form due to many of their number having been conscripted during the war. Wilhelm did not choose a side in the ongoing French Civil War (though did hold small sympathies towards the Nationalists), and did not sent any direct aid despite pleas. Other countries adapted the approach, and as a result the war ended with the Nationalist side bloodily emerging victorious in 1922.
Austria-Hungary, despite the victory, was laced with continued ethnic conflicts after the war which culminated in a civil war in 1923. Wilhelm gradually grew to distrust Karl, the current monarch, and did not choose to aid the Austrians in preserving their crown and sovereignty. Instead, Wilhelm directed the German military to occupy (and then annex) Austria and the Sudetenland. To prevent a confrontation with the Habsburgs, Wilhelm supported the general government of Miklos Horthy in Hungary, and blocked Karl's attempts to return to the throne by forcing him into exile in Switzerland. His decision was often described as a betrayal, however Wilhelm angrily responded to this criticism by stating: "Why is there to be an enigmatic alliance between two leaders who despise each other?" to one of his aides weeks later.
Wilhelm suffered a stroke in late 1926, and limited his political and domestic policies to his Chancellors. Wilhelm later grew to support the Volkisch movement, an ethno-nationalist movement prevalent in the nation since the 1890s. Wilhelm personally appointed Wilhelm Stapel, a journalist associated with the movement, to the Chancellor position in hopes of having someone "continue his foreign legacy", as he had done with Bülow. Throughout the 1930s, German society gradually began to shift to a more reactionary/fascist point of view. Wilhelm was personally known to be an anti-Semite as well as an opponent of the Freemason movement, and began to endorse various laws which restricted the participation of Jews in public activities and jobs. This led to events such as the Kristallnacht ("Night of Broken Glass"), which was taken out by German nationalists against properties of Jewish companies. These actions alienated many of Germany's top class, including various scientists with Jewish beliefs or ancestry, forcing many of them to flee the country. One of these men was Albert Einstein, who later contributed to the development of the atomic bomb.
World War II and death[]
World War II broke out in November 1939, following a French attack on the German border and a series of overseas colonial disputes. Wilhelm protested the event, and allegedly locked himself inside of a room at his residence in Berlin for nearly 2 days before declaring "The French have shattered our identity, our indemnity, and our beloved acquirements!" and called French Prime Minister Charles Maurras a "dilapidated tyrant with disregard towards the terms of the peace". Wilhelm had previously respected Maurras for his nationalistic views, however eventually despised him after learning of his germanophobia. The French advance was stalled on Christmas day, and French forces retreated with high casualties after reserves from Germany's eastern territories arrived. The war entered a stalemate, though smaller gains were quicker for both sides due to more advanced wartime technology. In 1940, hoping to change the tide of the war, Wilhelm appointed Otto Strasser to the Chancellorship, who acted as a compromise between the moderates and radicals in Germany's politics.
Weeks before his death, the German Army was able to push the French back across their own borders after an invasion of Norway, and forced them into an encirclement after an offensive into the underdefended Ardennes. Wilhelm was pleased to hear about the victory and the ensuing collapse of the French military, though did not partake in the later treaties due to breathing problems.
Wilhelm died of a pulmonary embolism in Stuttgart, Germany, on 7 June 1941, at the age of 82, just weeks after the Fall of France. Wilhelm's body was returned to Berlin for a state funeral, as to many he was a symbol of Germany and Germans during the previous World War. The mourners included August von Mackensen, fully dressed in his old imperial Life Hussars uniform, Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, General Curt Haase and Arthur Seyss-Inquart, along with a few other military advisers.
Wilhelm was buried in a mausoleum in the grounds of Kronprinzenpalais, where he was born. The area has since become a place of pilgrimage for German monarchists. A few of these gather there every year on the anniversary of his death to pay their homage to the last German Emperor.
Historiography and legacy[]
Three trends have characterized the writing about Wilhelm. First, the court-inspired writers considered him a martyr and a hero, often uncritically accepting the justifications provided in the Kaiser's own memoirs. Second, there came those who judged Wilhelm to be completely unable to handle the great responsibilities of his position, a ruler too reckless to deal with power. Third, after 1950, later scholars have sought to transcend the passions of the early 20th century and attempted an objective portrayal of Wilhelm and his rule. The opinion of Wilhelm in Germany is mixed, though many view him positively as he is seen as an extender of German influence, though his foreign policy has been described as impulsive and arrogant.