The war is over – WWI that is
September 30th, 2010 at 9:40 am by David FarrarThe Daily Telegraph reports:
The First World War will officially end on Sunday, 92 years after the guns fell silent, when Germany pays off the last chunk of reparations imposed on it by the Allies.
The final payment of £59.5 million, writes off the crippling debt that was the price for one world war and laid the foundations for another.
Germany was forced to pay the reparations at the Treaty of Versailles in 1919 as compensation to the war-ravaged nations of Belgium and France and to pay the Allies some of the costs of waging what was then the bloodiest conflict in history, leaving nearly ten million soldiers dead.
The initial sum agreed upon for war damages in 1919 was 226 billion Reichsmarks, a sum later reduced to 132 billion, £22 billion at the time.
I wonder if there were provisions for interest in late payments?
September 30th, 2010 at 9:52 am
The war was over when the treaty was signed as apart from the armistace. Thats called a formal ceasation of hostilities.
They just finished paying for it, so what? Since when did paying the bill define the period of conflict? We’ve moved from lazy journalism to just plain bloody stupid journalism.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 9:54 am
Well said Murray.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 9:58 am
The final payment of £59.5 million…
The initial sum…later reduced to £22 billion at the time.
They borrowed to pay it and have payed back the loans?
Most of the money goes to private individuals, pension funds and corporations holding debenture bonds as agreed under the Treaty of Versailles
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 10:02 am
Don’t go round invading neutral Holland and deliberately killing civilians and you wont get stuck with the bill is the bottom line.
Also don’t go round shooting ostriches if your name is Archie Duke and you’re hungry.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 10:15 am
In future news: The 2008 NZ election campaign will officially end in 2084 when NZ First finally pay back the stolen $158,000 they owe us.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 10:16 am
I bet the fucking French got most of it. Bastards
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 10:18 am
Idiots.
They should have moved to New Zealand, and got it transmuted to 200 hours community service.
Which they wouldn’t have to show up for.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 10:20 am
I cannot believe that the rest of Europe has the cheek to expect the Germans to hand over this money when it is the Germans who have been subsidising most of the European nations for years and years by way of the EU.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 10:23 am
Murray and others on here, there is a strong argument that the Treaty of Versailles and its associate reparations led Germany straight down a path of intolerance and extremism that only ended with WW2! Versailles may well have been a big mistake and, if that’s right, Germany bares only a small part of the blame for it.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 10:23 am
I agree fot.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 10:23 am
I thik a lot of Europe might have been a pissy about the whole double round of invasions thing Fot.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 10:48 am
I never realised that payments had resumed after WWII! How bizarre.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 10:50 am
Murray
Are you suggesting that Europeans have learnt something about manufactured grievances from the NZ Maori?
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 11:04 am
No I’m saying the Germans reaped what they chose to sew. Ike was a lost less PC than any “leader” we have now.
The result is a very passifist Germany and I can live with that.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 11:09 am
Murray
Nobody would argue that the Germans had to pay something for the havoc they caused, however, thanks to the work ethic and determination of those same Germans the Italians, Greeks and numerous other European people have lived a life of luxury.
IMHO today’s German people have every right to be highly pissed off at subsidising the rest of Europe.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 11:16 am
Fot, they have a right to be. But they’re not. I don’t really understand it, but for some reason Germans are accepting that they should pay for everyone else in Europe. Well, actually, the suggestion I’ve seen is that the beer drinkers are paying for the wine drinkers. As ever in society.
Maybe that should be a new Labour policy – ban drinking of wine, force everyone to drink beer, we’ll automatically get richer.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 11:16 am
They should start another war Fot, and sort it out!.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 11:18 am
No No Paul! It’s a pride thing, the Germans can’t stand anybody doing anything better than them!.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 11:20 am
The Germans had to pay because they lost the war; not because they started it, or indeed caused it. In fact most of the economic cost of the treaty reparations were born by the US (excluding the forceable appropriation of physical property, largely by the French).
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 11:21 am
But they’re not. I don’t really understand it, but for some reason Germans are accepting that they should pay for everyone else in Europe.
Some of them are not happy. When I was there a few months ago there was definite grizzling about bailing out the Greeks so they could retire from 55 (the average is 61), while the retirement age in Germany may be nudged up to 67.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 11:28 am
“No No Paul! It’s a pride thing, the Germans can’t stand anybody doing anything better than them!.”
