World War I The War Ends Summary & Analysis

The Collapse of Germany

In the early days of November 1918, the situation in Germany deteriorated from unstable to outright chaotic. Prince Max von Baden proved ineffective at negotiating favorable terms for a German armistice, and unrest within the military grew, especially in the navy, where mutinies were becoming widespread. Kaiser Wilhelm II, who by this point was in hiding in the Belgian resort town of Spa, found himself under rapidly increasing pressure to abdicate, which he stubbornly refused to do.

On November 7, Prince Max dispatched a group of German delegates by train to the secluded location of Compiègne, France, to negotiate an armistice. The delegation arrived on the morning of November 9, and negotiation promptly began. That same day, the prince announced Wilhelm II’s abdication of the German throne—without the now-delusional kaiser’s agreement. Prince Max himself then resigned, and separate left-wing political groups proclaimed the establishment of a German Soviet Republic and a German Socialist Republic, though neither would actually come to be.

The Armistice

Finally, on November 11, at 5:10 AM, the armistice with Germany was signed. Hostilities officially ended at 11:00 AM that day. Thus, World War I is said to have ended on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918. It would be more than seven months, however, before formal peace treaties would finalize the arrangements among all the various warring nations.

The Treaty of Versailles

Just as it had begun, World War I ended with complicated diplomatic negotiations. It took many months, but the treaty defining Germany’s present and future existence was signed at Versailles on June 28, 1919.

For Germany, it was a day of complete humiliation. The country was required to accept losses of territory, including Alsace-Lorraine and much of present-day Poland. Germany would retain the border region of the Rhineland but was strictly forbidden to develop the area militarily. Germany also had to agree to pay massive war reparations that would require half a century to fulfill. Finally, Germany was forced to publicly acknowledge and accept full responsibility for the entire war. This stipulation was a hard pill for many Germans to swallow, and indeed it was a blatant untruth.

The Legacy of the War

World War I began with a cold-blooded murder, diplomatic intrigue, and overconfident guesses about what the other side would do. Contemporary accounts report that there was even a sense of excitement and adventure in the air, as some seemed to envision the war more as a chance to try out the newest technological innovations than anything else. Five tragic years later, the reality of the war was unfathomably different: tens of millions dead, entire countries in ruins, and economies in shambles. Millions of soldiers had been drawn into the war, many from faraway colonies and many with little more than an inkling of what it was they were fighting for.

The Treaty of Versailles, rather than fix these problems, imposed bewilderingly harsh terms upon Germany, forcing that nation to accept full financial and diplomatic responsibility for the entire war. In the peace treaties ending most previous European wars, each side had accepted its losses, claimed its spoils, shaken hands, and then moved on. After World War I, however, the German people were humiliated, impoverished, and left with nothing to hope for but more of the same. Internally, Germany became a tumultuous place, teetering on the brink of violent revolutions from both the right and the left and vulnerable to takeover from extremist elements like the Nazi Party. Indeed, just a few decades would prove that the Allies had gone overboard with the punishments they inflicted on Germany—a misjudgment that created precisely the conditions required to launch Europe into the center of an even more horrible war.