Berlin behind Sarajevo? A strange claim...

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ljadw
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Re: Berlin behind Sarajevo? A strange claim...

#616

Post by ljadw » 14 Oct 2016, 07:30

Slobodan Cekic wrote:I have got a question, if someone knows, btw. How well could the both sides obtain the financing in the foreign sovereign debt markets? Especially the Germans, i would expect them to have had more financial problems supporting the war, than they actrually had; could they obtain enough foreign credits, would someone know? This is not the direct thread subject, of course.

On German side the war was mostly financed by loans .

In billions of RM

1914 : 4.5

1915 : 9.1

: 12.1

1916 : 10.7

: 10.7

1917 : 13.1

:12.6

1918 :15.

:10.4


Total : 9 loans and 98.2 billion of RM

Source : Deutsche kriegsanleihe im ersten weltkrieg

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Re: Berlin behind Sarajevo? A strange claim...

#617

Post by Slobodan Cekic » 14 Oct 2016, 10:13

ljadw wrote:
Slobodan Cekic wrote:I have got a question, if someone knows, btw. How well could the both sides obtain the financing in the foreign sovereign debt markets? Especially the Germans, i would expect them to have had more financial problems supporting the war, than they actrually had; could they obtain enough foreign credits, would someone know? This is not the direct thread subject, of course.

On German side the war was mostly financed by loans .

In billions of RM

1914 : 4.5

1915 : 9.1

: 12.1

1916 : 10.7

: 10.7

1917 : 13.1

:12.6

1918 :15.

:10.4


Total : 9 loans and 98.2 billion of RM

Source : Deutsche kriegsanleihe im ersten weltkrieg
Thank you; that means, loans from it's own population, I suppose. Could they, and how much could they borrow from the foreign banks, directly or chanelled in some way over the German banks, would you know, or point to a source, please?


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Terry Duncan
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Re: Berlin behind Sarajevo? A strange claim...

#618

Post by Terry Duncan » 14 Oct 2016, 12:17

Slobodan Cekic wrote:Thank you; that means, loans from it's own population, I suppose. Could they, and how much could they borrow from the foreign banks, directly or chanelled in some way over the German banks, would you know, or point to a source, please?
Certainly there was a lot of bond selling in all nations during the war, Germany was no exception, many investing their entire life savings only to lose everything when the war was lost - the world chess champion Emanuel Lasker was one notable casualty of this.

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Re: Berlin behind Sarajevo? A strange claim...

#619

Post by ljadw » 14 Oct 2016, 13:20

Between 1914 and 1917 the US money markets lent over 2 billion $ to the Entente and only between 25 and 37 million to the Central Powers . (Source :War Finance Germany by Stephen Gross ,available on the net ).The Entente had free access to foreign money markets, Germany not .

Other source, but only available on Amazon is : Die Finanzpolitik des Deutschen Reiches im Ersten Weltkrieg by Konrad Roesler .

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Re: Berlin behind Sarajevo? A strange claim...

#620

Post by Slobodan Cekic » 14 Oct 2016, 17:56

ljadw wrote:Between 1914 and 1917 the US money markets lent over 2 billion $ to the Entente and only between 25 and 37 million to the Central Powers . (Source :War Finance Germany by Stephen Gross ,available on the net ).The Entente had free access to foreign money markets, Germany not .

Other source, but only available on Amazon is : Die Finanzpolitik des Deutschen Reiches im Ersten Weltkrieg by Konrad Roesler .
Yes, I found that data yesterday, and exactly this made me ask the question, because I found this as well
War Finance and Monetary Consequences: The German Case Revisited, Gerd Hardach:

(from http://encyclopedia.1914-1918-online.ne ... _revisited)

"The foreign exchange market was controlled. To finance the growing trade deficit, the government, the Reichsbank and private business tried to obtain credits in neutral countries, and to sell securities in Marks or foreign currency. Private gold exports were prohibited in November 1915, and gold transfers were monopolized by the central bank.[83] For two years Germany was surprisingly successful in attracting capital imports. When the Reichsbank negotiated loans in neutral countries, pre-war bonds of the central government and the states were accepted as security.[84] Apparently the monetary propaganda, with the central bank’s gold reserve as the main argument, impressed foreign investors.

