A potential German Rework #1: The Ludendorff Dictatorship & the end of the war (1917-1920)
Hi there, your favorite KR Wiki Editor is back! You may remember me from my first proposal about unrestricted submarine warfare back in May; now, I finally finished the second one as promised.
After spending almost 6 weeks on extensive research, I can finally proudly present you probably one of the most ambitious lore proposals this subreddit has ever seen. It includes 64 pages full of well-researched information that would make the German lore in KR more detailed than ever before & which is entirely compatible with a lot of the existing and future lore of other nations.
The proposal deals with the German lore between the years 1917 & 1920 and includes major changes to Hindenburg's and Ludendorff's shadow dictatorship, the German far-right, the 1918 September Insurrections & the end of war/early post-war events in Germany, but due to the chosen timeframe, it also covers radical, actually fact-based changes to the Weltkrieg, e.g. the German Spring Offensive & the Macedonian Front. Forget weird stuff like the 1918 Entente Offensive or Operation Teutoburg, wonky lore that has remained unchanged for years - everything was redone from scratch.
Here, I have to give special thanks to u/Tehrozer, whom you may know as the lead developer of the KR submod Eastern Europe Reworked. Tehrozer, the most knowledgeable person about WW1 history & KR lore alike I have ever met, helped a lot with the proposal in general, giving me lots of interesting impulses & the most valuable feedback I could ever imagine during the development process - but in regard to strategic changes to the Weltkrieg lore (for example the different offensives), he outdid himself once again, crafting potentially the most in-depth alternate history timeline to these offensives the world has ever seen by reading countless works on the topic. I know some of the devs do not have the best relations to him due to events of the past, but he always does excellent work & it would be unfair not to mention him here for his great deeds.
Due to the sheer length of the proposal (the timeline alone is 40 pages long) I decided to write you a tl;dr this time - but caution, this short summary cannot give you the full gist of all the different changes in this proposal. So please, don't form your opinion or complain on base of this small synopsis!
Here is the proposal:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1mo0Qn7exTUbNd_b5fPYIsEAuJMWQzago8I0ip74ktpo/edit?usp=sharing
And here the tl;dr:
TL;DR
In January 1917, unrestricted submarine warfare is never relaunched due to the reasons I explained in my first proposal. Instead, submarine warfare in accordance with the prize rules continues. Initially successful, it would lose its effect over time, only further strengthening the right-wing lobby which begins to push for USMW with increased vehemence over the course of the next months.
For the rest of 1917, Germany would continuously face Allied offensives & engage in more or less fruitless peace efforts initiated by Reichskanzler Bethmann, in office since 1909. However, even though Bethmann comes close to establishing peace with the Allies via the Pope & even sets up a reform proposal for the Prussian suffrage, he would be forced to resign after losing the confidence of the military and Reichstag alike - too hesitant for the reformers, too radical for the reactionaries. The two succeeding chancellors, Michaelis & Hertling, are more or less puppets of Ludendorff and the OHL.
However, 1917 would also see the strengthening of the parliamentary cause: In the Reichstag, a left-leaning majority of social democrats, progressives & catholics forms, exerting more influence on the government than ever before.
1918 would begin with peace in the east. Shortly after, the Germans launch their Great Spring Offensive, in an effort to end the war by the end of summer - as we all know, this does not happen. The Allies launch a semi-successful counter-offensive, being able to reconquer a few territories - but by September/October, both sides are exhausted and the people realize that there will be another war winter.
In Germany, the political far-right would capitalize upon this. One of the most influential ultranationalist organisations at the time is the German Fatherland Party (DVLP), founded in 1917 as a reaction to Germany's internal reform attempts & peace efforts - when it becomes clear that an end to the war is still not in sight, they would agitate against the government with pamphlets & in newspapers, demanding the immediate relaunch of unrestricted submarine warfare and claiming that it could end the war before the end of the year when introduced as fast as possible. The population, stirred up by that, heads to the streets & protests for peace and USMW.
However, the subsequent pacifist strikes would soon be supplanted by much more radical elements, like the Spartacist League. Over the course of late September, the protests would gradually intensify, eventually culminating into an outright rebellion, with local hotbeds sprinkled all over Northern Germany - after escalations in Bremen & Brunswick, the military steps in with extensive violence to put down the insurrection.
