Why didn't Germany invade the Netherlands in World War One? (Short Animated Documentary)

in the second world war Germany famously invaded France by going through Luxembourg Belgium and the Netherlands the idea was that doing so would broaden the front stretching French forces and allowing German troops to quickly go around them and avoid some fortifications too but during the first world war when the German military had the same concerns the Netherlands was left alone which raises the question why why didn't Germany invade the Netherlands in the first world war so to begin whilst planning for any future war with France German commanders led by Alfred Von schleifer knew that it would likely also involve Russia the original plan was to hold at the border and Crush Russia before bringing their full might against France however in 1905 the Russians showed the world that their military wasn't as mighty as they had let on and so the Germans changed their plan instead France would be crushed first and then Russia dealt with the problem was that the franco-german Border was heavily manned and fortified meaning that going through there would take a long time Schlieffen felt that quickly pushing through Luxembourg would allow the Germans to go around French fortifications and that going through Belgium were dating cutting through Luxembourg and that going through the Netherlands were Aid in going through Belgium however when war broke out nine years later Germany left the Netherlands alone so why well the first reason was overconfident Germany's military Chiefs believe that going through the Netherlands to flank the belgians was unnecessary because crushing them was going to be easy so why deal with the extra paperwork the second reason was that the German Emperor had a good relationship with the Dutch royal family and Kaiser Wilhelm personally preferred that they weren't subject to capture or humiliation at the hands of the German Army the third reason was the most important pragmatism German High command neither invading France via Belgium would pull Britain into the war and with Britain's Navy easily able to block trade to Germany he needed to keep some of the Seas open for food and goods as such keeping the Netherlands out of the war meant that as a neutral Nation it could openly import Goods which Germany could purchase as a neutral third party the Dutch could be threatened with escalation in order to prevent them from taking Britain or France's side the German military knew that the Dutch monarchy would never take their country into war with a great power and so the threat of War which Britain and France would never countenance could be used to give some minor concessions for example in the opening days of the invasion of Belgium the Dutch closed the river shelled which runs through its territory here to Antwerp and later to Brussels now technically the Dutch were obliged to do this in times of War but the untaunted put immense pressure on the Netherlands to keep it open however the government of the Netherlands weren't willing to do this because if weapons and troops travel through its territory to fight Germans the Germans would have a justification to invade and so it's these three reasons why the Netherlands was never invaded and as the war progressed the German economic situation only got worse thus the need for Dutch trade only ever grew and intervention had no benefit and in case you're wondering why Germany did invade it in the second world war it's because it was great for building airfields close to Britain and also again overconfidence I hope you enjoyed this episode and a special thanks to my patrons James bisonnet Kelly moneymaker Sky Chappelle kosher wolf Jerry Landon Jordan Longley Adam Stalter Marcus Arsenal YN hockey Spencer Lightfoot rod D Martin words about books podcast Captain side August of swan Marvin Casal Community Winston caywood boogly Wiggly Daniel tobian Miss is it Aaron the white Corey Turner the magwapper Alex Schwinn Anthony Beckett Coppertone Maggie Paskowski she went in spinning three plates and Charles the first

Channel: History Matters

Views: 1,630,960

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Id: XXPSjLecm3c

Length: 3min 9sec (189 seconds)

Published: Mon Nov 21 2022