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The net capital transfer into Germany amounted to 17.75 billion marks, or 2.1% of Germany's entire national income over the period 1919–1931. In effect, America paid Germany four times more, in price-adjusted terms, than the U.S. furnished to West Germany under the post-1948 Marshall Plan.
Most of Germany's reparations payments were funded by loans from American banks, and the recipients used them to pay off loans they had from the U.S. Treasury. Between 1919 and 1932, Germany paid out 19 billion goldmarks in reparations, and received 27 billion goldmarks in loans from New York bankers and others.
Of this figure, Germany was only required to pay 50 billion gold marks ($12.5 billion), a smaller amount than they had previously offered for terms of peace. [65] Reparations were unpopular and strained the German economy but they were payable and from 1919 to 1931, when reparations ended, Germany paid fewer than 21 billion gold marks. [66]
The German invasion of Belgium on 3 August led to a declaration of war by Britain on Germany on 4 August, creating the conflict that became the First World War. [4] Two alliances faced off, the Central Powers (led by Germany) and the Triple Entente (led by Britain, France and Russia).
The aftermath of Germany's loss in World War 1 saw the country experience severe hyperinflation, with the Weimar Republic finally tackling the issue by 1923. A period of known as the Golden Twenties then saw major economic stabilization and growth fuelled largely by foreign investments and loans. However, the Great Depression resulted in the ...
When Germany stopped making payments in 1932 after the agreement reached at the Lausanne Conference failed to be ratified, [12] Germany had paid only a part of the sum. This still left Germany with debts it had incurred in order to finance the reparations, and these were revised by the Agreement on German External Debts in 1953. After another ...
Thus, when Germany could no longer afford war reparations to Britain, France and other former members of the Entente, the Americans came up with the Dawes Plan and Wall Street invested heavily in Germany, which repaid its reparations to nations that, in turn, used the dollars to pay off their war debts to Washington.
This is a list of conflicts in Europe ordered chronologically, including wars between European states, civil wars within European states, wars between a European state and a non-European state that took place within Europe, militarized interstate disputes, and global conflicts in which Europe was a theatre of war.