When the war lasted longer, the foreign exchange situation deteriorated.[85] In August 1916 the central bank informed the government that the financing of imports became more difficult than before. Import prices went up due to the depreciation of the mark; the sale of securities in neutral countries declined; and foreign exchange earnings from exports dwindled. Imports would have to be strictly limited.[86] A month later the central bank repeated its warning. The lack of foreign exchange necessitated a serious reduction of imports. Exports should be increased to earn more foreign exchange; but this would conflict with the demand of the military.[87]

...

In a meeting of government officials and central bank officials in June 1917 Germany’s foreign trade situation was described as extremely serious, heading towards disaster. The Reichsbank saw no solution for the crisis. It offered Marks in neutral countries, though this accelerated the depreciation of the currency, and it sold a considerable amount of its cherished gold reserve to finance imports.[91] In addition to the blockade, financial constraints contributed to the decline of Germany’s imports.

...

On balance the German economy drew more heavily on foreign resources during the war than at any previous time. German imports from August 1914 to December 1918 amounted to 32 billion Marks; exports were only 17 billion Marks.[95] In addition to its own trade deficit of 15 billion Marks Germany financed import surpluses of its allies of 5 billion Marks. The total deficit of 20 billion Marks was financed by gold transfers, sales of securities on neutral markets and credits in Marks or foreign currencies.[96] The official dollar exchange in rate Berlin was 143 percent of the pre-war gold standard parity.[97]"


From this it seems Germany had not much of a problem financing the growing trade deficit with foreign credit until mid 1916. From that point on, things have seemingly begun to complicate themselves. Germany had a total deficit of 20 billion Marks by the war's end, and as it had to be financed somehow, much foreign borrowing is to be supposed. That is why these 37$ million from the US seem somehow too small a number. I think the public opinion or the regulations in the US could hardly have been against credits to Germany in the first part of the war, am I wrong there?

Once more, please excuse the digression.
Last edited by Slobodan Cekic on 15 Oct 2016, 13:03, edited 1 time in total.

glenn239
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Re: Berlin behind Sarajevo? A strange claim...

#621

Post by glenn239 » 14 Oct 2016, 19:27

ljadw wrote:This is not so : A Russian attack on the Ottoman Empire would have resulted in war with Britain : a new Crimea war .

And there is no proof that the Ottoman Empire would have joined the Central Powers if there was no war in 1914 .
Britain agreed to Russian annexations in 1915 so her policy towards the Ottoman Empire was set by 1914 - as subordinate to the Ententes.

There is no proof the Ottoman Empire would have allied with Germany without the war, but the evidence for it is compelling.

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Re: Berlin behind Sarajevo? A strange claim...

#622

Post by glenn239 » 14 Oct 2016, 19:35

Terry Duncan wrote: An objection you have never raised even once when it was 'the Entente/Grey/Russia did it' over several threads, so it is strange you object here where speculation is doing no more than pointing out many possible links rather than just 'I dont like Grey so he masterminded the entire Crisis' based theories.
I've never stated Russia or Britain caused Sarajevo - there's no evidence for either. All we can say for certain is a Russian connection seems likelier than any other, if having to choose. On this thread it was only because this nonsensical 'Germany did it' theory was droning on and on without end that I bothered chiming in.
My point is that the Entente were almost never going to get all three involved to attack the Central Powers as it would be totally against British policy for one, and neither Britain or France wanted to see Russia occupy parts of Germany!
As the Ottoman Empire drifted into alliance with Germany a collision seems increasingly likely.
Grey did not make any 'underhanded' decision to hold naval talks, it was the Russians that were asking for them, and I cannot recall the Germans ever inviting Britain to military discussions between Austria and Gemany, so this nonsense based around some sort of 'Britain shouldnt talk to Russia' without German permission is really going nowhere. Secret talks, requested by Sazonov, were hardly designed to be enflamatory as nobody was supposed to know about them in the first place. There is also the facts seldom mentioned here that they were two part talks, the second part of which were not due to take place until mid August 1914, not to forget that the RN thought the Russians delusional because the Pommeranian plan was plainly impossible even if the shipping for so many troops had been available - remember it was larger than D-Day in intended scale, with 400,000 troops being the initial intention.
Grey was either incompetent or underhanded in his timing, as the political danger to an Anglo-Russian naval accord was great while the military requirement for it did not exist.
Things changed for the German perspective because the Germans couldnt believe other nations would not attack them as soon as a situation arose they themselves thought suitable. It was the same with the 'we have information that the French plan to invade Belgium' nonsense they tried, where all they actually had was their own military planning department saying 'we we would do it if we were France'. This is why the saying that German dimplomacy was 'childlike' has a lot of truth to it, their reasoning was based entirely on others acting as they would, not on how the others may view things, let alone actually did.
The danger Germany posed to France is understood as a matter of course. Where we seem to be having difficulty is in your inability to admit that France posed an aggressive danger to Germany as well.

