Alldeutscher Verband

Alldeutscher Verband (German for "All-German Union" or "Pan-German League") was a German far-right organization which promoted pangermanism and imperialism, created in 1891 in protest to the exchange of Heligoland for Zanzibar. Ernst Hasse was its first president, and was succeeded by Heinrich Class in 1908. The industrialist Emil Kirdorf was also a founding member. The Alldeutscher Verband was dissolved in 1939.

The aim of the Alldeutscher Verband was to protest against government decisions which they believed could weaken Germany. A strong element of its ideology included social Darwinism. The Verband wanted to uphold German racial hygiene and were against breeding with so-called inferior races like the Jews. The agitations of the Alldeutscher influenced the German government and helped undermine the German foreign position developed by Bismarck.

The Alldeutscher had an enormous influence on the German government during World War I, when they opposed democratization and were in favour of unlimited submarine war. Opponents of the Alldeutscher were called cowards. Influential figures in the Alldeutscher Verband founded the Vaterlandspartei in 1917 following the request of the majority of the German parliament to begin peace negotiations with the allies.

After World War I, the Alldeutscher Verband supported general Ludendorff in his accusation against democrats and socialists that they had betrayed Germany and made the Germans lose the war. According to Ludendorff and the Alldeutscher, the army should not have been held responsible for the German defeat. In reality, Ludendorff had declared that the war was lost in October 1918, before the German November Revolution. This accusation is called the Dolchstoßlegende ("stab in the back legend").

See also

• Colonialism
• Pangermanism

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