Fernanda Corzo

30-Mar-2011

World History

Interwar Years Essays

After World War I, the years 1919-1938 were not the happiest ones for either Germany, France, Britain, the US, and China/Japan. The war left these countries extremely weak, both economically and physically. For example, in France there was an increasing death rate, and a decreasing birth rate, causing the lack of work. In the UK, there were about 3 million people without jobs, in France also millions were unemployed, and in the US people were also unemployed. Those who were lucky worked in farm or work camps for minimum wages, and last, Italy was also unhappy economically.

Though, the worse was Germany, because they were the ones being blamed for the whole war. The countries were mad that thanks to Germany their whole perfect economy went down. France is the perfect example. They were completely powerful before the war with no complications, yet after the war it was completely different story. France had lost millions of men and along with them their economy. The franc had lost about 50% of its value. They were forced to ask for money to various countries but did nothing to try and pay it back. So they simple decided to point all fingers to Germany, under Raymond Poincare. Germany would not be whiling to blindly pay for something they were not entirely responsible for. So, France’s impatience forced them to invade Germany in order to have the money paid. It was useless; France made no impact and continued to lose more money. Until 1928 when Poincare made the wise move to devaluate the franc, which paid their debts off perfectly.

The UK as well was left with no government business, as was the US, Japan, and Italy. Japan was not so far off, their economy also dropped massively. There was even rioting involved. Many jobs that people would have completely vanished thanks to the lack of economy. Nobody could support those jobs anymore. Next, Italy was starting to use more materials than what they had, spending more money than what they had, which was deficit spending. Theses economic problems made Italy want to also follow a Fascist government, as Germany would also later want. Therefore, Italy was going to be dictated by Benito Mussolini. Who would be later known as, “His Excellency Benito Mussolini, Head of Government, Duce of Fascism, and Founder of the Empire”. Along with his “black shirts” (group of Fascist people), he remained in power. He even made a pact of Steel with Hitler, but Hitler was more concerned with his progress than Mussolini’s, so he was pretty much left in the dark. Ultimately, with this dictator, Italy got nowhere, because Mussolini was not in the slightest bit concerned about solving Italy’s problems. He was only planning on how to attack his opponents.

On the other hand, Germany was on the way to recovering, but there was still unemployment; so people were starting to want to follow fascism. Since they saw it as the only way out. President von Hindenburg was in power as a monarch, but Adolf Hitler brought him down exceptionally quickly. Adolf Hitler was an arising power that was not at all happy with Germany’s defeat in World War I, blaming it all on Jews and Socialists, as well as his anger toward the loss of German territory in the Treaty of Versailles. He later broke that treaty by starting to create a massive military force. He started gaining power with his Nazi soldiers to whom he brainwashed with propaganda since they were young. Hitler would arrange youth camps to teach children his “ways”. He would be spreading ideas of Anti-Semitism, which was the grudge against Jews, Rabbis, Priests, or any impure race like handicapped, homosexuals, and gypsies. He wanted a mass organization that would be perfect with no impurities, and also take over Europe. In 1939, concentration camps and ghettos where constructed. Then the war began with the invasion of Poland.

Ultimately, this interwar period was a buildup of grudges and he changes. Some were victorious in the war, but not victorious economically. Others held grudges against countries, others were simply looking for ways out of that misery, and other simply sought for ultimate power of Europe. All of these reasons, equally important, are what made World War II break out and never be forgotten.