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The Germans viewed WW1 as a chance to prove their power as one of the strongest militaries in the world and as a chance to re-establish their idea of the ideal German state and greatness of the First Reich.

Thesis

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Nationalism

Drang nach vorne: a push forward

Geist and macht: spirit and might

“state of surreal harmony, dionysian activity and apollonian

tranquility” - (Thomas Nevin, Ernst Junger and Germany)

Germans believed that ww1 was this time

Return to the former glory of germany

Seigfried slays the dragon

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German WW1 Propaganda

'Good books - good comrades. You too give often and of many kinds: may a good book always be at hand!'

The war is not bad

Find good comrades

Join the military

Propaganda

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German propaganda

Calling butchers and hunters
Telling them the military needs fur
Idea of the entire country mobilizing
National identity

Propaganda

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German Propaganda

'What England wants! Not only the belt of humiliation around your loins, no, to send you weighed down into the abyss! Are you tapping, Michel, blindly towards your calamity, towards the curses of your heirs? Hold out and triumph! Even if it’s the last loaf! England down or disaster!'

Calling the people to revolt against england

Propaganda

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Effects on the German people at the start of the war

the condition of war had brought about a condition of peace/ of overcoming
conflicts and differences had been set aside
“the spirit amounted to a realization of sozialen volksstaat, the peoples state, in which political left and right, the worker and the bourgeois, cooperated voluntarily and productively” - (Thomas Nevin, Ernst Junger and Germany)
“Germans had finally achieved that unity, spiritual and physical which bismark has tried, but in the end failed, to bring about” - (Thomas Nevin, Ernst Junger and Germany)
all its citizens united under a sense of german nationalism
Victory had already been won by the very eruption,

the very enunciation, of the “ideas of August”

victory on the battlefield would be a mere formality

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Middle of the war

“Despite the initial confidence, the "inevitable" victory on the battlefield did not come. It did not come in 1914 nor in 1915. The rhapsodic mood of the first days and weeks of the war could not possibly be maintained. The danger existed that cleavages between a spiritual essence, attained in August, and a debilitating reality, represented by material concerns both at the front and at home, would return.” - (Thomas Nevin, Ernst Junger and Germany)

“by 1915 rifts had appeared on the home front as more and more members of the social democratic party began to raise questions about the war aims and polititcal reforms. the conduct of war-- the resort to gas and to unrestrict use of submarines -- introduced more problems” - (Thomas Nevin, Ernst Junger and Germany)

People began to doubt the effectiveness of the war
The military’s response to this was to increase the effort.

Trench warfare

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Argonnerwald, at midnight

Pioneer song from the World War, 1915

http://www.worldwar1.com/sfgp1.htm

And threatens the enemy even more,

We Germans no longer fear him.

And though he likes to be so strong,

In our position he is still coming in.

The storm is breaking! The mine crashes!

The pioneer makes straight forward.

He gets up to the enemy

And then fire the hand grenade.

Stormtrooper

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Ernst Junger

“Junger believed that both England and Germany had won the war because they read the war’s meaning aright; the losers were all those, regardless of nation or nationalism, unable to comprehend the language of might: might as individual courage might as revelation of horrendous laws.” - (Thomas Nevin, Ernst Junger and Germany)

humanity has prevailed over its tools but has been transformed radically by their use.

the best example of a modern german warrior

stated that Germany's defeat came from defects of leadership

the defeat must not be blamed on any part of the people

defeat could be as instructive as victory

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Losing the war

“Nietzche’s tirades against objectivity became increasingly popular after his death in 1900; and as we have seen, widely read cultural critics alike.”

The end of the war marked another blow to Germany's national identity

The treaty of versailles also oppressed germany even more

Caused more anger and hate from the german people

Junger blamed the loss on the leadership of the military

Newspaper

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conclusion

Because the germans did not achieve the inevitable victory they were promised they were restricted by both the treaty of versailles and by the doubt now placed in their leaders to prove their national identity; this anger and hate led to blaming their failure in WW1 on groups of their population and coincidentally to WW2.

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Works cited

“German War Poetry.” Trenches on the Web - Special: German War Poetry, www.worldwar1.com/sfgp1.htm.

“11 Incredible German First World War Posters.” Imperial War Museums, www.iwm.org.uk/history/11-incredible-german-first-world-war-posters.

Nevin, Thomas. Ernst Jünger and Germany: into the Abyss, 1914-1945. Constable, 1997.

“War God.” Rights of Spring. Eksteins, Modris. 1989.

“War God.”Rites of Spring. Modris Eksteins. 1989.