# The First World War and the Interwar Collapse

History II · Contemporary History · https://tryals.app/learn/history-ii/the-first-world-war-and-the-interwar-collapse

## Four Years, and Then Twenty More

The First World War killed around ten million soldiers. Modern technology made defence far cheaper than attack.

Key features of industrialised warfare:
- Entrenched fronts gained kilometres at vast human cost.
- **Verdun** lasted nearly all of 1916.
- The **Somme** cost Britain 57,470 casualties on its first day.

Societies sustained this through **total war**. States directed economies, introduced conscription, rationed food, and blurred the line between combatants and civilians.

Two political shifts decided the outcome:
- Russia's **February revolution** destroyed the monarchy, and the **October revolution** brought the Bolsheviks to power.
- Russia exited the war in 1918.
- The entry of the **United States** in 1917 guaranteed Allied victory.

The **Treaty of Versailles** settled the peace in 1919. It disarmed Germany and assigned war guilt. Reparations were fixed in **1921** at **132 billion gold marks** (132 billion). In practice, Germany only paid the A and B bonds worth **50 billion** (50 billion). The rest pleased voters in Britain and France. Keynes argued against the settlement in *The Economic Consequences of the Peace* (1919).

## The Interwar Collapse

European recovery after 1924 depended heavily on American loans. The **Wall Street Crash** of October **1929** ended this flow of capital.

In Germany, unemployment reached **six million** by early 1932. Countries tied to the gold standard suffered deep deflation.

Economic ruin destroyed the Weimar Republic:

| Reichstag election | NSDAP share of the vote |
|---|---|
| May 1928 | 2.6 per cent |
| September 1930 | 18.3 per cent |
| July 1932 | 37.3 per cent |
| November 1932 | 33.1 per cent |

The Nazi vote actually **fell** from 37.3 per cent in July 1932 to 33.1 per cent in November 1932. Hitler was not elected to lead Germany. Instead, Hitler was **appointed** chancellor in January 1933 by conservative elites. In March 1933, the Reichstag passed the Enabling Act.

> **Common pitfall:** claiming Hitler was elected. The NSDAP never won a majority. His vote fell in late 1932 before backroom deals installed him in January 1933.

## Practice questions

11 of this lesson's 15 practice questions, with answers. The full set is in the app.

### 1. Reparations were fixed in 1921 at 132 billion gold marks, but the schedule divided the total into A, B and C bonds and Germany was required to service only the first two. Why does that structure matter to the debate about Versailles?

A. It shows Britain and France always intended to cancel the full sum once payments began
B. It indicates the final schedule was purely advisory and never formally implemented in Europe
C. It proves German hyperinflation was caused entirely by an immediate demand to pay C bonds
D. The real burden was roughly 50 billion, so claims based on the total sum overstate it

**Answer:** D. The real burden was roughly 50 billion, so claims based on the total sum overstate it

**Why:** The C bonds let British and French governments show their electorates a punitive total while the real schedule was closer to 50 billion. Marks and others argue the effective burden was within Germany’s capacity and that non-payment was chosen rather than forced. The headline figure did enormous political work in Germany, which is a separate and also important fact.

Page: https://tryals.app/practice/history-ii/the-first-world-war-and-the-interwar-collapse/reparations-were-fixed-in-1921-at-132-billion-gold-marks-but-the

### 2. Arrange these events of the war and its aftermath, earliest first.

**Answer:**

1. The first day of the Somme offensive
2. The Bolsheviks take power in Petrograd
3. Brest-Litovsk takes Russia out of the war
4. The armistice ends the fighting
5. The Treaty of Versailles is signed
6. Reparations are fixed at 132 billion gold marks

**Why:** Note the two-year gap between the armistice and the reparations figure. The treaty of 1919 did not name a sum; it created a commission to name one, which it did in 1921. Arguments that treat Versailles as having imposed 132 billion in 1919 are compressing two separate decisions taken under different political conditions.

Page: https://tryals.app/practice/history-ii/the-first-world-war-and-the-interwar-collapse/arrange-these-events-of-the-war-and-its-aftermath-earliest-first

### 3. Which features made the First World War a "total war"?

A. State direction of industrial production and raw materials
B. Large-scale entry of women into industry and transport
C. Conscription, rationing and organised censorship and propaganda
D. A formal agreement among the belligerents to spare civilian populations

**Answer:** A. State direction of industrial production and raw materials; B. Large-scale entry of women into industry and transport; C. Conscription, rationing and organised censorship and propaganda

**Why:** Total war means the whole society is a war resource, which is why the category of the civilian erodes: if factories and food supply decide the outcome, they become targets, and the state acquires powers over labour, speech and consumption that it does not readily give back afterwards.

Page: https://tryals.app/practice/history-ii/the-first-world-war-and-the-interwar-collapse/which-features-made-the-first-world-war-a-total-war

### 4. The technology of 1914 to 1918 favoured the defence, which is the main reason the western front settled into stalemate.

**Answer:** True

**Why:** **True.** Defenders had prepared positions, wire, interlocking machine-gun fire and rail supply to their rear; attackers had to cross open ground and then reinforce across a destroyed landscape faster than the defender could reinforce by train. Breaking that asymmetry took four years of tactical and technical work.

