Question 1
Evaluate the interpretations in both of the two passages and explain which you think is more
convincing as an explanation of the reasons for the development of the policy of Weltpolitik.
Passage A
The emergence of this government team in 1897 has led many historians to view it as an important turning-point in German history for it coincided with the drive to achieve world-power status for Germany by espousing Weltpolitik. How and why did Weltpolitik emerge as government policy? Certainly, the Kaiser himself believed in Germany’s destiny to become a world power and in the government team assembled in 1897 he had a number of like-minded ministers. However, there were also powerful forces at work in Germany at large which contributed to the new policy. Industrialisation had created economic demands for the acquisition of raw materials and markets beyond Europe. The ideology of German nationalism was also being perceived in a different way. The idealistic nationalism of unification was giving way to the ideas of Social Darwinism and the unending struggle between nations. In this sense it was believed by some that the survival of Germany as a leading nation-state necessitated a more active world policy. Finally, economic changes and new intellectual currents also contributed to the emergence of new political forces. The 1890s not only witnessed the rise of the Social Democrats, but also populist right-wing movements, which reflected the radicalisation of the peasantry and the Mittlestand. These radical nationalists formed a series of pressure groups. Such groups were anti-socialist, racist, anti-Semitic, expansionist and inevitably strong supporters of any policy which advanced German power and influence. They therefore performed a two-fold purpose: on the one hand they popularised the message of Weltpolitik and generated a degree of mass support for the policy, and on the other they exerted political pressure on the imperial government to pursue the policy to the full.
Adapted from G. Layton, Bismarck to Hitler: Germany 1890–1933, published in 1995.
Passage B
Contemplating the self-restraint of the Bismarckian and Caprivi eras with a mixture of pity and contempt, and partly animated by concern that the British might go over to protectionism and close off her markets, a younger generation of Germans unleashed on all parts of the globe a hectic flurry of activity known as ‘world policy’, seeking to gain spheres of influence in China, South America, in Turkey especially, and, above all, additional colonies. What this amounted to in the consciousness of the nation, among the so-called liberal imperialists in particular, was a redivision of the globe that would more accurately reflect prevailing power relations. In practice, this could only be attained by means of war.
In reality, there did indeed exist at the summit of the Reich a degree of collaboration between political and military leaders, embracing propagandist and psychological as well as financial and economic preparations for war. A clear decision was made to secure and extend its European base. And this decision was taken not from purely a military standpoint to secure a Great Power’s freedom of action; it was made from a long-term power-political, economic and domestic political perspective. The German military leaders’ confidence in victory was based on the Moltke-Schlieffen doctrine of the short-war, in accordance with the tradition of the wars of 1864, 1866 and 1870.
Adapted from F. Fischer, From Kaiserreich to Third Reich, published in 1986.
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Answer