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Re: Berlin behind Sarajevo? A strange claim...

#623

Post by glenn239 » 14 Oct 2016, 19:44

Slobodan Cekic wrote:

I tend to agree with most. There is a pont or two where I am not that sure. As the Septemberprogramm has put it, the territories in the west of Russian Empire, much larger than Germany itself, should have been ripped out 'for all imaginable time'.

Actually, Germans had been able to realize the most of these aims at Brest-Litovsk. This was due, among other things, to their role in igniting and financing of the Bolshevik revollution. If they ever thought about the bad consequences for themselves, of destroying the tzarism in Russia, that did not prevent them from doing it.
No Russian government, except the German client bolsheviks possibly, would ever give over these territories to Germany without war, so them expecting a peace with Russians without further war would' we meant no Poland, Ukraine, Baltic, Byelorussia, etc ' for all imaginable time'. And I do think, these territories an important German war goal.
The Central Powers were willing to make a separate peace with Russia in the first years of the war, but the Tzar preferred to commit suicide in an all-or-nothing gamble. He ignored all opportunities and elected a war to the death. And got what he wanted. The Germans then repeated the same thing with the allies and got the same result. Curiously, like the Russians with their partners in 1915-1916, as I look at it again closely, it was the Austrians that might have had the opportunity to split away from Germany and make a separate peace, had their timing been just right.

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Re: Berlin behind Sarajevo? A strange claim...

#624

Post by Terry Duncan » 14 Oct 2016, 19:51

glenn239 wrote:Britain agreed to Russian annexations in 1915 so her policy towards the Ottoman Empire was set by 1914 - as subordinate to the Ententes.
If the Ottomans had not joined Britains enemies by that point you may have had an argument, but everything available suggests Britain would not have allowed Russia to move on a neutral Ottoman state as it was a very useful buffer.
glenn239 wrote:There is no proof the Ottoman Empire would have allied with Germany without the war, but the evidence for it is compelling.
They had pretty much all but signed the agreement iirc at the moment the war broke out, I would say it would only have remained secret if there had been no war, like the Romanian alliance was. Ottoman policy was always going to run against the majority of the Balkan states, so when Austria wanted to pick off one annoying neighbour, it would aid the Ottomans by default, and as Russia tended to support the Balkan states, it was further natural the Ottomans would look to her enemies as friends.

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Re: Berlin behind Sarajevo? A strange claim...

#625

Post by Terry Duncan » 14 Oct 2016, 20:10

glenn239 wrote:Grey was either incompetent or underhanded in his timing, as the political danger to an Anglo-Russian naval accord was great while the military requirement for it did not exist.
From memory the pressure for the talks came from the French, who pointed out that the Russians felt they were treated as lesser partners than the French, as the French had a naval agreement whilst the Russians did not. The talks were scheduled long before any assassination, and there was really little serious thought given to them by the RN, other than that the government may agree to something that the RN had not the slightest intention of doing. The RN had no intention of making any agreement, the government were not inclined to do much in the way of overruling them when it came to where it was impractical to deploy a fleet too, so these secret talks posed no real threat to Germany at all. I am not sure how you feel there was a 'political danger' as Britain and Russia already had an Entente, so could reasonably be expected to co-operate in times of war, even if it were not possible for the two fleets to physically work together.
glenn239 wrote:The danger Germany posed to France is understood as a matter of course. Where we seem to be having difficulty is in your inability to admit that France posed an aggressive danger to Germany as well.
I dont see France attacking Germany alone at all, so the only aggressive danger she posed to Germany was as part of an alliance. If Germany did not get into a fight with Russia, then it is most likely France would have done nothing, just as she had done since 1871.