If only we could get Kiwis to think that way.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 11:36 am
They made fabulous targets over Crete, Unsurpassed.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 11:43 am
The Germans have been the victims of the French more often than they have victimised the French. Look at how the French border has moved eastward, into Germany.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 12:15 pm
£22 billion – f*ck me that’s a lot of money.
From the comments:
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 12:23 pm
Murray, it’s WW1 we’re talking about, Germany did not invade Holland in WW1 (it did in WW2). Maybe it was Belgium you’re thinking about.
I’ve read extensively about WW1 and the causes of it, and as a result I agree with the “war guilt” clause in the Versailles Treaty, Germany essentially wanted to start a war in order to further it’s imperial aims, and did so on a pretext. The assassination of the Archduke was merely a trigger event, the Serbian Government had a relatively tenuous connection with the “Black Hand” organisation that was behind the plot, and it also agreed with the terms required by Austria Hungary (and they were fairly oppressive and apparently designed to be rejected), however Austria-Hungary declared war anyway. The Russians started mobilizing in response, and the Germans declared war on them and moved immediately to invade France via Belgium.
The wisdom of the totality of the Versailles Treaty is indeed very open to question, it was essentially dictated by the French (and by Foch in particular) who were rather vengeful as a consequence of the damage inflicted by the occupation. The theory is that one should either crush or conciliate, and Versailles wasn’t harsh enough to crush but certainly did not conciliate.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 12:29 pm
All that happened at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month 1918 is that there was an Armistice. The German Army was allowed to march back into Germany with flags flying, drums beating and bayonets fixed leading to the claim that they were never defeated but stabbed in the back by politicians. All that happened at Versailles was that a ‘Peace Treaty’ was signed and a lot of good that did too!!!!!!
Contrast that with 1945 when both Germany and Japan were forced to ‘Unconditionally Surrender’.
Lesson learned perhaps.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 1:05 pm
If the Versailles Treaty had been administered by the IRD, Germany would still owe several trillion in penalties and interest.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 1:45 pm
Guess the Marshall plan slipped past you guys.
The Germans didn’t rebuild Germany. For a start after WWII there was no “Germany”. The Americans rebuilt West Germany while the Russians turned East Germany into a steriod powered source of athlets and one of the worst cases of manmade egological destruction ever seen.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 2:12 pm
Murray and others on here, there is a strong argument that the Treaty of Versailles and its associate reparations led Germany straight down a path of intolerance and extremism that only ended with WW2! Versailles may well have been a big mistake and, if that’s right, Germany bares only a small part of the blame for it.
So what your saying is: Don’t hold the aggressor to account lest they get all haughty and start another war?
Fuck that! The lesson is the world should have spanked the fuck out of Germany when they started re-mobilizing in the mid 1930′s in violation of the Treaty of Versailles and not sit back while they re-mobilized, then occupied neighboring countries before finally setting the limit at Poland.
Your right though the cause of WW2 was the Versailles Treaty, though not the treaty itself, but the rest of the worlds lack of will to enforce it.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 2:26 pm
I wonder if the creditors spammed them with life insurance offers and airpoints schemes toward their next invasion while they were paying it off.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 2:39 pm
“one of the worst cases of manmade egological destruction ever seen.”
The Russians destroyed more than a lot of egos.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 3:09 pm
Well said Beaven. There is actually a very strong argument that the treaty of Versailles was not hard enough and the reason we blundered to war was that no nation had the balls to enforce the terms that existed.
The hammering Germany got after WW V2.0 bitch slapped them into pasificism nicely. This was not done with Japan and now they get to play the biggest victim card every year while forgetting that they brought it all on themselves with their expasionist agression.
Pete this C is just for you. Use it to replace any G you feel the need for.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 3:25 pm
Beaven, the Treaty of Versailles was both unrealistic and irrational. Most historians endorse this observation, and were not surprised by the repercussions of its forced adoption on Germany, leading to the Second World War.
Yes, I completely agree that aggressor’s need to be held fully accountable for their actions, but in a realistic and sensible format. Provisions should be set that protect the interests of the people, and the plight of national development. This particular treaty did the complete opposite: encouraged particularly by the French.
