Rathenau becomes the Weimar Republic’s foreign minister…
1922 CE
Rathenau becomes the Weimar Republic’s foreign minister in 1922.
Rathenau seeks reconciliation with the victorious powers, institutes measures toward meeting Germany's reparations obligations, and concludes the Treaty of Rapallo between Germany and the USSR.
The Rapallo treaty cancels Germany's war debt to the USSR, extends to the Soviet government its first diplomatic recognition, and enables Germany to construct and test new weapons secretly in the USSR.
In 1922, Germany signs a treaty with the Soviet regime and Japan, grants Germany’s former China concession, and makes peace with the Chinese republic.
Benito Mussolini seizes power in 1922 and establishs a fascist regime in Italy.
The crushing war reparations placed on Germany’s economy by the Allies prepare the way for the rise of the National Socialist Party, or Nazis, a fascist organization based on the governmental precepts of Italy’s Mussolini.
As inflation has mounted, Germany suspends payment of reparations in 1922.
Nationalist elements in Germany loathe Rathenau both as a Jew and as a representative of the Weimar government.
One of these groups assassinates Rathenau in Berlin in June, 1922.
Outspoken anti-Semite Henry Ford allegedly bankrolls Hitler during this period.
According to a 1922 New York Times article about Hitler, “The wall beside his desk in Hitler’s private office is decorated with a large picture of Henry Ford.
in the antechamber there is a large table covered with books, nearly all of which are translations of books written and published by Henry Ford.” The anti-Nazi Berliner Tageblatt, a German newspaper, calls on the American ambassador to investigate Ford’s funding of Hitler.
Gandhi is imprisoned in 1922 for civil disobediance.
US troops fight Turkish nationalists in Smyrna, 1922.
Turkey defeats the advance of the Greeks.
Modern Turkey, minus its Empire and Sultan, is formed under Mustapha Kemal (Ataturk).
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The US deploys naval and other forces in China during the nationalist revolt that begins in 1922.
Communist Russia supports Sun Yat-sen’s Kuomintang (KMT) Nationalists as the best vehicle to crush the warlords and pave the way for socialism.
The Chinese Communists order their members to join the KMT as individuals.
Kuwait, in a disagreement over payment of customs duties to ibn Sa'ud's regime, experiences border raids and a Sa'udi blockade.
In 1922, the exasperated British High Commissioner takes a red pencil and draws a line on a map, thereby fixing the boundaries between the Saudi realm and that of the Emir of Kuwait.
He also delineates two "neutral zones" along ibn Sa'ud's borders, one shared with Kuwait, the other with Iraq-termed "neutral" in both cases because the Bedouin would be able to pass back and forth to graze their flocks and because they would be jointly administered. (Source: Yergin, Daniel: The Prize; the Quest for Oil, Money & Power (Simon & Schuster, New York, 1991))
The fact of Saudi hegemony in Arabia has obviated all claim to former Arabian thrones, so the departing British invent two in the north, placing Faysal and 'Abd Allah, the sons of Sharif Husayn of Mecca, king of the Hejaz, on the thrones of Iraq and Transjordan, respectively.
These territories, together with the Hejaz, serve as a formidable British-protected cordon around the northern and western borders of the Wahhabi state.
Inevitably, frequent border incidents occur.
In 1921-1922, the Ikhwan conduct border raids against the two Hashemite kingdoms.
Stamboliyski's new pacifist policies have alarmed Bulgaria’s remaining strong nationalist elements, led by a large Macedonian group in Sofia.
Alienated also are the old political leaders, the Military League (composed of active and reserve officers), and Tsar Boris' court.
Bulgaria’s rightist parties, silent since the war but influenced by the successes of Benito Mussolini's fascist organization (known as the Blackshirts) in Italy, have reorganized into a confederation called the National Alliance, (later called Democratic Alliance) and plan to march on Sofia to wrest control of the country.
Stamboliyski's Orange Guard jails the leaders of that group in 1922, temporarily stopping its momentum.
Inflation and industrial exploitation continue.
Many of Stamboliyski's subordinates inflame social tensions by taking very dogmatic positions in favor of peasant rights.
The urban working class, unaided by agrarian reforms, gravitates to the communists or the socialist workers.
On the left, the communists view the Agrarian government as their principal opponent.
Nevertheless, the most dangerous enemies are the Military League and the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (IMRO).
IMRO, establishing effective control over the Pirin region, launches terrorist attacks across the border into Yugoslav and Greek Macedonia.
It also assassinates several Agrarian leaders.
The Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, having inherited formidable economic problems after the Great War, must repair war damage, repay debts, eradicate feudalism by passing land reform, integrate differing customs areas, currencies, rail networks, and banking systems, and make up for shortages of capital and skilled labor.
The agricultural sector, which employs over 75 percent of the Yugoslav population, undergoes a radical reform that fails to relieve nagging rural poverty.
Before the war, German, Austrian, and Hungarian families owned sprawling estates in Slovenia, Croatia, and Vojvodina; Turkish feudalism remained in Kosovo and Macedonia; Muslim landlords in Bosnia owned large farms worked by Christian sharecroppers; some Dalmatians remained tenant farmers in a system devised in Roman times; and Serbia was a chaotic blend of independent small farms.
The Yugoslav government has erased remnants of feudalism, but the peasants receive plots too small for efficient farming to support the rural population.
Yields fall; poverty and ignorance dominates most of the peasantry.
Industrialization and emigration does not ease overpopulation.
In the industrial sector, the kingdom concentrates on extracting raw materials, expanding light industry, and improving its infrastructure.
Insufficient domestic capital forces the Yugoslav kingdom to seek foreign investment.
The government sells mining rights to foreign firms and borrows heavily to build roads and rail lines, power plants, and a merchant marine.
Despite steady economic growth based on the food industry, mining, and textiles, the kingdom remains substantially undeveloped and falls far behind the rest of Europe.
Divergent economic interests and the widening differences in development of Croatia and Slovenia with the less developed southern regions exacerbate Serbian-Croatian tensions.
The development disparity especially embitters many Serbs, who believed that their sacrifices in the war have benefited former enemies more than themselves.
In Germany, The International Jew, an anti-Semitic book subsidized by Henry Ford and been translated into German, runs through sixteen editions between 1920 and 1922.
White miners on the Witwatersrand stage an armed revolt in 1922; Smuts quickly smashes it.
From 1922, Walvis Bay is administered as part of Namibia.
Jewish settlement is specifically excluded from the Transjordan area of the Palestine Mandate by a British government memorandum in September 1922, approved by the League of Nations Council.
The whole process is aimed at satisfying wartime pledges made to the Arabs and at carrying out British responsibilities under the mandate.
High commissioner Samuel augments Hajj Amin's power in 1922 by appointing him president of the newly constituted Supreme Muslim Council (SMC), which is given wide powers over the disbursement of funds from religious endowments, fees, and the like.