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Mitteleuropa ("Middle Europe"), formally known as the Central European Economic Union (Mitteleuropäische Wirtschaftsunion), is an economic alliance established by the German Empire following the end of the Weltkrieg to help coordinate the newfound economic dominance Germany held over the continent. In its initial stages, Mitteleuropa expanded east to states formed in the aftermath of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, and later expanded to include Austria-Hungary, Ireland, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, and Sweden.
Due to its vast size, the union holds a monopoly on trade which flows through the Baltic sea, while holding similar, albeit not absolute, levels of influence over trade through the North Sea. Much of this trade influence is exercised through the numerous ports under the aegis of the union, such as Hamburg, Antwerp, Rotterdam and Bremerhaven. Within the Black Sea, the union has a similarly monopolistic presence via the Ukrainian port cities of Odessa and Sevastapol, the Georgian city of Poti, and the multi-nationally administered Commission on the Mouth of the Danube.
History[]
Early use of the term[]
The term Mitteleuropa was formally introduced in the 1840s by German and Austrian scholars and statesmen, who aimed for the creation of an interlocking economic confederation in Central Europe, as the German Confederation was divided into several Zollvereine ("custom zones"), all of which acted independently from each other and hampered efficient trade. However, due to Northern German (especially Prussian) resistance, these plan were eventually dropped.
After the Austro-Prussian War of 1866 and the Prussian-led unification of Germany under Chancellor Otto von Bismarck in 1871, Austria had to abandon its claim to leadership in Central Europe and thereafter used Mitteleuropa to refer to the lands of Austria-Hungary in the Danube basin. In Austria, the Mitteleuropa concept evolved as an alternative to the German question, equivalent to an amalgamation of the states of the German Confederation and the multi-ethnic Austrian Empire under the firm leadership of the Habsburg dynasty.
In the early years of the German Empire, the Mitteleuropa concept was re-adopted by the ruling National Liberal Party; This time however, it was not centered around the egalitarian Austrian approach, but around Prussian dominance with a a distinct Pan-German notion accompanied by the concept of a renewed settler colonialism, connected with significant anti-Slavic, especially anti-Polish stances. Over time, and especially after the fall of Bismarck and the NLP, the plan would become more and more obscure, however, and would be adopted instead by German far-right organizations, like the Alldeutscher Verband (Pan-German League).
In 1914, when the Weltkrieg began and Reichskanzler Theobald von Bethmann-Hollweg had worked out the Septemberprogramm, Mitteleuropa, meaning Central Europe under the total control of Germany, had become a part of the German hegemonic policy and war aims.
The Prussian Mitteleuropa Plan[]
The Mitteleuropa plan was to achieve an economic and cultural hegemony over Central Europe by the German Empire and subsequent economic and financial exploitation of this region combined with direct annexations and the creation of puppet states in the east as a buffer between Germany and Russia. An important advocate of the concept was the liberal politician Friedrich Naumann of the NLP, who dedicated the concept its own book in his 1915 work "Mitteleuropa". According to Naumann, this part of Europe was to become a politically and economically integrated block subjected to German rule. Naumann also supported programs of Germanization and Hungarization and the creation of German dependencies in Crimea and the Baltics.
The concept of Mitteleuropa met the approval of the ruling political and economic elite; War plans in the east were drawn out quickly, it was spoken of a "new German order in Europe". Eastern Europe was planned to serve as an economic backyard of Germany, whose exploitation would enable the German sphere of influence to better compete against strategic rivals like Britain or the United States of America. Political, military and economic organization was to be based on German domination, with commercial treaties imposed on countries like Poland and Ukraine. It was believed that the German working class would be appeased by the economic benefits of territorial annexations, a new economic sphere of influence, and exploitation of conquered countries for the material benefit of Germany. The Mitteleuropa plan was heavily opposed and viewed as a threat by the British, who feared it would destroy British continental trade, and, as a consequence, the source of its global dominance - something that indeed happened after the conclusion of the war and would indirectly cause the British Revolution and the collapse of the British Empire in 1924/25.
The Mitteleuropa concept worked out by Reichskanzler von Bethmann-Hollweg in the early stages of the war additionally planned an inclusion of parts of Western Europe in the economic union, most prominently Belgium and, in case of a total victory, France. The German occupation of Belgium was the first phase in this process; Plans to create a "Duchy of Flanders" and a "Grand Duchy of Lorraine" were discussed as political units of future "localized" administration. German left-wing parties heavily opposed said plans, calling it "romantic nonsense" and a "dynastic joke" to reestablish the old medieval fiefdoms and titles. Eventually these plans were dropped and Germany instead opted for an altered approach: Turning Belgium into a puppet state (possibly split between the Dutch and French population) and forcing France to make strategic territorial concessions, most importantly the Longwy-Briey basin, one of Europe's richest mining areas directly located at the Franco-German border.
The most important economist behind the Mitteleuropa plans was without a doubt Walther Rathenau, a German-Jewish industrialist and CEO of AEG, one of the world's leading electrical equipment producers. He rejected the more radical visions of the right-leaning political establishment (like complete German economic domination of the planet) and strived for the creation of a customs union of equals consistent with a history of the Zollverein and German Confederation of the 19th century. There were many concerns that this would make Germany too inward-looking, but Rathenau's more liberal Mitteleuropa concept gained the support of Georg von Hertling, Minister-President of Bavaria and, since 1917, German Reichskanzler, and eventually even the German Foreign Office.
Realization[]
Belgium[]
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Already in 1914, plans for the future economic union began to be realized in occupied Belgium. The Germans had captured Antwerp, Europe's fourth-largest trading port, in October and planned to set it up as the future gateway into Mitteleuropa, where all trade would flow in and out. German companies and government officials took over Belgian banks, railways and post offices and a German–Belgian trading company was established. Belgian capital markets were soon absorbed into the German sphere.
At the start of the war, the Belgian government hurriedly removed silver coins from circulation and replaced them with banknotes. With the German occupation, these banknotes remained legal and their production continued. To offset the costs of occupation, the German administration demanded regular "war contributions" of 35 million Belgian francs each month. The contribution considerably exceeded Belgium's pre-war tax income and so, in order to pay it, Belgian banks used new paper money to buy bonds. The excessive printing of money, coupled with large amounts of German money brought into the country by soldiers, led to considerable inflation. The Germans also artificially fixed the exchange rate between the German mark and the Belgian franc to benefit their own economy at a ratio of 1:1.25. To cope with the economic conditions, large numbers of individual communes and regions began to print and issue their own money, known as "Necessity Money".
Fiscal chaos, coupled with problems of transportation and the requisition of metal led to a general economic collapse as factories ran out of raw materials and laid off workers. The crisis especially afflicted Belgium's large manufacturing industries. As raw material usually imported from abroad dried up, more firms laid off workers. Unemployment became a major problem and increased reliance on charity distributed by civil institutions and organisations. As many as 650,000 people were unemployed between 1915 and 1919. The German authorities used the crisis to loot industrial machinery from Belgian factories, which was either sent to Germany intact or melted down. The policy escalated after the end of the German policy of deportation in 1917 which later created major problems for Belgian economic recovery after the end of the war.
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Eastern Europe[]
-> Poland!!!!
(((The first realization of these plans was reflected in the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, where guarantees of economic and military domination over Ukraine by Germany were laid out.))) WIP
Central Powers nations[]
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France[]
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Post-Weltkrieg expansion[]
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