This is Kaiser Wilhelm II. Say something nice about him.

>half G*rman, half Anglo
Literal Hellspawn.

>>2804472
This was basically him
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yh2DfwLIoFo

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There is literally nothing nice to say. He had absolutely no redeeming qualities as a ruler or as a person.

>>2804472
Mustache game is on point

>>2804472
he tried

>>2804472
i think he was pretty good at horseback riding?

>>2804472
He abdicated.

He's dead.

He was intelligent and charismatic and full of energy and vigor.

One of his arms is perfectly healthy and strong.

>>2804472
His domestic policy was far from poor and his foreign policy was largely the failure of the autocratic state he'd inherited that had no checks on his cabinet

>>2804472
He's kind of a tragic figure when you look at his childhood and how out of time he was

>>2804472
Ideal model of a ruler

>>2804472
Started off as a bad guy/misguided anti-hero and became a good guy around WWII

>>2805603
What did you mean by this? No really, I would seriously like to know.

>>2804472
He wasn't Hitler.

>>2804472
Thanks for Alsace Lorraine!

>>2804491
This, pretty much. I know some on /his/ feel sorry for him because of his social awkwardness, hard upbringing, and withered arm, but even on a personal level he was an utterly venomous and despicable individual. Also a huge fan of Hitler.

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>>2804472
Why Austro-Hungary out of all nations, Willy? Why them??? Why not Russia like Bismarck wanted or Italy for Gott's sake???!!!

Why fucking Austria-Hungary and Ottomans?????
Why did you let French befriend Anglos???

Experience should be passed only that way you can develop.
You went backwards instead of further.

>>2806360
>Started off as a bad guy/misguided anti-hero
Canned Bismarck over a petty disagreement then proceeded to commit diplomatic suicide and doomed Germany to the Treaty of Versailles.

>and became a good guy around WWII
Stood up to the Nazis and became beloved by the people of Doorn

>>2806415
That's actually pretty cool. Thanks, anon.

>>2804472
He wasn't really evil, just childish and retarded.

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>>2804498
Like a lot of people from the time period he was actually handsome as fuck before the retarded facial hair ruined it. Pic related, it's Young Willy.

>>2804491
It kind of says a lot when even Christopher Clark can't find much of anything great to say about him. His manic awkwardness is hilarious though. Here's a story from The Sleepwalkers.

>The Kaiser constantly complained of being kept out of the loop, of being denied access to important diplomatic documents. He was particularly upset when foreign policy officials insited on vetting his personal correspondence with foreign heads of state. There was quite a fuss, for example, when the German ambassador in Washington, Speck von Sternburg, refused to pass on a letter from Wilhelm to President Roosevelt in 1908, in which the Kaiser expressed his profound admiration for the American president. It was not the politcal content of the letter that worried the diplomats, but rather the effusiveness and immaturity of its tone. It was surely unacceptable, one official remarked, that the sovereign of the German Empire should write to the president of the United States "as an infatuated schoolboy might write to a pretty seamstress."

>>2805226
Wilhelm didn't hold supreme power. The only monarch of the major powers who really did was Nicholas II and even then he still had to constantly fight with his ministers. Wilhelm did have to sign off on stuff but he was more a walking PR disaster than a walking policy disaster since he didn't really control that and was constantly kept out of the loop about shit anyway.

>>2806400
Read The Sleepwalkers. There's an entire chapter that goes into how the different alliance systems came about.

What didn't help was British paranoia regarding any and all threats to its colonial possessions so the alliances were less about "yeah let's help the French" or whatever and more about taking out a weakened opponent. After the French got made to look like bitches in the Fashoda Incident, they switched focus to Germany and signed a treaty with Britain which opened the way to the Entente Cordiale. Likewise, after Russia got their shit pushed in during the Russo-Japanese War they were in no real position to fuck around in Asia with Britain who pretty eagerly went into an alliance with Russia to take away a threat to their Asian colonies.

This left Germany out in the cold where their only big ally was Austria-Hungary (and Italy but they were unreliable shits from the start) and that meant no way would there ever be any kind of real alliance with Russia because, again, post-Russo-Japanese War Russian interests in getting their warm water port shifted to the Balkans and propping up Serbia and helping to push for the spread of Pan-Slavism which went directly against A-H's interests in the area so as long as Germany was allied with them then an alliance with Russia would never be a possibility. Especially because France and Russia were already in alliance and no way would the French enter into something that, theoretically, put them on the same side as the Germans so even if they just abandoned A-H that was no guarantee that a Russian alliance would be possible.