The expectations at Versailles were completely out of depth, and did not take into account Germany’s perspective: that the brutality of the treaty’s expectations would do more harm than good for everyone involved.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 3:51 pm
Beaven, the Treaty of Versailles was both unrealistic and irrational. Most historians endorse this observation, and were not surprised by the repercussions of its forced adoption on Germany, leading to the Second World War
Oh no! Not the historians!!!!! Who always seem change their opinion to what ever blames the allied nations the most. God forbid we just admit the obvious that early 20th century Germany was nothing more than a militaristic nation hell bent on expanding its borders – oh no, lets shift the blame to the US and UK!
Unrealistic: the only unrealistic aspect to the treaty was the League of Nations lack of will to enforce it. Irrational? Bullshit! Invading France because some git killed an Ostrich, now THAT is irrational!
Germany, Austria, et el – got exactly what they deserved. If they didn’t want to be held to account, they shouldn’t have started the bloody war!
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 4:07 pm
Oh for goodness sake Bevan, grow up – one would think that we were still living in the Cold War era with your rhetoric.
Imperialism was a significant factor in the lead up to the First World War, but need I remind you that the German and Austro-Hungarian empires were certainly not the most brutal of the time period. In fact, if I can recall correctly, both the British and Russian empires chose to ALIENATE the German empire as a result of imperial issues concerning Austro-Hungary (its loyal ally). Had the British and the Russians chosen to embrace the Germans at this point, in a diplomatic fashion, the first world war may never have occured. The Germans identified expansion as a viable economic option because its economic dialogue with the British, the Russians, and their fellow allies had tumbled.
Am I making some sense to you? It’s really not that hard to comprehend here.
There is certainly enough blood to go around to everyone involved here. The British were at the mercy of their own failures.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 4:17 pm
Let’s also bare in mind here that the League of Nations was a complete and utter failure:
Its purpose post-WWI was to prevent a similar global catastrophe from occuring, it probably promoted one through such an extreme treaty, that served no long-term security prospects whatsoever.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 5:05 pm
Oh for goodness sake Bevan, grow up – one would think that we were still living in the Cold War era with your rhetoric.
???? WTF, resorting to insults already? Gee your arguement must be weak!
Imperialism was a significant factor in the lead up to the First World War, but need I remind you that the German and Austro-Hungarian empires were certainly not the most brutal of the time period. In fact, if I can recall correctly, both the British and Russian empires chose to ALIENATE the German empire as a result of imperial issues concerning Austro-Hungary (its loyal ally). Had the British and the Russians chosen to embrace the Germans at this point, in a diplomatic fashion, the first world war may never have occured. The Germans identified expansion as a viable economic option because its economic dialogue with the British, the Russians, and their fellow allies had tumbled.
Am I making some sense to you? It’s really not that hard to comprehend here.
Riiight, your paragraph above is nothing more than excusing the actions of Germany and Austro-Hungary, remember they were the agressor, along with Russia and Serbia, not the UK! In fact the only thing the UK was really guilty of is not clearly declaring their will to defend the nuetrality of Belgium – there is a well known school of thought that had the Germans realised that Britain really was perpared to go to war to defend Belgium, they would have shown more restraint before declaring war, or the very least chosen another route into France.
Shit mate, if you want as history lesson regarding WW1, I’d be happy to help you – but please no revisionism – lets just stick to the facts, no revisionist, “Blame the white angle saxons for the world’s problem’s” nonsense.
Embrace the Germans! You’ve got to be kidding right? I didn’t realise the best way to reward a tantrum was to offer a cuddle.
Let’s also bare in mind here that the League of Nations was a complete and utter failure:
No shit sherlock. Now why was it a failure? Could it possibly be because of their failure to enforce the Treay of Versailes on Germany? Once it was shown that nothing would pull Germany into line, the league was doomed. Nothing like a stern letter to help get the boiler started.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 5:16 pm
Fale, I agree with you. Polititians of that era were weak. The Austria-Serbia stouch should only have been a localised conflict. The Russians, Germans, British and French should have sought a diplomatic solution, but could not as they were inept. As it transpired, Germany’s desire to march through Belgium, to invade France (who were allied to the Russians, who were in turn coming to the aid of Serbia who were under attck from Austria who were supported by the Germans after Russia got involved) that led to the dusting off of an ancient treaty which saw Britain become involved. It all seems very silly in hindsight and very preventable if only for some half competent politicians.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 5:21 pm
It took 92 years to pay off what in effect were bad government decisions and incompetence. It makes you think how long it will take for New Zealand to pay off bad government decisions and incompetence. A few decisions come to mind like Kiwirail, Think Big, WFF rorts, Interest Free Government Student Loans. How many generations will have to be enslaved to pay of these programmes?
