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For yrs I have told pupils that Germany had to pay £6.6 billion. However, reading up on the Young Plan suggests that they had to pay this per yr until 1988 (originally)
Is this true? The Young Plan reduced reparatiosn to £28 billion (i think) Could somebody more knowledgeable than me, shed some light on this please?
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WWI Reparations figure?
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#2
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Posted 22 October 2009 - 09:14 PM
This is an absolute minefield, and everyboidy says something different and how a secondary historian is expected to decide what is 'true' beats me.
So if anything I say below is incorrect, I apologise - it's only what I think is true.
The US State department has a webpage on it; I suppose it's as easy to trust that as any.
The first thing to note is that the ToV didn't set reparations.
It set up a Commission which debated and then declared an amount on 27 April 1921.
As far as I can ascertain that sum was NOT declared at £6.6 billion.
It was declared at 132 billion gold marks. At the exchange rate of the time, this equated to £6.6bn (or $31.5bn).
It was to be paid in installments at a rate of 2 billion gold marks per annum - which would take it through to 1988.
The pupils (and a number of websites!) get themselves all muddled up about this.
First of all, it's ALL American billions (1,000,000,000 - a thousand million) not 'British' billions (1,000,000,000,000 - a million millions) - British documents of the time referred to £6.6 'milliards' (thousand-millions/American billions).
So the reparations in British currency are £6,600,000,000 (£6,600 million = £6.6 milliards/American billions)
Secondly, You have to get the currency sign right - whether its marks, £ or $!!
The Dawes Plan reduced annual payments (ie extended the repayment period), but did not reduce the absolute sum.
The Young Plan reduced the reparations sum to 121 billion gold marks, almost $29 million, to be paid in installments until 1988.
There were various plans after that which slashed the annual payments and the total sum still further, but by this time Europe was in the grip of the Depression, and the whole thing simply collapsed.
Is this enough?
So if anything I say below is incorrect, I apologise - it's only what I think is true.
The US State department has a webpage on it; I suppose it's as easy to trust that as any.
The first thing to note is that the ToV didn't set reparations.
It set up a Commission which debated and then declared an amount on 27 April 1921.
As far as I can ascertain that sum was NOT declared at £6.6 billion.
It was declared at 132 billion gold marks. At the exchange rate of the time, this equated to £6.6bn (or $31.5bn).
It was to be paid in installments at a rate of 2 billion gold marks per annum - which would take it through to 1988.
The pupils (and a number of websites!) get themselves all muddled up about this.
First of all, it's ALL American billions (1,000,000,000 - a thousand million) not 'British' billions (1,000,000,000,000 - a million millions) - British documents of the time referred to £6.6 'milliards' (thousand-millions/American billions).
So the reparations in British currency are £6,600,000,000 (£6,600 million = £6.6 milliards/American billions)
Secondly, You have to get the currency sign right - whether its marks, £ or $!!
The Dawes Plan reduced annual payments (ie extended the repayment period), but did not reduce the absolute sum.
The Young Plan reduced the reparations sum to 121 billion gold marks, almost $29 million, to be paid in installments until 1988.
There were various plans after that which slashed the annual payments and the total sum still further, but by this time Europe was in the grip of the Depression, and the whole thing simply collapsed.
Is this enough?
#7
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Posted 04 November 2009 - 08:24 AM
Serrie Meakins, on 03 November 2009 - 09:31 AM, said:
My financial husband tells me British & American bilions are the otehr way round?? Not sure myself...
Your financial husband is wrong (see, for example, http://www.askoxford...billion?view=uk). Now I understand why we have a banking crisis.
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