By early October, most of the unrest has been dealt with, but the mere fact that it came to such a revolution attempt has proved to the political right once and for all that the Hertling administration is weak & inept. The Fatherland Party would agitate against the government in their newspapers, soon winning the support of most of the population which is in favor of a quick end to the war. Backed by influential industrialists, rightist agitation organisations & in secret even Ludendorff and the OHL, the Kaiser is confronted with a petition to immediately fire Hertling & his government and replace them with an "administration of non-partisan experts" - which indirectly means a DVLP government. Under public pressure, the old and sick Hertling resigns on 4 October and is replaced with Johann Albrecht zu Mecklenburg (why him is explained in the proposal) and high-ranking DVLP functionaries like Tirpitz, Kapp & Hassell - it is the beginning of the Ludendorff-DVLP dictatorship.
In the Reichstag, the September Insurrections & the new government would lead to a split within the majority coalition: The Catholics end their cooperation with the left, fearing it could discredit their party's reputation, and instead a controversial coalition of national-liberals, conservatives & catholics is formed. This would lead to a split within the Catholic Zentrum Party after the end of the war.
The new authoritarian government would slowly begin to centralize the power within the Empire: The navy leadership is reformed, a propaganda ministry is established, reforms to the Prussian suffrage are introduced (with a twist) and social reforms are announced. More details about that in the proposal. But much more importantly, unrestricted submarine warfare is relaunched in November. I can already hear you screaming, but no worries, it is all explained and justified.
In March 1919, Ludendorff launches the "Great Offensive for the Fatherland", with the aim to take Paris as fast as possible. However, war-weariness has taken its toll on Allied and German soldiers alike, leading to no real progress apart from the capture of Compiegne. The Allies soon after launch a counter-offensive in April, which is only successful due to the employment of French tanks, which are superior to the German ones. Motivated by that success, the Allies go onto the offensive once again in May, hoping to push back the exhausted Germans, but to no avail as their own forces become soon plagued with mutinies.
When summer dawns, both sides are unable to stage a proper attack: Ludendorff has gone on the defensive, realizing that the time is now on Germany's side and that any unnecessary offensive could end in a disaster like in April and would just destabilize the otherwise stable and secure geostrategical situation of the Central Powers. The Allies, plagued by crippling mutinies in the north, decide to make on last sudden, unexpected attack at St. Mihiel near Verdun (as the Lorrainian Front, which has remained calm since 1916, is the only front without major mutinies), catching the Germans off-guard & potentially pushing deep into Alsace-Lorraine, turning the tide of the war in the last moment - but this attack fails as well; after that, France is unable to continue the war and the Allies enter into reluctant peace negotiations. An armistice is signed in August, the different peace treaties are signed troughout autumn & winter.
Germany finally stands victorious - but internally, unrest is brewing. The DVLP government proclaims that the dictatorship has to be continued for the sake of national security, as enemies of the nation are lurking within the country and abroad. This move however is contested by the democratic parties in the Reichstag, who demand demobilization and a return back to normal.
In mid-February 1920, Reichskanzler zu Mecklenburg dies. The conservatives and the nationalist right call for the appointment of Vice Chancellor Wolfgang Kapp as his successor & the continuation of the non-partisan, authoritarian government, while liberal democratic reformers want to see Max von Baden in office, in hope of steering the country onto a reformist compromise path. In the end, after heated debates, the Kaiser chooses Baden - Ludendorff and the DVLP decide to take immediate action.
Less than 48 hours later, they would launch a coup in Berlin with the help of the Guards Corps elite forces, putting the Kaiser under house arrest & proclaiming Kapp as the rightful Reichskanzler. The exact procedure is described in-depth in the proposal. In the end, the coup fails just like the OTL Kapp Putsch: Ludendorff and Co. are arrested (but later pardoned), Baden's government returns to Berlin and soon introduces democratic reforms (though not as progressive as the OTL Weimar Republic of course), like a proper suffrage reform, constitutional amendments, changes to the administration of Alsace-Lorraine etc. Again, the details are in the proposal. Then, the first democratic elections since 1912 are held, with a social democratic-progressive-catholic government being elected and the Kaiser poclaiming his will to "build a Germany stronger than ever before on the pillars of parliamentarism and with the help of talented party politicians of all ideologies".
This left-leaning government however would eventually collapse after the next elections due to the general post-war troubles every nation is confronted with: A radical change in leadership is the result, leading Germany into a new golden era... but that will be the topic of a future proposal.