Chapter 27: The European Search for Stability, 1920-1939
- The Eastern European Empires fell
- Finland gained independence from Russia
- Poland was rebuilt in order to weaken Germany and Russia
- Czechoslovakia was taken out of German and Austrian lands
- Yugoslavia encompassed most of the Balkan region
- After the war, the German civilian population, domestic infrastructure, and industrial power remained mostly intact
- Stayed the industrial power of Europe
- There was an increased sense that the Treaty of Versailles was unfair
- Treaty of Rapallo (1922)
- Tried to create economic cooperation between Germany and Russia
- Germany secretly started to rebuild its military to regain the Polish Corridor
- The World Economy collapsed
- War debt
- Bonds (inflation increased leading to loss of wealth and destruction of savings)
- Inter-government loans
- Increased printing of currency
- Slowed demand for goods
- Dawes Plan
- United States would provide Germany with loans and the allies would schedule payments over time
- U.S. protectionist policies stopped European access to large U.S. markets and stable currency
- European and U.S. trade declined as U.S. goods were too expensive
- U.S. and German financial institutions became tied together as trade declined
- Depression hit Germany due to the 1929 Stock Market crash
- Great Purge (1934-1938)
- Communism rose to popularity in the 1920s
- Fascism: nationalistic, anti-liberal, authoritarian regime which based its ideology in irrational rhetoric
- Corporate State: corporations sponsored by the state became the foundation for Italian Fascism
- 1939 Pact of Steel
- Bound Italian military to Germany
- Treaty of Versailles’ effects on Germany
- Democratic government (Weimar Republic) was implemented in Germany
- German sovereignty was limited
- Hitler
- Leader of the National Socialist Party (Nazis)
- Attempted to lead a revolt in 1923
- Hitler’s popularity grew as the rates of unemployment dropped
- The Popular Front (1936)
- Great Britain failed to deal with the depression
- Spain became a democratic republic in 1931
- Elected radical popular front in 1936
- Hitler declared the Treaty of Versailles as null-in-void
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