Spirit of 1914

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The Spirit of 1914 refers to the social climate of jubilation, particularly in Germany, just prior to the start of World War I. Jubilant crowds gathered to hear the news of the upcoming war and a strong wave of euphoria took hold of the public in the midst of celebration. National pride had showed its potential as a force of unity and cohension and many considered the changing conditions to be the start of a new age, based almost entirely on an underestimation of the horrors of war and faith in a quick and relatively bloodless victory.

However, the Spirit of 1914 was not universal in Germany and the emotions of the population are a complex focus of study. The greatest enthusiasm was portrayed by the upper classes, while propaganda played a part in widening the belief of national unity. German nationalists also saw the war's potential to unify Europe's German peoples.^{[citation needed]} However, much of this initial enthusiasm waned as the war progressed, especially on the home front, which was struck hard by shortages related to a "soldiers first" economic structure and the British blockade of the continent.

In time, the groups who had appeared to be in the same frame of mind during the Spirit of 1914 became skeptical. Socialist domestic disturbances returned to become a thorn in the side of the German war effort, and those who had been distanced from the homefront and could not understand their plight were among the first to forward the Dolchstosslegende when defeat came in 1918.

The Spirit of 1914 remanifested itself in 1933. The optimistic atmosphere of 1914 was in stark contrast to the bitter reality that followed Germany's defeat in World War I less than five years later. Conditions in the Weimar Republic, a collective memory of the idealism on the eve of World War I and the popular perception that Germany had been stabbed in the back rendered the public vulnerable to a Nazi program that seemed to embody the spirit of pre-war Germany and supposedly represented the revival of German pride, confidence and power.