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Re: Berlin behind Sarajevo? A strange claim...

#626

Post by ljadw » 14 Oct 2016, 20:28

After the elections in France in the summer of 1914, France had ceased to be a potential threat for Germany (I doubt she ever was one ) :the left-wing, anti-army and anti-Russia parties had won : Jaurès dictated de facto French domestic and foreign policy, and Jaurès was pro Germany and anti Russia .

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Re: Berlin behind Sarajevo? A strange claim...

#627

Post by Slobodan Cekic » 14 Oct 2016, 21:35

Soon after their Marne failure Germans have began probing around for a separate peace and in all directions. It was clear to them, that in spite of their advantages in the quality of the army, in spite of the trench warfare being the great leveller of all odds, the numbers are going to speak evermore for the Entente, as well as their their growing war experience. That was the reason to try splitting the Entente with the separate peace offers.

Such German offers have not had much chance for the same reason German tries of keeping Britain out of the war could not succeed. It has been very clear to the British what the German war aims have been - a complete German domination over the Continent. If the British government ever beleived, Germans want to punish the Sarajevo assassins only, and nothing more, British would have never entered the war. But they knew what German leadership wanted and they knew very well, that if they let France fall, they would simply be the next in the row.

For the very same reason, knowing that if they let their allies down, the Germans would finish them off and then turn back, the Russians and other Entente members have not accepted the separate peace offers even inthe dark hours of 1916, when the Entente victory was nowhere to be seen, and when such proposals must have been rather tantalising to any of the the war wretched countries.

Regarding the CPs, that is what one gets for beeing generally seen as an arrogant and insatiable bully. For the reason of his being that exactly.

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Re: Berlin behind Sarajevo? A strange claim...

#628

Post by Attrition » 15 Oct 2016, 00:34

I don't agree, I think that the 1914 campaign gave the Germans everything they could reasonably expect, a defensible frontier in the west, enclosing the economic and demographic resources of Belgium and northern France, a French army severely depleted of pre-war regulars and reservists and a British army on its knees. In the east the Austro-Hungarians kept the Russians busy, albeit in the wrong direction and the German army in East Prussia pulled off a spectacular (although not as tacular as propaganda made out). In 1915 the Germans added the finishing touches. Sorted.

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Re: Berlin behind Sarajevo? A strange claim...

#629

Post by Slobodan Cekic » 15 Oct 2016, 02:43

Attrition wrote:I don't agree, I think that the 1914 campaign gave the Germans everything they could reasonably expect, a defensible frontier in the west, enclosing the economic and demographic resources of Belgium and northern France, a French army severely depleted of pre-war regulars and reservists and a British army on its knees. In the east the Austro-Hungarians kept the Russians busy, albeit in the wrong direction and the German army in East Prussia pulled off a spectacular (although not as tacular as propaganda made out). In 1915 the Germans added the finishing touches. Sorted.
What about unreasonable expectations? One of them - the countries with much more population and BDP should accept the status of 1915 ?

German army stayed dangerous to the very end in 1918, but nonetheless, this very end came as Germany had no more materiel and troops to hold all the fronts from unravelling. In a long war the opponent with more men and materiel wins almost always; the militarily better prepared opponent with smaller resources must win fast, or he is in trouble.

That Germans caused so much trouble themselves before being finally beaten, is in my opinion a great tribute for their millitary handwork.

Moltke's tears in mid-September 1914 after the Marne tell us about his state of mind then, as well, but as he said -'Your Majesty, we have lost the war' - he has been reasoning in the terms of grand strategy.

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Re: Berlin behind Sarajevo? A strange claim...

#630

Post by Attrition » 15 Oct 2016, 10:35

We know the Germans lost but they managed to split the entente in 1917, which was the strategy to compensate for material inferiority. The Germans miscalculated but short of not going to war at all, what they did was logical and the best course they could choose. The boss class left everyone else holding the bag in 1918 and ended the interregnum in 1930. could have been worse (for them).

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