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 7:05 pm
Best explanation for the cause of WW1 ever!
Baldrick: The thing is: The way I see it, these days there’s a war on, right? and, ages ago, there wasn’t a war on, right? So, there must have been a moment when there not being a war on went away, right? and there being a war on came along. So, what I want to know is: How did we get from the one case of affairs to the other case of affairs?
Edmund: Do you mean “Why did the war start?”
Baldrick: Yeah.
George: The war started because of the vile Hun and his villainous empire-building.
Edmund: George, the British Empire at present covers a quarter of the globe, while the German Empire consists of a small sausage factory in Tanganyika. I hardly think that we can be entirely absolved of blame on the imperialistic front.
George: Oh, no, sir, absolutely not. [aside, to Baldick] Mad as a bicycle!
Baldrick: I heard that it started when a bloke called Archie Duke shot an ostrich ’cause he was hungry.
Edmund: I think you mean it started when the Archduke of Austro-Hungary got shot.
Baldrick: Nah, there was definitely an ostrich involved, sir.
Edmund: Well, possibly. But the real reason for the whole thing was that it was too much effort not to have a war.
George: By Golly, this is interesting; I always loved history…
Edmund: You see, Baldrick, in order to prevent war in Europe, two superblocs developed: us, the French and the Russians on one side, and the Germans and Austro-Hungary on the other. The idea was to have two vast opposing armies, each acting as the other’s deterrent. That way there could never be a war.
Baldrick: But this is a sort of a war, isn’t it, sir?
Edmund: Yes, that’s right. You see, there was a tiny flaw in the plan.
George: What was that, sir?
Edmund: It was bollocks.
Baldrick: So the poor old ostrich died for nothing.
http://www.johndclare.net/causes_WWI1_Blackadderversion.htm
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 8:53 pm
The treaty of Versailles was an atrocity – the way the French handled it makes me feel France got what it deserved when Germany invaded France over 20 years later.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 9:06 pm
Bevan, you’re being simplistic. Europe had been at war on and off for centuries. Germany as a concept had only recently existed – many of the countries weren’t as we see them now. Yes, the Germans “started” the war. But at that time, in that place, it wasn’t really that uncommon. Yes, they “lost” the war. And the French wanted reparations, so they got them.
But it’s all more complex than that. It’s like attempting to have a sensible conversation about what’s going on in the middle east. The Arabs attacked the Israelis. No, before that, the Israelis dispossessed the Palistinians (who didn’t even exist as a country at the time). No, before that the Germans killed the Jews. No, before that, the Israelis were expelled from the middle east. No, before that the Jews killed Jesus.
The reality is that those making the most noise are as mad as hatters, and more often than not they’re in charge. And there is no simplistic blame, and no simplistic answer, because there’s just too damn much history.
Last time we were in Europe, we went through Dresden. Place was all bombed in the war, quite amazing. We also went to Krakow, looked at a church that had been severely damaged in the war. Of course, that particular war was some time in the 1800s, where our immediate assumption was WW2, or maybe WW1. Those of us in this part of the world forget that wars, razings, territorial disputes, been going on forever in Europe.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 9:12 pm
That about sums it up. Along with Bismarcks aggression/non-agression pacts, the Kaisers fantasies of Empire, finally setting the stage up nicely for WWI.
It must be said, the frogs have always been proper cocks though…
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 9:26 pm
PaulL,
I agree. For some 400 years there had been major imperial expansion – a huge European race to claim the wider world’s riches. For most of that time, and certainly the 19th century, war was the ‘grown ups’ equivalent of “tag, you’re it” – only played with muskets and canons.
The “tag” part was played out amidst the armament cycles – i.e. different nations would be better prepared to wage war at different times during the century. Bismarck had already shown that the mighty Prussians could crush the French in 6 weeks and that it took at least that length of time for the creaky and geographically dispersed Russian war machine to mobilise its forces.
[In a very real sense WWI was very simple - The Germans knew they could crush France and Russia separately, they knew they were approaching a zenith position in terms of armament and preparation, and they (arrogantly) believed that they could do both consecutively - i.e 'give me 6 weeks to knock off France and I'll ship the men and weapons East to take care of the Russians too.'
