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Speaker 1: Welcome back to Behind the Bastards. I'm Robert Evans and

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Speaker 1: this is part two of our episode on Kaiservillehelm the

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Speaker 1: second um. Now, before we get into the episode, because

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Speaker 1: I think it's important that you know about the bastardry

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Speaker 1: being practiced by the hosts of the show, I need

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Speaker 1: to tell everyone that Jamie Loftus is dipping popcorn into

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Speaker 1: salad dressing. Okay, goddamn monster, I got fucking okay. First

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Speaker 1: of all, yes, that is an well. I got dragged

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Speaker 1: the last time I was on this show because I

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Speaker 1: mentioned that I dipped bagels and catch up and there

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Speaker 1: was all I said. That was fine. I'm okay with

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Speaker 1: the popcorn dipping into dressing. I think you have like

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Speaker 1: taste woods that need more I need I need. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: oh right, yeah I have. Um note, I have poor

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Speaker 1: people taste buds. I hope, I hope, very desperately Jamie,

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Speaker 1: that this makes you less judgmental of the Kaiser, because

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Speaker 1: I firmly believe that the millions he got killed in

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Speaker 1: the trenches of Europe and you dipping your popcorn into

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Speaker 1: salad dressing our equivalent crimes. They're okay, sir, I it's

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Speaker 1: this is your Battle of the palm. This is not ideal.

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Speaker 1: I would prefer to dip popcorn in soy sauce. There's

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Speaker 1: no soy sauce here. I go for salad dressing. Dipping

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Speaker 1: popcorn and soy sauce is your verdune. Here's the thing.

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Speaker 1: I like to make dry food wet. I can't explain why.

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Speaker 1: I'm sure it's a very fucked up motivation behind it.

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Speaker 1: But when a food is dry, I'm like, let's moisten

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Speaker 1: this up. Let's see what harribles. Horrible, It's good, horrible.

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Speaker 1: I've never been so proud to be your friend, Jamie.

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Speaker 1: Thank you so much. It actually I feel bad because

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Speaker 1: I'm sure the salad dressing is stinky. But but never nevertheless,

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Speaker 1: you're board. Yeah, there you go. Live your truth? Baby?

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Speaker 1: Does this make you uncomfortable? I was just gonna say,

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Speaker 1: speaking of living your truth, let's talk about what happens

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Speaker 1: when a profoundly damaged young man and becomes the King

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Speaker 1: of Germany and then gets a chance to live his truth.

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Speaker 1: I've got his birth chart up, let's figure this out.

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Speaker 1: Let's do it. What does it say about people of

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Speaker 1: his astrological sign leeving the Imperial German military. Well, um,

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Speaker 1: here's the thing. I did his natal chart, but that's

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Speaker 1: a little too complicated. What everyone needs to know is

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Speaker 1: he's an aquarious and uh inquiry and leaders. You know,

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Speaker 1: they're positive traits, they're open minded, right, they're creative. He

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Speaker 1: was an artist right there, free spirited, uh, negative traits,

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Speaker 1: really bad stuff across the board off for leaders, Impulsive, unpredictable, inconsistent, extreme,

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Speaker 1: and stubborn. So you know, it was foretold. I wouldn't

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Speaker 1: call him open minded in any way, but a lot

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Speaker 1: of that tracks. That's crazy. I feel like I'll get

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Speaker 1: dragged more for invoking astrology than I will for dipping

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Speaker 1: popcorn and salad dressing. And they're both horrible crimes against humanity,

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Speaker 1: you know what, To each their own. I'm living a

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Speaker 1: vile life over here now. The Reich that kaiserville Helm

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Speaker 1: inherited had been built and largely managed by Otto von Bismarck,

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Speaker 1: and above all else, Bismarck wanted peace. The system of

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Speaker 1: alliances he crafted for Germany were essentially again, like I

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Speaker 1: said that Era's version of mutually assured destruction, starting a

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Speaker 1: war with Germany would mean fighting with Russia too, and

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Speaker 1: Russia controlled a sixth of the planet's surface. This was

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Speaker 1: a pretty good system. While at lasted Bismarck was a monster,

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Speaker 1: but not a dumb man. Um knew what he was doing.

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Speaker 1: But Wilhelm came to power with distinct and probably agonizing

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Speaker 1: memories of his father's martial prowess and military victories. He

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Speaker 1: had been insecure his entire life because of his arm

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Speaker 1: and the complete lack of praise he received from hens Peter. Likewise,

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Speaker 1: his wife in Bismarck, had succeeded in inculcating a deep

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Speaker 1: antipathy of his parents and of England in him. Kaiserville

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Speaker 1: Helm the second. A concise life describes the mind side.

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Speaker 1: All of this resulted in once the young man came

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Speaker 1: to power and was given the world's most powerful land

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Speaker 1: army quote Prince Wilhelm's mindset on the threshold of succeeding

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Speaker 1: to the throne was characterized by bellicose ambition and contempt

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Speaker 1: for parliaments and political parties, indeed for civilians in general.

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Speaker 1: Britain must be destroyed was his watchword, and he was

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Speaker 1: already developing a passion for the idea of a strong

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Speaker 1: German navy. But Paris, too had to be destroyed. He railed.

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Speaker 1: Wilhelm was naturally very much in favor of war and

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Speaker 1: hopes it will break out soon. General Walders noted with

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Speaker 1: glee on twenty fifth January eighteen eight seven, under the

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Speaker 1: latter's influence, the prince also advocated war with Russia, that

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Speaker 1: young man once war with Russia and would like to

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Speaker 1: draw his swords straight away if he could. Chancellor Bismarck

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Speaker 1: recorded with Dismay in eighteen eighty eight. So, and to

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Speaker 1: be clear, he doesn't come to power until he is

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Speaker 1: nearly thirty years old. Um, is that right? So at

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Speaker 1: this point where like this is no, yeah, yeah, he's

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Speaker 1: a juvenile young boy who wants to have sex with

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Speaker 1: his mother's hand. This is a grown ass, petty man

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Speaker 1: who wants to have sex with his who wants to

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Speaker 1: have sex with his mother's hand. Of course, Now, Bismarck

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Speaker 1: was also deeply concerned about the young emperor's almost violent

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Speaker 1: hatred of Jewish people. This was the result of the

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Speaker 1: influence of one Adolf Vaughan Stoker, the court chaplain. Now.

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Speaker 1: Stoker was a member of the Christian Socialist Movement, an

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Speaker 1: anti Semitic far right party that also hated Catholics. Philhelm's

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Speaker 1: parents and grandmother had all been disgusted by discrimination and

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Speaker 1: had pushed to end it in their country, But Wilhelm

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Speaker 1: wanted to blaze a new, much more racist path, and

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Speaker 1: he was supported in this by the Prussian officer corps,

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Speaker 1: who were also thoroughly bigoted. The Kaiser and his new

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Speaker 1: allies wanted to keep the German race pure, stopped Jewish immigration,

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Speaker 1: and remove Jews from positions in schools and public office.

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Speaker 1: Before his ascension, Bismarck had rebuked the Prince for his

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Speaker 1: support of anti Semitism. This sparked a passive aggressive battle

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Speaker 1: between the two men. From vander Kiss's biography of Wilhelm,

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Speaker 1: when Bismarck had articles published in the official press taking

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Speaker 1: the religious conservatives to task for using Wilhelm, the latter

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Speaker 1: wrote petulently to hints Peter that he did not deserve

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Speaker 1: such treatment, as for the Chancellor's sake, he had for

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Speaker 1: years locked myself out of my parents house. And about

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Speaker 1: the same time, Wilhelm drafted a proclamation to the German

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Speaker 1: princes which was to be published in the event of

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Speaker 1: his session. Bismarck told him to burn it soaking Wilhelm

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Speaker 1: replied that when he came to the throne, he would

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Speaker 1: have all Jewish influence over the press. Stopped told that

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Speaker 1: this would be a violation of the Constitution, Wilhelm said

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Speaker 1: grandly that they would have to get rid of the

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Speaker 1: Constitution as well. It sounds like, yeah, if you look

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Speaker 1: up Kaiser Wilhelm Donald Trump, there's like a dozen different

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Speaker 1: articles that different people have written about similarities between the

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Speaker 1: two men um. I think, for one thing, I think

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Speaker 1: that's I don't entirely agree with that for a number

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Speaker 1: of reasons. One of them is that Wilhelm is an

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Speaker 1: infinitely more sympathetic figure than Donald Trump. Um. But there

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Speaker 1: are some similarities and that that that would definitely be

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Speaker 1: one of them. Oh wow, there's a whole there's a

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Speaker 1: whole goddamn New Yorker article. Yeah, there's a ton of

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Speaker 1: articles about the similarities between the two men um. Well again, yeah.

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Speaker 1: Wilhelm was fond of making these sorts of grand threats

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Speaker 1: and pronouncements like the one he made against Russia and England. Fortunately,

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Speaker 1: they rarely resulted in anything. He was easy to talk down,

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Speaker 1: and he was liable to balk at the last minute

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Speaker 1: from acting on any of his rhetoric, but the rhetoric

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Speaker 1: itself had a damaging effect on international relations. Wilhelm deeply

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Speaker 1: worried the rest of Europe when he made this pronouncement

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Speaker 1: to the people of Germany after taking the crown. We

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Speaker 1: were born to each other I in the army. We

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Speaker 1: were born for each other, and will cleave indissolutely to

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Speaker 1: each other, whether it be the will of God to

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Speaker 1: send us to calm or storm. You will soon swear

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Speaker 1: fealty and submission to me, And I promise ever to

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Speaker 1: bear in mind from the world above the eyes of

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Speaker 1: my forefathers looked down on me, and that I shall

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Speaker 1: one day have to stand accountable for them for the

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Speaker 1: glory and honor of the army. Also, why can't you

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Speaker 1: have sex with your mother's hand? That should be now?

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Speaker 1: The Kaiser no real military experience and no aptitude whatsoever

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Speaker 1: for warfare, but he felt that he had to portray

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Speaker 1: himself as a mighty war lord, in part because his

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Speaker 1: father and grandfather had been mighty warlords. That was kind

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Speaker 1: of pruscious whole deal. So to compensate for being just

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Speaker 1: a dude with a bad arm, Billhelm collected an absurd

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Speaker 1: amount of military uniforms. His cousin, the Queen of Romania,

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Speaker 1: wrote that he changed his uniform several times a day

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Speaker 1: as a smart woman changes her gown. Now, vanderkiss Her,

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Speaker 1: I know it's about to get embarrassinger because vanderkiss book

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Speaker 1: goes into detail about just how extensive Wilhelm's wardrobe really was.

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Speaker 1: In addition to his much cherished foreign uniforms, he had

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Speaker 1: a full one for every Prussian regiment over three hundred alone,

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Speaker 1: to say nothing of those of Bavaria, Saxony, and Wurtemburg,

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Speaker 1: as well as navel and marine uniforms all had their

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Speaker 1: own individual badges, sashes, caps, helmets, epilepts, shoulder points, belts, swords, lances,

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Speaker 1: and firearms. The resulting wardrobe and armory had to be

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Speaker 1: housed in a hall containing huge wardrobes, with a camer

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Speaker 1: diner on duty from onning tonight to select the shortest

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Speaker 1: possible notice any outfit he might require. According to Anne Topham,

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Speaker 1: his daughter's governess, he cut a fine figure in military dress,

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Speaker 1: but in civilian clothes the effect was completely lacking. Many

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Speaker 1: German gentlemen lost much appearance when out of uniform, but

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Speaker 1: none to the extent that their emperor did. He no

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Speaker 1: longer had any shred of dignity, and curiously enough, that

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Speaker 1: charm of manner was also bereft of its influence, emerged

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Speaker 1: into what was an offensive wearisome buffoonery. He was wise,

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Speaker 1: she added, not to appear before his subjects except in uniform.

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Speaker 1: Oh God, I like how he's He's just like, how

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Speaker 1: could I possibly not be a war hero? Look at

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Speaker 1: all nice shirts? Like You're like, yeah, that's not how

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Speaker 1: that works. Pause. Pizza's here, so we're we're back. They

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Speaker 1: received pizza in the room and Jamie and I are

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Speaker 1: talking about all the articles comparing Kaiserville Helm to trump

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Speaker 1: Um and uh. One of the things I noted is

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Speaker 1: that like nobody ever really defends Kayserville. One of my

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Speaker 1: one of my weird hobbies is I like to go

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Speaker 1: on YouTube and I like to find collections of imperial

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Speaker 1: Prussian and Imperial British and Imperial Russian. Uh, like court music,

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Speaker 1: like military marches and stuff like that. And I like

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Speaker 1: to read like comments. Very weird. Yeah, I like to

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Speaker 1: read the comments because the comments are filled with monarchists,

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Speaker 1: with people who like desperately want to return to monarchy

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Speaker 1: in Europe. And they're all the saddest, dumbest people in

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Speaker 1: the entire world, and it's it's I like to read

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Speaker 1: their arguments between each other. But nobody ever defends the Kaiser. No,

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Speaker 1: that's that's textually. I mean, commenters will defend almost anything.

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Speaker 1: I like to go to the YouTube of like okay,

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Speaker 1: not the okay what am I saying? Okay, where you're

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Speaker 1: like looking for a specific song and so you search

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Speaker 1: it on YouTube and then you accidentally scroll down to

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Speaker 1: the comments and it's like something that's very depressing out

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Speaker 1: of nowhere. I forget what song I was looking at. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: but the top comment was like my husband died to

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Speaker 1: this song and and it's nice that it's on YouTube

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Speaker 1: dot com and it was like a dance song. But anyways,

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Speaker 1: I love comments. A story there. Where's the Wilhelm Hive,

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Speaker 1: Where's the will Hive? Yeah? They they are not not

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Speaker 1: buzzing um because he was really bad at his job

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Speaker 1: and even the dumbest people in the world monarchists can

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Speaker 1: recognize that. Now. As his reign began, the Kaiser fell

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Speaker 1: under the influence of a number of bad apples. Uh.

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Speaker 1: There was the anti Semite Stoker who we already talked about.

