General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1922 Original Publisher: The University Subjects: Germany History / Europe / Germany Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million books for free. Excerpt: The Internal Collapse As the powers of resistance and the morale of the German armies on the western front collapsed in the autumn of 1918 before the steady blows of the allied armies, so the internal front crumbled when the German nation gave up the unequal struggle after four years of false hopes, privations, and social, economic, and moral decay.49 This collapse was all the more dramatic since the nation had entered upon the war with universal enthusiasm because of its belief that it had been attacked. From the Socialists who voted the war credits, to the Pan-Germans who joyously shouted, Vae yictis, the entire nation had united about the person of the last emperor to conquer a place in the world which would be worthy of Germany’s imperial destiny. Notwithstanding the superiority of Germany’s war preparations over those of her enemies, innumerable mistakes were made at the outset. The one-sided adoption of the Schlieffen plan of crushing France while Russia was held off in the east proved a failure, not due to the fact that it was carried out by Epigoni, but to the lack of sufficient military strength and to the unparalleled resistance of the French.5?/Under the delusion that the war would be a short one, men and materiel were ruthlessly wasted during the first year in an attempt to reach a quick decision Neither Austria, Bulgaria, nor Turkey possessed that military preparation which had been indicated by German General Staff reports.51 As the war progressed the powers of the General Staff increased, while the impe…