Your challenge, with a POD after August 1, 1914, is for Kaiser Wilhelm II to end up executed like how "Hanging the Kaiser" was a popular slogan in the Entente countries. It doesn't matter whether his execution is carried out by domestic revolutionaries (perhaps a more radical 1918 Revolution leads to Germany going Communist under the Spartacus League, who proceed to give the Kaiser the same fate as his Russian cousin)) or by the Entente, though there are bonus points if you could find a way for the Entente to do it as opposed to domestic revolutionaries.
AHC: Wilhelm II executed
- Thread starter Whiteshore
- Start date
True, which is why IMHO it is more likely such an execution is done by a Communist Germany (and even that is unlikely).
It doesn't even have to be Communists just have him get caught by one of the revolutionary groups during the German revolution. There good chance he will get shot.
There was a 'private' attempt to capture him:
On a cold January night in 1919, U.S. Army Col. Luke Lea and six American soldiers made a brazen visit to a 17th century Dutch castle where Kaiser Wilhelm II lived in exiled comfort with his wife and entourage. “The capture, trial and punishment of the Kaiser,” Lea wrote, “was to the American doughboy the object which inspired him to leave home, to cross submarine swept sea, to surrender the freedom of a citizen of a republic, to become a cog of the best disciplined fighting machine in any war and finally to give his life, if need be.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...ashtray/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.4c9687e2673d
and a March 1918 effort to assassinate him:https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...ashtray/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.4c9687e2673d
Britain tried to kill Kaiser Wilhelm II in 1918 with secret RAF bombing raid, reveals archives
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...g-kill-germany-emperor-boulogne-a8375996.html
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...g-kill-germany-emperor-boulogne-a8375996.html
So, what do you think is more likely, folks? Him being executed by domestic revolutionaries like the Spartacus League or tried and hanged for "war crimes" by the Entente?
I don't know about French and Americans but Brits might be quiet relucant execute even former royal. Perhaps home arrest rest of his life but I can't see Brits being willingful for actual hanging of the Kaiser.
More plausible seems being that Germany gots if not Communist government at least more socialist govenrment than OTL government was and decide put the Kaiser to trial and hang him. But them should capture him firstly when Dutch government hardly is willingful hande him to Germans when they know that he would be surely executed.
More plausible seems being that Germany gots if not Communist government at least more socialist govenrment than OTL government was and decide put the Kaiser to trial and hang him. But them should capture him firstly when Dutch government hardly is willingful hande him to Germans when they know that he would be surely executed.
This may have merit, but I can't see George V going too far to save the Kaiser from the hangmen noose, after all he seems to have looked the other way by helping to block saving his other first cousin, Tsar Nicholas II from the clutches of the Russian Revolution which eventually led to his whole family being murdered by the Bolsheviks, and he was his "ally" for three years during the war.
Executing Wilhelm would be way out of bounds for the Entente governments. In the last several hundred years, the head of state/monarch losing their head for losing a war had dropped out of favor. Sure sometimes "savage" heads of state in colonial wars got the long drop, but not heads of civilized countries. I mean look at Napoleon and the devastation of the Napoleonic Wars - he got exile (one can argue about was he poisoned at the end or not). The only rulers/monarchs that ended up dead were those who fell to internal revolutions. Executing Wilhelm II would be bad form, and be seen as setting a bad example for the future. Furthermore Germany was a constitutional monarchy, why not execute the political party leaders who voted for war, or the Ludendorff and Hindenburg? Yes, Wilhelm had a lot more power than George, but Germany was not the sort of absolute monarchy that Russia was and even there there were some constitutional forms. If you execute Wilhelm what about the Hapsburg Emperor, and the Ottoman Sultan? The crimes of Japan leading up to and in WWII made the worst things the Germans did in WWI look like misdemeanors. For purely practical reasons Hirohito was let off the hook.
I can see Wilhelm being killed by some sort of revolutionary movement in Germany (whether or not folks like Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht kept power), but not by the victorious powers.
I can see Wilhelm being killed by some sort of revolutionary movement in Germany (whether or not folks like Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht kept power), but not by the victorious powers.
It would depend on whether or not they managed to capture him. During the Leipzig War Crimes Trial of 1921, there were several individuals who the Allies demanded the Germans extradite in order to put them on trial, but the requests were simply ignored. Those who actually were tried for alleged war crimes either received only brief prison sentences or nothing at all. If an Allied tribunal couldn't even manage to get low-level German personnel executed, it's doubtful that they could have gotten the Kaiser. (It's not that there weren't high-ranking Germans who they might have more realistically been able to convict for war crimes, but none of those efforts succeeded-they had wanted to execute Baron Colmar Freiherr von der Goltz who had played a large role in the crimes associated with the "Rape of Belgium" in 1914, but he had died in 1916 of natural causes.) Of course if they did try the Kaiser, who can say if it might have come to light how much his power had diminished during the war and how many other military commanders had more culpability.
At least Nazis might try execute every national leader which they can capture. Very possible that even kings of Belgium and Denmark would had been executed, perhaps even whole royal families would had killed too.
Well, @Alanith and @HerodotusTheSecond, this prompt also allows for Wilhelm to be executed by a Communist Germany, so keep that in mind.
It's hard to say, the Nazis relied on support from quite a few right wing monarchists in both Germany and friendly nations such as Italy, to say nothing of their alliances with exiled White Russian supporters of the ex-Czardom, and such groups would understandably be miffed by monarchs being executed by the Germans no matter what country it was in.
Just FYI prior to 1919 he is either Baron Colmar von der Goltz or Freiherr Colmar von der Goltz. Baron and Freiherr is the same title. And ever since 1919 it would have been Colmar Freiherr von der Goltz as all noble titles were abolished and only allowed as part of the last name.
I think Wilhelm could only be killed by the communists or Hitler if Wilhelm works against him. He was under house arrest after all during the occupation.
Sorry, I've seen him referred to with both titles at once for some reason, probably a mistake by English-speakers