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Speaker 1: There was also Count Alfred Valan walder Cy, the deputy

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Speaker 1: chief of the German General Staff. Now, he was a

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Speaker 1: rapidly pro war nut funk who supported an immediate attack

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Speaker 1: against both France and Russia. Um, like this was advice,

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Speaker 1: we just invade them both simultaneously, right now? Um? Now,

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Speaker 1: when Bismarck heard about the growing friendship between the Kaiser

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Speaker 1: and walder Ce, he is said to have cried, alas,

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Speaker 1: my poor grand children. So Bismarck, being a smart guy,

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Speaker 1: pretty instantly realizes, like, oh ship, this dude is going

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Speaker 1: to plunge the whole continent into a stupid, stupid war. Um, boy,

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Speaker 1: was he right? He was not wrong. Like I said,

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Speaker 1: Bismarck is a very is a visionary. He's he's a

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Speaker 1: bad man, but he's a visionary and he clearly saw

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Speaker 1: what was going to happen. I hate when the bad

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Speaker 1: people are smart as well. Yeah, effectively bad. Yeah. I

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Speaker 1: mean in Bismarck's defense, like he was just kind of

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Speaker 1: kind of a sociopath, but he wasn't. Like his goals

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Speaker 1: weren't dominate Europe and put all the Jews in camp.

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Speaker 1: His goals were ensured Germany a place of prominence among

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Speaker 1: nations and stop a massive European war. And he did

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Speaker 1: gross and manipulative things to ensure that. But he wasn't

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Speaker 1: trying to like make the world worse. He wasn't doing

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Speaker 1: chaos for chaos's sake. Yeah, yeah, he wasn't like a yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: Like he just wants things to not break into a

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Speaker 1: war and he wants in Germany to be popular. Okay,

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Speaker 1: well he felt yeah, he definitely did. Didn't succeed in

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Speaker 1: the long run. Now, Count Uhlenberg, the Kaiser's best friend

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Speaker 1: and probable crush, also led to the Kaiser's break with Bismarck.

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Speaker 1: The Kaiser demanded that Bismarck promote the Count to the

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Speaker 1: position of Prussian envoy in Munich, which was a very

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Speaker 1: important job. Now Bismarck balked at giving this job to

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Speaker 1: an inexperienced friend of the Kings. The conflict between the

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Speaker 1: two men very much embodied a greater conflict within German governance.

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Speaker 1: A large chunk of the country, including Bismarck, wanted Germany

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Speaker 1: to be a proper nation state with rules and laws

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Speaker 1: and checks and balances. They weren't democrats, and I don't

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Speaker 1: mean that like the American political sense, I mean like

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Speaker 1: pro democracy sense, at least not all of them. But

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Speaker 1: they didn't want an absolute monarchy where the Kaiser's will

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Speaker 1: determined everything. The Kaiser, on the other hand, didn't really

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Speaker 1: see why other people should have a say and how

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Speaker 1: he ran Germany now. Bismarck warned the Kaiser that filling

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Speaker 1: government posts with his buddies would lead to a situation

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Speaker 1: wherein he couldn't actually trust any of his ministers to

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Speaker 1: give him good information, because they'd all be toady's at worst,

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Speaker 1: or his friends at best, and in any case, they

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Speaker 1: wouldn't be trustworthy to actually speak the truth to him

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Speaker 1: when the truth needed speaking. The Kaiser ignored Bismarck, and

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Speaker 1: over the next few years the positions of the ministers

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Speaker 1: and the reich Chancellor. Bismarck's job were demoted to what

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Speaker 1: role calls royal lackeys. So yeah yeah. Throughout eighteen eighty

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Speaker 1: eight and eighteen eighty nine, Bilhelm and Bismarck's relationship degraded.

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Speaker 1: Things came to a head in eighteen eighty nine when

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Speaker 1: a bunch of miners in the rural district went on

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Speaker 1: strike for better working conditions now here hins Peter had

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Speaker 1: what you would actually say as a positive influence. As

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Speaker 1: odd as it sounds, Kaiser Villehelm instantly sided with the

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Speaker 1: striking workers against their employers. Um. This caused another riff

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Speaker 1: between him and Bismarck, because Bismarck's again a piece of shit,

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Speaker 1: um chance Yeah, the the chancellor didn't give a funk

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Speaker 1: about the workers and obviously cared mostly about steel production

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Speaker 1: and his friends who ran the company's um. But you know,

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Speaker 1: the Kaiser stood for the working people, and on May

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Speaker 1: twelve he charged into a meeting the Prussian Ministry of

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Speaker 1: State and declared that Bismarck was wrong for not acceding

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Speaker 1: to their demands and declared the workers were his subjects

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Speaker 1: whom he had to look after. All right, yeah, this

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Speaker 1: is likely, Yeah, this one, this is good. Now Wilhelm

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Speaker 1: got his way on the rear strike, for they're frustrating

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Speaker 1: the Reich Chancellor. In the summer of eighteen eighty nine,

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Speaker 1: he took his yacht out for his first cruise across

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Speaker 1: Scandinavian waters. This became a yearly tradition when he kept

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Speaker 1: up for decades. On his first outing, he brought valder

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Speaker 1: C and Yuhlenberg with him. The latter was at least

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Speaker 1: a sane person who didn't support wars of aggression with

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Speaker 1: the rest of the world. But valder C was a

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Speaker 1: racist nut fuck, and during their vacation he convinced the

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Speaker 1: Kaiser that Bismarck was Jew ridden and had been conned

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Speaker 1: into giving control of the Reich's monetary policy to a

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Speaker 1: bunch of Jews. His crush, no, no, no, his crush

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Speaker 1: is a pretty reasonable guy. This is that racist general

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Speaker 1: who wants him to invade the entire world. The names

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Speaker 1: are so confusing, Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, sorry, there's a lot.

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Speaker 1: Valder C is the racist general, Uhlenberg is his. Now,

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Speaker 1: so Waldersee convinces the Kaiser that Bismarck had been conned

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Speaker 1: into giving control of the Reich's monetary policy to a

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Speaker 1: bunch of Jews. This was a lie, but reality had

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Speaker 1: very little influence on the Kaiser. Now, this month long

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Speaker 1: annual cruise around the coast of Norway became one of

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Speaker 1: the Kaiser's favorite things. And I have to read you

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Speaker 1: vander kiss description of it because it sounds like the

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Speaker 1: worst time you can have on a boat. The annual

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Speaker 1: cruise or Nordland Rice, with its exclusively male company, allowed

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Speaker 1: him the Kaiser, to indulge in practical jokes and boyish tomfoolery,

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Speaker 1: like applying a foot to the backside of elderly aids

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Speaker 1: de camp engaged in physical exercises. Its purpose was originally

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Speaker 1: to give him a month long break from court life,

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Speaker 1: but in due course his doctor decided it was counter productive,

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Speaker 1: as he was physically and mentally upset by the long voyage, diet,

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Speaker 1: and exhaustion of various kinds, and it did him more

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Speaker 1: harm than good. His entourage soon tired of these cruises board,

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Speaker 1: if not repelled by the juvenile atmosphere and behavior of

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Speaker 1: the Kaiser and some of his officers, who loathed every

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Speaker 1: childish prank and moment themselves, but were too sycophantic to

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Speaker 1: say so. God, it sounds like it reminds me of

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Speaker 1: like that documentary where Jim Carrey goes method, where you're like, oh,

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Speaker 1: he's just a tyrant. He's been waiting his whole life

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Speaker 1: to get people trapped in this in this enclosed setting

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Speaker 1: to be horrible cool. Well, I'm glad you did Franks

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Speaker 1: on the set of his You wanna you want to

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Speaker 1: you want to go on a month long prank cruise

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Speaker 1: with the King Boy with the with the King Boy

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Speaker 1: who like has a god, imagine just having on a

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Speaker 1: cruise with him and all of his demons. That's wild. Guarantee.

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Speaker 1: He never didn't have an erection and he never knew

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Speaker 1: what it was for. Well, they mean he's just walking

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Speaker 1: around with a full erection all the time, Like, do

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Speaker 1: you guys know what? This is? Just kicking people in

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Speaker 1: the butt? I think, laughing hard as a kicking old

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Speaker 1: people around what. Okay, well he is officially um you know, well,

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Speaker 1: I mean he's just a bad He's a batman. He's

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Speaker 1: a creatively bad man in this case. Yeah, really really

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Speaker 1: punishing everyone around him in very specific ways. Yeah. Now,

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Speaker 1: in January of eighteen ninety, Wilhelm told his Crown Council

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Speaker 1: that he would celebrate his thirty first birthday with two

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Speaker 1: new proclamations, one to protect working people and limit their

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Speaker 1: labor hours, and another to call an international summit in

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Speaker 1: Berlin to improve labor conditions across the continent. So that's

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Speaker 1: pretty cool, right, yeah, labor crusader. I'm very surprised that

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Speaker 1: he is like gunning for labor like this. He well,

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Speaker 1: you know, one of the good things about hint Peter's

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Speaker 1: he had taken him around to all these factories and

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Speaker 1: minds and stuff when he was a kid. So the

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Speaker 1: Kaiser had seen like how tough life was for working people,

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Speaker 1: and he wasn't He's not like a sociopath or anything.

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Speaker 1: He had empathy for these people. So he did care

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Speaker 1: about people. Like he's not a monster. Um, he does

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Speaker 1: monstrous things, but he's not a monster. Now Bismarck thought

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Speaker 1: that the Kaiser's love of the working people was super dumb.

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Speaker 1: The two fought over this, and another fight broke out

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Speaker 1: in March of eighteen ninety when Bismarck entered into negotiations

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Speaker 1: with the leader of the Center Party. He's like, why

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Speaker 1: do you care about the poores? It's such a bad look.

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Speaker 1: They're the pores, man, Come on, or what what are

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Speaker 1: you going to get out of that? So Bismarck enters

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Speaker 1: into negotiations with the leader of the Center Party, a

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Speaker 1: guy named win Thorst, and their goal is to get

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Speaker 1: rid of bigoted, anti Catholic legislation in Germany. So again

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Speaker 1: Bismarck like is trying to fight against discrimination here. So

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Speaker 1: none of these sides are are simple. Here. Bismarck hates

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Speaker 1: working people but also hates discrimination. The Kaiser fights for

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Speaker 1: the working man, but gets furious about removing this anti

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Speaker 1: Catholic legislation because he's a bigot um. So they're just

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Speaker 1: like a stalemate. Yeah. Now he's particularly pissed that this

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Speaker 1: meeting between Bismarck and the leader of the Center Party

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Speaker 1: had been organized by Bismarck's banker, who was a Jewish man. Now,

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Speaker 1: to the Kaiser, this was confirmation that the Jews were

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Speaker 1: secret running his empire via Bismarck. God damn it okay? Next,

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Speaker 1: according to Kaiser ville Helm the Second a concise life.

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Speaker 1: Early in the morning of fifteen March eighteen ninety, there

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Speaker 1: took place one of the most highly charged scenes ever

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Speaker 1: played out in Berlin's center of government, the wilhelm strassa

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Speaker 1: Kaiser Willhelm the Second someon the seventy five year old

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Speaker 1: Reich Chancellor from his bed and upbraided him for receiving Windthorst.

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Speaker 1: He went on to a complain that Bismarck had dug

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Speaker 1: out a dusty old cabinet order of eighteen fifty two

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Speaker 1: that prevented the monarch from receiving ministers except in the

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Speaker 1: presence of the Minister President. He pre emptorily demanded that

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Speaker 1: the order to be rescinded, which Bismarck refused to do.

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Speaker 1: Wilhelm later recounted that Bismarck had become so violent towards

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Speaker 1: him that he was afraid the Chancellor would throw the

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Speaker 1: inkstand at my head. After this dramatic quarrel, waldr ce

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Speaker 1: urged the Kaiser in the presence of the chief of

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Speaker 1: the military cabinet. The sack Bismarck forthwith the present state

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Speaker 1: of affairs was quite untenable, he argued, and moreover, the

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Speaker 1: Chancellor was too closely allied with the Jews. Bismarck first

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Speaker 1: sent honk Is like military leader, and then the chief

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Speaker 1: of the civil cabinet, Herman von Lucanus, to the Chancellor,

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Speaker 1: ordering him to hand in his resignation, which Bismarck finally

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Speaker 1: did on eighteenth March eighteen ninety. If waldersee Is one

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Speaker 1: can safely assume expected to take Bismarck's place, he was

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Speaker 1: in for a bitter disappointment. That same evening, bill Helm

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Speaker 1: the Second announced the commanding generals assembled in the Berlinish

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Speaker 1: loss that in order to remain master of the situation,

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Speaker 1: he had to issue an order to the Chancellor insisting

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Speaker 1: that he submit. So the Kaiser accepted Bismarck's letter of uh,

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Speaker 1: you know, he's retired his retirement and made a guy

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Speaker 1: named capri V who was a lick spittle, um, you know,

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Speaker 1: the the new chancellor. So he he forces out the

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Speaker 1: guy who like the political cartoons in Europe at this

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Speaker 1: time are like, show the Kaiser on a boat kicking Bismarck,

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Speaker 1: the pilot of the boat off of the ship. Um.

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Speaker 1: And that's generally how this has seen. Germany has like

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00:21:48,560 --> 00:21:53,080
Speaker 1: jettisoned its pilot in favor of the dumbest monarch in Europe,

402
00:21:53,400 --> 00:21:58,080
Speaker 1: the man. What a choice, What a choice. It's not great,

403
00:21:58,240 --> 00:22:01,119
Speaker 1: it's not great. I mean, there's no win scenario, but

404
00:22:01,240 --> 00:22:04,040
Speaker 1: they did seem to choose the losing er of the two.

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00:22:04,119 --> 00:22:08,040
Speaker 1: They definitely chose the losing ist scenario. But you you

406
00:22:08,080 --> 00:22:12,359
Speaker 1: know what's not the losing scenario, Jamie, tell me the

407
00:22:12,400 --> 00:22:15,680
Speaker 1: products and services that support this show. Oh, it's true.

408
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409
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Speaker 1: The dick pills especially and one of the behind the bastards.

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Speaker 1: Guarantees is that no more than seven percent of our

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00:22:27,040 --> 00:22:31,200
Speaker 1: sponsors contributed to the outbreak of hostilities in World War One. Wow. Okay,

412
00:22:31,280 --> 00:22:33,879
Speaker 1: so that's a guarantee no other podcast will give you.

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Speaker 1: That's a little wiggle room. That's nice. That's nice up

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Speaker 1: to Okay, I'll crunch those numbers and then cancel you later.

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Speaker 1: Al Right, here's some ants now with bis Mark out

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Speaker 1: of Kayserville. Helm was the unquestioned chief power in Germany,

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Speaker 1: and this was not a good thing. Phil Helm was

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Speaker 1: bad at every aspect of a job, particularly diplomacy, and

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Speaker 1: for years the most he had been four years a

420
00:23:06,600 --> 00:23:10,840
Speaker 1: to anyone. Yeah. Now, he was convinced that his relation

421
00:23:10,880 --> 00:23:12,919
Speaker 1: to the other crowned heads of Europe and his personal

422
00:23:13,000 --> 00:23:15,920
Speaker 1: charisma would allow him to negotiate well with other nations.

423
00:23:16,200 --> 00:23:19,000
Speaker 1: The New Yorker summarizes his talent for this part of

424
00:23:19,000 --> 00:23:22,200
Speaker 1: the job. Thus, late quote, he called the diminutive King

425
00:23:22,280 --> 00:23:25,040
Speaker 1: Victor Emmanuel the third of Italy the dwarf. In front

426
00:23:25,040 --> 00:23:28,040
Speaker 1: of the king's own entourage, he called Prince later Csar

427
00:23:28,160 --> 00:23:32,119
Speaker 1: Ferdinand of Bulgaria Ferdinando Nasso, on account of his beaky

428
00:23:32,200 --> 00:23:35,040
Speaker 1: nose and spread rumors that he was a hermaphrodite. Since

429
00:23:35,080 --> 00:23:40,359
Speaker 1: Philhelm was notably indiscreet, people always yeah. Since Wilhelm was

430
00:23:40,400 --> 00:23:43,200
Speaker 1: notably indiscreet, people always knew what he was saying behind

431
00:23:43,240 --> 00:23:46,080
Speaker 1: their backs. Ferdinand had his revenge after a visit to

432
00:23:46,119 --> 00:23:48,800
Speaker 1: Germany in nine nine, during which the Kaiser slapped him

433
00:23:48,800 --> 00:23:51,280
Speaker 1: on the bottom in public and then refused to apologize.

434
00:23:51,480 --> 00:23:54,520
Speaker 1: Ferdinand awarded a valuable arms contract that had been promised

435
00:23:54,520 --> 00:23:57,399
Speaker 1: to the Germans to a French company instead. One of

436
00:23:57,440 --> 00:23:59,760
Speaker 1: the many things that Wilhelm was convinced he was brilliant at,

437
00:24:00,119 --> 00:24:04,600
Speaker 1: despite all evidence to the contrary, was personal diplomacy, fixing

438
00:24:04,800 --> 00:24:07,560
Speaker 1: foreign policy through one on one meetings with other European

439
00:24:07,600 --> 00:24:10,040
Speaker 1: monarchs and statesman. This is one of the reasons people

440
00:24:10,040 --> 00:24:12,320
Speaker 1: compare him to Trump a lot. In eighteen ninety, he

441
00:24:12,400 --> 00:24:15,399
Speaker 1: let Laps a longstanding defensive agreement with Russia, the German

442
00:24:15,400 --> 00:24:19,040
Speaker 1: empires vast and sometimes threatening eastern neighbor. He judged wrongly

443
00:24:19,080 --> 00:24:21,440
Speaker 1: that Russia was so desperate for German goodwill that he

444
00:24:21,440 --> 00:24:24,840
Speaker 1: could keep it dangling. Instead, Russia immediately made an alliance

445
00:24:24,880 --> 00:24:29,360
Speaker 1: with Germany's western neighbor and enemy, France. A single negotiation

446
00:24:29,520 --> 00:24:34,480
Speaker 1: that's nasty. It's bad. VILLELM decided he would charm and

447
00:24:34,520 --> 00:24:37,440
Speaker 1: manipulate Zar Nicholas the Second, a ninny and a whimperer,

448
00:24:37,480 --> 00:24:41,200
Speaker 1: according to Wilhelm, fit only to grow turnips into abandoning

449
00:24:41,200 --> 00:24:45,240
Speaker 1: the alliance. In Nicholas told Wilhelm to get lost. The

450
00:24:45,280 --> 00:24:48,840
Speaker 1: German Russian alliance withered. So he comes to power and

451
00:24:48,920 --> 00:24:52,560
Speaker 1: within a couple of years scraps the alliance with Russia

452
00:24:52,680 --> 00:24:56,560
Speaker 1: and Russia immediately allies with France, which means that Germany

453
00:24:56,640 --> 00:24:59,840
Speaker 1: is now surrounded on both sides by enemies. So he

454
00:25:00,000 --> 00:25:03,280
Speaker 1: went from Germany's entire flank to the east being totally

455
00:25:03,280 --> 00:25:06,840
Speaker 1: protected by a military ally, to the nation being surrounded.

456
00:25:09,280 --> 00:25:12,520
Speaker 1: He's so bad at this, it's crazy at how I did.

457
00:25:12,680 --> 00:25:15,200
Speaker 1: Like the speed at which he's bad at it too,

458
00:25:15,520 --> 00:25:18,240
Speaker 1: Like is he not even a slow burned like I

459
00:25:18,359 --> 00:25:23,399
Speaker 1: do something shitty everyone Like he's just like expeditiously ruining everything. No,

460
00:25:23,600 --> 00:25:27,560
Speaker 1: he is a more stupid, faster guy. Um very much so,

461
00:25:27,800 --> 00:25:31,720
Speaker 1: the worst kind of person. Okay, Now, one good thing

462
00:25:31,760 --> 00:25:33,520
Speaker 1: you can say for the Kaiser is that he was

463
00:25:33,560 --> 00:25:36,119
Speaker 1: better than most modern governance that promoting gay people to

464
00:25:36,200 --> 00:25:39,159
Speaker 1: positions of high authority. The downside of this is that

465
00:25:39,200 --> 00:25:41,359
Speaker 1: these guys were all his friends and sycophants, and he

466
00:25:41,400 --> 00:25:44,280
Speaker 1: almost certainly had no idea they were gay. His best

467
00:25:44,280 --> 00:25:47,200
Speaker 1: friend Uhlenberg, of course, occupied high positions in the Reich,

468
00:25:47,280 --> 00:25:49,400
Speaker 1: but there were too many rumors about him for him

469
00:25:49,400 --> 00:25:51,159
Speaker 1: to be made chancellor. There were a number of like

470
00:25:51,240 --> 00:25:53,400
Speaker 1: they were, like trials and like news stories that would

471
00:25:53,400 --> 00:25:56,560
Speaker 1: come out. Um So the Kaiser promoted a dude named

472
00:25:56,560 --> 00:25:59,359
Speaker 1: Buelow for the job. A letter Buelow wrote in July

473
00:25:59,480 --> 00:26:02,119
Speaker 1: eight nine six shows that things within the German government

474
00:26:02,119 --> 00:26:05,919
Speaker 1: had degraded exactly the way Bismarck predicted they would quote.

475
00:26:06,359 --> 00:26:08,880
Speaker 1: I would be a different kind of chancellor from my predecessors.

476
00:26:08,880 --> 00:26:10,840
Speaker 1: Bismarck was a power in his own right, a pipin

477
00:26:10,960 --> 00:26:14,600
Speaker 1: a richelieu. Caprivi and Hohenlow regarded or regard themselves as

478
00:26:14,600 --> 00:26:16,800
Speaker 1: the representatives of the government and to a certain extent

479
00:26:16,840 --> 00:26:19,480
Speaker 1: of the parliament in relation to his majesty. I would

480
00:26:19,560 --> 00:26:22,600
Speaker 1: regard myself as the executive tool of his majesty, so

481
00:26:22,640 --> 00:26:25,200
Speaker 1: to speak, his political chief of staff. With me. Personal

482
00:26:25,280 --> 00:26:28,360
Speaker 1: rule in the good sense would really begin. I'm picturing

483
00:26:28,400 --> 00:26:33,360
Speaker 1: this is like an instagram caption Yeah, yeah, Pulo would

484
00:26:33,359 --> 00:26:36,800
Speaker 1: have been tweeting sycophantically about his boss in this modern era.

485
00:26:36,840 --> 00:26:38,720
Speaker 1: But he's like, he comes to power and immediately promises

486
00:26:38,720 --> 00:26:40,880
Speaker 1: I'm going to do everything the Kaiser says and not

487
00:26:41,040 --> 00:26:43,439
Speaker 1: represent the rest of the government in any way. Like

488
00:26:43,520 --> 00:26:46,560
Speaker 1: that's his promise and these things, that's a good thing.

489
00:26:48,080 --> 00:26:51,880
Speaker 1: In an eight letter to his mother, kaiserville Helm exulted

490
00:26:51,880 --> 00:26:54,520
Speaker 1: in his ability to gradually wear down the government of

491
00:26:54,520 --> 00:26:57,760
Speaker 1: Germany into acting as just an extension of his ego

492
00:26:58,359 --> 00:27:00,720
Speaker 1: forever and ever. He exulted in the letter to his

493
00:27:00,760 --> 00:27:04,399
Speaker 1: mother in there is only one real emperor in the world,

494
00:27:04,440 --> 00:27:07,680
Speaker 1: and that is the German, regardless of his person in qualities,

495
00:27:07,720 --> 00:27:10,159
Speaker 1: but by right of a thousand years tradition, and his

496
00:27:10,280 --> 00:27:16,359
Speaker 1: chancellor has to obey God. Leave your if nothing else,

497
00:27:16,440 --> 00:27:21,000
Speaker 1: leave your poor mother alone. Now you Lenberg, who'd put

498
00:27:21,040 --> 00:27:23,560
Speaker 1: blow up for the job, because Uhlenberg, there were too

499
00:27:23,560 --> 00:27:26,600
Speaker 1: many rumors about him being gay. Wrote the new chancellor

500
00:27:26,720 --> 00:27:29,240
Speaker 1: this advice for working under Kaiser Wilhelm. And again I

501
00:27:29,280 --> 00:27:33,280
Speaker 1: have to remind you this man loves Wilhelm right well,

502
00:27:33,320 --> 00:27:37,360
Speaker 1: I mean Wilhelm the second takes everything personally, only personal

503
00:27:37,480 --> 00:27:40,320
Speaker 1: arguments make any impression on him. He likes to give

504
00:27:40,320 --> 00:27:42,880
Speaker 1: advice to others, but is unwilling to take it himself.

505
00:27:43,000 --> 00:27:47,200
Speaker 1: He cannot stand boredom, ponderous, stiff, excessively thorough. People get

506
00:27:47,240 --> 00:27:50,120
Speaker 1: on his nerves and cannot get anywhere with him. Billhelm

507
00:27:50,160 --> 00:27:53,240
Speaker 1: the second wants to shine and decide everything himself. What

508
00:27:53,359 --> 00:27:56,639
Speaker 1: he wants to do himself, unfortunately, often goes wrong. He

509
00:27:56,680 --> 00:27:59,400
Speaker 1: loves glory. He is ambitious and jealous. To get him

510
00:27:59,400 --> 00:28:01,439
Speaker 1: to accept an idea, one has to pretend that the

511
00:28:01,480 --> 00:28:04,640
Speaker 1: idea came from him. Never forget that his majesty needs

512
00:28:04,680 --> 00:28:06,840
Speaker 1: praise from time to time. He's the sort of person

513
00:28:06,920 --> 00:28:09,360
Speaker 1: who becomes sullen unless he has given recognition from time

514
00:28:09,400 --> 00:28:12,320
Speaker 1: to time by someone of importance. You will always accomplish

515
00:28:12,320 --> 00:28:14,320
Speaker 1: whatever you wish, so long as you do not admit

516
00:28:14,400 --> 00:28:17,560
Speaker 1: to express your appreciation. When his majesty deserves it, he

517
00:28:17,640 --> 00:28:19,960
Speaker 1: is grateful for it, like a good clever child. If

518
00:28:20,000 --> 00:28:23,359
Speaker 1: one remains silent when he deserves recognition, he eventually sees

519
00:28:23,440 --> 00:28:26,359
Speaker 1: malevolence in it. We two will always carefully observe the

520
00:28:26,400 --> 00:28:29,399
Speaker 1: boundaries of flattery. I mean, who among us has not

521
00:28:29,440 --> 00:28:34,159
Speaker 1: worked for someone exactly like absolutely yes, I was working

522
00:28:34,160 --> 00:28:38,120
Speaker 1: for someone like this two weeks ago. Yeah, Hollywood is

523
00:28:38,160 --> 00:28:43,760
Speaker 1: thirty people like Wilhelm. Yeah, oh god, I mean, but

524
00:28:43,840 --> 00:28:45,880
Speaker 1: the fact that that's like one of his closest friends,

525
00:28:45,960 --> 00:28:49,480
Speaker 1: He's like, yeah, he's an absolute night marries, the worst

526
00:28:49,520 --> 00:28:52,080
Speaker 1: person I know. But also he's my closest friend, so

527
00:28:52,400 --> 00:28:54,520
Speaker 1: you know, I love him. Yeah, And the health insurance

528
00:28:54,560 --> 00:28:57,800
Speaker 1: is great, so put up with it. Yeah. Now, Wilhelm

529
00:28:57,960 --> 00:29:00,840
Speaker 1: had a bad reputation for basically aiding with whatever the

530
00:29:00,920 --> 00:29:03,680
Speaker 1: last person he talked to had said. Since a number

531
00:29:03,720 --> 00:29:07,520
Speaker 1: of his generals were warmongering racists, this was problematic. In

532
00:29:07,600 --> 00:29:11,760
Speaker 1: eighteen ninety six, the Kaiser impulsively sent to congratulatory telegram

533
00:29:11,840 --> 00:29:15,560
Speaker 1: to Paul Krueger of the Transvaal Republic South Africa for

534
00:29:15,720 --> 00:29:18,200
Speaker 1: his victory over a British raiding party. This is like

535
00:29:18,320 --> 00:29:20,840
Speaker 1: in the Bower War period. Now, the Boers are a

536
00:29:20,920 --> 00:29:23,360
Speaker 1: Germanic people, and there was great sympathy for them within

537
00:29:23,440 --> 00:29:26,760
Speaker 1: the Reich. But England was the world's pre eminent naval power,

538
00:29:26,880 --> 00:29:29,560
Speaker 1: and by sending this message, the Kaiser provoked rage from

539
00:29:29,560 --> 00:29:31,960
Speaker 1: a country he really needed to keep on his side,

540
00:29:32,000 --> 00:29:36,360
Speaker 1: since he'd already alienated Russia. Um, so that's not a

541
00:29:36,440 --> 00:29:39,720
Speaker 1: great move, like reaching out to the enemy of the

542
00:29:39,760 --> 00:29:41,720
Speaker 1: greatest naval power in the world being like, good job

543
00:29:41,800 --> 00:29:44,880
Speaker 1: killing some of their guys, Like it doesn't play well

544
00:29:44,960 --> 00:29:50,800
Speaker 1: in England again, petty, petty dumb, petty dumb. Now there

545
00:29:51,040 --> 00:29:53,600
Speaker 1: there were numerous other insults and slides like that. He

546
00:29:53,680 --> 00:29:55,880
Speaker 1: was Kaiser for like twenty six years before the war,

547
00:29:55,960 --> 00:29:58,600
Speaker 1: and this ship happened constantly. I'm just gonna you know,

548
00:29:58,640 --> 00:30:00,360
Speaker 1: I'm giving you a couple of example. Well, so you

549
00:30:00,440 --> 00:30:02,840
Speaker 1: know the sorts of ship he was up to. Bit

550
00:30:02,960 --> 00:30:07,200
Speaker 1: by bit, Wilhelm alienated basically all of Germany's allies. His

551
00:30:07,280 --> 00:30:10,720
Speaker 1: advisers and ministers, men like Buloh and Uhlenberg, proved unable

552
00:30:10,760 --> 00:30:12,800
Speaker 1: to do anything but praise the Kaiser and hoped to

553
00:30:12,840 --> 00:30:15,560
Speaker 1: calm him down and reduce his impulsive swings. They were

554
00:30:15,640 --> 00:30:19,520
Speaker 1: often unsuccessful. In nineteen hundred, the Boxer rebellion in China

555
00:30:19,640 --> 00:30:22,560
Speaker 1: led to the capture of a number of Europeans, including Germans,

556
00:30:22,600 --> 00:30:25,280
Speaker 1: in the city of pe King. Most of Europe's great

557
00:30:25,320 --> 00:30:28,680
Speaker 1: powers dispatched soldiers to deal with the situation. The Kaiser

558
00:30:28,760 --> 00:30:30,719
Speaker 1: was late in doing so, and his men arrived too

559
00:30:30,800 --> 00:30:33,400
Speaker 1: late to participate in the fight, but before they left,

560
00:30:33,440 --> 00:30:36,120
Speaker 1: the Kaiser insisted on addressing them personally with a speech

561
00:30:36,160 --> 00:30:38,560
Speaker 1: that made him the laughing stock of Europe. It ended

562
00:30:38,640 --> 00:30:42,160
Speaker 1: like this, should you encounter the enemy, he will be defeated.

563
00:30:42,320 --> 00:30:44,840
Speaker 1: No quarter will be given. Prisoners will not be taken.

564
00:30:44,920 --> 00:30:47,280
Speaker 1: Whoever falls into your hands as forfeited. Just as a

565
00:30:47,320 --> 00:30:49,560
Speaker 1: thousand years ago, the Huns under their king Attila made

566
00:30:49,600 --> 00:30:52,440
Speaker 1: a name for themselves, one that even today makes them

567
00:30:52,440 --> 00:30:54,920
Speaker 1: seem mighty in history and legend. May the name German

568
00:30:55,000 --> 00:30:57,160
Speaker 1: be affirmed by you in such a way in China

569
00:30:57,240 --> 00:30:59,800
Speaker 1: that no Chinese will ever again dare to look cross

570
00:31:00,000 --> 00:31:03,600
Speaker 1: it at a German. Now you've heard of like how

571
00:31:03,720 --> 00:31:06,080
Speaker 1: the Huns, like Germany were referred to as the Huns

572
00:31:06,200 --> 00:31:08,760
Speaker 1: in like World War One propaganda by the British and

573
00:31:08,760 --> 00:31:12,440
Speaker 1: the Americans and stuff. This speech is why this is

574
00:31:12,800 --> 00:31:14,760
Speaker 1: the Huns speech is what people call it. So they

575
00:31:14,800 --> 00:31:19,840
Speaker 1: were just getting they were just like roasting filam, indirectly exactly,

576
00:31:19,960 --> 00:31:22,520
Speaker 1: but pretty directly. Actually, yeah, I guess that's not even

577
00:31:22,560 --> 00:31:25,400
Speaker 1: a subtweet, because like this is seen as really silly.

578
00:31:25,480 --> 00:31:28,320
Speaker 1: For one, thing like beating China in this period was

579
00:31:28,440 --> 00:31:31,520
Speaker 1: not something to brag about like the European powers had

580
00:31:31,600 --> 00:31:36,360
Speaker 1: machine guns and like modern battleships and military tactics, and

581
00:31:36,680 --> 00:31:39,640
Speaker 1: the Chinese military just did not um and so it

582
00:31:39,760 --> 00:31:43,600
Speaker 1: wasn't really a fight. Um. Also, the Germans arrived too

583
00:31:43,720 --> 00:31:46,240
Speaker 1: late to participate in the fight. So this was both

584
00:31:46,280 --> 00:31:48,880
Speaker 1: seen as like a man child pretending to be a warrior,

585
00:31:49,120 --> 00:31:51,240
Speaker 1: but it was also seen as deeply worrying by the

586
00:31:51,320 --> 00:31:54,040
Speaker 1: crowned heads of Europe, the other leaders of the European powers,

587
00:31:54,160 --> 00:31:57,320
Speaker 1: because the Kaiser had Europe's most powerful army, and it's

588
00:31:57,320 --> 00:31:58,960
Speaker 1: not comforting to hear him say this ship. It's like

589
00:31:59,000 --> 00:32:01,480
Speaker 1: somebody with a huge gun collection talking about how he

590
00:32:01,560 --> 00:32:03,720
Speaker 1: could carry out a school shooting if he wanted to.

591
00:32:05,000 --> 00:32:08,440
Speaker 1: Be like, oh fuck, yeah, this this is a problem.

592
00:32:08,520 --> 00:32:10,640
Speaker 1: Maybe I should call the police, but of course there's

593
00:32:10,640 --> 00:32:13,680
Speaker 1: no police to call on the Kaiser. No. Don't you

594
00:32:13,800 --> 00:32:16,920
Speaker 1: love when someone's above the law and therefore thousands of

595
00:32:17,000 --> 00:32:22,120
Speaker 1: people have to die. But yeah, I'm so sorry. Yeah,

596
00:32:22,480 --> 00:32:28,200
Speaker 1: millions nations worth? Okay, Now, speaking of the army, they

597
00:32:28,240 --> 00:32:30,040
Speaker 1: were the only ones who really gained in power during

598
00:32:30,080 --> 00:32:32,360
Speaker 1: Wilhelm's reign. He had a habit of promoting generals to

599
00:32:32,400 --> 00:32:35,400
Speaker 1: ministerial positions. He liked being surrounded and consulted by them.

600
00:32:35,760 --> 00:32:39,880
Speaker 1: His appointees included General Alfred von Schlieffen, a military tactician

601
00:32:39,920 --> 00:32:42,360
Speaker 1: who developed an elaborate plan for how Germany could beat

602
00:32:42,400 --> 00:32:44,960
Speaker 1: both Russia and France and a European war. Wasn't it

603
00:32:45,040 --> 00:32:48,600
Speaker 1: like a five year plan? It was? What was the duration?

604
00:32:48,680 --> 00:32:51,160
Speaker 1: It was very quick. It was very happened in a

605
00:32:51,200 --> 00:32:53,960
Speaker 1: matter of months. So basically the idea was that you've

606
00:32:54,000 --> 00:32:57,040
Speaker 1: got you're surrounded now because Wilhelm fucked up and made

607
00:32:57,120 --> 00:33:00,160
Speaker 1: Russia an enemy, so Germany has to fight both ship

608
00:33:00,280 --> 00:33:02,840
Speaker 1: in France at the same time. So Schleepen's idea was

609
00:33:02,920 --> 00:33:05,760
Speaker 1: that the vast majority of the German's army, like two

610
00:33:05,840 --> 00:33:09,800
Speaker 1: or three million men would invade and conquer Paris very quickly.

611
00:33:10,360 --> 00:33:12,600
Speaker 1: Um and then you know, a small chunk of the

612
00:33:12,680 --> 00:33:14,760
Speaker 1: German army would hold off the Russian army in the

613
00:33:14,840 --> 00:33:16,760
Speaker 1: east until the rest of the army could be freed

614
00:33:16,800 --> 00:33:18,760
Speaker 1: up and sent by rail to go fight the Russians.

615
00:33:19,480 --> 00:33:22,880
Speaker 1: The only way for them to beat France quickly was

616
00:33:23,120 --> 00:33:27,960
Speaker 1: to bypass France's fortresses and like uh like defensive line

617
00:33:28,000 --> 00:33:31,520
Speaker 1: on the German French border. And invade through Belgium. Now,

618
00:33:31,640 --> 00:33:37,040
Speaker 1: this would necessitate Germany break like basically Belgium's and neutral power.

619
00:33:37,440 --> 00:33:40,240
Speaker 1: So this would like necessitate Germany launch a war of

620
00:33:40,280 --> 00:33:43,440
Speaker 1: aggression against a neutral power. And Britain had an agreement

621
00:33:43,480 --> 00:33:45,520
Speaker 1: with Belgium that they would defend them from this sort

622
00:33:45,560 --> 00:33:48,120
Speaker 1: of thing. So basically the nature of the Schleepen plan

623
00:33:48,320 --> 00:33:51,240
Speaker 1: essentially guaranteed that Britain would get involved in a war

624
00:33:51,400 --> 00:33:56,320
Speaker 1: between France and Germany. Um so it's not a great plan.

625
00:33:56,480 --> 00:33:59,200
Speaker 1: It's a very detailed and elaborate plan, but it's not

626
00:33:59,320 --> 00:34:03,160
Speaker 1: a good idea DIA and it's just like dot com article.

627
00:34:03,320 --> 00:34:05,360
Speaker 1: He's like, all right, here's what I want to do,

628
00:34:05,680 --> 00:34:08,400
Speaker 1: and everyone's like, um, well, at least he came up

629
00:34:08,480 --> 00:34:11,719
Speaker 1: with a plan. I mean, you could argue that it

630
00:34:11,840 --> 00:34:15,200
Speaker 1: was the best possible plan in the impossible situation that

631
00:34:16,280 --> 00:34:19,799
Speaker 1: Germany no, no, no, But like if you like, if

632
00:34:19,880 --> 00:34:22,279
Speaker 1: you have to try to beat Russia a sixth of

633
00:34:22,320 --> 00:34:25,400
Speaker 1: the world and France, the second largest military power in

634
00:34:25,480 --> 00:34:28,840
Speaker 1: Europe simultaneously, there's really no good way to do that.

635
00:34:31,560 --> 00:34:34,319
Speaker 1: And in in Schleifen's defense, this actually came very close

636
00:34:34,400 --> 00:34:37,560
Speaker 1: to working. Like Germany almost won World War One very

637
00:34:37,600 --> 00:34:42,480
Speaker 1: early on. They didn't in everything else that happened, have

638
00:34:42,560 --> 00:34:44,799
Speaker 1: you had to come to Schlepen's defense. In this way,

639
00:34:46,080 --> 00:34:48,720
Speaker 1: it's more just pointing out, like I think it's important

640
00:34:48,760 --> 00:34:51,600
Speaker 1: to note how powerful the German army was. The German

641
00:34:51,760 --> 00:34:55,000
Speaker 1: army essentially on its own because Austria Hungary was useless

642
00:34:55,080 --> 00:34:57,719
Speaker 1: and their allies, the Italians, turned their backs on them

643
00:34:57,719 --> 00:35:01,560
Speaker 1: almost immediately. So Germany on their own own conquered a

644
00:35:01,680 --> 00:35:06,320
Speaker 1: huge chunk of France, beat Russia, beat Romania, and conquered

645
00:35:06,440 --> 00:35:09,840
Speaker 1: the majority like almost one a war against the entire world.

646
00:35:10,280 --> 00:35:13,040
Speaker 1: And that's the force that this guy inherits, this like

647
00:35:13,239 --> 00:35:16,600
Speaker 1: young man with anger problems. So it's it's it's less

648
00:35:16,640 --> 00:35:18,560
Speaker 1: like a guy with a gun collection and a guy

649
00:35:18,680 --> 00:35:22,960
Speaker 1: with a new collection. Um like he's he that's the

650
00:35:23,080 --> 00:35:25,800
Speaker 1: power of the army that he he gets as birthright,

651
00:35:26,520 --> 00:35:29,960
Speaker 1: which maybe means you shouldn't get armies by birthright. Now

652
00:35:30,080 --> 00:35:36,719
Speaker 1: there's now there's something to think about. Hold on a second, Yeah, yeah,

653
00:35:37,000 --> 00:35:40,600
Speaker 1: so uh, it's a bad it's a bad idea. So basically,

654
00:35:40,680 --> 00:35:43,440
Speaker 1: the Sleeping Plan means that by necessity, there would be

655
00:35:43,520 --> 00:35:48,279
Speaker 1: no defensive wars for Germany under the Kaiser. So another

656
00:35:48,400 --> 00:35:50,920
Speaker 1: general close to the Kaiser was Helm with fun Moltka.

657
00:35:51,239 --> 00:35:53,440
Speaker 1: Moltka was one of the relatively few people who was

658
00:35:53,480 --> 00:35:56,480
Speaker 1: brave enough to criticize kaiserville Helm to his face. The

659
00:35:56,600 --> 00:35:58,920
Speaker 1: cause of his ire in the first case was the

660
00:35:59,040 --> 00:36:02,480
Speaker 1: annual German war games, particularly the fact that every year

661
00:36:02,800 --> 00:36:05,080
Speaker 1: they were arranged so that the Kaiser would win no

662
00:36:05,239 --> 00:36:08,080
Speaker 1: matter what he did. Von moltkea was convinced that the

663
00:36:08,160 --> 00:36:11,200
Speaker 1: next European war would be an enormous, bloody affair consisting

664
00:36:11,239 --> 00:36:13,960
Speaker 1: of millions of men and entire nations at arms. He

665
00:36:14,040 --> 00:36:16,960
Speaker 1: did not think set piece war games like Germany practice

666
00:36:17,160 --> 00:36:19,759
Speaker 1: were adequately preparing her for this sort of conflict. And

667
00:36:19,760 --> 00:36:22,240
Speaker 1: I'm gonna quote a passage now from von Moltka's memoires,

668
00:36:24,200 --> 00:36:26,200
Speaker 1: and this is him talking to the Kaiser. And when

669
00:36:26,239 --> 00:36:28,279
Speaker 1: I now look at the strategic war game plans which

670
00:36:28,320 --> 00:36:31,120
Speaker 1: are put before your majesty year after year, regularly ending

671
00:36:31,160 --> 00:36:33,560
Speaker 1: with the taking prisoner of enemy armies consisting of five

672
00:36:33,680 --> 00:36:36,080
Speaker 1: or six hundred thousand men, and that too after only

673
00:36:36,080 --> 00:36:38,760
Speaker 1: a few days of operations, I cannot avoid the feeling

674
00:36:38,800 --> 00:36:40,680
Speaker 1: that this in no way meets the conditions of war.

675
00:36:41,000 --> 00:36:44,080
Speaker 1: I cannot engage in such war games. Your Majesty knows

676
00:36:44,120 --> 00:36:46,920
Speaker 1: yourself that the army is led by you, regularly encircled

677
00:36:46,960 --> 00:36:49,040
Speaker 1: the enemy, and in this way allegedly in the war

678
00:36:49,160 --> 00:36:52,040
Speaker 1: with one blow. In my opinion, these results can only

679
00:36:52,120 --> 00:36:55,160
Speaker 1: be brought about by forcefully distorting circumstances in such a

680
00:36:55,200 --> 00:36:57,600
Speaker 1: way that the basic principle that the war games should

681
00:36:57,600 --> 00:36:59,799
Speaker 1: be a study for real war and should take into

682
00:36:59,840 --> 00:37:02,120
Speaker 1: a out all the friction and obstacles that arise in

683
00:37:02,200 --> 00:37:04,840
Speaker 1: war is not met. This kind of war game, in

684
00:37:04,920 --> 00:37:07,560
Speaker 1: which to a certain extent your Majesty's enemy is at

685
00:37:07,640 --> 00:37:10,520
Speaker 1: your mercy with his hands tied from the outset, must

686
00:37:10,560 --> 00:37:13,240
Speaker 1: give rise to false ideas which can only be pernicious

687
00:37:13,280 --> 00:37:15,400
Speaker 1: when war comes. But in my view this is not

688
00:37:15,480 --> 00:37:17,160
Speaker 1: the worst part of it. I hold it to be

689
00:37:17,239 --> 00:37:19,400
Speaker 1: even more disturbing that the distorted war games have the

690
00:37:19,440 --> 00:37:22,000
Speaker 1: effect of destroying their interest. For the wide circle of

691
00:37:22,080 --> 00:37:25,160
Speaker 1: officers involved, everybody has the feeling that it doesn't matter

692
00:37:25,239 --> 00:37:27,759
Speaker 1: what you do. A higher destiny controls the business and

693
00:37:27,840 --> 00:37:30,200
Speaker 1: brings it one way or another to the desired conclusion.

694
00:37:30,560 --> 00:37:33,360
Speaker 1: Your Majesty will have noticed that it becomes increasingly difficult

695
00:37:33,400 --> 00:37:36,239
Speaker 1: to find officers who want to exercise command against you.

696
00:37:36,719 --> 00:37:39,440
Speaker 1: This is because everyone says, I'll only be wiped off

697
00:37:39,480 --> 00:37:42,320
Speaker 1: the map. However, what I complain about most, and what

698
00:37:42,440 --> 00:37:44,560
Speaker 1: I must say to your Majesty, is that because of

699
00:37:44,640 --> 00:37:47,400
Speaker 1: all this, the officer's confidence in their supreme commander is

700
00:37:47,480 --> 00:37:50,600
Speaker 1: severely shaken. The officers say that the Kaiser is much

701
00:37:50,680 --> 00:37:53,120
Speaker 1: too clever not to notice how everything is arranged, and

702
00:37:53,200 --> 00:37:55,520
Speaker 1: that he shall turn out to win, so that must

703
00:37:55,560 --> 00:37:59,360
Speaker 1: be the way he wants it now. The Kaiser express

704
00:37:59,400 --> 00:38:01,960
Speaker 1: shocked to that things had been arranged this way, and

705
00:38:02,000 --> 00:38:04,000
Speaker 1: claimed to have no idea that the war games he

706
00:38:04,080 --> 00:38:07,440
Speaker 1: took part in every year were rigged. Honestly. Yeah, I

707
00:38:07,520 --> 00:38:10,640
Speaker 1: think he's just deluded. Yeah, I think that he. I mean,

708
00:38:10,800 --> 00:38:13,000
Speaker 1: it's like, given his upbringing and the fact that just

709
00:38:13,200 --> 00:38:16,040
Speaker 1: no one has ever pointed anything out to him in

710
00:38:16,160 --> 00:38:19,759
Speaker 1: his entire life, like it tracks that he's like, wait

711
00:38:19,800 --> 00:38:23,440
Speaker 1: a second, I'm not fucking the coolest person that's ever.

712
00:38:23,719 --> 00:38:26,680
Speaker 1: I'm not the best military leader in history, especially at

713
00:38:26,760 --> 00:38:29,000
Speaker 1: this point where he's been in charge for so long too,

714
00:38:29,160 --> 00:38:32,200
Speaker 1: Like no one has negged him in decades. Yeah, not

715
00:38:32,320 --> 00:38:37,279
Speaker 1: since Hince Peter, Yeah exactly. Uh yeah, And that a

716
00:38:37,400 --> 00:38:41,640
Speaker 1: great thing. From an early age, Wilhelm the Second had

717
00:38:41,680 --> 00:38:45,560
Speaker 1: been obsessed with warships like most boys, But unlike most boys,

718
00:38:45,640 --> 00:38:47,719
Speaker 1: he came up to own a nation, and he was

719
00:38:47,760 --> 00:38:50,600
Speaker 1: able to indulge in his obsession with naval boats. This

720
00:38:50,760 --> 00:38:54,040
Speaker 1: quickly became a problem. See England's thing was being the

721
00:38:54,120 --> 00:38:56,480
Speaker 1: best at having a navy. Since they were a tiny

722
00:38:56,600 --> 00:38:59,320
Speaker 1: country with a very tiny army, the Royal Navy was

723
00:38:59,400 --> 00:39:02,680
Speaker 1: really the only thing that ensured Great britain safety. Germany

724
00:39:02,800 --> 00:39:05,560
Speaker 1: was the unquestioned military master of Europe, and the only

725
00:39:05,680 --> 00:39:08,359
Speaker 1: reason that Britain didn't worry more was that they had

726
00:39:08,480 --> 00:39:12,000
Speaker 1: naval supremacy. But in eighteen ninety seven Wilhelm made an

727
00:39:12,040 --> 00:39:15,759
Speaker 1: admiral named Alfred von Turpet's the secretary of the Navy. Now,

728
00:39:15,880 --> 00:39:18,080
Speaker 1: his reasons for this were simple. Turpets was good at

729
00:39:18,120 --> 00:39:21,640
Speaker 1: praising the Kaiser and making him feel included in naval decisions.

730
00:39:22,200 --> 00:39:24,920
Speaker 1: Turpets had realized on their first meeting that the Kaiser

731
00:39:25,040 --> 00:39:28,040
Speaker 1: quote did not live in the real world, and had

732
00:39:28,080 --> 00:39:30,920
Speaker 1: discovered that he could very easily manipulate the Emperor by

733
00:39:31,000 --> 00:39:33,920
Speaker 1: painting a lurid picture of a gallant and unstoppable high

734
00:39:34,000 --> 00:39:37,560
Speaker 1: seas fleet. In eight seven, the year after the Kaiser's

735
00:39:37,600 --> 00:39:41,600
Speaker 1: disastrous Krueger Telegram where he praised people for killing British soldiers,

736
00:39:42,000 --> 00:39:46,240
Speaker 1: Germany passed its first naval bill, announcing a massive expansion

737
00:39:46,280 --> 00:39:48,640
Speaker 1: of the fleet. Coming a year after the Kaiser praised

738
00:39:48,680 --> 00:39:50,920
Speaker 1: one of Britain's enemies for defeating her soldiers, this was

739
00:39:51,000 --> 00:39:57,000
Speaker 1: not seen as a friendly move all right. According to

740
00:39:57,120 --> 00:40:00,239
Speaker 1: John sat a professor at the University of Virginia, the

741
00:40:00,320 --> 00:40:04,040
Speaker 1: Kaiser often indignantly denied that Germany was challenging Britain's domination

742
00:40:04,080 --> 00:40:05,719
Speaker 1: of the seas, but there is clear evidence that this

743
00:40:05,840 --> 00:40:08,120
Speaker 1: was in fact the aim of Admiral Alfred von Turpets,

744
00:40:08,120 --> 00:40:09,840
Speaker 1: whom he had made Secretary of the Navy in eighteen

745
00:40:09,920 --> 00:40:12,360
Speaker 1: ninety seven. When in nineteen o four Britain settled its

746
00:40:12,400 --> 00:40:15,480
Speaker 1: outstanding disputes with France, the Kaiser, at Bulow's suggestion, went

747
00:40:15,520 --> 00:40:18,160
Speaker 1: to Tangier the following year to challenge France's position in

748
00:40:18,239 --> 00:40:22,080
Speaker 1: Morocco by announcing German support from Iroccan independence. His hopes

749
00:40:22,120 --> 00:40:24,480
Speaker 1: of thereby showing that Britain was of no value as

750
00:40:24,480 --> 00:40:26,840
Speaker 1: an ally to France were disappointed at the nineteen o

751
00:40:26,920 --> 00:40:29,680
Speaker 1: six Algiers Conference, in which the Germans were forced to

752
00:40:29,719 --> 00:40:33,480
Speaker 1: accept French predominance over Morocco. In nineteen o eight, William

753
00:40:33,560 --> 00:40:35,960
Speaker 1: caused great excitement in Germany by giving, after a visit

754
00:40:36,000 --> 00:40:39,080
Speaker 1: to England, a tackless interview to the Daily Telegraph, telling

755
00:40:39,160 --> 00:40:41,480
Speaker 1: his interviewer that large sections of the German people were

756
00:40:41,480 --> 00:40:44,320
Speaker 1: anti English. He had sent the text beforehand to Buelow,

757
00:40:44,320 --> 00:40:46,640
Speaker 1: who had probably neglected to read it, and who defended

758
00:40:46,719 --> 00:40:49,399
Speaker 1: his master very lamely in the Reichstag. This led will

759
00:40:49,440 --> 00:40:51,560
Speaker 1: Help to play a less prominent role in public affairs,

760
00:40:51,760 --> 00:40:53,840
Speaker 1: and feeling that he had been betrayed by Buelow, he

761
00:40:53,920 --> 00:40:57,440
Speaker 1: replaced him with Theovold Bond Bethman. Holwig beth Man's attempts

762
00:40:57,480 --> 00:40:59,920
Speaker 1: to reach agreement with Britain failed because Britain would not

763
00:41:00,040 --> 00:41:02,840
Speaker 1: promised neutrality in a war between Germany and France unless

764
00:41:03,000 --> 00:41:06,440
Speaker 1: Germany would limit its fleet. This, the Kaiser interprets refused

765
00:41:06,480 --> 00:41:09,960
Speaker 1: to do. So, there's a chance to stop Britain from

766
00:41:10,000 --> 00:41:13,000
Speaker 1: coming in against Germany and World War One, but he

767
00:41:13,080 --> 00:41:15,239
Speaker 1: has to not build a shipload of boats. And the

768
00:41:15,360 --> 00:41:19,040
Speaker 1: Kaiser really wants a shipload of toy boats, I mean,

769
00:41:19,120 --> 00:41:21,640
Speaker 1: and he's one, and and again. You can track that

770
00:41:21,960 --> 00:41:25,759
Speaker 1: way the funk back. His man loves his boats. He

771
00:41:25,920 --> 00:41:30,560
Speaker 1: loves his fucking boats. Jesus. Now, that Moroccan crisis that

772
00:41:30,600 --> 00:41:33,000
Speaker 1: was talked about in the quote above very nearly resulted

773
00:41:33,040 --> 00:41:35,279
Speaker 1: in World War One breaking out in nineteen o six,

774
00:41:35,719 --> 00:41:38,640
Speaker 1: and in that case, the Kaiser and everyone were lucky

775
00:41:38,719 --> 00:41:41,239
Speaker 1: that cooler heads were able to pull Europe's fat out

776
00:41:41,280 --> 00:41:43,279
Speaker 1: of the fire. But the fact that things had gotten

777
00:41:43,320 --> 00:41:45,759
Speaker 1: that close was evidence that the Kaiser's utter lack of

778
00:41:45,880 --> 00:41:49,480
Speaker 1: competent ministers and gut focused foreign policy was basically the

779
00:41:49,560 --> 00:41:53,240
Speaker 1: world's deadliest game of dice. The series of bad decisions

780
00:41:53,320 --> 00:41:55,960
Speaker 1: that would lead the world into blood soaked calamity started

781
00:41:56,000 --> 00:41:59,120
Speaker 1: in nineteen o nine, when Austria Hungary announced the formal

782
00:41:59,160 --> 00:42:03,759
Speaker 1: annexation of Bosnia and Hurtzgovina. These provinces had been administered

783
00:42:03,800 --> 00:42:06,480
Speaker 1: by Vienna since eighteen seventy eight, but they were formerly

784
00:42:06,600 --> 00:42:09,920
Speaker 1: part of the Ottoman Empire. When the Young Turk rebellions

785
00:42:09,920 --> 00:42:13,000
Speaker 1: swept the Ottoman Empire and imposed a constitution on the Sultan,

786
00:42:13,320 --> 00:42:15,520
Speaker 1: Austria Hungary saw it as a chance to write what

787
00:42:15,640 --> 00:42:19,440
Speaker 1: they saw as a historical wrong. Now the Ottoman Empire

788
00:42:19,560 --> 00:42:21,800
Speaker 1: was allied with Germany, and that alliance was one of

789
00:42:21,840 --> 00:42:25,239
Speaker 1: Wilhelm's very few successes. But the Kaiser was unhappy with

790
00:42:25,320 --> 00:42:28,200
Speaker 1: the Young Turk Revolution because the constitution they forced on

791
00:42:28,239 --> 00:42:30,640
Speaker 1: the Sultan was made an imitation of Great Britain, and

792
00:42:30,719 --> 00:42:34,279
Speaker 1: Wilhelm took offense to this, backing Austria Hungary in This

793
00:42:34,440 --> 00:42:36,719
Speaker 1: was an odd decision, especially given the fact that one

794
00:42:36,719 --> 00:42:39,040
Speaker 1: of Wilhelm's later schemes was to try and win the

795
00:42:39,120 --> 00:42:42,120
Speaker 1: Muslim world over to his banner. And we're gonna talk

796
00:42:42,120 --> 00:42:44,920
Speaker 1: about that Before we talk about how Kaiser Wilhelm tried

797
00:42:44,960 --> 00:42:47,279
Speaker 1: to win over the Muslims. Let's talk about how these

798
00:42:47,320 --> 00:42:49,440
Speaker 1: products and services are going to try to win over

799
00:42:49,960 --> 00:42:58,360
Speaker 1: year dollars. Smooth transition as usual, Robbert may maybe my best. Yeah, products,

800
00:43:04,480 --> 00:43:08,160
Speaker 1: we're back now. We're talking about Kaiser Wilhelm's attempt to

801
00:43:08,200 --> 00:43:10,600
Speaker 1: make all the Muslims love him. Uh that that may

802
00:43:10,640 --> 00:43:12,920
Speaker 1: seem weird, but there's logic behind it. See, the British

803
00:43:12,960 --> 00:43:15,960
Speaker 1: Empire ruled a huge chunk of the Muslim world in

804
00:43:16,000 --> 00:43:18,960
Speaker 1: the French Empire did as well, and most of those

805
00:43:19,040 --> 00:43:22,239
Speaker 1: Muslims were unhappy with this fact. If Wilhelm could earn

806
00:43:22,320 --> 00:43:24,680
Speaker 1: their loyalty. He thought it would provide him with another

807
00:43:24,719 --> 00:43:28,160
Speaker 1: weapon to use against England. Friendship with the Ottomans also

808
00:43:28,280 --> 00:43:31,439
Speaker 1: helped counter Germany's isolation, which was only a thing because

809
00:43:31,520 --> 00:43:35,440
Speaker 1: ville Helms sucked at diplomacy. He said, this, and the

810
00:43:35,520 --> 00:43:38,520
Speaker 1: present very tense circumstances, when we stand almost alone in

811
00:43:38,600 --> 00:43:41,080
Speaker 1: the face of great coalitions which are being formed against us,

812
00:43:41,120 --> 00:43:43,920
Speaker 1: our last trump card is Islam and the Mohammedan world.

813
00:43:45,200 --> 00:43:47,920
Speaker 1: So Wilhelm saw the young Turks and their Anglo friendliness

814
00:43:47,960 --> 00:43:50,600
Speaker 1: as an attack on his hard won courtship of their empire,

815
00:43:50,840 --> 00:43:52,920
Speaker 1: so he threw them under the bus to support Austria

816
00:43:53,000 --> 00:43:56,759
Speaker 1: Hungary's ambitions. This trend of supporting Austria Hungary, regardless of

817
00:43:56,840 --> 00:43:59,400
Speaker 1: what it did, would prove to be all of Europe's undoing,

818
00:43:59,719 --> 00:44:03,480
Speaker 1: As Rolls Biography notes, from then onwards, Kaiser Villehelm ardently

819
00:44:03,480 --> 00:44:06,960
Speaker 1: supported his allies initiative, and as usuable overshot the mark

820
00:44:07,000 --> 00:44:10,240
Speaker 1: in his martial Enthusiasm on the possibility of war between

821
00:44:10,280 --> 00:44:13,360
Speaker 1: Austria Hungary and Serbia loomed, he exclaimed, if only it

822
00:44:13,400 --> 00:44:15,840
Speaker 1: would start. He was fully aware of the danger that

823
00:44:15,880 --> 00:44:17,800
Speaker 1: Germany could be drawn into a war against France and

824
00:44:17,880 --> 00:44:20,920
Speaker 1: Russia by a Balkan conflict. Thirteen years earlier, on November eight,

825
00:44:21,880 --> 00:44:25,239
Speaker 1: Philhelm the second had assured the Austro Hungarian ambassador, Count

826
00:44:25,760 --> 00:44:28,200
Speaker 1: uh let Us law Van, I'm not going to try

827
00:44:28,200 --> 00:44:31,359
Speaker 1: to pronounce his sucker's name, the Austro Hungarian ambassador quite

828
00:44:31,360 --> 00:44:33,719
Speaker 1: plainly that he would stand at Austria Hungary side with

829
00:44:33,800 --> 00:44:36,840
Speaker 1: all the forces at my disposal, without any further inquiry

830
00:44:36,880 --> 00:44:39,000
Speaker 1: as to whether there's any cause for war that exists

831
00:44:39,040 --> 00:44:42,120
Speaker 1: in our accordance with our Treaty of Alliance. Uh You're

832
00:44:42,160 --> 00:44:44,600
Speaker 1: all highest Sovereign France, Joseph may be quite sure that

833
00:44:44,640 --> 00:44:47,200
Speaker 1: if at any moment the position of Austro Hungarian monarchy

834
00:44:47,280 --> 00:44:50,040
Speaker 1: is an issue, my entire fighting forces will be immediately

835
00:44:50,120 --> 00:44:54,720
Speaker 1: and unconditionally at his disposal. So the Kaiser gives Austria

836
00:44:54,800 --> 00:44:57,320
Speaker 1: Hungary a blank check to do whatever they want. And

837
00:44:57,400 --> 00:45:00,320
Speaker 1: it's this would wind up probably being the key stake

838
00:45:00,480 --> 00:45:04,960
Speaker 1: most responsible for plunging Europe into the First World War. Yeah,

839
00:45:05,120 --> 00:45:08,920
Speaker 1: it seems to be the popular opinion. Yeah. Yeah. When

840
00:45:09,040 --> 00:45:12,120
Speaker 1: Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated by a Serbian partisan in

841
00:45:12,160 --> 00:45:15,080
Speaker 1: the summer of nineteen fourteen, it made Austria's war against

842
00:45:15,120 --> 00:45:18,440
Speaker 1: Serbia inevitable. Russia was bound to come to Serbia's defense,

843
00:45:18,480 --> 00:45:21,320
Speaker 1: and the Kaiser had repeatedly promised loudly and publicly to

844
00:45:21,480 --> 00:45:25,440
Speaker 1: back Austria Hungary in any such war. Now, there's been

845
00:45:25,440 --> 00:45:28,239
Speaker 1: another Balkan crisis in nineteen twelve and thirteen that had

846
00:45:28,239 --> 00:45:30,560
Speaker 1: almost led Europe off a cliff into war, but again

847
00:45:30,640 --> 00:45:33,759
Speaker 1: cooler heads had talked things down this time. However, in

848
00:45:33,880 --> 00:45:37,480
Speaker 1: nineteen fourteen, there were fewer cooler heads available. For one thing,

849
00:45:37,560 --> 00:45:41,040
Speaker 1: the Kaiser's best friend, Yuhlenberg was no longer in the picture.

850
00:45:41,440 --> 00:45:44,719
Speaker 1: A complex blackmail plot, orchestrated in part by pro war

851
00:45:44,880 --> 00:45:48,160
Speaker 1: elements in the German government, had been executed against Yuhlenberg.

852
00:45:48,440 --> 00:45:51,440
Speaker 1: The chief cause for this was Uhlenberg's pacifism. Once he

853
00:45:51,520 --> 00:45:53,600
Speaker 1: was out of the picture, the Kaiser had no friends

854
00:45:53,680 --> 00:45:55,520
Speaker 1: close to him who actually cared about him as a

855
00:45:55,600 --> 00:45:58,400
Speaker 1: human being. Yuhlenberg was a lickspittle, but he was a

856
00:45:58,440 --> 00:46:01,400
Speaker 1: lickspittle who legitimately had Helm's best interest at heart and

857
00:46:01,480 --> 00:46:03,920
Speaker 1: didn't want a war. Sorry, can you unpack the term

858
00:46:04,040 --> 00:46:07,799
Speaker 1: lick spittle? Yeah, he's he's a sickophant. He's somebody who

859
00:46:07,880 --> 00:46:09,680
Speaker 1: just is going to praise the leader and not going

860
00:46:09,719 --> 00:46:11,960
Speaker 1: to question them too much. Is that your word or

861
00:46:12,040 --> 00:46:13,879
Speaker 1: is that someone else? No? No, no, no, no, that's

862
00:46:13,880 --> 00:46:17,360
Speaker 1: a that's a common word. Yeah, says from the I

863
00:46:17,480 --> 00:46:23,640
Speaker 1: learned it from the Simpsons. Says okay, Well, Finelenberg gone.

864
00:46:23,840 --> 00:46:27,480
Speaker 1: The Kaiser's next best friend was Prince max Egan of Boten,

865
00:46:27,520 --> 00:46:30,320
Speaker 1: who was closely related to the Emperor of Austria Hungary,

866
00:46:30,600 --> 00:46:32,600
Speaker 1: which of course had drawn the Kaiser close to the

867
00:46:32,640 --> 00:46:35,520
Speaker 1: Austrian royal family, which made him make more and more

868
00:46:35,600 --> 00:46:39,080
Speaker 1: dumb promises. I'm simplifying things here by quite a lot

869
00:46:39,160 --> 00:46:40,640
Speaker 1: because we only have so much time. But I think

870
00:46:40,680 --> 00:46:42,719
Speaker 1: this paints the essential picture of what went on to

871
00:46:42,800 --> 00:46:44,560
Speaker 1: bring pille Helm to a point where he was willing

872
00:46:44,600 --> 00:46:46,759
Speaker 1: to make these bad, bad, bad calls. I mean, it

873
00:46:46,920 --> 00:46:49,799
Speaker 1: is kind of remarkable, this hearing it all out in order,

874
00:46:49,960 --> 00:46:53,399
Speaker 1: Like how long a massive conflict was avoided? Like that's

875
00:46:53,640 --> 00:46:57,440
Speaker 1: there's been There's so many close scrapes before something actually

876
00:46:57,480 --> 00:47:01,640
Speaker 1: starts yep, yep, yep. And yeah, there were a lot

877
00:47:01,719 --> 00:47:03,759
Speaker 1: of other things going on. One of them was cold,

878
00:47:03,880 --> 00:47:06,759
Speaker 1: ugly math. The German general staff had this fabulous plan

879
00:47:06,840 --> 00:47:08,719
Speaker 1: cooked up by Schleief and to win a two front

880
00:47:08,760 --> 00:47:10,960
Speaker 1: war in Europe, and they kept careful tabs on both

881
00:47:11,000 --> 00:47:14,080
Speaker 1: the Russian and French armies, and they calculated that nineteen

882
00:47:14,160 --> 00:47:16,800
Speaker 1: fourteen was basically the best year possible for them to

883
00:47:16,880 --> 00:47:19,160
Speaker 1: have a war like this if it was inevitable, which

884
00:47:19,200 --> 00:47:22,480
Speaker 1: they thought it was because both nations had started revamping

885
00:47:22,520 --> 00:47:26,000
Speaker 1: their field armies. So this exact sequence of events that

886
00:47:26,080 --> 00:47:28,000
Speaker 1: led to the outbreak of hostilities in World War One

887
00:47:28,160 --> 00:47:29,880
Speaker 1: is too long a story to fit in at the

888
00:47:29,960 --> 00:47:32,520
Speaker 1: end of an episode, and kaiserville Helm's exact level of

889
00:47:32,560 --> 00:47:35,839
Speaker 1: blame is heavily debated to this day. Um Rolf's book

890
00:47:35,840 --> 00:47:38,920
Speaker 1: paints him as an eager belligerent wringing his hands in anticipation.

891
00:47:39,400 --> 00:47:42,200
Speaker 1: Um he was not excited for war precisely, but he

892
00:47:42,360 --> 00:47:45,200
Speaker 1: was excited for a major diplomatic victory that would humble

893
00:47:45,280 --> 00:47:50,320
Speaker 1: Russia in Britain without a shot being fired. Fighting, Yeah, exactly.

894
00:47:50,400 --> 00:47:52,560
Speaker 1: He understood fighting might result, and he was willing to

895
00:47:52,600 --> 00:47:54,520
Speaker 1: take that risk, but he didn't want it to come

896
00:47:54,560 --> 00:47:57,840
Speaker 1: to that. He attempted to mediate between Austria and Serbia

897
00:47:58,040 --> 00:48:01,000
Speaker 1: and was briefly optimistic of peace once Serbians yielded the

898
00:48:01,080 --> 00:48:03,719
Speaker 1: most of Austria's demands, but then his ally decided to

899
00:48:03,760 --> 00:48:07,239
Speaker 1: go to war anyway, and the Kaiser backed him. Still now,

900
00:48:07,600 --> 00:48:10,880
Speaker 1: vander Kiss's biography paints a more reticent picture of Wilhelm.

901
00:48:11,040 --> 00:48:13,239
Speaker 1: His belligerent words and threats of violence were the same

902
00:48:13,280 --> 00:48:15,680
Speaker 1: sort of impulsive passing fancies that had steered him his

903
00:48:15,840 --> 00:48:18,360
Speaker 1: entire life. He was a rich kid with poor impulse control,

904
00:48:18,560 --> 00:48:21,200
Speaker 1: but he ultimately didn't want war, and when it came,

905
00:48:21,280 --> 00:48:24,680
Speaker 1: he was horribly anxious over the whole affair. Writing years later,

906
00:48:24,800 --> 00:48:28,160
Speaker 1: Buello recalled no German, and above all, no English pacifist

907
00:48:28,280 --> 00:48:30,400
Speaker 1: was filled with a profounder or more honest love of

908
00:48:30,440 --> 00:48:32,680
Speaker 1: peace than was William the Second. It was his own

909
00:48:32,800 --> 00:48:35,239
Speaker 1: and our misfortune that his words and his gestures never

910
00:48:35,360 --> 00:48:38,120
Speaker 1: coincided with his real attitude in the manner when he

911
00:48:38,160 --> 00:48:40,359
Speaker 1: boasted or even threatened people in words, it was often

912
00:48:40,400 --> 00:48:43,600
Speaker 1: because he wanted to allay his own timidity. I think

913
00:48:43,680 --> 00:48:48,560
Speaker 1: that's right. He's like, he's an awkward, sad, insecure kid

914
00:48:49,080 --> 00:48:52,399
Speaker 1: who winds up boasting and threatening because he doesn't he's

915
00:48:52,440 --> 00:48:56,640
Speaker 1: fundamentally insecure, and because he's a crowned head of a nation,

916
00:48:57,239 --> 00:48:59,520
Speaker 1: it helps lead to war. I feel like, yeah, that

917
00:48:59,640 --> 00:49:02,040
Speaker 1: does like kind of the story of World War One

918
00:49:02,200 --> 00:49:04,400
Speaker 1: in a lot of ways, where it's like the the

919
00:49:05,320 --> 00:49:08,200
Speaker 1: you know, the social conflicts are generally directing stuff, but

920
00:49:08,320 --> 00:49:12,480
Speaker 1: then the funked up inbred leaders, are you know, able

921
00:49:12,520 --> 00:49:17,040
Speaker 1: to be manipulated accordingly? Yeah, and you know there was.

922
00:49:17,200 --> 00:49:19,400
Speaker 1: There was a big debate and has been for it

923
00:49:19,480 --> 00:49:22,000
Speaker 1: still continues as to who is responsible for World War One.

924
00:49:22,120 --> 00:49:24,840
Speaker 1: The nation of Germany was forced to take responsibility in

925
00:49:24,920 --> 00:49:27,080
Speaker 1: the Treaty of her Saille, which was not fair. Um,

926
00:49:27,719 --> 00:49:30,839
Speaker 1: Germany and the Kaiser are not mostly responsible for World

927
00:49:30,920 --> 00:49:32,920
Speaker 1: War One because there's so much blame to be shared

928
00:49:32,960 --> 00:49:35,719
Speaker 1: by different nations. But you could make a strong case

929
00:49:35,840 --> 00:49:38,880
Speaker 1: that the single individual with the largest share of the

930
00:49:38,960 --> 00:49:43,040
Speaker 1: blame is kaiserville Helm the second you can make that case. Yeah,

931
00:49:43,160 --> 00:49:45,600
Speaker 1: I mean, and it was like he was It feels

932
00:49:45,600 --> 00:49:47,279
Speaker 1: like his whole life is setting him up to do

933
00:49:47,520 --> 00:49:51,680
Speaker 1: this level of exactly you can see it coming from

934
00:49:51,920 --> 00:49:57,680
Speaker 1: so far away. It's infuriating. Yeah. Now, once war was joined,

935
00:49:57,800 --> 00:49:59,640
Speaker 1: the Kaiser was hopeful that it would be a short,

936
00:50:00,000 --> 00:50:02,400
Speaker 1: satively bloodless affair and would leave the overall map of

937
00:50:02,480 --> 00:50:04,880
Speaker 1: Europe relatively unchanged. He's not a Hitler type guy. He

938
00:50:04,920 --> 00:50:07,120
Speaker 1: doesn't want to conquer France, and he doesn't want to

939
00:50:07,160 --> 00:50:09,920
Speaker 1: own and hold Belgium forever. He wants to move through

940
00:50:10,000 --> 00:50:12,800
Speaker 1: Belgium and then eventually leave. He wants to beat France

941
00:50:12,840 --> 00:50:14,920
Speaker 1: in a war and then sign a treaty with them,

942
00:50:15,000 --> 00:50:16,719
Speaker 1: take a little bit more of their land, maybe, but

943
00:50:16,760 --> 00:50:19,560
Speaker 1: he wants France to still exist. He doesn't really want

944
00:50:19,560 --> 00:50:22,479
Speaker 1: to destroy England as a as a nation. He doesn't

945
00:50:22,520 --> 00:50:25,040
Speaker 1: want to conquer. He doesn't want to conquer the entire world,

946
00:50:25,200 --> 00:50:28,560
Speaker 1: you know, he just wants to He wants to funck

947
00:50:28,640 --> 00:50:30,480
Speaker 1: his mom, and he wants to be seen as a

948
00:50:30,520 --> 00:50:36,160
Speaker 1: military hero. I mean, don't we all in a way? Yeah? Yeah,

949
00:50:36,680 --> 00:50:40,040
Speaker 1: we all in a way do now. Vilhelm believed he'd

950
00:50:40,080 --> 00:50:42,799
Speaker 1: be able to arrange peace when it was necessary at

951
00:50:42,840 --> 00:50:45,320
Speaker 1: basically any point, by just working things out one on

952
00:50:45,400 --> 00:50:49,279
Speaker 1: one with his royal cousins. He noted that mere democracies

953
00:50:49,360 --> 00:50:52,000
Speaker 1: could never make a peace conference work because war was

954
00:50:52,200 --> 00:50:55,560
Speaker 1: a royal sport to be indulged in by hereditary monarchs

955
00:50:55,600 --> 00:50:58,680
Speaker 1: and concluded at their will. This was part of the

956
00:50:58,800 --> 00:51:00,920
Speaker 1: idea about war at the time time, which was that

957
00:51:01,520 --> 00:51:04,880
Speaker 1: war between kings never is that bad because kings are

958
00:51:04,920 --> 00:51:07,000
Speaker 1: all friends at the end, and you know, all soldiers

959
00:51:07,000 --> 00:51:08,640
Speaker 1: will kill each other for a while. But I don't

960
00:51:08,680 --> 00:51:10,359
Speaker 1: want you to lose your crown. I don't want things

961
00:51:10,400 --> 00:51:12,440
Speaker 1: to be that bad for you. We're just having a

962
00:51:12,560 --> 00:51:15,800
Speaker 1: spat and you know, once this has concluded satisfactorily, we

963
00:51:15,880 --> 00:51:18,480
Speaker 1: can go back to being friends. And then Bill hilps

964
00:51:18,520 --> 00:51:20,920
Speaker 1: idea at the start of this Yeah, well because he's yeah,

965
00:51:20,920 --> 00:51:25,160
Speaker 1: because he's like talking with his cousins, like it's like

966
00:51:25,360 --> 00:51:28,719
Speaker 1: being yeah, with just no awareness for the fact that

967
00:51:28,800 --> 00:51:32,279
Speaker 1: there is a rest of the world that this effects. Yeah,

968
00:51:32,640 --> 00:51:34,960
Speaker 1: and this is not how things worked out. Um. And

969
00:51:35,760 --> 00:51:38,640
Speaker 1: World War One was instant no, no, no, like a

970
00:51:38,800 --> 00:51:41,000
Speaker 1: quarter of a million Germans die in the first week

971
00:51:41,080 --> 00:51:44,960
Speaker 1: of fighting. Um like it's it's like hundreds of thousands

972
00:51:45,040 --> 00:51:47,400
Speaker 1: of people are dead as soon as the fighting starts,

973
00:51:48,000 --> 00:51:51,160
Speaker 1: and the Kaiser, you know, as the situation grows more serious,

974
00:51:51,239 --> 00:51:54,279
Speaker 1: the Kaiser is very quickly sidelined by his generals. He

975
00:51:54,400 --> 00:51:57,320
Speaker 1: actually had almost no role in the conduct of the

976
00:51:57,360 --> 00:52:00,320
Speaker 1: war throughout the vast majority of it. Um. It was

977
00:52:00,360 --> 00:52:03,640
Speaker 1: basically ceremonial you know, he'd address factory workers and soldiers,

978
00:52:03,719 --> 00:52:05,640
Speaker 1: and he's spent a lot of his time on vacations

979
00:52:05,680 --> 00:52:09,680
Speaker 1: at his farm. Germany increasingly became a military dictatorship, and

980
00:52:09,840 --> 00:52:11,359
Speaker 1: by the end of it, the Kaiser was as much

981
00:52:11,360 --> 00:52:13,879
Speaker 1: of a figurehead as the King of England. And of course,

982
00:52:13,920 --> 00:52:16,239
Speaker 1: when the war ended in Yeah, when the war ended

983
00:52:16,280 --> 00:52:19,760
Speaker 1: in German defeat in seventeen million deaths, Wilhelm the Second

984
00:52:19,880 --> 00:52:23,200
Speaker 1: was forced to abdicate and flee the country. He spent

985
00:52:23,280 --> 00:52:25,480
Speaker 1: the rest of his life in Dorn in the Netherlands,

986
00:52:25,680 --> 00:52:28,040
Speaker 1: living the quiet life of a country gentleman and a

987
00:52:28,040 --> 00:52:31,160
Speaker 1: global pariah until his death in nineteen forty one from

988
00:52:31,200 --> 00:52:33,840
Speaker 1: being old as shit in the end, I think the

989
00:52:33,920 --> 00:52:37,239
Speaker 1: best epitaph for this man was written by journalist Charles Lowe,

990
00:52:37,360 --> 00:52:40,680
Speaker 1: a foreign correspondent for The Times. He called Wilhelm quote

991
00:52:41,000 --> 00:52:43,239
Speaker 1: the chief creator of the war spirit which he found

992
00:52:43,280 --> 00:52:45,719
Speaker 1: it impossible to exercise or resist, and was thus, so

993
00:52:45,880 --> 00:52:48,840
Speaker 1: to say, devoured by his own offspring. For at the

994
00:52:48,960 --> 00:52:51,080
Speaker 1: last moment, when shrinking from the results of his own

995
00:52:51,120 --> 00:52:53,800
Speaker 1: creative handiwork, he allowed the sword in his own phrase,

996
00:52:54,040 --> 00:52:56,319
Speaker 1: to be thrust into his hand, which was just as

997
00:52:56,400 --> 00:52:58,320
Speaker 1: much as if he had drawn out of his own accord,

998
00:52:58,560 --> 00:53:01,320
Speaker 1: thus proving himself to be a weak willed and criminal ruler,

999
00:53:01,520 --> 00:53:04,400
Speaker 1: the most nefarious of his kind whoever sat upon a throne.

1000
00:53:05,160 --> 00:53:08,840
Speaker 1: There it is that hand comparison again, Sorry to see it,

1001
00:53:09,120 --> 00:53:12,040
Speaker 1: you hate to see it. The hand comes back to

1002
00:53:12,120 --> 00:53:15,719
Speaker 1: the hands, always back to hands with this guy. Well, yeah,

1003
00:53:15,880 --> 00:53:18,640
Speaker 1: you know what, what a coward that was set up

1004
00:53:18,719 --> 00:53:21,880
Speaker 1: to be a fucking loser. That would cost millions of

1005
00:53:21,920 --> 00:53:27,800
Speaker 1: people their lives. Yep, yep. And that's why monarchists to

1006
00:53:27,840 --> 00:53:33,239
Speaker 1: the dumbest people in the world. Yeah, they're horrible in there,

1007
00:53:33,320 --> 00:53:36,200
Speaker 1: and and I and I hate that. There's usually an

1008
00:53:36,280 --> 00:53:38,759
Speaker 1: inn to feel kind of bad for them because you're like, oh,

1009
00:53:38,800 --> 00:53:42,719
Speaker 1: you're well, why would you not be horrible monarchs like

1010
00:53:43,239 --> 00:53:46,520
Speaker 1: monarchs themselves? Like I absolutely you have to have sympathy

1011
00:53:46,560 --> 00:53:48,520
Speaker 1: for a guy like phil Helm because like funk Man,

1012
00:53:48,560 --> 00:53:50,960
Speaker 1: there's no good ending to this story. But like the

1013
00:53:51,040 --> 00:53:53,480
Speaker 1: people who want to go back to having a monarchy,

1014
00:53:54,680 --> 00:53:57,560
Speaker 1: I baffles me. I can't figure out. I'm like, do

1015
00:53:57,640 --> 00:54:02,239
Speaker 1: you just like tabloids? Like what you like fancy costumes?

1016
00:54:02,360 --> 00:54:05,000
Speaker 1: That's what this ship's about it. I mean, like you

1017
00:54:05,120 --> 00:54:07,560
Speaker 1: can still have that. There's a lot of people that

1018
00:54:07,600 --> 00:54:09,399
Speaker 1: will wear a lot of fancy. You should just start

1019
00:54:09,440 --> 00:54:12,160
Speaker 1: watching drag Grays. If you're a Marcist, just start watching

1020
00:54:12,280 --> 00:54:15,040
Speaker 1: drag Grays gay like you'll you'll get what you want,

1021
00:54:15,760 --> 00:54:19,520
Speaker 1: and so are you. I'm sorry, no, no, that's that's

1022
00:54:19,560 --> 00:54:22,200
Speaker 1: the end of my call to action for the monarchists.

1023
00:54:23,200 --> 00:54:27,480
Speaker 1: Has your level of sympathy or feeling about kaiserville Helm

1024
00:54:27,640 --> 00:54:30,200
Speaker 1: changed at all over the course of these episodes, I

1025
00:54:30,440 --> 00:54:35,480
Speaker 1: honestly my sympathy for him went up. Like I knew,

1026
00:54:35,520 --> 00:54:38,200
Speaker 1: I knew. I knew that everyone, you know, all all

1027
00:54:38,280 --> 00:54:41,759
Speaker 1: the monarchy like that were involved in the beginning of

1028
00:54:41,880 --> 00:54:46,560
Speaker 1: World War One. We're dumb as rocks, you know. But

1029
00:54:47,280 --> 00:54:50,560
Speaker 1: dumb is a bag of dead horses. But the but

1030
00:54:50,719 --> 00:54:55,480
Speaker 1: the specificity of yeah, like how how that how they

1031
00:54:55,520 --> 00:54:59,120
Speaker 1: even got that far is oh, it's it just sucks.

1032
00:54:59,400 --> 00:55:03,360
Speaker 1: It sucks. I you know, he just wanted to his

1033
00:55:03,520 --> 00:55:06,440
Speaker 1: mom to be in love with him. He just wanted

1034
00:55:06,480 --> 00:55:09,920
Speaker 1: to fuck his mom's hand and get a metal. I

1035
00:55:10,840 --> 00:55:15,319
Speaker 1: feel for her, and I feel for Germany and that, yeah, God,

1036
00:55:15,440 --> 00:55:19,480
Speaker 1: that there I'm feeling. I'm not feeling as like indignant

1037
00:55:19,520 --> 00:55:21,440
Speaker 1: and angry as I usually am. At the end of

1038
00:55:21,840 --> 00:55:25,960
Speaker 1: this I'm just feeling empty. I feel like a husk, Robert, Yeah,

1039
00:55:26,080 --> 00:55:29,640
Speaker 1: absolute husk right now. I watched an interesting movie on

1040
00:55:29,760 --> 00:55:32,440
Speaker 1: Netflix last night called The Exception, which is based on

1041
00:55:32,480 --> 00:55:34,880
Speaker 1: a book called The Kaiser's Last Kiss, and it's it's

1042
00:55:34,920 --> 00:55:39,080
Speaker 1: a fictional story about a German s S officer who

1043
00:55:39,880 --> 00:55:43,640
Speaker 1: is the head of Wilhelm's bodyguard when Germany conquers the

1044
00:55:43,719 --> 00:55:46,840
Speaker 1: country where he's staying Um at the start of the

1045
00:55:46,920 --> 00:55:50,040
Speaker 1: Second World War. And it's also about this like British

1046
00:55:50,120 --> 00:55:55,480
Speaker 1: spy and it's the movie is more sympathetic towards Wilhelm

1047
00:55:55,760 --> 00:55:58,040
Speaker 1: Um than I think the book is. The guy who

1048
00:55:58,040 --> 00:56:00,640
Speaker 1: wrote the book had like has a very deep knowledge

1049
00:56:00,680 --> 00:56:02,600
Speaker 1: of the man's Really it's a fun it's an interesting

1050
00:56:02,680 --> 00:56:05,640
Speaker 1: book that I think gives a good a very fair

1051
00:56:06,040 --> 00:56:10,719
Speaker 1: um like accounting of the man's personality and doesn't make

1052
00:56:10,760 --> 00:56:14,080
Speaker 1: him into a demon or a good guy. He's just like.

