Major changes took place within Europe in the years following the end of the First World War (WWI). Once great and powerful empires were toppling from the great human and economic costs impressed upon them by the world’s first great war. Germany, deemed by world public opinion as the primary aggressor in the Great War, was on the verge of collapse due to the heavy costs from the all out war of attrition. America’s entrance into the war against Germany in March of 1917 and decisive Allied victories in late 1917 and early 1918 spelled the beginning of the end for Germany. German resources were exhausted from the great economic cost of war and its military was depleted from years of trench warfare. On November 9, 1918 Kaiser Wilhelm II, the leader of the German Empire, abdicated his throne and fled to Holland. (1)

A new republic was created in the wake of the Kaiser’s departure from Central Europe and German politics. The new German republic was created and named after the city of Weimar, where it’s constitution was drafted. The Weimar Republic took control of the affairs of Germany the same day Kaiser Wilhelm II abdicated his throne on November 9, 1918. This new government broke away from the monarchical Wilhelmine Empire and sought to create a new democratic German Republic in the midst of international turmoil and domestic infighting. (read full text…)