By Allan Hall, The Daily Telegraph
Almost 92 years after the guns fell silent on the Western Front, the final act of the First World War will be played out on Sunday when Germany pays the last chunk of reparations imposed by the victorious allied powers.
The payment of 59.5 million pounds ($96.9 million Cdn) ends the crippling debt that was the price of one world war and laid the foundations for the next.
Germany was forced to pay the reparations under the Treaty of Versailles in 1919 as compensation to the war-ravaged nations of Belgium and France and to pay the Allies some of the costs of waging what was then the bloodiest conflict in history, in which almost 10 million soldiers died.
The initial sum agreed in 1919 was 226 billion Reichsmarks, a sum later reduced to 132 billion ($35 billion Cdn) - at the time. The bill would have been settled much earlier had Adolf Hitler not reneged on reparations after taking power.
Hatred of the settlement agreed at Versailles, which crippled Germany's Weimar Republic as it tried to shape itself into a democracy following the armistice, was significant in propelling the Nazis to power.
Most of the money will go to private individuals, pension funds and corporations holding debenture bonds as agreed under the Treaty of Versailles, where Germany was made to sign the "war guilt" clause, accepting blame for the conflict.
Almost 92 years after the guns fell silent on the Western Front, the final act of the First World War will be played out on Sunday when Germany pays the last chunk of reparations imposed by the victorious allied powers.
The payment of 59.5 million pounds ($96.9 million Cdn) ends the crippling debt that was the price of one world war and laid the foundations for the next.
Germany was forced to pay the reparations under the Treaty of Versailles in 1919 as compensation to the war-ravaged nations of Belgium and France and to pay the Allies some of the costs of waging what was then the bloodiest conflict in history, in which almost 10 million soldiers died.
The initial sum agreed in 1919 was 226 billion Reichsmarks, a sum later reduced to 132 billion ($35 billion Cdn) - at the time. The bill would have been settled much earlier had Adolf Hitler not reneged on reparations after taking power.
Hatred of the settlement agreed at Versailles, which crippled Germany's Weimar Republic as it tried to shape itself into a democracy following the armistice, was significant in propelling the Nazis to power.
Most of the money will go to private individuals, pension funds and corporations holding debenture bonds as agreed under the Treaty of Versailles, where Germany was made to sign the "war guilt" clause, accepting blame for the conflict.
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