They were too late in the empire/great power game to push their weight around and kind of a victim of circumstances outside their control because of it.

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>>2804472
He was extremely handsome later on and seemed to chill out after exile

He was the most /r9k/ historical figure and shitposted about Brits, frogs, ruskies and japs

>>2807104
good post

he didn't understand what he was doing

>>2807611
yeah and he congratulated hitler immediately when he started the war

>>2805140
I chuckled

>>2807104
Did Wilhelm and Germany consider making an alliance with Japan, they proved themselves as possibly powerful allies after crushing Russia and a German-Japanese alliance could easily stir fear in Russia.

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>>2806387
Eh, wut?

>>2807067
>Doesn't like mustaches
Wrong board, anon.

>>2807904
Mustaches can be fine but certainly not retarded ones like Wilhelm had. Compare him normally to >>2807352 for instance which looks much better.

>>2807104
>muh Japan
Russia lost because of insufficient naval power projection.
They would've steamrolled Britain in a lnd war in central Asia, Nicky was a gigantic fucking retard for signing the Anglo-Russian Entente and so was his dad with his francobooism.

>>2807694
>>2806387
He just supported Hitler at the very beginning of the war, but he then turned against Nazism after the Invasion of the Netherlands. Plus he thought the victories were thanks to German people, not Nazism per se.

>>2808270
Russia lost a lot of prestige, lost a good chunk of its navy, lost a lot of influence in Asia and the war going to shit played a part in various uprisings that required the Tsar's attention, including in Poland where he had to send 250,000 troops, more than had been deployed for the war IIRC. So yes at that time Russia was in no position to be fucking around in Asia. Maybe in a few years but not at that point.

>>2808408
>prestige
This isn't a Parashit game you dumbass.

Random aside but the arrogance of the elites in government pre-World War I is always hilarious. This bit from Sleepwalkers about Paul Cambon (French ambassador to London) is pretty choice:

>Cambon did not regard himself as a subordinate employee of the government, but as a servant of France whose expertise entitled him to a major role in the policy-making process.

>Underpinning Cambon's exalted sense of self was the belief -- shared by many of the senior ambassadors -- that one did not merely represent France, one personified it. Though he was ambassador in London from 1898 until 1920, Cambon spoke not a word of English. During his meetings with Edward Grey (who spoke no French), he insisted that every utterance be translated into French, including easily recognized words such as "yes". He firmly believed -- like many members of the French elite -- that French was the only language capable of articulating rational thought and he objected to the foundation of French schools in Britain on the eccentric grounds that French people raised in Britain tended to end up mentally retarded.

>>2808412
>get blown out by island monkeys who, 40 years previously, were barely out of the Euro equivalent to the 1600s due to two centuries of stagnation
>this does not affect how other nations see, and thus treat, you

>>2804472
he has a nice left arm

>>2804472
I visited his grave two days ago, rip in pepperoni

>>2804472

At least Berlin wasn't razed to the ground.

>>2808408
>including in Poland where he had to send 250,000 troops, more than had been deployed for the war IIRC.

The Russians deployed 1,200,000 troops in the Far East for the war.

>>2810236
In tota. 1.2 million Russians weren't deployed in the East against Japan in 1905.

>>2810430
They deployed 1.4 million in total. There were 350,000 men at Mukden alone. Per the British report "Casualties and Medical Statistics of the Great War. History of the Great War Based on Official Documents by Direction of the Committee of Imperial Defence", Russian Army forces in the Far East peaked at 700,000 in 1905.

>>2804472
his anglo blood led to the destruction of the greatest empire known to man

>>2806387
No, he even asked for swastikas to not be displayed at his funeral (still got them though)

>>2807067
Looks like Ryan gosling

>>2804472
Hellow Willy

>>2804475
fpbp

He's my left hand man

>>2804472
He had an above average willy

>>2807892
Wilhelm personally hated Japan and the Japanese. He thought their efforts at modernisation were just an attempt to attack Europe and Germany, he also believed the Japanese were trying to lure Christian Europe and spread Shinto and Buddhism, he often thought Japan friendly nations like Britain and France were being misguided.