Page: https://tryals.app/practice/history-ii/the-first-world-war-and-the-interwar-collapse/the-technology-of-1914-to-1918-favoured-the-defence-which-is-the

### 5. Total war blurred the line between combatants and civilians during the First World War. What followed from this shift for ordinary society?

A. Private industrial production ceased entirely across Europe
B. Civilian populations were fully exempted from rationing rules
C. Military commanders replaced all civilian political leaders
D. Home fronts became direct economic and strategic targets

**Answer:** D. Home fronts became direct economic and strategic targets

**Why:** Total war mobilised whole populations rather than abolishing civil authority or private industry. Treating the home front as part of the war effort ultimately exposed entire civilian societies to direct strategic disruption.

Page: https://tryals.app/practice/history-ii/the-first-world-war-and-the-interwar-collapse/total-war-blurred-the-line-between-combatants-and-civilians-during

### 6. Complete the account of the depression and the gold standard.

**Answer:** Recovery after 1924 rested on American **lending**, which stopped after the crash of 1929. German unemployment reached around **six** million by early 1932. Eichengreen showed that countries which abandoned the gold **standard** earlier recovered earlier, because the gold link forced **deflation** on economies that needed the opposite.

**Why:** The gold-standard argument is the strongest single explanation for the timing of recovery across countries, and it reframes the politics: governments were not merely choosing austerity out of conviction but were locked into it by a monetary commitment, and the countries that broke the commitment first came out first.

Page: https://tryals.app/practice/history-ii/the-first-world-war-and-the-interwar-collapse/complete-the-account-of-the-depression-and-the-gold-standard

### 7. In which year was the Treaty of Versailles signed?

**Answer:** 1919

**Why:** **1919**, on 28 June, five years to the day after the assassination at Sarajevo, a symmetry the organisers chose deliberately. The treaty did not name a reparations figure; it created the commission that produced one two years later, which is a distinction a great many arguments about Versailles ignore.

Page: https://tryals.app/practice/history-ii/the-first-world-war-and-the-interwar-collapse/in-which-year-was-the-treaty-of-versailles-signed

### 8. Arrange the steps by which the German republic was dismantled.

**Answer:**

1. Depression drives unemployment towards six million
2. The NSDAP vote rises steeply, peaking in July 1932
3. The party loses ground at the November 1932 election
4. Conservative politicians persuade Hindenburg to appoint Hitler chancellor
5. The Enabling Act allows the cabinet to legislate without the Reichstag

**Why:** Placing the setback before the appointment is what makes the sequence instructive. The republic did not fall to an unstoppable electoral tide; it was handed over by a small group of conservatives who thought a declining demagogue could be used, at a moment when waiting might have served them better.

Page: https://tryals.app/practice/history-ii/the-first-world-war-and-the-interwar-collapse/arrange-the-steps-by-which-the-german-republic-was-dismantled

### 9. Sort each statement by whether it belongs to the KEYNESIAN critique of the peace settlement or to the LATER REVISION of that critique.

**Answer:**

- Keynesian critique: The settlement imposed an economically ruinous burden, The treaty would destabilise the European economy as a whole
- Later revision: Germany’s real payment burden was within its capacity, Non-payment was in significant part a policy choice

**Why:** Keynes’s book was enormously influential and it made the treaty seem indefensible to a whole generation of British and American opinion, which mattered in the 1930s, when that opinion was reluctant to enforce anything. Whether he was right about the economics and whether his book had political consequences are two separate questions, and the answers differ.

Page: https://tryals.app/practice/history-ii/the-first-world-war-and-the-interwar-collapse/sort-each-statement-by-whether-it-belongs-to-the-keynesian-critique

### 10. German unemployment reached roughly six million in early 1932, and the NSDAP vote peaked that July before falling in November. What does that combination suggest about the relationship between depression and Nazi support?

A. Party support rose in lockstep with joblessness, securing an outright democratic majority.
B. Support peaked before mass joblessness, showing the depression undermined party momentum.
C. Crisis raised the party's ceiling, but power was achieved through elite political deals.
D. Joblessness had no impact on voting, with gains driven purely by diplomatic grievances.

**Answer:** C. Crisis raised the party's ceiling, but power was achieved through elite political deals.

**Why:** The depression is what took a fringe party from 2.6 per cent to over a third of the vote, so it is clearly central. But a third of the vote is not a majority, the share fell in November while unemployment stayed catastrophic, and power came through an appointment. Structural crisis set the conditions; identifiable people made the decision.

Page: https://tryals.app/practice/history-ii/the-first-world-war-and-the-interwar-collapse/german-unemployment-reached-roughly-six-million-in-early-1932-and

### 11. The influenza pandemic of 1918 to 1919 killed more people worldwide than the fighting of the First World War.

**Answer:** True

**Why:** **True.** Estimates for the pandemic run into the tens of millions worldwide, well above the war’s military and civilian deaths combined. The two are connected, mass troop movements, crowded camps and censorship of health reporting all helped it spread, but the pandemic is a distinct catastrophe and is routinely left out of accounts of the period.

Page: https://tryals.app/practice/history-ii/the-first-world-war-and-the-interwar-collapse/the-influenza-pandemic-of-1918-to-1919-killed-more-people-worldwide