The 'Traitor States', that was how many in Berlin still viewed Japan and the Ottoman Empire, strong allies who had turned their coat midway through the conflict, and left the German Empire scrabbling all but alone for the victory it knew ought to belong to it. Such a tale was an abbreviated one, a story written to fit the audience, or the mood of the story-teller, ignoring French's great success in China, and the imminence of Japan's defeat, squeezed upon all sides. It ignored also, the descent of British forces upon Egypt and the desperate position of the Khedive, echoing on upwards to the Caliphate itself. Yusef Izzedin was not the man his father had been - luckily for the Ottoman Empire. Seeing devastation lurking in the undergrowth, he had negotiated a treaty that had shocked the world, even despite the Japanese example.
But explanations, excuses, reasoned understanding - these were not things that made any impression in Berlin. For those who did not cleave to the anarchist-radical ideas of the Russian Makhno and his lieutenants, the story was a simple one - betrayal, and revenge wreaked mightily upon them. The lands that France had torn from Germany at the close of the First war, and had had to cede back at the close of the Second, were gone once more - but in addition, so was the Saarland, and so was the Rhineland, erected into a fantasy republic that sang France's praises and tossed its begging bowl to Paris every few months.
Not only were the Southern German states resurrected in their pitiful independence, and Austria along with them, but so was Hannover, a British whim, a British demand, a British item on the treaty which had caused so much death, so much suffering before a delegation had survived to sign it all away. And Bohemia, loosed from German overlordship, and Poland, stealing German provinces that may once have been Polish - so long ago that nobody in Berlin thought relevant.
It was a nightmare, Germany it was still called but an emasculated Prussia-Saxony was more or less all it was. Even Norway, client, colony or vassal (one took one's pick) was gone, the Hessian Prince sovereign in his realm kicked out and replaced by a Dane as King. To balance things, the Danes had been forced to make similar arrangements for Iceland, but Copenhagen could live without Reykjavik, whilst Germany could only look at Schleswig torn asunder, and weep for another loss.
The German fleet was one battleship, moored at Lubeck, a few cruisers at Rostock and a single rusting submarine at Stralsund. It was not even in the peace treaty, it was just how it was - the victors had sunk the majority in the closing months of the war, seized most of what was left, and of the remnant who paid their wages? A defection to Sweden, a few suspicious immolations off the Polish coast, and a hoarde of rusting ancient hulks that nobody wanted. Berlin could only pay for this nucleus, and even then many decried the so-called expense. Denmark and Poland had bigger navies than the German Empire - in terms of tonnage so did even Lithuania, though there was no battleship there, and ex-Russian cruisers made up the bulk, serving more as training ships than as realistic men of war.
But Berlin was a hot-bed, even though the military government clamped down on things they could not keep sight of everything long enough to find it, squash it, and keep it down. Veterans marched, workers rallied, and radical movements fought running battles in the streets, halls and parks. The army would not fire on its own, unless provoked, it would not fire on the workers unless attacked, but it would fire on the radicals if it seemed a good idea. But the army was not all - the Militia, successor to the Landswehr, and the various police forces all answered to different commanders in the military government, and private feuds were as often as not fought out with government forces, as with those opposing them.
There was even confusion as to the correct legal form of the state, a confusion nobody could answer for who was the final arbitor? The Kaiser had abdicated, the Crown Prince had abdicated in both his name and his son's, the rest of the Kaiser's sons had seen losses in action, and the final heir was perhaps Wilhelm Victor, born only in 1918 to Adalbert, the admiral dead in the last months of the war, the regent perhaps the Kaiser's youngest, Prince Joachim, some said a madman, others a disturbed and angry thirty year old, for a while exiled in Switzerland, now fled, though he would say removed, to Hungary. Heirs there were to Wilhelm Victor, but in cousins, his late father's late brothers' sons, all children. Perhaps the Kaiser's brother, Heinrich, still in Germany in retirement in Potsdam, could be Regent, or maybe his eldest son Waldemar, a light in the military veterans service, living in Mecklenburg but still involved in politics.
Or perhaps the Empire was a Republic, nobody knew. Who was to say? The Treaty of The Hague did not care, stating only as conditions the Kaiser's abdication and the signature of the representatives of the Empire. Three generations of Wilhelms now lived in rough and ready exile in Sweden, in Scania, gazing across the Baltic towards their lost German homeland - the Kaiser, the Crown Prince and his only son. Maybe even they would return, but nobody knew. Who was it down to to abolish the old and declare the new? Nobody knew...
Field Marshal Mackensen was a hero, and a hero's hero. He had innumerable victories in the East, he had almost taken Moscow at the height of German power, and he had fought a masterly retreat when it all went to Hell. Latterly, he had pushed the Poles out of Posen, but could not prevent them from over-running East and West Prussia. As Chancellor he had been unwavering in bringing the military in to take control of what remained of the Empire, and he was slowly rebuilding the nation, if only those in opposition would give him time. An army man, he understood the value of the navy on the flank, and he fought hard to keep some part of it alive, a nucleus for a future revival, something to defend the coast if attacked, something to support the army should it ever recover its offensive spirit.
In his darkest moments, Chancellor Mackensen thought that the same could be said for the German army - whilst it kept almost three hundred thousand men under arms, including the Militia, its offensive spirit was dissipated, and the victors constrained all of its efforts to properly rearm. Privately Mackensen and his Minister of War, the Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha doubted that the empire had even the offensive capability of Bavaria, who had surprised them all by operating deep within Switzerland in the recent carve-up of that confederation. Whilst the empire had armoured battle wagons and aeroplanes stock-piled in warehouses and on open ground, the designs were rapidly heading from the out-of-date to the obselete. In fact, the Horsch Werks had used a stolen Bavarian design to create its new prototype battle wagons, the first modern design that the Heer had been in any position to consider since the Armistice.
As for the Airforce, Lothar von Richtofen had slimmed it down to just a few squadrons, to the financial bureaucrats' relief, but what use out-dated aeroplanes against a French enemy which could blast them out of the sky with impunity? They had sacrificed quantity for quality, and had a force of roughly equal effectiveness, but if it came to the worst a few hundred pilots would die, as opposed to a few thousand. The modern designs were still being built in the factories across Saxony, and high hopes rested with them, but time would be what it took to make a reality of even the defensive possibilities of the modern air force.
Many refused to accept the drastic shrinkage in size of the Empire, but Mackensen understood that you worked with what you had - it was a base for the future, it was the starting point for revival, and it must become strong if the dreams of resurrection were ever to escape the books and pamphlets, and make real their claims upon reality...
Best Regards
Grey Wolf