>>2804472
He is dead. The only good Imperialist is a dead one.

>>2812693
Would shinto be more resistant to Islamic invasion?
Buddhism has already proven itself a failed cuck religion incapable of dealing with islam.

>>2804472
I hope he has a nice family to share his toughts and opinions with

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>>2812754
I wouldn't know, shinto is more cultural now in Japan I think. Japan had never really had much interaction with Islam at really any point save for a Japanese visit and alliance with the Ottomans in the early 1900s.

>>2812693
Of course, Wilhelm being Wilhelm he would always draw up plans for alliance with Japan before dropping them and deciding Germany needed an alliance against them and then he'd forget about it entirely.

>>2812693
Wilhelm was right tbqh

>>2812693

I don't understand how anybody in Europe was concerned about Japan, considering the massive geographical distance.

>>2814200
It was the hot new world power with a weird religion, places like Germany saw it as too different and somewhat feared it more so because of that aspect.

best mustache of any European ruler

Cool mustache dude

>>2812693
>the Japanese were trying to lure Christian Europe and spread Shinto and Buddhism
That's...an unfounded fear. At least when it comes to Shinto.
Shinto is not really good for converting people into, it's almost entirely ethnocentric animism, and an aspect of Japanese tradition and identity, pretty hard for a christian European to go full "I am now Japanese, and the Gods created my Japanese Islands and the Emperor is a descendant of Amaterasu, praise the Sun!"
Also the Japs were almost always LARPers when it came to religion. Far from how the codified Abrahamic faiths could become a "culture weapon".

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>>2816150
Not even close Anon

Retard, you are a retarded and you singlehandedly ruined the Second Reich, you retard. Otherwise, beautiful mustache, m8.

Why, Willy, why? You had the world between your hands and you ruined it... you ruined it all Willy... just tell me why?

>>2808244
>>2807352
You, my two good sirs, have literally no class. The mustache Wilhelm has in OP's picture is fucking FABULOUS

>>2816258
>Kaiser Franz Joseph

Too bad the Great War had him in his last days

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>>2816816
>reddit is actually an alright site guys

>>2816823

too bad his son couldn't have kept it together

I think he should be resurrected and given a second chance to lead that plucky little country.

>>2807104
Damn, this is super insightful. Might have to actually track down this book.

>>2807104
Pretty sure building the second-largest surface fleet in the world in less than ten years had more to do British paranoia than the Fashoda incident

>>2817604

Surely that mantle was held by the United States at the time.

He wasn't the most savage and retarded hun to ever slide out of the rotten cunt of the Whore of Europe.

>>2817629

I can say I well like him more than any contemporary frog variety of European I can think of.

>>2817628
I can't recall off the top of my head if the US or Germany were second but I don't believe the gap was large either way

>>2807574
fucking this

post autistic willy qoutes please

>>2816872
In all seriousness, that mustache is rad, anon. I unironically wish I could grow one like it. That being said, yes, I use Reddit more often than 4chan (like you and everyone else even though edgy man-children will never admit it)

>>2804472
Most handsome, successful and moral leader of the 20th century.

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He loved to cosplay

>>2804472
Chill out cousin Willy, stop acting so silly.
You be trippin' by flippin' the bird willy-nilly.
The armies of the triple entente - mighty.
Russia, France and this bitch - blighty.
Your rhymes are a shamble. Your words are a gamble.
You're taking an enormous punt. No wonder my homies, and yours too, think you're a massive difficult chap.
Your territorial ambitions puts us in this position.
So go ahead, cuz, rant and rave.
Your plans will be sunk like your floating junk.
Royal Britannia rules the waves.

>>2814200
It was because of the distance that it mattered. Japan was right next to China, IndoChina and all the other super lucrative east asian colonies. If they decided to invade, they could do so and entrench long before any of the european powers would be able to reinforce.

>>2814200
Japan basically went from a feudal eastern society to an industrialised western society in the space of about 18 years.
They were in a position where they could break free from any European influence, and were basically the biggest fish in the very, very big pond that was eastern Asia.
East Asia had a lot of resources that couldn't be found anywhere else in the world and a shitload of manpower.
Basically the rise of Japan to the world stage was a threat to every major European power.

>>2804472

He certainly had a long reach and one hell of a left hook.

>>2804472
He was /our guy/