By 1914, a web of hostile alliances entangled Germany and most of the other European nations. When war erupted between Austria and Serbia, Russia and France threatened to intervene. Germany’s Kaiser Wilhelm II declared war on the Russia and France, calling it an act of self-defense. World War I had broken out.
Kaiser Wilhelm largely ignored the Reichstag and directed the war along with his top generals headed by Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg. Germany had to fight on two main fronts—the eastern and western. In the east, the war went well. A new communist government in Russia sued for peace in 1917. In the west, the Germans advanced quickly, but were stopped about 60 miles from Paris. The western front turned into a stalemate, with neither side able to advance. In 1917, however, the United States entered the war against Germany.
Throughout the war, the kaiser and his generals had assured the German people of victory. In the fall of 1918, however, with defeat certain, the German generals suddenly called for an armistice, a ceasefire until the signing of a peace treaty. Most Germans were shocked. To divert blame from themselves, the generals claimed that the German army had been “stabbed in the back” by Reichstag politicians who had not adequately supported the war effort.