The intended end result, of course, was not genuine Imperial conquest. Oh gosh no! Not of the continent - Back in the old (the 19th century) days, you smacked the other lot on the snout, knicked a bit of land, and then allowed the other imperial forces to regroup and rearm so you could play the game again in a few years time.
I guess what really went wrong in WWI is that the timing went all to hell and descended into a real hell from there; that might have been hinted at in the past - e.g. the Crimean War - but which had never really been experienced.
Once they experienced real hell - as opposed to the 19th century 'tag' games - they thought it best not to go back to that and, naively thought, the best way was to cripple the aggressor permanently [well for 25 years or so really]
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 9:29 pm
Grizz, couldn’t have said it better myself.
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 9:31 pm
Fale / Grizz,
Yep!!!
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 9:58 pm
The technological leap from cavalry charges, squared infantry formations, movement of war material by horse/foot, etc. to more mobile (rail, etc.) replenishment, REAL HEAVY artillery and nations being put on total (or approaching) war footings was also a significant factor from previous “skirmishes”
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 10:15 pm
Dazzaman,
Yeah. There seems to have been a great weapons & tactics technological leap from the turn of the 20th Century to WWI (even within WWI years) that doesn’t seem to have an equal type of match in the previous century.
Hindsight is a great thing, but there seems to be a real “they really didn’t see it coming, did they?” aspect to the actual warfare of WWI to the military & political upper echelon anticipation of warfare
Vote:September 30th, 2010 at 10:27 pm
Yep.
Over in six months?……I think not!
Fortunately we haven’t gone wholesale into battle with our great tech. leap….nukes & all you know.
Vote:October 1st, 2010 at 10:34 am
Poor Belgium always gets the short shrift in these things. We saw that in Band of Brothers.
Anyway, is Germany and Japan still paying reparations for WW2 or have their economic successes paid that bill.
Maybe we should start a war wif Oz, get our butts kicked and be given a brand new industrial economy.
Or is the industrial sector defunct. I read in the Waikato Times yesterday dairying is the only profitable business in the Waikato now. What about race horses?
Vote:October 1st, 2010 at 11:18 am
Maybe some of the smaller countries (like Belgium) only existed as buffer for the larger countries to get notice. So another way to look at it is that if Belgium didn’t always get short shrift, then Belgium wouldn’t have needed to exist – and would have been part of Germany or France.
wikiriwhis business: the industrial sector is subject to three problems – the tyranny of distance, economies of scale, and a shortage of cheap labour.
The tyranny of distance means that unless you’re making something very unique, your market is basically NZ. If you’re good at what you’re doing, you can dominate the NZ market, but if you have competition in NZ then the market gets split, if you have no competition in NZ you may get complacent. Making stuff in NZ and shipping to the world isn’t economic unless we have some genuine competitive advantage, because of the shipping costs. We have competitive advantage in agriculture, largely due to our climate (which cannot be copied), and partly due to our systems and political situation (which could be copied, but we hope won’t be).
The tyranny of scale means that NZ isn’t a big enough market in most sectors to get an economy of scale. So even though they have to ship all the way here, something made in the US could still be cheaper and better than something made here. Arguably we could do something really well and get economy of scale here, allowing us to ship to the US or elsewhere and still be competitive. The problem is that if someone in the US just copies whatever we’re doing well, they’re immediately cheaper in the US than us, even if they don’t copy particularly well.
Finally, the lack of cheap labour means that anything that is labour intensive, or that can be labour intensive, can be made in China or India cheaper. I remember one of my friends telling me about stainless steel milk vats. They have domed tops on them, those domes are hard to make well. He worked on a process to form them elegantly using compressed air. Then he went to India to see how they did it there. They had a pit in the ground lined with sand, a circle of stainless steel and a bunch of guys with sledge hammers. The thing that really annoyed him was they didn’t even wear shoes – no safety standards. And he couldn’t compete.
We can faff around with industry and protectionism all we like, the reality is that most industrial things won’t work in NZ. Unless we can use technology and smarts in a way that means we can get economy of scale at a much smaller volume – which is possible in some sectors, but I don’t see many in NZ doing it. Or get good at making something that doesn’t have shipping costs – like software, or call centres.
In short, we should be very grateful for our agricultural advantages. Especially in the Waikato.
Vote: