title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The Global Terrorism Index (GTI) is a report published annually by the Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP), and was developed by IT entrepreneur and IEP's founder Steve Killelea. The index provides a comprehensive summary of the key global trends and patterns in terrorism since 2000. It is an attempt to systematically rank the nations of the world according to terrorist activity. The index combines a number of factors associated with terrorist attacks to build an explicit picture of the impact of terrorism, illustrating trends, and providing a data series for analysis by researchers and policymakers. It produces a composite score in order to provide an ordinal ranking of countries on the impact of terrorism.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The GTI is based on data from the Global Terrorism Database (GTD) which is collected and collated by the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) at the University of Maryland. The GTD has codified over 190,000 cases of terrorism, it covers 163 countries, consisting 99.7% of the world's population.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The GTI was developed in consultation with the Global Peace Index expert panel. The aim is to examine trends and to help inform a positive and practical debate about the future of terrorism and the required policy responses.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: There is no single internationally accepted definition of what constitutes terrorism. IEP accepts the terminology and definitions agreed to by the authors of the GTD, the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) researchers and its advisory panel. The GTI therefore defines terrorism as "the threatened or actual use of illegal force and violence by a state and non-state actor to attain a political, economic, religious, or social goal through fear, coercion, or intimidation". This definition recognises that terrorism is not only the physical act of an attack, but also the psychological impact it has on a society for many years after.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: In order to be included as an incident in the GTD the act has to be: "an intentional act of violence or threat of violence by a non-state actor". This means an incident has to meet three criteria in order for it to be counted as a terrorist act:


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The GTI score for a country in a given year is based on a unique scoring system to account for the relative impact of incidents in the year. There are four indicators counted in each country's yearly score:


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The greatest weighting is thus in general attributed to a fatality. The property damage measure is further disaggregated into four bands depending on the measured scope of the property damage inflicted by one incident. These bandings are shown in the table below, whereby incidents causing less than US$1 million are accorded a weight of 1, between $1 million and $1 billion, and more than $1 billion. A great majority of incidents are coded in the GTD as an 'unknown' level of property damage, thus scoring nil, with 'catastrophic' events being extremely rare.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: To assign a relative number to how a country has been directly impacted by terrorism in any given year, for every incident recorded, the GTI calculates a weighted sum of all indicators. To illustrate, the table below depicts a hypothetical country's score for a given year:


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: A five-year weighted average is applied to reflect the lingering psychological effect of terrorist acts over time.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The GTI reports are titled by their publication year. The index is calculated up to the preceding year, e.g. the reference year of the 2020 GTI is 2019.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The resulting raw scores are then quasi-logarithmically transformed onto a scale of 0–10 by way of 20 bands. A raw score of formula_1 corresponds to a GTI of 0.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: where formula_4 are the steps in the raw score, formula_5 is the lowest recorded raw score, and formula_6 the highest recorded raw score.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The model includes both the direct and indirect costs, such as the lost life-time earnings, cost of medical treatments and property destruction from incidents of terrorism. The direct costs include those borne by the victim of the terrorist act and associated expenditure, such as medical spending. The indirect costs include lost productivity and earning as well as the psychological trauma to the victims, their families and friends.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The analysis presents conservative estimates of the economic impact of terrorism and does not include variables for which detailed appropriate data was not available. For instance, the analysis does not include the impact on business, the cost of fear from terrorism or the cost of counterterrorism.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The global economic impact of terrorism reached US$89.6 billion in 2015, decreasing 15% from its 2014 level.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: There have been three peaks in the economic impact of terrorism since the year 2000 and they are linked to the three major waves of terrorism. The first large increase in the economic impact of terrorism happened in 2001, when the attacks of September 11 in New York City and Washington, D.C., took place. The second peak was in 2007 at the height of the Iraq war. The 2007 increase is mainly attributed to al-Qa'ida affiliated terrorist groups and coincided with the coalition troop surge in Iraq. The third wave started in 2012 and is still continuing, with the economic impact of terrorism peaking at US$105.6 billion in 2014. The increase in the last four years was mainly driven by increases in terrorism in Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The Institute for Economics and Peace has published nine editions of the Global Terrorism Index to date. The most recent report was released in March 2022.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The fifth edition of the Global Terrorism Index was published in November 2017. The study covered analyses of 163 countries. The global GTI scored deteriorated by four percent from 2015 to 2016.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: Overall, deaths from terrorism have fallen for the second consecutive year, resulting in a 22 percent decrease since the peak in 2014. At an all-time high, 106 countries experienced at least one terrorist attack. Of these, 77 countries recorded at least one death, an increase from 65 countries in 2015.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: Iraq, Afghanistan, Nigeria, Syria, and Pakistan remain the top five countries most affected by terrorism. However, Nigeria also saw the greatest reduction in deaths. In 2016, deaths attributed to Boko Haram decreased by 80 percent, however, deaths attributed to ISIL increased by 49 percent. Together these five countries accounted for three-quarters of all deaths from terrorism in 2016.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: OECD countries have experienced a rise in terrorism, accounting for one percent of global deaths from terrorism in 2016. In 2010 OECD countries accounted for just 0.1 percent of deaths. Attacks in OECD countries have shifted tactics since 2014 to utilize simpler methods against non-traditional targets. Less sophisticated attacks can be executed at a lower cost and can be more difficult to detect. Positively, the first six months of 2017 have recorded 82 deaths from terrorism, lower than the 265 deaths in 2016.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The fourth edition of Global Terrorism Index was published in November 2016. The study covered analysis of 163 countries. Overall, the global GTI score decreased by six per cent.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: In 2015, the number of deaths from terrorism decreased by ten percent, the first decline since 2010. However, the 29,376 deaths recorded still rank 2015 as the second deadliest year on record. While much attention has been devoted to ISIL, the Taliban recorded its deadliest year in Afghanistan.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: As with the past three years, Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Nigeria, and Syria suffered the highest levels of terrorism, accounting for 72 per cent of all deaths from terrorism in 2015. Large decreases in fatalities in Iraq and Nigeria accounted for a large portion of the worldwide decrease.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: Conversely, in OECD member countries, deaths from terrorism dramatically increased in 2015, rising by 650 per cent when compared to 2014. Twenty-one of the 34 OECD countries experienced at least one terrorist attack with the majority of deaths occurring in Turkey and France. Of attacks conducted in the United States, 98 per cent were carried out by lone actors, resulting in 156 deaths.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The third edition of Global Terrorism Index was published in November 2015. The study covered analysis of 162 countries. Data from 2014 showed there has been a nine-fold increase in the number of deaths from terrorism since 2000.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: Terrorist activity increased by 80 per cent in 2014 to its highest recorded level. The largest ever year-on-year increase in deaths from terrorism was recorded in 2014, rising from 18,111 in 2013 to 32,765 in 2014. Terrorism deaths spread geographically as well with the number of countries experiencing over 500 deaths increasing from five to 11.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The rise in terrorism can largely be attributed to two groups: ISIS; and Boko Haram, the Nigerian jihadist group that pledged allegiance to ISIS in March 2015. Combined, these groups were responsible for 51% of all terrorism-related deaths in 2014.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: In the West, lone wolf attacks account for 70 per cent of terrorist deaths since 2006. Amongst lone actors, few attacks were inspired by Islamic fundamentalism, with 80 per cent of attacks were attributed to a range of right-wing extremists, nationalists, and other types of political extremism and supremacism.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The countries most heavily affected by terrorism in 2014 were, Iraq, Afghanistan, Nigeria, Pakistan and Syria. Terrorism increased most significantly in Nigeria, where deaths increased by over 300 per cent to 7,512 fatalities.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The second edition of Global Terrorism Index was published in November 2014. The study covered analysis of 162 countries. From 2000 to 2013 there was a five-fold increase in the number of people killed by terrorism, resulting in approximately 18,000 deaths.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: Of the 162 countries, 87 experienced a terrorist incident, but only 60 countries recorded one or more deaths from terrorism in 2013. Worldwide over 50 per cent of terrorist attacks claimed no fatalities and only 10 per cent claimed more than five lives. Explosives were used for 60 per cent of attacks, with firearms used in 30 per cent and 10 per cent of attacks using other weapons.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: In 2013 terrorist activity increased substantially with the total number of deaths rising from 11,133 in 2012 to 18,111 in 2013, a 61 per cent increase. Over the same period, the number of countries that experienced more than 50 deaths rose from 15 to 24. This highlighted that not only was the intensity of terrorism increasing, its breadth was increasing as well.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The countries most heavily affected by terrorism in 2013 were, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Nigeria and Syria. Four terrorist groups, ISIL, Boko Haram, the Taliban, and al-Qa'ida, claimed 66 per cent of deaths in 2013. Among OECD countries, Turkey and Mexico reported the highest deaths in 2013 losing 57 and 40 lives respectively. Since 2000, seven per cent of all terrorist incidents occurred in OECD countries.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The first edition of Global Terrorism Index was published in 2012. The study covered analysis of 158 countries. Data showed that terrorism increased by 234 per cent from 2002 to 2011.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The 2012 report found that the global impact of terrorism increased significantly from 2002 to 2007, reaching its peak in 2007, and subsequently plateauing. The biggest rise took place over the period from 2005 to 2007 when the majority of the global increase in terrorism was driven by events in Iraq. Four other countries also significantly contributed to the global rise with Pakistan, Afghanistan, and the Philippines all experiencing increases, especially between 2007 and 2009.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: Only 20 nations scored a zero for terrorist impact over the 2002-2011 period, indicating the impact of terror, while heavily concentrated in some places like Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India, was widely distributed around the world.


title: Global Terrorism Index

text: The countries most heavily affected by terrorism in 2011 were, Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan, India and Yemen. Including these countries, the top ten countries affected by terrorism accounted for 87 per cent of total global incidents.


title: Bose Corporation

text: Bose Corporation () is an American manufacturing company that predominantly sells audio equipment. The company was established by Amar Bose in 1964 and is based in Framingham, Massachusetts. It is best known for its home audio systems and speakers, noise cancelling headphones, professional audio products and automobile sound systems. Bose has a reputation for being particularly protective of its patents, trademarks, and brands.


title: Bose Corporation

text: The majority owner of Bose Corporation is the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Non-voting shares were donated to MIT by founder Amar Bose, and receive cash dividends. According to the company annual report for the 2021 financial year, Bose Corporation's annual sales were $3.2 billion, and the company employed approximately 7,000 people.


title: Bose Corporation

text: The company was founded in Massachusetts in 1964 by Amar Bose with angel investor funding, including Amar's thesis advisor and professor, Y. W. Lee. Bose's interest in speaker systems had begun in 1956 when he purchased a stereo system and was disappointed with its performance. The purpose of the company was to develop speaker systems which used multiple speakers aimed at the surrounding walls to reflect the sound and replicate the sound of a concert hall.


title: Bose Corporation

text: In 1966, the Bose 2201 was the first product sold by the company. It was an unusual design consisting of 22 speakers, with many of them facing away from the listener. The 2201 was designed to be located in the corner of a room, using reflections off the walls to increase the apparent size of the room. The 2201 was a failure in the market and was discontinued after three or four years.


title: Bose Corporation

text: After this experience, Bose came to the conclusion that the audio system measurement techniques of the time (such as measuring distortion and frequency response) were not effective ways to evaluate the goal of natural sound reproduction. Bose argued that the best measure of audio quality is the listener's perception. Also in 1968, the company introduced the Bose 901 stereo speaker system, which used eight mid-range drivers pointing towards the wall behind the speaker, and a ninth driver towards the listener. The purpose of this design was to achieve a dominance of reflected over direct sound in home listening spaces. The design used in the 901 was unconventional compared with most systems, where mid-range and high-frequency speakers directly face the listener. The 901 was an immediate commercial success, and Bose Corporation grew rapidly during the 1970s. The Bose 901 model name was a mainstay of the Bose line-up for many years, being produced from 1968 until 2016.


title: Bose Corporation

text: In 1991, a team of Bose researchers debunked a 1989 experiment that claimed to have created energy through cold fusion.


title: Bose Corporation

text: The first Bose retail store was opened in 1993 in Kittery, Maine.<ref name="Innovations/achievements"></ref>


title: Bose Corporation

text: In 2011, then-chairman and primary stockholder Amar Bose donated the majority of the firm's non-voting shares to his former employer and alma mater, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. An annual cash dividend is paid out to "advance the research and education mission of MIT". However, the conditions of receiving the shares stated that MIT was not allowed to sell them, nor was MIT permitted to participate in the company's management and governance. Following Amar Bose's death in 2013, Bob Maresca became the Chief Executive Officer.


title: Bose Corporation

text: In June 2016, Bose and Flex manufacturing extended their strategic partnership. Bose operations in Malaysia and Mexico will transfer to Flex.


title: Bose Corporation

text: At the end of 2017, Maresca stepped down as CEO and Bose President Phil Hess took the position. Maresca remained Chairman of the Board.


title: Bose Corporation

text: In January 2020, Bose announced that they would be closing all their more than 100 retail stores in North America, Japan, Europe, and Australia. They will retain their online presence, as well sell their products through Target, Best Buy, and Amazon.


title: Bose Corporation

text: In August 2020, Bose named their first female CEO, Lila Snyder, who was formerly an executive at Pitney Bowes. Snyder, who will take her position September 2020, is an MIT alumna, having earned her masters and Ph.D. degrees in mechanical engineering there.


title: Bose Corporation

text: Bose's products are manufactured in the United States, Mexico, China and Malaysia. The company's factories in the United States are located in Framingham, Massachusetts (also the site of the company headquarters), Westborough, Massachusetts and Stow, Massachusetts. In early 2021, Bose Corporation notified the Town of Stow of intention to vacate the 81.5 acre Stow campus after 18 years at the site, moving nearly 1500 employees to the Framingham headquarters. The Bose factories in Mexico are located in Tijuana and San Luis Río Colorado. The Malaysian Bose factory is located in Batu Kawan and is also the company's distribution hub for the Asia-Pacific and Middle East.


title: Bose Corporation

text: In 2015, two facilities in Columbia, South Carolina and Carrickmacross, Ireland, were closed (with the loss of 300 and 140 jobs respectively), as part of a "global streamlining of Bose's supply chain. Bose used the Columbia facility, which opened in 1993, for distribution and repair, sub-manufacturing and regional manufacturing, and final assembly for some headsets. The Carrickmacross factory, which began operations in 1978, did final assembly for some home theatre systems, Wave radios, and other regional manufacturing. The operation of the San Luis and Batu Kawan factories were taken over by contract manufacturer Flex in 2016 and continued to produce Bose products.


title: Bose Corporation

text: Following an unsuccessful attempt to sell aftermarket car speakers, Bose's first OEM audio installation was in a MY1983 Cadillac Seville. Bose has since supplied audio systems for many car manufacturers. In 2007, the Bose media system won the International Telematics Award for the "Best Storage Solution for In-Car Environment".


title: Bose Corporation

text: A prototype active suspension system, using electromagnetic motors instead of hydraulic/pneumatic power, was unveiled by the company in 2004 and was due for release in 2009, but it did not materialize due to weight and cost. The system used electromagnetic linear motors to raise or lower the wheels of an automobile in response to uneven bumps or potholes on the road. The wheels are raised when approaching a bump (or lowered into a pothole) to keep the vehicle level, using principles similar to noise cancelling audio devices. A prototype car had the ability to jump over an obstacle. The company said that the system is too expensive and heavy, even after development over more than 20 years costing $100 million of development. In November 2017, it was reported that Bose had sold the technology to ClearMotion. In May 2018, it was announced that five major car manufacturers had expressed interest in the technology and that it may be available in 2019 for low-volume vehicles and by 2020 for the mass market.


title: Bose Corporation

text: A truck seat system called "Bose Ride" was introduced in 2010. This active seat system aims to reduce fatigue, back pain and physical stress experienced by truck drivers by reducing vibration from the road. Bose claimed up to a 90% reduction in driver's seat vibration.


title: Bose Corporation

text: Automobile brands that currently have Bose audio systems available in their vehicles are Buick, Cadillac, Chevrolet, Fiat, GMC, Honda, Hyundai, Infiniti, Kia, Mazda, Mitsubishi, Nissan, and Porsche.


title: Bose Corporation

text: In 2012, Bose was the highest selling company in the United States for retail home theater systems, and the third highest selling for portable audio products.


title: Bose Corporation

text: The company has sold aviation headsets since 1989 and consumer headphones since 2000. The current range of headphones/headsets consists of over-ear, in-ear, aviation and military models.


title: Bose Corporation

text: The "Bose Professional" division was established in 1972 to produce and install public address systems. In 2009, the division accounted for about 60% of Bose's annual revenue. Bose was the first company to pay for the title of official Olympics sound system supplier, providing audio equipment for the 1988 and 1992 Winter Olympics in Calgary and Albertville respectively. Bose's systems have not received THX certification.


title: Bose Corporation

text: The "Bose L1" is a range of portable line array loudspeaker systems for musicians. The L1 was introduced in 2003 with models that have been retroactively known as the "L1 Classic" range. These products were replaced by the "L1 Model I" and "L1 Model II" in 2007. A smaller and lighter "L1 Compact" model was introduced April 2009. The L1 Model I was replaced by the "L1 Model 1S" in 2012, and the "B1 Bass Module" was replaced by the larger "B2 Bass Module".


title: Bose Corporation

text: Since the 1980s, Bose has offered 25-volt and 70-volt installed commercial audio systems for businesses.


title: Bose Corporation

text: The company is known for its refusal to provide specifications for its products. This policy dates back to 1968, when Amar Bose published a paper titled "On the Design, Measurement and Evaluation of Loudspeakers", wherein he rejected numerical test data in favor of subjective evaluation. In a 2007 interview, Amar stated: "There are two reasons we cut out the specifications: 1- We don’t know of any measurements that actually determine anything about a product, and 2- Measurements are phony, in general, as they are printed."


title: Bose Corporation

text: In some non-audio related publications, Bose has been cited as a producer of "high-end audio" products. Commenting in 2007 on Bose's "high-end" market positioning among audiophiles (people concerned with the best possible sound), a "PC Magazine" product reviewer stated "not only is Bose equipment's sound quality not up to audiophile standards, but one could buy something that does meet these stringent requirements for the same price or, often, for less." Bose has also received mixed reviews from the public. Bose has not been certified by THX for its home entertainment products even though its more expensive home theater products compete at prices where THX certification is common. Some other views include:


title: Bose Corporation

text: Bose has been described by audio industry professionals as a litigious company. In 1981, Bose unsuccessfully sued the magazine "Consumer Reports" for libel. "Consumer Reports" reported in a review that the sound from the system that they reviewed "tended to wander about the room." Initially, the Federal District Court found that "Consumer Reports" "had published the false statement with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of its truth or falsity" when it changed what the original reviewer wrote about the speakers in his pre-publication draft, that the sound tended to wander "along the wall." The Court of Appeals then reversed the trial court's ruling on liability, and the United States Supreme Court affirmed in a 6–3 vote in the case "Bose Corp. v. Consumers Union of United States, Inc.", finding that the statement was made without actual malice, and therefore there was no libel. In an interview decades later Amar Bose said "We had 37 people at the time. I gathered them in one room and said, 'If we don't do anything, it will probably kill us. But if we do something, we have no credibility since we're just a small company and we can't do anything against this.' I said I think we oughtta do something. I wanted a vote. It was unanimous in favor of taking action. Little did we know it would take 14 years to go through the legal process."


title: Bose Corporation

text: Bose sued Thiel Audio in the early 1990s to stop the audiophile loudspeaker maker from using ".2" at the end of its product model "CS2.2". To comply with Bose's trademark of ".2" associated with the Bose Model 2.2 product, Thiel changed their model name to "CS2 2", substituting a space for the decimal point. Bose did not trademark ".3" so in 1997 when Thiel introduced the next model in the series, they named it the "Thiel 2.3", advertising "the return of the decimal point."


title: Bose Corporation

text: In 1996, Bose sued two subsidiaries of Harman International Industries—JBL and Infinity Systems—for violating a Bose patent on elliptical tuning ports on some loudspeaker products. In 2000, the court determined that Harman was to cease using elliptical ports in its products, and Harman was to pay Bose $5.7 million in court costs. Harman stopped using the disputed port design but appealed the financial decision. At the end of 2002, the earlier judgment was upheld but by this time Bose's court expenses had risen to $8 million, all to be paid by Harman.


title: Bose Corporation

text: Bose was successful in blocking QSC Audio Products from trademarking the term "PowerWave" in connection with a certain QSC amplifier technology. In 2002, a court decided that the "Wave" trademark was worthy of greater protection because it was well-known on its own, even beyond its association with Bose.


title: Bose Corporation

text: In 2003, Bose sued Custom Electronics Design and Installation Association (CEDIA), a non-profit electronics trade organization for use of the "Electronic Lifestyles" trademark, which CEDIA had been using since 1997. Bose argued that the trademark interfered with its own "Lifestyle" trademark. Bose had previously sued to protect its "Lifestyle" trademark beginning in 1996 with a success against Motorola and continuing with settlements against New England Stereo, Lifestyle Technologies, Optoma and AMX. In May 2007, CEDIA won the lawsuit after the court determined Bose to be guilty of laches (unreasonable delays), and that Bose's assertions of fraud and likelihood of confusion were without merit. CEDIA was criticized for spending nearly $1 million of its member's money on the lawsuit, and Bose was criticized for "unsportsmanlike action against its own trade association", according to Julie Jacobson of "CE Pro" magazine.


title: Bose Corporation

text: In July 2014, Bose sued Beats Electronics for patent infringement, alleging that its "Studio" headphones line incorporated Bose noise cancelling technology. Bose and Apple had collaborated on the SoundDock for iPod music players in 2004. Then in May 2014, Beats was bought by Apple, bringing Bose and Apple into direct competition in the headphone market. In Apple stores, Bose headphones were once the foremost brand offered, but at the time of the lawsuit, Beats products outnumbered Bose. In 2014 total premium headphone market share, Beats held 62%, Bose held 22%. In October 2014, Bose dropped the lawsuit, as Bose and Beats settled out of court without revealing the terms. Apple removed all Bose products from its Apple stores a few days after the lawsuit was settled, but two months later, Bose products returned.


title: Bose Corporation

text: In April 2017, Bose was sued alleging a privacy violation regarding the mobile phone apps delivered by Bose to control their Bluetooth headphones.


title: Alfred Jodl

text: Alfred Josef Ferdinand Jodl (; 10 May 1890 – 16 October 1946) was a German "Generaloberst" who served as the chief of the Operations Staff of the "Oberkommando der Wehrmacht" – the German Armed Forces High Command – throughout World War II.


title: Alfred Jodl

text: After the war, Jodl was indicted on charges of conspiracy to commit crimes against peace, planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression, war crimes and crimes against humanity at the Allied-organised Nuremberg trials. The principal charges against him related to his signature of the criminal Commando and Commissar Orders. Found guilty on all charges, he was sentenced to death and executed in Nuremberg in 1946.


title: Alfred Jodl

text: Alfred Jodl was educated at a military cadet school in Munich, from which he graduated in 1910. Ferdinand Jodl, who would also become an army general, was his younger brother. The philosopher and psychologist Friedrich Jodl at the University of Vienna, was his uncle. Jodl was raised Roman Catholic but rejected the faith later in life.


title: Alfred Jodl

text: From 1914 to 1916, he served with a battery unit on the Western Front, being awarded the Iron Cross 2nd class for gallantry in November 1914, and for being wounded in action. In 1917, he served briefly on the Eastern Front before returning to the West as a staff officer. In 1918, he won the Iron Cross 1st class for gallantry in action. After the defeat of the German Empire in 1918, he continued his career as a professional soldier with the much-reduced German Army (Reichswehr). Jodl married twice: in 1913 and (after becoming a widower) in 1944.


title: Alfred Jodl

text: Jodl's appointment as a major in the operations branch of the Truppenamt in the Army High Command in the last years of the Weimar Republic put him under command of General Ludwig Beck. In September 1939, Jodl first met Adolf Hitler. During the build-up to the Second World War, Jodl was nominally assigned as a commander of the 44th Division from October 1938 to August 1939 after the Anschluss.


title: Alfred Jodl

text: He was chosen by Hitler to be Chief of Operation Staff of the newly formed Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (OKW) on 23 August 1939, just prior to the German invasion of Poland. Jodl acted as a chief of staff during the invasion of Denmark and Norway. Following the Fall of France, Jodl was optimistic of Germany's success over Britain, writing on 30 June 1940 that "The final German victory over England is now only a question of time."


title: Alfred Jodl

text: Jodl signed the Commissar Order of 6 June 1941 (in which Soviet political commissars were to be shot) and the Commando Order of 28 October 1942 (in which Allied commandos, including properly uniformed soldiers as well as combatants wearing civilian clothes, such as Maquis and partisans, were to be executed immediately without trial if captured behind German lines).


title: Alfred Jodl

text: Jodl spent most of the war at the Wolf's Lair, Hitler's forward command post in East Prussia. On 1 February 1944, he was promoted to the rank of Generaloberst (colonel general). He was among those slightly injured during the 20 July plot of 1944 against Hitler, during which he suffered a concussion.


title: Alfred Jodl

text: On 6 May 1945, Jodl was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross by "Großadmiral" Karl Dönitz, who had succeeded Hitler on 30 April 1945 as head of Germany and its armed forces.


title: Alfred Jodl

text: Following regional surrenders of German forces in Europe, Jodl was sent by Dönitz to respond to the demand for "immediate, simultaneous and unconditional surrender on all fronts." Jodl signed the German Instrument of Surrender on 7 May 1945 in Reims on behalf of the OKW. The surrender to all the Allies was concluded on 8 May in Berlin. On 13 May, on the arrest of "Generalfeldmarschall" Wilhelm Keitel, Jodl succeeded him as chief of OKW.


title: Alfred Jodl

text: Jodl was arrested, along with the rest of the Flensburg government of Dönitz, by British troops on 23 May 1945 and transferred to Camp Ashcan POW camp and later put before the International Military Tribunal at the Nuremberg trials. He was accused of conspiracy to commit crimes against peace; planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression, war crimes and crimes against humanity. The principal charges against him related to his signature of the Commando Order and the Commissar Order, both of which ordered that certain classes of prisoners of war were to be summarily executed upon capture. When confronted with the 1941 mass shootings of Soviet POWs, Jodl claimed the only prisoners shot were "not those that could not, but those that did not want to walk".


title: Alfred Jodl

text: Additional charges at his trial included unlawful deportation and abetting execution. Presented as evidence was his signature on an order that transferred Danish citizens, including Jews, to Nazi concentration camps. Although he denied his role in this activity of the regime, the court sustained his complicity based on the evidence it had examined, with the French judge, Henri Donnedieu de Vabres, dissenting.


title: Alfred Jodl

text: His wife Luise attached herself to her husband's defence team. Subsequently, interviewed by Gitta Sereny, researching her biography of Albert Speer, Luise alleged that in many instances the Allied prosecution made charges against Jodl based on documents that they refused to share with the defence. Jodl nevertheless proved that some of the charges made against him were untrue, such as the charge that he had helped Hitler gain control of Germany in 1933.


title: Alfred Jodl

text: Jodl pleaded not guilty "before God, before history and my people". Found guilty on all four charges, he was hanged at Nuremberg Prison on 16 October 1946. Jodl's last words were reportedly ""Ich grüße Dich, mein ewiges Deutschland"""I salute you, my eternal Germany."


title: Alfred Jodl

text: His remains, like those of the other nine executed men and Hermann Göring (who had taken his own life prior to his scheduled execution), were cremated at Ostfriedhof and the ashes were scattered in the Wenzbach, a small tributary of the River Isar to prevent the establishment of a permanent burial site which might be enshrined by nationalist groups. A cross commemorating him was later added to the family grave on the Frauenchiemsee in Bavaria. In 2018, the local council ordered the cross to be removed; however, in March 2019, a Munich Court upheld Jodl's relatives' right to maintain the family grave, while noting the family's willingness to remove his name.


title: Alfred Jodl

text: On 28 February 1953, after his widow Luise sued to reclaim her pension and his estate, a West German denazification court posthumously declared Jodl not guilty of breaking international law, based on Henri Donnedieu de Vabres's 1949 disapproval of Jodl's conviction. This not guilty declaration was revoked by the Minister of Political Liberation for Bavaria on 3 September 1953, following objections from the United States; the consequences of the acquittal on Jodl's estate were, however, maintained.


title: Momo (food)

text: Momo is a dish with origins from Tibet. They are bite-size dumplings made with a spoonful of stuffing wrapped in dough. Usually steamed, though they are sometimes fried or steam-fried. The dish has spread to Nepal, India, and China.


title: Momo (food)

text: Momo is the colloquial form of the Tibetan word "mog mog". It is possible that this Tibetan word is borrowed from the Chinese term momo (馍馍), a name traditionally used in northwestern Chinese dialects for bread. The word mo (馍) itself means food related to flour. As can be seen in dishes from Shaanxi cuisine like roujiamo and paomo. The different names for the dumpling include Assamese: মম; Bengali: মোমো; Hindi-Urdu: मोमो, مومو; Ladakhi: མོག་མོག་ Nepali: मम; Nepal Bhasa: मम, small momo - ममचा; ; .


title: Momo (food)

text: As for the Himalayan momo, the dish is believed to have spread to Nepal along with the influx of the Tibetan diaspora. Since this dish was initially popular among the Newar community of the Kathmandu Valley of Nepal, one prevalent belief is that travelling Nepali Newar merchants took the recipe of momo from Tibet where the Nepali Newar Merchants used to go to trade and brought it back home to Nepal. In Tibet, the filling of the dish was typically meat, such as yak and occasionally potatoes and cheese. However, after arriving in the Indo-Gangetic Plains, the meat became chicken, and mixed vegetables momo was introduced to feed the large population of vegetarian Hindus. Unproven, but substantiated by the dates and references to momo in colloquial references, the civil war in Nepal pushed out the Nepali diaspora to seek a livelihood in India, which further increased to the prevalence of Himalayan style momo in the southern half of India especially in the cities of Chennai and Bangalore.


title: Momo (food)

text: Momo is a type of steamed dumpling with some form of filling, most commonly chicken (traditionally yak, but often chicken and goat) and it is originally from Tibet. Momo has become a delicacy in Nepal and Tibetan communities in Bhutan, as well as people of the Indian regions of Darjeeling, Ladakh, Sikkim, Assam, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh and Arunachal Pradesh. In Pakistan, Gilgit-Baltistan region it is known as mamtoo.


title: Momo (food)

text: A simple white-flour-and-water dough is generally preferred to make the outer momo covering. Sometimes, a little yeast or baking soda is added to give a more doughy texture to the finished product.


title: Momo (food)

text: Traditionally, momo is prepared with ground/minced meat, potatoes, and leek filling. Nowadays, the fillings have become more elaborate and Momo is prepared with virtually any combination of ground meat, vegetables, tofu, mushrooms, paneer cheese, soft chhurpi (local hard cheese) and vegetable and meat combinations.


title: Momo (food)

text: The dough is rolled into small circular flat pieces. The filling is enclosed in the circular dough cover either in a round pocket or a half-moon or crescent shape. People prefer meat with a lot of fat because it produces flavourful, juicy momos. A little oil is sometimes added to the lean ground/minced meat to keep the filling moist and juicy. The dumplings are then cooked by steaming over a soup (either a stock based on bones or vegetables) in a momo-making utensil called "mucktoo". Momos may also be pan-fried or deep-fried after being steamed.


title: Momo (food)

text: Momo are traditionally steamed but can also be deep-fried or pan-fried and cooked in soup. Momo is usually served with chilli garlic sauce and pickled daikon in Tibet. In Nepal, popular dipping sauces include tomato-based chutneys or sesame or peanut or soybean-based sauces called Jhol achar. Sauces can be thick or thin in consistency depending on the eatery (locally called "chutney/achār"), usually made with tomato or peanut, sesame and soybean as the base ingredient. In Kathmandu valley, the traditional way of serving momo (called momochā or local momo) is ten ping-pong ball-sized round momo drowned in a sauce called jhol achar, infused with Timur pepper (Nepali pepper, a variety of Sichuan pepper). Jhol momo has warm or hot tomato-based broth poured over momo (not cooked in the broth), whereas Jhol achhar is served in-room /cooled temperature. One of the main ingredients of jhol achar is Nepali hog plum (lapsi), but if this is unavailable, lemon or lime juice may be used.


title: Momo (food)

text: Soup momo or mok-thuk (Tibetan) is another way to serve momos which usually involve using smaller shaped dumplings, where the momos are either cooked in broth for a type of dumpling soup or steamed momos, which are added to the broth. Pan-fried momo is also known as "kothey momo". Steamed momo served in hot sauce is called "C-momo". There are also a variety of dumplings of Nepal found in the Indian state of Sikkim and Darjeeling district, including Tingmo and Tiebao.


title: German colonial empire

text: The German colonial empire () constituted the overseas colonies, dependencies and territories of the German Empire. Unified in the early 1870s, the chancellor of this time period was Otto von Bismarck. Short-lived attempts at colonization by individual German states had occurred in preceding centuries, but Bismarck resisted pressure to construct a colonial empire until the Scramble for Africa in 1884. Claiming much of the left-over uncolonized areas of Africa, Germany built the third-largest colonial empire at the time, after the British and French. The German Colonial Empire encompassed parts of several African countries, including parts of present-day Burundi, Rwanda, Tanzania, Namibia, Cameroon, Gabon, Congo, Central African Republic, Chad, Nigeria, Togo, Ghana, as well as northeastern New Guinea, Samoa and numerous Micronesian islands. Including mainland Germany, the empire had a total land area of 3,503,352 square kilometers and population of 80,125,993 people.


title: German colonial empire

text: Germany lost control of most of its colonial empire at the beginning of the First World War in 1914, but some German forces held out in German East Africa until the end of the war. After the German defeat in World War I, Germany's colonial empire was officially dissolved with the Treaty of Versailles. Each colony became a League of Nations mandate under the supervision (but not ownership) of one of the victorious powers. Talk of regaining their lost colonial possessions persisted in Germany until 1943, but never became an official goal of the German government.


title: German colonial empire

text: Germans had traditions of foreign sea-borne trade dating back to the Hanseatic League; German emigrants had flowed eastward in the direction of the Baltic littoral, Russia and Transylvania and westward to the Americas; and North German merchants and missionaries showed interest in overseas engagements. The Hanseatic republics of Hamburg and Bremen sent traders across the globe. Their trading houses conducted themselves as successful "Privatkolonisatoren" [independent colonizers], concluding treaties and land purchases in Africa and the Pacific with chiefs and/or other tribal leaders. These early agreements with local entities later formed the basis for annexation treaties, diplomatic support and military protection by the German government.


title: German colonial empire

text: However, until their 1871 unification, the German states had not concentrated on the development of a navy, and this essentially had precluded German participation in earlier imperialist scrambles for remote colonial territory. Without a blue-water navy, a would-be colonial power could not reliably defend, supply or trade with overseas dependencies. The German states prior to 1870 had retained separate political structures and goals, and German foreign policy up to and including the age of Otto von Bismarck (1815–1898; in office as Prussian Foreign Minister from 1862 to 1890) concentrated on resolving the "German question" in Europe and on securing German interests on the continent. However, by 1891 the Germans were mostly united under Prussian rule. They also sought a more clear-cut "German" state, and saw colonies as a good way to achieve that.


title: German colonial empire

text: In the states of the German Confederation founded in 1815 and the Zollverein founded in 1834, there was some call from private and economic interests for the establishment of German colonies, especially in the 1840s. However, governments had no such aspirations. In 1839, private interests founded the , which sought to purchase the Chatham Islands east of New Zealand and settle German emigrants there, but Great Britain had a pre-existing claim to the island. Hamburg relied on the Royal Navy for its worldwide shipping interests and therefore gave no political support to the Colonial Society. The Society for the Protection of German Immigrants to Texas, established in Mainz in 1842 sought to expand the German settlements into a colony of "New Germany" (). About 7400 settlers were involved. The venture proved a complete failure. There was a constant lack of supplies and land and around half of the colonists died. The plan was definitively ended with the annexation of Texas by the United States in 1845.


title: German colonial empire

text: Starting in the 1850s German commercial enterprises spread into areas that would later become German colonies in West Africa, East Africa, the Samoan Islands, the unexplored north-east quarter of New Guinea with its adjacent islands, the Douala delta in Cameroon, and the mainland coast across from Zanzibar.


title: German colonial empire

text: In 1857, the Austrian frigate "Novara" departed from Triest on the Novara Expedition, which aimed to explore and take possession of the Nicobar islands in the Indian Ocean. The "Novara" arrived at the Nicobars in 1858, but the Austrians did not subsequently lay claim to the islands.


title: German colonial empire

text: The next state-sponsored attempt to acquire a colony occurred in 1859, when Prussia attempted to claim the island of Formosa (modern Taiwan). Prussia had already sought the approval of the French Emperor Napoleon III for the undertaking, since France was also seeking to acquire colonies in East Asia at that time. Since French interests focused on Vietnam, not Formosa, Prussia could seek to acquire the island. A Prussian naval expedition, which departed Germany at the end of 1859, was tasked with concluding trade treaties in Asia for Prussian and the other states of the Zollverein and with occupying Formosa. However, this task was not carried out, due to the limited strength of the expedition forces and because they did not wish to preclude a trade treaty with Qing China. In a cabinet order of 6 January 1862, the expedition's ambassador, Friedrich Albrecht zu Eulenburg was "released from carrying out the part of his task concerned with identification of overseas settlements suitable for Prussian settlement."


title: German colonial empire

text: Despite this, one ship from the expedition, the "Thetis" was sent to Patagonia in South America to investigate its prospects as a colony, since the Prussian naval command in particular were interested in the establishment of a naval strong point on the South American coast. The "Thetis" had already reached Buenos Aires which the commander of the ship decided to return to Germany due to the exhaustion of the men after the year-long expedition and the need for repairs to the ship.


title: German colonial empire

text: After the Second Schleswig War in 1864, colonialist societies in Prussia aspired to take possession of the Nicobar islands which had previously been in Danish possession. For its part, Denmark unsuccessfully proposed to exchange the Danish West Indies for some of the lost territory in Schleswig in 1865. In 1866 and then again in 1876, Jamal ul-Azam, Sultan of the Sulu Islands, located between Borneo and the Philippines, offered to place his islands under Prussian and then Imperial German control, but both times he was rebuffed. Ahmad ibn Fumo Bakari, the Sultan of Wituland asked the Prussian traveller to establish a Prussian protectorate over his lands, but this request was never considered in Berlin.


title: German colonial empire

text: In the 1867 constitution of the North German Confederation, article 4.1 declared "colonisation" as one of the areas under the "oversight of the Confederation", which remained the case in the Imperial constitution established in 1871.


title: German colonial empire

text: In 1867/8, Otto von Bismarck dispatched the warship "Augusta" to the Caribbean to show the flag of the North German Confederation. At the personal urging of Prince Adalbert, the commander of the North German Federal Navy, and without Bismarck's knowledge, the commander of the "Augusta", conducted negotiations with José María Castro Madriz, President of Costa Rica with a view to establishing a naval base at Puerto Limón. Bismarck rejected the acquisition, due to the American Monroe Doctrine. This desire to avoid antagonising the United States also led him to reject a Dutch offer to establish a naval base on the Dutch island of Curaçao.


title: German colonial empire

text: In 1868, Bismarck made his opposition to any colonial acquisitions clear in a letter to the Prussian Minister of War Albrecht von Roon:


title: German colonial empire

text: The policy of the North German Confederation at this time focussed on the acquisition of individual naval bases, not colonies. With these it would be able to use gunboat diplomacy to protect the global trade interests of the Confederation through a kind of informal imperialism. In 1867, it was decided to establish five overseas bases. Accordingly, in 1868, land was bought in Yokohama in Japan for a German naval hospital, which remained in operation until 1911. In 1869 the "East Asian Station" ("Ostasiatische Station") was established there by the navy as the first overseas base, with a permanent presence of German warships. Until the German Empire's acquisition of Tsingtao in China as a military port in 1897, Yokohama remained the base of the German fleet in East Asia. It later proved useful following the acquisition of colonies in the Pacific and in Kiaochow.


title: German colonial empire

text: In 1869, the Rhenish Missionary Society, which had been established in southwestern Africa for several decades asked King William of Prussia for protection and suggested the establishment of a naval station at Walvis Bay. William was very interested in this suggestion, but the matter was forgotten following the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War.


title: German colonial empire

text: A French proposal after the Franco-Prussian War to hand over the French colony of Cochinchina instead of Alsace–Lorraine, was rejected by Bismarck and a majority of the delegates in the North German Reichstag in 1870. After German Unification in 1871, Bismarck maintained his earlier position. During the 1870s, colonialist propaganda achieved increasing public profile in Germany. In 1873, the was established, which considered exploration of Africa its main function. In 1878 the foundation of the was established, which sought to acquire colonies for Germany, and in 1881 was founded, which included the "acquisition of agricultural and commercial colonies for the German Empire" in its founding statute. In 1882, the first was established, which was a lobby group for colonialist propaganda. In 1887, the competing Society for German Colonization was established with the goal of actually undertaking colonisation. The two societies merged in 1887 into the German Colonial Society. Generally, four arguments were advanced in favour of the acquisition of colonies:


title: German colonial empire

text: Moreover, German public opinion in the late-19th century viewed colonial acquisitions as a true indication of having achieved full nationhood, and eventually arrived at an understanding that prestigious African and Pacific colonies went hand-in-hand with dreams of a High Seas Fleet.


title: German colonial empire

text: Bismarck remained opposed to these arguments and preferred an informal commercial imperialism, in which German companies carried out profitable trade with areas outside Europe and made economic inroads without the occupation of territories or the construction of states. Bismarck and many deputies in the "Reichstag" had no interest in making colonial conquests merely to acquire square miles of territory.


title: German colonial empire

text: As a result, the first colonial enterprises abroad were extremely hesitant: a was signed in 1876, which provided for the establishment of a coal station on the Tongan island of Vavaʻu, guaranteeing all usage rights of the specified area to the German Empire, but leaving the King of Tonga's sovereignty untouched. No actual colonisation occurred. On 16 July 1878, he commander of the SMS "Ariadne", occupied Falealili and Saluafata on the Samoan island of Upolo "in the name of the Empire". The German occupation of these places was revoked in January 1879 with the conclusion of a treaty of friendship between th local rulers and Germany. On 19 November 1878, von Werner established a treaty with the leaders of Jaluit Atoll and the Ralik islands of Lebon and Letahalin, granting privileges like the exclusive right to establish a coal station. An official German colony in the Marshall Islands was only established in 1885. Von Werner also acquired a harbour on the islands of Makada and Mioko in the Duke of York Islands in December 1878, which would become a component part of the future protectorate of German New Guinea in 1884. On 20 April 1879, the commander of the SMS "Bismarck", and the German Consul for the South Seas Islands, Gustav Godeffroy Junior established a treaty of commerce and friendship with "the government" of Huahine, one of the Society Islands, which granted the German fleet the right to anchor at all harbours on the island, among other things.


title: German colonial empire

text: Although Bismarck "remained as contemptuous of all colonial dreams as ever", in 1884, he consented to the acquisition of colonies by the German Empire, in order to protect trade, safeguard raw materials and export-markets and to take advantage of opportunities for capital investment, among other reasons. In the very next year Bismarck shed personal involvement when "he abandoned his colonial drive as suddenly and casually as he had started it" – as if he had committed an error in judgment that could confuse the substance of his more significant policies. "Indeed, in 1889, [Bismarck] tried to give German South-West Africa away to the British. It was, he said, a burden and an expense, and he would like to saddle someone else with it."


title: German colonial empire

text: Following 1884, Germany invaded several territories in Africa: German East Africa (including present-day Burundi, Rwanda, and the mainland part of Tanzania); German South-West Africa (present-day Namibia), German Cameroon (including parts of present-day Cameroon, Gabon, Congo, Central African Republic, Chad and Nigeria); and Togoland (present-day Togo and parts of Ghana). Germany was also active in the Pacific, annexing a series of islands that would be called German New Guinea (part of present-day Papua New Guinea and several nearby island groups). The northeastern region of the island of New Guinea was called Kaiser-Wilhelmsland; the Bismarck Archipelago to the islands' east also contained two larger islands named New Mecklenburg and New Pomerania. They also acquired the Northern Solomon Islands. These islands were given the status of protectorate.


title: German colonial empire

text: The shift in Bismarck's policy on the acquisition of colonies began as part of his 1878 policy on the protection of the German economy from foreign competition. The beginning of his colonial policy in connection with the Schutzzollpolitik was the acquisition of Samoa, where there were significant German economic interests. In June 1879, as Imperial Chancellor, he acknowledged the "Treaty of Friendship" agreed between the Samoan chiefs and the German consul in Samoa in January 1879, with the result that the consul assumed control of the administration of the city of Apia on the island of Upolo, along with the consuls of Britain and America. In the 1880s, Bismarck would unsuccessfully attempt to annex Samoa several times. The western Samoan islands, which included Apia, the main city, became a German colony in 1899.


title: German colonial empire

text: In April 1880, Bismarck actively intervened in domestic politics in favour of colonial matters, when he presented the Samoa Bill to the Reichstag. It had been endorsed by the Federal Council, but was rejected by the Reichstag. The bill would have provided German financial support to a private German colonial trade company that had fallen into difficulties.


title: German colonial empire

text: In May 1880, Bismarck asked the banker Adolph von Hansemann to produce a report on German colonial goals in the Pacific and the possibility of enforcing them. Hansemann submitted his "Memorandum on Colonial Aspirations in the South Seas" to Bismarck in September of the same year. The proposed territorial acquisitions were almost all taken or claimed as colonies four years later. Those Pacific territories that were claimed in 1884 but not taken were finally brought under German colonial administration in 1899. Significantly, Hausemann was a founding member of the New Guinea Consortium for the acquisition of colonies in New Guinea and the Pacific in 1882.


title: German colonial empire

text: In November 1882, the Bremen-based tobacco merchant Adolf Lüderitz contacted the Foreign Office and requested protection for a trade station south of Walvis Bay on the southwest African coast. In February and November 1883, he asked the British government whether the United Kingdom would provide protection to Lüderitz's trade station. Both times the British government refused.


title: German colonial empire

text: From March 1883, Adolph Woermann, a Hamburg bulkgoods trader, shipowner, and member of the Hamburg Chamber of Commerce, engaged in extremely confidential negotiations with the Foreign Office, which was headed by Bismarck, for the acquisition of a colony in West Africa. The reason for this was the fear of tariffs that Hamburg traders might have to pay if the whole of West Africa were to come under British or French control. Finally a secret request from the Chamber of Commerce to Bismarck for the establishment of a colony in West Africa was submitted to Bismarck on 6 July 1883, stating that "through such acquisitions, German trade in Trans-Atlantic lands could only be given a firmer position and a surer support, while without political protection trade cannot now thrive and progress."


title: German colonial empire

text: After this, in March 1883, the Sierra Leone Convention between the United Kingdom and France was published, in which the two countries' spheres of interest were laid out without consideration of other trading nations. In response the German government asked the senates of the cities of Lübeck, Bremen, and Hamburg for their opinions. In their answer, the Hamburg merchants demanded the acquisition of colonies in West Africa. In December 1883, Bismarck let Hamburg known that an Imperial commissioner would be sent to West Africa to secure the safety of German trade and to conclude a treaty with "independent Negro states". A warship, the SMS "Sophie" would be sent to provide military protection. Additionally, Bismarck requested suggestions on this plan and asked for Adolph Woermann's advice personally on what instructions should be given to the Imperial commissioner. In March 1884, Gustav Nachtigal was named as the Imperial Commissioner for the West African Coast and set sail for West Africa in the SMS "Möwe".


title: German colonial empire

text: The year 1884 marks the beginning of actual German colonial acquisitions, building on the overseas possessions and rights that had been acquired for the German Empire since 1876. In one year, Germany's holdings became the third-largest colonial empire, after the British and French empires. Following the British model, Bismarck placed many possessions of German merchants under the protection of the German empire. He took advantage of a period of foreign peace to begin the "colonial experiment", which he remained sceptical of. The transition to official acceptance of colonialism and to colonial government thus occurred during the last quarter of Bismarck's tenure of office.


title: German colonial empire

text: First, Adolf Lüderitz's trading post in the Bay of Angara Pequena ('Lüderitz Bay') and the surrounding hinterland (") was placed under the protection of the German Empire in April 1884 as German South West Africa. In July, Togoland and Adolph Woermann's possessions in Cameroon followed, then the northeastern section of New Guinea ('Kaiser-Wilhelmsland') and the neighbouring islands ('the Bismarck Archipelago'). In January 1885, the German flag was raised at Kapitaï and Koba on the west African coast. In February, imperialist and "man-of-action" Carl Peters accumulated vast tracts of land for his Society for German Colonization, "emerging from the bush with X-marks [affixed by unlettered tribal chiefs] on documents ... for some 60 thousand square miles of the Zanzibar Sultanate's mainland property." which became German East Africa. Such exploratory missions required security measures that could be solved with small private, armed contingents recruited mainly in the Sudan and usually led by adventurous former military personnel of lower rank. Brutality, hanging and flogging prevailed during these land-grab expeditions under Peters' control as well as others as no-one "held a monopoly in the mistreatment of Africans", and in April 1885, the brothers Clemens and Gustav Denhardt acquired Wituland in modern Kenya. With this, the first wave of German colonial acquisitions was largely completed.


title: German colonial empire

text: The raising of German flags on Pacific islands claimed by Spain between August and October 1885 sparked the Carolines Crisis, in which Germany ultimately backed down.


title: German colonial empire

text: In October 1885, the Marshall Islands were also claimed and finally several of the Solomon Islands in October 1886. In 1888, Germany ended the civil war on Nauru and annexed the island.


title: German colonial empire

text: The causes of Bismarck's sudden shift to a policy of colonial acquisition remain a matter of controversy among historians. There are two dominant schools of thought: one which focusses on German domestic politics and one which focusses on foreign affairs.


title: German colonial empire

text: In terms of internal politics, the key aspect is the public pressure which led to the development of a "Colonial fever" ("Kolonialfieber") among the German populace. Although the colonial movement was not very strong institutionally, it succeeded in bringing its position into the public debate. A memorandum authored by Adolph Woermann and sent to Bismarck by the Hamburg Chamber of Commerce on 6 July 1883 is considered to have been particularly important in this respect. The approach of the 1884 German federal election and Bismarck's desire to strengthen his own position and bind the National Liberal Party, which supported colonialism, to himself, have also been proposed as domestic factors in the adoption of the colonial policy. Hans-Ulrich Wehler advanced the social imperialism thesis, which holds that the colonial expansion served to "divert" social tensions created by economic crisis to the foreign sphere and helped to reinforce Bismarck's authority. The so-called "Crown-prince thesis" holds that Bismarck was attempting to deliberately worsen the German relationship with the United Kingdom before the anticipated succession of the "anglophile" Frederick III to the German throne in order to prevent him from instituting liberal English-style policies.


title: German colonial empire

text: In terms of foreign policy, the decision to colonise is seen as an extension of the concept of the European balance of power to a global context. By participating in the Scramble for Africa would also reinforce its position as one of the Great Powers. Improving relations with France through a "colonial entente" that would divert French attention from revanchism related to Alsace-Lorraine, which had been annexed by Germany in 1871, has also been seen as a motive.


title: German colonial empire

text: It is no longer believed that the initiation of colonial expansion represented a radical reversal of Bismarck's politics. The liberal-imperialist ideal of an overseas policy grounded in private economic initiatives, which he had held from the beginning, was not changed much by placing German merchants' possessions under the protection of the Empire.


title: German colonial empire

text: As Bismarck was converted to the colonial idea by 1884, he favoured "chartered company" land management rather than establishment of colonial government due to financial considerations. He used official letters of protection to transfer the commerce and administration of individual "German protectorates" to private companies. The administration of these areas was assigned to the German East Africa Company (1885–1890), the German Witu Company (1887-1890), the German New Guinea Company (1885–1899), and the in the Marshall Islands (1888–1906). Bismarck would have liked the German colonies in west Africa and southwest Africa to be administered in this way as well, but neither the nor the Syndicate for West Africa were willing to take on the role.


title: German colonial empire

text: These areas were brought into German possession with extremely unequal treaties following demonstrations of military power. Indigenous rulers ceded vast areas, which they often had no legal claim to, in exchange for vague promises of protection and laughably low purchase prices. Details of the treaties often remained unclear to them due to the language barrier. They engaged with these deals, however, because the long negotiations with the colonisers and the ritual act of signing a treaty enormously enhanced their authority. These treaties were approved by the German government, which granted complete authority without oversight to the colonial companies, while retaining for itself only ultimate sovereignty and a few unspecified rights to intervene. In this way, state financial and administrative engagement with the colonies was kept to a minimum.


title: German colonial empire

text: However, this strategy failed within a few years. The poor financial situation of almost all of the "protectorates" as well as the precarious security situation (indigenous revolts broke out in South West Africa and East Africa in 1888, while in Cameroon and Togo border conflicts with the neighbouring British colonies were feared, and in general the demands of efficient administration overwhelmed the colonial companies) compelled Bismarck and his successors to implement direct and formal rule in all the colonies.


title: German colonial empire

text: Although temperate zone cultivation flourished, the demise and often failure of tropical low-land enterprises contributed to changing Bismarck's view. He reluctantly acquiesced to pleas for help to deal with revolts and armed hostilities by often powerful rulers whose lucrative slaving activities seemed at risk. German native military forces initially engaged in dozens of punitive expeditions to apprehend and punish freedom fighters, at times with British assistance. The author Charles Miller offers the theory that the Germans had the handicap of trying to colonise African areas inhabited by aggressive tribes, whereas their colonial neighbours had more docile peoples to contend with. At that time, the German penchant for giving muscle priority over patience contributed to continued unrest. Several of the African colonies remained powder kegs throughout this phase (and beyond).


title: German colonial empire

text: After 1885, Bismarck opposed further colonial acquisitions and maintained his policy focus on maintaining good relationships with the Great Powers of England and France. In 1888, when the journalist Eugen Wolf urged him to acquire further colonies for Germany, so that it would not fall behind in the scramble with the other Great Powers for colonies, which he understood in a social Darwinian sense, Bismarck replied that his priority was rather the protection of the recently won national unity, which he considered to be under threat due to Germany's central location:


title: German colonial empire

text: In 1889, Bismarck considered withdrawing Germany from colonial policy, wishing to entirely end Germany activities in East Africa and Samoa, according to eyewitnesses. It was further reported that Bismarck wanted nothing more to do with the administration of the colonies and intended to hand them over to the admiralty. In May 1889, Bismarck offered to sell the German possessions in Africa to the Italian Prime Minister, Francesco Crispi – who countered with an offer to sell Italy's colonies to Germany.


title: German colonial empire

text: Bismarck also found the colonies useful as bargaining chips. Thus, at the Congo Conference held in Berlin from 1884 to 1885, he divied Africa up between the Great Powers. In 1884, a treaty was concluded in the name of Lüderitz with the Zulu king Dinuzulu, which would have given Germany a claim to St Lucia Bay in Zululand. However, the claim was dropped as part of a concession to Britain in May 1885, along with a claim to Pondoland. Also in 1885, Germany waived its claim to the west African territories of Kapitaï and Koba and Mahinland, in favour of France and Britain respectively. In 1886, Germany and Britain agreed on the boundaries of their spheres of interest in East Africa.


title: German colonial empire

text: After Bismarck had ended the policy of colonial acquisition in March 1890, he concluded the Heligoland–Zanzibar Treaty with Britain on 1 July 1890, in which Germany renounced all remaining claims north of German East Africa. In this way, he established a balance with Great Britain. Renouncing the German claims to the Somali coast between Burgabo and Alula also improved relations with Italy, one of Germany's partners in the Triple Alliance. In exchange for this, Germany acquired the Caprivi Strip, which extended German South West Africa east to the Zambezi River (it was hoped that the river would enable overland transport between German South West Africa and German East Africa). In these circumstances, further German colonial aspirations in South East Africa were brought to an end.


title: German colonial empire

text: German interest in African colonies was accompanied by a growth of scholarly interest in Africa. In 1845, the orientalist Heinrich Leberecht Fleischer of Leipzig University and others founded the Deutsche Morgenländische Gesellschaft. The linguist Hans Stumme, also of Leipzig, researched African languages. Leipzig established a professorship of Anthropology, Ethnography, and Pre-history in 1901 (Karl Weule, who established an ethnological and biological determinist school of African research) and a professorship for "Colonial geography and colonial policy" in 1915. The researcher Hans Meyer was director of the "Institute for Colonial Geography". In 1919, the Seminar for Colonial geography and colonial policy" was established.


title: German colonial empire

text: Kaiser Wilhelm II (1888-1918) was keen for Germany to expand its colonial holdings. Bismarck's immediate successor in 1890, Leo von Caprivi, was willing to maintain the colonial burden of what already existed, but opposed new ventures. Others who followed, especially Bernhard von Bülow, as foreign minister and chancellor, sanctioned the acquisition of further Pacific Ocean colonies and provided substantial treasury assistance to existing protectorates to employ administrators, commercial agents, surveyors, local "peacekeepers" and tax collectors. This accorded with the expansionistic policy and a forced upgrade of the Imperial German Navy. Colonial acquisition became a serious factor in German domestic politics. The German colonial society was joined in 1891 by the extremely nationalistic Pan-German League. In addition to the arguments previously made in support of colonialism, it was now argued that Germany had a duty to end the slave trade in the colonies and free indigenous people from their Muslim enslavers. These abolitionist demands, with their clear anti-Muslim bias turned the 1888 "Arab revolt" on the East African coast into a holy war. Pre-eminent, however, was the matter of German national prestige and the belief that Germany was locked in a Social Darwinist competition with the other Great Powers, in which Germany, as a "late-comer" had to claim her due share.


title: German colonial empire

text: Wilhelm himself lamented his nation's position as colonial followers rather than leaders. In an interview with Cecil Rhodes in March 1899 he stated the alleged dilemma clearly: "... Germany has begun her colonial enterprise very late, and was, therefore, at the disadvantage of finding all the desirable places already occupied." Under the new Weltpolitik ("Global policy"), a "place in the Sun" was sought for the "latecoming nation" (as the chancellor Bernhard von Bülow put it in a speech to the Reichstag on 6 December 1897), which entailed the possession of colonies and a right to have a say in other colonial matters. This policy focussed on national prestige sharply contrasted with the pragmatic colonial policy advanced by Bismarck in 1884 and 1885.


title: German colonial empire

text: After 1890, Germany succeeded in acquiring only relatively minor territories. In 1895, concessions were acquired from Qing China in Hankau and Tientsin (modern Wuhan and Tianjin). Following the Juye Incident of 1 November 1897, in which two German missionaries from the Society of the Divine Word were murdered, Kaiser Wilhelm dispatched the German East Asia Squadron to occupy Jiaozhou Bay and its chief port, Tsingtao (modern Qingdao) on the southern coast of the Shandong peninsula. This became the Kiautschou Bay Leased Territory and the area within 50 km of Jiaozhou Bay became a "Neutral Zone" in which Chinese sovereignty was limited in favour of Germany. Furthermore, Germany received mining and railway concessions in Shandong province.


title: German colonial empire

text: Through the German–Spanish Treaty of 1899, Germany acquired the Caroline Islands, Mariana Islands, and Palau in Micronesia for 17 million gold marks. Through the Tripartite Convention of 1899, the west part of the Samoan islands became a German protectorate. Simultaneously, the control of existing colonies was extended inland; for example the kingdoms of Burundi and Rwanda were added to German East Africa. However, from 1891, German efforts in this regard encountered sharp resistance in the Bafut Wars in Cameroon and the conflict with the Hehe in East Africa


title: German colonial empire

text: On 6 March 1901, as part of preparatory work by the Imperial postal service for laying a German underwater telegraph cable, the colonial official took possession of Sonsorol island. The next day, he also claimed the islands of Merir and Pulo Anna, followed on 12 April by the island of Tobi and the Helen Reef. These islands were placed under the administration of German New Guinea.


title: German colonial empire

text: In 1900, the Imperial Navy attempted to lease the island of Langkawi from the Sultan of Kedah for fifty years through the Behn Meyer company, based in Singapore. The deal fell through when the English government intervened based on a secret 1897 treaty with Siam which gave England the right to veto any Siamese concessions to a third power, so Kedah, which was a vassal of the Bangkok government, was prevented from loaning Langkawi to the German government. The Kaiser's attempt to acquire the Baja California peninsula from Mexico as another naval base for the German fleet in the Pacific also failed.


title: German colonial empire

text: During the Agadir Crisis in 1911, the German government attempted to get the whole of French Congo as compensation for German recognition of the French protectorate in Morocco. In the end they were given parts of north western French Congo, which were added to German Cameroon and dubbed Neukamerun. This acquisitive German colonial policy led to the increasing isolation of Germany among the Great Powers, seen in Germany as an "encirclement".


title: German colonial empire

text: For the academic development of the colonies, the was established in 1896. In 1898, the was established in Witzenhausen, to provide agricultural training to people for settlement in the colonies. It is now part of the University of Kassel. In 1900, the Institute for Naval and Tropical Medicine was established in Hamburg to train naval and colonial doctors.


title: German colonial empire

text: Of the German colonies, only Togoland and German Samoa became profitable and self-sufficient; the balance sheet for the colonies as a whole revealed a fiscal net loss for Germany. Despite this, the leadership in Berlin committed the nation to the financial support, maintenance, development and defence of these possessions.


title: German colonial empire

text: The forcefulness with which the German colonial rulers imposed their claim to control led to ever more revolts by the indigenous population. The native population was forced into unequal treaties by the German colonial governments. This led to the local tribes and natives losing their influence and power and eventually forced some of them to become slave laborers. The result was several military and genocidal campaigns by the Germans against the natives. Both the colonial authorities and settlers were of the opinion that native Africans were to be a lower class, their land seized and handed over to settlers and companies, while the remaining population was to be put in reservations; the Germans planned to make a colony inhabited predominately by whites: a "new African Germany".


title: German colonial empire

text: Since the Germans were materially and technologically superior but had only a minimal military presence, the indigenous peoples largely adopted guerilla tactics. The German colonial forces reacted similarly to other cases of asymmetric warfare involving colonial powers: they waged war against the whole population. In a burnt earth strategy, they destroyed villages, prevented economic activity, and withheld any protection against wild animals. Through these actions, they forced the population to flee into inaccessible regions, where many starved to death. Through this conscious strategy, the Germans caused lasting changes to the whole landscape, making it uninhabitable for decades.


title: German colonial empire

text: The most significant of these actions against local populations were reprisals against the Chinese following the Boxer Rebellion in 1901–1902, the Herero and Namaqua genocide in 1904–1905, and the suppression of the Maji Maji Rebellion in 1905–1907.


title: German colonial empire

text: After the outbreak of a cattle disease in South West Africa in 1897, the Herero spread their surviving cattle out over the area of the colony. However, these new pastures had been bought by settlers, who now claimed the Herero's cattle for themselves. In 1904, the situation finally escalated into the revolt of the Herero and the Nama, which the understaffed Imperial Schutztruppe for German South West Africa were not able to quell. The German government therefore dispatched a naval expeditionary force and subsequently reinforcement Schutztruppe. In total, around 15,000 men under Lieutenant-general Lothar von Trotha defeated the Herero forces in August 1904 at the Battle of Waterberg. Von Trotha issued the so-called "extermination order" ("Vernichtungsbefehl"), under which the surviving Herero were driven into the wilderness. 1800 of the survivors had reached British Bechuanaland by the end of November 1904, while thousands more fled to the northernmost parts of South West Africa, and into the desert. The Herero population is estimated at 50,000, of which around half had died by 1908. The Nama suffered 10,000 deaths, also around half of their population. They had fought on the German side against the Herero until the end of 1904. This was the first genocide of the 20th century.


title: German colonial empire

text: The Maji-Maji rebellion broke out in German East Africa in 1905/6 and its suppression led to an estimated 100,000 native deaths, many from famine resulting from German scorched earth tactics.


title: German colonial empire

text: The lack of any true war in Togoland led some in Europe to call it Germany's "model colony." But it saw its own share of bloodshed. The Germans used forced labor and harsh punishment to keep the Africans in line.


title: German colonial empire

text: To minimize dissent the German Colonial Press Law (written 1906–1912) kept the pugnacious settler press under control with censorship and prohibition of unauthorised publications. However, in Togoland, African writers avoided the law by publishing critical articles in the adjacent British Gold Coast Colony. In the process they built an international network of sympathisers. Exposés followed in the print media throughout Germany of the Herero rebellions in 1904 in German South-West Africa (Namibia today) where in military interventions between 50% to 70% of the Herero population perished, known as the Herero and Namaqua Genocide. The subduing of the Maji Maji uprising in German East Africa in 1905 was prominently published. The rejection of a supplementary budget to provide further funding for colonial conflicts at the end of 1906 led to the dissolution of the Reichstag and new elections. "A wave of anti-colonial feeling began to gather momentum in Germany" and resulted in large voter turnouts in the so-called " Hottentot election" for the "Reichstag" in January 1907. The conservative Bülow government barely survived, but in January 1907 the newly elected "Reichstag" imposed a "complete overhaul" upon the colonial service.


title: German colonial empire

text: As a result of the colonial wars in South West Africa and East Africa, which had been caused by poor treatment of native peoples, it was considered necessary to change the German colonial administration, in favour of a more scientific approach to the employment of the colonies that improved the lives of the people in them. Therefore, the highest authority in colonial administration, the Colonial Department ("Kolonialabteilung") was separated from the Foreign Office and, in May 1907, it became its own ministry, the Imperial Colonial Office ("Reichskolonialamt").


title: German colonial empire

text: The creator of the new colonial policy was a successful banker and private-sector restructurer, Bernhard Dernburg from Darmstadt, who was placed in charge of the Colonial Department in September 1906 and retained the role as Secretary of State of the revamped Colonial Office until 1910. Entrenched incompetents were screened out and summarily removed from office and "not a few had to stand trial. Replacing the misfits was a new breed of efficient, humane, colonial civil servant, usually the product of Dernburg's own creation, the ... Colonial Institute at Hamburg." In African protectorates, especially Togoland and German East Africa, "improbably advanced and humane administrations emerged." Dernburg went on tours of the colonies, to learn about their problems first-hand and find solutions. Capital investments by banks were secured with public funds of the imperial treasury to minimize risk. Dernburg, as a former banker, facilitated such thinking; he saw his commission to also turn the colonies into paying propositions. He oversaw large-scale expansion of infrastructure. Every African protectorate built rail lines to the interior. Dar es Salaam evolved into "the showcase city of all of tropical Africa," Lomé grew into the "prettiest city in western Africa", and Tsingtao in China was, "in miniature, as German a city as Hamburg or Bremen". Whatever the Germans constructed in their colonies was made to last. Scientific and technical institutions for colonial purposes were established or expanded, in order to develop the colonies on these terms. Two of these, the Hamburg Colonial Institute and the German Colonial School are predecessor organisations of the modern universities of Hamburg and Kassel.


title: German colonial empire

text: Dernburg declared that the indigenous population in the protectorates "was the most important factor in our colonies" and this was affirmed by new laws and initiatives. Corporal punishment was abolished. Every colony in Africa and the Pacific established the beginnings of a public school system, and every colony built and staffed hospitals. In some colonies, native agricultural holdings were encouraged and supported. In January 1909, Derburg said "The goal must be colonies closely bound to the Fatherland, administratively independent, intellectually self-sufficient, and healthy."


title: German colonial empire

text: Wilhelm Solf, who was Colonial Secretary from 1911 until 1918, also undertook tours in Africa in 1912 and 1913. The resulting impressions informed his colonial programme, which included an expansion of the powers of the governors and a ban on forced labour for Africans. As governor of Samoa, he had referred to the islanders as ""unsere braunen Schützlinge"" (our brown charges), who could be guided but not forced. Similarly, Heinrich Schnee, governor of East Africa from 1912, proclaimed that "the dominant feature of my administration [will be] ... the welfare of the natives entrusted into my care." Solf also advocated a network of motorways in the colonies. He secured support for this comparatively peaceful colonial policy, instead of the highly militarised approach that had been taken up to this point, from all parties in the Reichstag, except for the right.


title: German colonial empire

text: There were no further major revolts in the German colonies after 1905 and the economic efficiency of the overseas possessions rapidly increased, as a result of these new policies and improvements in shipping, especially the establishment of scheduled services with refrigerated holds, increased the amount of agricultural products from the colonies, exotic fruits and spices, that were sold to the public in Germany. Between 1906 and 1914, the production of palm oil and cocoa in the colonies doubled, the rubber production of the African colonies quadrupled, and the cotton exports from German East Africa increased tenfold. The total trade between Germany and its colonies increased from 72 million marks in 1906 to 264 million marks in 1913. Due to this economic growth, the income from colonial taxes and duties increased sixfold. Instead of being dependent on financial support from Germany, the colonies became or were on track to become financially independent. By 1914, only German New Guinea, Kiautschou, and the African Schutztruppen were subsidised. "The colonial economy was thriving ... and roads, railways, shipping and telegraph communications were up to the minute."


title: German colonial empire

text: The colonies were romanticized. Geologists and cartographers explored what were the unmarked regions on European maps, identifying mountains and rivers, and demarcating boundaries. Hermann Detzner and one Captain Nugent, R.A., had charge of a joint project to demarcate the British and German frontiers of Cameroon, which was published in 1913. Travelers and newspaper reporters brought back stories of black and brown natives serving German managers and settlers. There were also suspicions and reports of colonial malfeasance, corruption and brutality in some protectorates, and Lutheran and Roman Catholic missionaries dispatched disturbing reports to their mission headquarters in Germany.


title: German colonial empire

text: Idealists often volunteered for selection and appointment to government posts, while others with an entrepreneurial bent laboured to swell the dividends at home for the Hanseatic trading houses and shipping lines. Subsequent historians would commend German colonialism in those years as "an engine of modernization with far-reaching effects for the future."


title: German colonial empire

text: In the years before the outbreak of the World War, British colonial officers viewed the Germans as deficient in "colonial aptitude", but "whose colonial administration was nevertheless superior to those of the other European states". Anglo-German colonial issues in the decade before 1914 were minor and both empires, the British and German, took conciliatory attitudes. Foreign Secretary Sir Edward Grey, considered still a moderate in 1911, was willing to "study the map of Africa in a pro-German spirit". Britain further recognized that Germany really had little of value to offer in territorial transactions; however, advice to Grey and Prime Minister H. H. Asquith hardened by early 1914 "to stop the trend of what the advisers considered Germany's taking and Britain's giving."


title: German colonial empire

text: Once war was declared in late July 1914 Britain and its allies promptly moved against the colonies. The public was informed that German colonies were a threat because "Every German colony has a powerful wireless station – they will talk to one another across the seas, and at every opportunity they [German ships] will dash from cover to harry and destroy our commerce, and maybe, to raid our coasts." The British position that Germany was a uniquely brutal and cruel colonial power originated during the war; it had not been said during peacetime. The German overseas Colonies began to fall one by one to the allied forces. The first to go was Togoland to the British, then Dahomey to the French, then the Cameroons to the allied forces. Germany's colonies put up a stout fight but by 1916 Germany lost most of its colonies, except German East Africa, where a German force of General Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck held out against the Allies until the end of the war.


title: German colonial empire

text: In the Pacific, Britain's ally Japan declared war on Germany in 1914 and quickly seized several of Germany's island colonies, the Mariana, Caroline and Marshall Islands, with virtually no resistance. One reason these colonies fell so easily is because of the departure of Admiral von Spee's fleet. In other parts of the Pacific Western Samoa, another German colony fell without a fight to a New Zealand force. Later on an Australian invasion of Neu-Pommern beat the Germans seizing the entire colony within a few weeks.


title: German colonial empire

text: South Africa's J. C. Smuts, now in Britain's small War Cabinet, spoke of German schemes for world power, militarisation and exploitation of resources, indicating Germany threatened western civilisation itself. While propaganda was said about both sides it was here in Africa where Germany saw a crushing defeat. It was at Togoland where the Germans were quickly outnumbered leaving them to flee the capital which led to a large pursuit of German forces by allied armies leading to the eventual surrender of German forces on 26 August 1914. Smuts' warnings were repeated in the press. The idea took hold that they should not be returned to Germany after the war. These defeats all around the globe of a colonial power proved to the people of the world that these vast empires were not invincible and could one day be toppled. This fall of imperial Germany was the beginning of the end for colonialism.


title: German colonial empire

text: Germany's overseas empire was dismantled following defeat in World War I. With the concluding Treaty of Versailles, Article 22, German colonies were transformed into League of Nations mandates and divided between Belgium, the United Kingdom, and certain British Dominions, France and Japan with the determination not to see any of them returned to Germany – a guarantee secured by Article 119.


title: German colonial empire

text: In Africa, the United Kingdom and France divided German Kamerun (Cameroons) and Togoland. Belgium gained Ruanda-Urundi in northwestern German East Africa, the United Kingdom obtained by far the greater landmass of this colony, thus gaining the "missing link" in the chain of British possessions stretching from South Africa to Egypt (Cape to Cairo), and Portugal received the Kionga Triangle, a sliver of German East Africa. German South-West Africa was taken under mandate by the Union of South Africa. In terms of the population of 12.5 million people in 1914, 42 percent were transferred to mandates of Britain and its dominions, 33 percent to France, and 25 percent to Belgium.


title: German colonial empire

text: In the Pacific, Japan gained Germany's islands north of the equator (the Marshall Islands, the Carolines, the Marianas, the Palau Islands) and Kiautschou in China. German Samoa was assigned to New Zealand; German New Guinea, the Bismarck Archipelago and Nauru went to Australia as mandates.


title: German colonial empire

text: British placement of surrogate responsibility for former German colonies on white-settler dominions was at the time determined to be the most expedient option for the British government – and an appropriate reward for the Dominions having fulfilled their "great and urgent imperial service" through military intervention at the behest of and for Great Britain. It also meant that British colonies now had colonies of their own – which was very much influenced at the Paris proceedings by W. M. Hughes, William Massey, and Louis Botha, the prime ministers of Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. The principle of "self-determination" embodied in the League of Nations covenant was not considered to apply to these colonies and was "regarded as meaningless". To "allay President [Woodrow] Wilson's suspicions of British imperialism", the system of "mandates" was drawn up and agreed to by the British War Cabinet (with the French and Italians in tow), a device by which conquered enemy territory would be held not as a possession but as "sacred trusts". But "far from envisaging the eventual independence of the [former] German colonies, Allied statesmen at the Paris Conference regarded 1919 as the renewal, not the end, of an imperial era." In deliberations the British "War Cabinet had confidence that natives everywhere would opt for British rule"; however, the cabinet acknowledged "the necessity to prove that its policy toward the German colonies was not motivated by aggrandizement" since the Empire was seen by America as a "land devouring octopus" with a "voracious territorial appetite".


title: German colonial empire

text: President Wilson saw the League of Nations as "'residuary trustee' for the [German] colonies" captured and occupied by "rapacious conquerors". The victors retained the German overseas possessions and did so with the belief that Australian, Belgian, British, French, Japanese, New Zealand, Portuguese and South African rule was superior to Germany's. Several decades later during the collapse of the then existing colonial empires, Africans and Asians cited the same arguments that had been used by the Allies against German colonial rule – they now simply demanded "to stand by themselves".


title: German colonial empire

text: In Germany after the First World War, the general public opinion was that the seizure of the colonies had been unlawful and that Germany had a right to its colonies. Nearly all the parties elected to the Weimar National Assembly on 19 January 1919, voted in favour of a resolution which demanded the return of the colonies on 1 March 1919, i.e. while the Paris Peace Conference was still in progress. Only seven delegates from the USPD voted against it. The charge that Germany had failed to "civilise" the peoples under its control was seen as particularly outrageous - this had played a central role in German colonialism's self-legitimation. This protest achieved nothing - in the final version of the Treaty of Versailles, Germany was required to give up all its colonies. With the exception of German Southwest Africa, where some descendants of German settlers still live today (the German Namibians), all Germans were required to leave the colonies.


title: German colonial empire

text: Even in the early phase of the Weimar Republic, there were voices calling for the return of the colonies - among them Konrad Adenauer, who was then mayor of Cologne. Adenauer was Deputy President of the German Colonial Society from 1931 to 1933. From 1924 there was a Colonial Office in the Federal Foreign Office, directed by Edmund Brückner, the former Governor of Togo. Brückner's policy was that the return of Togo, Cameroon, and German East Africa were the most likely. In 1925, the Colonial Imperial Society ('Korag') was established as an umbrella organisation, from which the Reichskolonialbund emerged in 1933. Also in 1925, Johannes Bell, who had been Colonial Minister in the Scheidemann cabinet, founded the "Interparty Colonial Union", which included members of the whole political spectrum, from the Nazi party to the SPD. In 1925, some settlers also returned to their plantations in Cameroon, which they had bought the previous year with financial support from the Foreign Office. In anticipation of the recovery of the colonies, the Colonial Women's School of Rendsburg was founded in 1926. In 1931, an Institute for Foreign and Colonial Forestry was founded at the Royal Saxon Academy of Forestry.


title: German colonial empire

text: The treaty of Versailles attributed war guilt to Germany, but most Germans did not accept this and many saw the confiscation of the colonies by the Allies as a theft, especially after the South African premier Louis Botha stated that all allegations which the Allies had published during the war about the German colonial empire were, without exception, baseless fabrications. German colonial revisionists spoke of a "Colonial Guilt Myth."