Reparations!

This is coolbert:

Thanks to the tip from the blog Jungle Trader for the der Spiegel article.

War is bad for the economy! Read thoroughly this amazing stuff!

"Germany Closes Book on World War I With Final Reparations Payment"

"Germany will make its last reparations payment for World War I on Oct. 3, settling its outstanding debt from the 1919 Versailles Treaty and quietly closing the final chapter of the conflict that shaped the 20th century."

"the final chapter of World War I with the end of reparations payments 92 years after the country's defeat."

[let me abundantly clear here! We are not speaking about the Second World War, we are speaking about the Great War, the First World War!!]

"The German government will pay the last installment of interest on foreign bonds it issued in 1924 and 1930 to raise cash to fulfil the enormous reparations demands the victorious Allies made after World War I."

"The sum was initially set at 269 billion gold marks, around 96,000 tons of gold, before being reduced to 112 billion gold marks by 1929, payable over a period of 59 years."

Payment, the reparations to be made in GOLD MARKS! The victorious allies NOT accepting funny money of any type. Wanted actual gold or currency issued that could be redeemed for gold. Very reminiscent of the indemnity as forced upon the French in the aftermath of the Franco-Prussian war of 1870!

That borrowed money to pay for the gold and gold-back currency placed an undue burden upon the fledgling and generally unstable German government of the period. An excessive portion of the yearly budget was used merely to service that debt?

It has often been suggested that this onerous debt, the reparations as exacted on the German in the aftermath of World War One, the resentment leading to the eventual rise to power of Hitler and the Nazi party. Professor Niall Ferguson suggests that this resentment was not entirely valid, the Wiemar Republic government more inept than anything else, the "onerous" debt being actually a burden that could have been borne!

"Germany could have paid reparations had there been the political will . . . France paid 4,933 million francs in reparations to Germany between 1871 and 1873 totalling 25% of French national net income without causing national bankruptcy, and has argued that German claims . . . that reparations payments threatened Germany with bankruptcy were just an excuse to try to get out of paying reparations" - - Ferguson.

Please keep in mind that such a debt, when paid off over such a long time, is being paid in devalued currency, and NOT in gilt or anything even resembling gold or gold-backed currency.

coolbert.