1053
00:56:14,239 --> 00:56:15,960
Speaker 1: One of the phrases that it says about him is

1054
00:56:16,040 --> 00:56:21,600
Speaker 1: that he was half genius and half child. Um. Yeah,

1055
00:56:22,560 --> 00:56:26,040
Speaker 1: and says he's there's another Do we feel he was

1056
00:56:26,080 --> 00:56:28,680
Speaker 1: a genius in anyway? Is that? Is that? Do we

1057
00:56:28,800 --> 00:56:30,759
Speaker 1: give him that I don't. I didn't see that. I

1058
00:56:30,840 --> 00:56:35,160
Speaker 1: didn't see it. Yeah, I didn't see it. There were

1059
00:56:35,239 --> 00:56:37,960
Speaker 1: some parts like his his understanding of labor rights and

1060
00:56:38,160 --> 00:56:40,200
Speaker 1: like them, like that sort of thing, like he was

1061
00:56:40,280 --> 00:56:43,120
Speaker 1: really good about certain things throughout his reign, but he

1062
00:56:43,200 --> 00:56:45,960
Speaker 1: was on the whole not a good leader. But he was, um,

1063
00:56:46,560 --> 00:56:49,160
Speaker 1: he wasn't. Like. The point this guy is making is

1064
00:56:49,280 --> 00:56:52,040
Speaker 1: that the things about him that he wasn't smart about

1065
00:56:52,320 --> 00:56:55,640
Speaker 1: led him to make a lot of his worst decisions. Mustache,

1066
00:56:56,160 --> 00:56:58,719
Speaker 1: like I mean mustache. Yeah, And when you're full of

1067
00:56:58,880 --> 00:57:01,359
Speaker 1: yes men, you know, when you're surrounded by yes men

1068
00:57:01,400 --> 00:57:03,759
Speaker 1: who won't tell you you're dumbest shit, you end up

1069
00:57:03,800 --> 00:57:08,319
Speaker 1: with that mustache and that life. Yeah, yeah, yeah, there's

1070
00:57:08,400 --> 00:57:10,160
Speaker 1: there's there's a lot of good quotes in that book.

1071
00:57:10,200 --> 00:57:13,640
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm reading the book right now and it's fun. Um,

1072
00:57:14,440 --> 00:57:16,680
Speaker 1: so maybe check that out if you want more Kaiser

1073
00:57:16,760 --> 00:57:25,480
Speaker 1: Vilhelm in your life. Um, that's a hard he if

1074
00:57:25,520 --> 00:57:29,439
Speaker 1: you'll pardon the phrase, he drew a rough hand in life.

1075
00:57:29,560 --> 00:57:32,240
Speaker 1: Oh don't say, don't mention hands in front of him.

1076
00:57:32,280 --> 00:57:35,320
Speaker 1: He loses it and then he played that hand for

1077
00:57:35,480 --> 00:57:41,240
Speaker 1: shit God, and then he's just like shaking his operational

1078
00:57:41,320 --> 00:57:44,400
Speaker 1: fist at the sky. You hate to see it. He

1079
00:57:44,560 --> 00:57:48,320
Speaker 1: might be the worst at a job that anyone's ever been. Yeah,

1080
00:57:49,080 --> 00:57:52,840
Speaker 1: like really really bad. Why you shouldn't just be given

1081
00:57:53,160 --> 00:57:58,160
Speaker 1: the most consequential jobs, not a job that should have existed. Nope,

1082
00:57:58,800 --> 00:58:01,760
Speaker 1: certainly not and you get the fielding. If he'd been

1083
00:58:01,800 --> 00:58:04,360
Speaker 1: a ceremonial monarch like the King of England is today,

1084
00:58:04,560 --> 00:58:07,160
Speaker 1: he'd been great at it. He loved marching around and

1085
00:58:07,240 --> 00:58:13,720
Speaker 1: wearing uniforms, outfit like outfits on Instagram monarch. He would

1086
00:58:13,760 --> 00:58:16,200
Speaker 1: have been very happy if he'd never had to make

1087
00:58:16,240 --> 00:58:18,560
Speaker 1: a real decision. He if he was just posting fit

1088
00:58:18,720 --> 00:58:21,240
Speaker 1: checks every day, like he would be happy as a

1089
00:58:21,280 --> 00:58:26,720
Speaker 1: little clam first posting about the Russian Army. Fine about

1090
00:58:26,800 --> 00:58:30,240
Speaker 1: his mom, Yeah, just another pick of me and mama.

1091
00:58:31,200 --> 00:58:36,520
Speaker 1: Uh yeah no. But you know, you know, monarchists, Um,

1092
00:58:38,200 --> 00:58:43,360
Speaker 1: you're idiots, you're dumb, you're unnoticed. See in the comments section. Yeah,

1093
00:58:43,400 --> 00:58:46,160
Speaker 1: we're going to really bring the monarchist listeners behind the

1094
00:58:46,240 --> 00:58:52,320
Speaker 1: bastards out of the world work. Yeah, it's one of

1095
00:58:52,360 --> 00:58:54,480
Speaker 1: those things. I had this opinion before I started doing

1096
00:58:54,520 --> 00:58:57,840
Speaker 1: this research that kings were basically the same as dictators.

1097
00:58:58,560 --> 00:59:01,400
Speaker 1: Um and I don't feel that way anymore, in part

1098
00:59:01,520 --> 00:59:05,080
Speaker 1: because of all this reading about how hopelessly everyone watched

1099
00:59:05,160 --> 00:59:08,600
Speaker 1: this guy slouched towards being in power and couldn't stop it,

1100
00:59:09,000 --> 00:59:13,040
Speaker 1: which like a dictator sees his power generally um and

1101
00:59:13,320 --> 00:59:15,520
Speaker 1: like there's not really a question about it, Like they

1102
00:59:15,600 --> 00:59:17,200
Speaker 1: take the power and even if everyone, like a lot

1103
00:59:17,200 --> 00:59:19,360
Speaker 1: of people know they're bad at it, like they take it.

1104
00:59:19,640 --> 00:59:21,560
Speaker 1: Whereas with this everyone's like, yeah, this guy's going to

1105
00:59:21,640 --> 00:59:25,000
Speaker 1: be a disaster, too bad, there's nothing to do about it, right.

1106
00:59:25,400 --> 00:59:26,880
Speaker 1: That's the thing is, Like it seems like if he

1107
00:59:27,000 --> 00:59:29,360
Speaker 1: had had been if he had been given away out

1108
00:59:29,520 --> 00:59:32,680
Speaker 1: or that wouldn't have resulted in an eternal shame upon

1109
00:59:32,880 --> 00:59:35,520
Speaker 1: him and his family, he absolutely would have taken it

1110
00:59:36,320 --> 00:59:38,280
Speaker 1: if he could still have been the Kaiser, but not

1111
00:59:38,480 --> 00:59:42,040
Speaker 1: have had to make Maybe I don't know, prins he

1112
00:59:42,160 --> 00:59:45,520
Speaker 1: just wanted to be a fashion king. Yeah, I do

1113
00:59:45,720 --> 00:59:48,400
Speaker 1: think he wanted he wanted to be a military power

1114
00:59:48,520 --> 00:59:50,560
Speaker 1: too though, and like I don't think he wanted to

1115
00:59:50,760 --> 00:59:52,920
Speaker 1: in that. I don't think it was inherently a military

1116
00:59:53,040 --> 00:59:56,360
Speaker 1: kind of guy, but because his whole family had raised

1117
00:59:56,400 --> 00:59:58,560
Speaker 1: him to believe that it's shameful to be a Prussian

1118
00:59:58,680 --> 01:00:03,400
Speaker 1: and not be a great warrior. Yeah, like, yeah, it's fucked, man,

1119
01:00:03,640 --> 01:00:06,480
Speaker 1: it's a bummer of a story. It's it's definitely fucked.

1120
01:00:06,600 --> 01:00:10,280
Speaker 1: I hate that. I feel for him, but you kind

1121
01:00:10,320 --> 01:00:12,680
Speaker 1: of can't. And it doesn't mean he didn't get millions

1122
01:00:12,720 --> 01:00:15,600
Speaker 1: of people killed and isn't a piece of shit, But

1123
01:00:15,800 --> 01:00:18,440
Speaker 1: like it also means that, like, well, fuck you. You

1124
01:00:18,560 --> 01:00:22,720
Speaker 1: plug anybody into that job with that kind of upbringing,

1125
01:00:23,000 --> 01:00:25,880
Speaker 1: how how does it end well? How does Yeah? It's

1126
01:00:25,920 --> 01:00:32,600
Speaker 1: as I blame society, Robert, I blame very specific assholes,

1127
01:00:32,720 --> 01:00:37,600
Speaker 1: not society in general. I blame a bunch of people society,

1128
01:00:38,840 --> 01:00:44,520
Speaker 1: that's my whole point. I blame George Hints, Peter, Queen Victoria, Uh,

1129
01:00:45,400 --> 01:00:48,880
Speaker 1: the Empariss, Augusta Um and a couple of other terrible

1130
01:00:48,960 --> 01:00:54,200
Speaker 1: assholes and some bad, bad doctors. I blame that the

1131
01:00:54,400 --> 01:00:57,720
Speaker 1: doctor's Oh, I blame the arms stretcher. Whoever made that

1132
01:00:58,200 --> 01:01:01,760
Speaker 1: stretch that didn't they really have a lot to answer for,

1133
01:01:02,280 --> 01:01:05,120
Speaker 1: all right, And it didn't work, first of all, and

1134
01:01:05,240 --> 01:01:08,200
Speaker 1: second of all, it was deeply humiliating, and and you

1135
01:01:08,360 --> 01:01:10,640
Speaker 1: can sort of trace the death of many people to

1136
01:01:10,840 --> 01:01:16,760
Speaker 1: the humiliation from the arms stretcher. So um by an

1137
01:01:16,840 --> 01:01:19,680
Speaker 1: arms stretcher. By the way, this podcast is supported by

1138
01:01:19,880 --> 01:01:24,479
Speaker 1: arm stretch. Ad came on for an arms stretcher right now, child,

1139
01:01:24,520 --> 01:01:29,280
Speaker 1: the Prince of Prussia is his arm g strate out

1140
01:01:29,400 --> 01:01:34,320
Speaker 1: of course, good lord boy, yeah he is. You do

1141
01:01:34,480 --> 01:01:36,840
Speaker 1: have to You can't really understand him, nless you understand

1142
01:01:36,880 --> 01:01:40,880
Speaker 1: that he was also a disabled man who was abused

1143
01:01:41,200 --> 01:01:45,800
Speaker 1: by a bigoted medical establishment, right and and there was

1144
01:01:45,880 --> 01:01:48,680
Speaker 1: like no option or ability for him to be accepted

1145
01:01:49,000 --> 01:01:53,320
Speaker 1: as as he was. It's yeah, it sucks. It fucking sucks.

1146
01:01:54,240 --> 01:01:58,280
Speaker 1: You know, it doesn't suck. Jamie what you're that's well,

1147
01:01:59,080 --> 01:02:03,200
Speaker 1: wait and see getting they're great. Um. You can follow

1148
01:02:03,240 --> 01:02:06,160
Speaker 1: me on Twitter at Jamie christ or no, at Jamie

1149
01:02:06,480 --> 01:02:10,000
Speaker 1: Lofta's help. Uh, you can listen to I'm releasing a

1150
01:02:10,080 --> 01:02:12,920
Speaker 1: short form podcast called My Year in MENSA that's about

1151
01:02:13,640 --> 01:02:18,480
Speaker 1: my horrible year in the MENSA organization. So excited. I'm

1152
01:02:18,680 --> 01:02:22,400
Speaker 1: very Robert your voice is in it. I was editing

1153
01:02:22,440 --> 01:02:24,880
Speaker 1: it in just yesterday. It comes out on Thanksgiving. It's

1154
01:02:24,960 --> 01:02:27,760
Speaker 1: a full blown nightmare. I hope people listen to it.

1155
01:02:28,600 --> 01:02:31,360
Speaker 1: And uh, yeah, then you can listen to the Bechtel

1156
01:02:31,440 --> 01:02:34,280
Speaker 1: Cast every Thursday and that's and those are my plugies.

1157
01:02:36,000 --> 01:02:38,840
Speaker 1: Listen to the Bechtel Cast, Listen to My Year in Mensa,

1158
01:02:38,920 --> 01:02:41,160
Speaker 1: which is Jamie's year in Mensa, not my year, not

1159
01:02:41,360 --> 01:02:43,800
Speaker 1: your year. But you know you could if you wanted to,

1160
01:02:44,080 --> 01:02:48,400
Speaker 1: but you know, yeah, I no, no, I could not. Um.

1161
01:02:49,520 --> 01:02:51,720
Speaker 1: Find us on the internet behind the bastards dot com

1162
01:02:51,840 --> 01:02:53,480
Speaker 1: or we'll love all the sources for this. Find us

1163
01:02:53,480 --> 01:02:56,560
Speaker 1: on Twitter and Instagram at at bastards pod um and

1164
01:02:56,880 --> 01:02:58,920
Speaker 1: find some room in your heart to buy a next

1165
01:02:58,960 --> 01:03:01,680
Speaker 1: stretching machine. Or the young infant child in your life

1166
01:03:01,720 --> 01:03:03,840
Speaker 1: today and I'm sure they grow up just like the Kaiser.

1167
01:03:04,160 --> 01:03:06,640
Speaker 1: I gotta go get a stretch in right now, right

1168
01:03:06,680 --> 01:03:09,680
Speaker 1: after I write my mom the scariest letter I've ever

1169
01:03:09,800 --> 01:03:13,400
Speaker 1: wrote in my life. Everybody write your mom's about their sexy,

1170
01:03:13,520 --> 01:03:17,440
Speaker 1: sexy hands. Everyone writing about their mom's sexy hands. No shame,

1171
01:03:17,640 --> 01:03:23,200
Speaker 1: just don't hit scent. It's it's that robbery throws shaming

1172
01:03:23,280 --> 01:03:25,760
Speaker 1: people horny for their mom's hands. I'm a little more

1173
01:03:25,800 --> 01:03:30,440
Speaker 1: open minded. That's the fucking episode by you