Since we're on the topic of economics, let's talk about the myths about the Treaty of Versailles.
Well we all already know the truth: the Treaty of Versailles was an excessively punitive, humiliating treaty for Germany which result in mass inflation and is partially responsible for the rise of Nazism. Right!?
Actually, no, that's not really the case at all. Let's look at the Franco-Prussian war. France lost. They were made to give up territory, and Germany occupied France until a sum total of 5 billion francs was paid. 5 billion is quite a bit of money:
You're basically looking at about 400 billion USD when updated to today's dollars paid from France to Germany, in full. Compare that then to the Treaty of Versailles indemnities:
So, basically, the amount tacked onto Germany for WWI, a war which mind you completely devastated France and Belgium, was hardly more than Germany extracted from France post the Franco-Prussian war. Yet, the French economy didn't collapse, or go through hyperinflation. So why did the German economy? Well, it's because Germany has a history of being really terrible at managing money. Germany financed WWI by taking out foreign loans. These amounted to so much that, by the end of the war, about 90% of the budget was going to paying off the interest of loans.
But didn't Foch say:
Isn't this proof that they saw the Treaty of Versailles as too harsh??
**** no. In fact, if you actually read what Foch thought, it was the 100% exact opposite. He said this because he believed Germany, if not occupied and contained, would simply use its surviving industry and light punishment to rebuild the army and attack again. He was basically literally right that the Treaty of Versailles would not work to contain German aggression.
Germany also didn't pay ****. Havenstein deliberately sabotaged the economy to try and get reparations reduced. The idea that the French occupation was any less harsh than the German one in 1871 is a joke.
Part of the myth comes from the fact that the British and French governments basically lied about how harsh the treaties were to appease their citizens. Germany was worse. They lied to their citizens claiming they didn't even lose the war, lol. Their propaganda about the harshness of the Treaty of Versailles was basically just that, and it's the same propaganda from the same people who would start the "stabbed in the back" myth and begin implicating Jews in Germany's defeat. So while it's not exactly Nazi propaganda, it's about as close as you can be without actually being Nazi propaganda.
In any case, yeah, the World Wars are a huge case of the defeated writing much of the history. The causes of WWII are a huge one. Germany, if you could personify it, was a sore loser and couldn't accept defeat and basically destroyed Europe as a result.
I'm really starting to hate apologists for Imperial Germany. The country was a ****ty, aggressive belligerent nightmare that didn't get punished enough and still decided to ruin half of everything and create the worst genocides for no good reason.