The fall of the Hohenzollern monarchy at the end of World War I came as a tremendous shock, and from that point until the establishment of the Nazi state in 1933 he focused on bringing down the parliamentary government of the Weimar Republic.

[3] As the most influential voice in the DNVP's pan-German bloc, he opposed the Dawes Plan, which attempted to resolve the issues surrounding Germany's reparations payments, in the belief that a return to the economic chaos of hyperinflation would bring down the Republic.

[21] At the ceremony, Hugenberg praised the Emperor in his acceptance speech and went on to say that democracy would not improve the condition of the German working class, but only a "very much richer, very much greater and very much more powerful Germany" would solve its problems.

[24] In September 1914, Hugenberg and Class co-wrote a memorandum setting out the annexationist platform, which demanded that, once the war was won, Germany would annex Belgium and northern France, British sea power would end, and Russia would be reduced to the "frontiers existing at the time of Peter the Great".

Together with his industrialist friends Emil Kirdorf, Hugo Stinnes and Wilhelm Beukenberg, Hugenberg in 1916–1917 founded a number of corporations to exploit the occupied parts of Belgium and northern France.

Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg and General Erich Ludendorff – both firm annexationists – appreciated Hugenberg's willingness to spend millions of marks to mobilize public support for their cause.

[26] In 1918, after the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, Hugenberg founded two corporations, the Landgesellschaft Kurland m.b.H and Neuland AG, which had a combined budget of 37 million marks, to establish cooperative funds that would make loans to the hundreds of thousands of German farmers that he expected to soon be settled in Eastern Europe.

His business transactions were filled with plans to buy and sell shares of different companies, the creation of new corporations as holding concerns to take various firms, contracts with confidants acting as middlemen and ever-present schemes to avoid taxes.

[4] Hugenberg's devotion to the "social Darwinist and Nietzschean philosophies", with their emphasis on the power of willpower that he had embraced in the late 19th century, further reinforced his commitment to doing his part in bringing about the revival of Germany.

[39] Influenced by Otto von Bismarck and Wilhelm II, Hugenberg believed in Sammlungspolitik ("the politics of rallying together") to create a broad national opposition to the Weimar Republic and to hold together the DNVP, which had strong fissiparous tendencies.

[39] After speaking in 1919, Hugenberg would not give a speech again in the Reichstag until 1929, and he rarely spoke at meetings of the Reich Association of German Industry; however, his ability to donate millions of marks to his favored causes made him an important figure within the DNVP.

[51] In January 1923, when Germany defaulted on its reparations to France, the French premier Raymond Poincaré ordered the occupation of the Ruhr, marking the beginning of "passive resistance" that led to hyperinflation.

[40] It was during the crisis year of 1923 that Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz suggested that Hugenberg should pursue the chancellorship because there was no other "personality in Germany who would be so suited to bring the 'expeditious' understanding necessary for the salvation of our country and so suitable for the situation".

[52] The decision by Gustav Stresemann of the German People's Party, until then considered a part of the "national opposition", to accept the chancellorship and to end the passive resistance in September 1923 was condemned by Hugenberg as a betrayal.

[52] Stresemann became a Vernunftrepublikaner ("republican by reason" – someone who was still loyal to the monarchy in his heart, but accepted the republic as the least bad alternative), and insofar as his policies aimed at economic and political stability, he became the subject of immense hatred from Hugenberg.

[53] In an editorial in the Hugenberg-owned München-Augsburger Abendzeitung newspaper, Hitler was praised as an "exceptionally popular speaker" who had "liberated" the minds of "innumerable workers from international socialism", but the putsch was condemned on the grounds that "You must gather together and not scatter!

"[52] To end the hyperinflation of 1923, a new currency, the Reichsmark was created to replace the worthless Papiermark, reparation payments were lowered through the Dawes Plan, and a huge loan to Germany was floated in New York.

[56] Since the DNVP agreed to support the government of Hans Luther, Hugenberg grew more embittered, writing a series of essays in February–March 1925, later published as a book, that included such lines as "it stinks in the German Reich" and the "false leaders belong in the asylums".

[59] In January 1926, Hugenberg was involved in a plan for a putsch organized by his good friend, Henrich Class, calling for President Hindenburg to appoint as chancellor someone who was unacceptable for the Reichstag, which would lead to a motion of no confidence.

[60] Hindenburg would respond by dissolving the Reichstag and resigning while the election campaign was in progress; the Chancellor would become acting president, and Class planned to have him issue a declaration of martial law and become the "Reich Regent".

[64] In 1927, the Scherl press published Hugenberg's essays of 1925 as Streiflichter aus Vergangenheit und Gegenwart (Highlights from Past and Present), in which he attacked the policies associated with Westarp and implicitly challenged his competence to be the DNVP's leader.

[86] This was especially the case as the French government had agreed that in exchange for German acceptance of the Young Plan that France would end its occupation of the Rhineland in the summer of 1930, which was five years earlier than the Treaty of Versailles had called for.

[90] As a result, the Nazi Party soon became the recipients of Hugenberg's largesse, both in terms of monetary donations and of favorable coverage from the Hugenberg-owned press, which had previously largely ignored Hitler or denounced him as a socialist.

[93] Several industrialists such as Albert Vögler and Fritz Thyssen supported the "Freedom Law", but the majority were opposed, favoring the Young Plan since it promised economic stability; rather than risk a split, the association declared itself neutral at a meeting on 20 September 1929.

[101] The promise of more aid to farmers was popular in rural areas, and several DNVP representatives led by Westarp wanted the party to vote for the bill, which Hugenberg was opposed to on the grounds that some of the tax revenue raised would go to France in the form of reparations.

[106] During the campaign, the Hugenberg press largely concentrated its attacks on "Marxism", warning that the SPD was working for a revolution and wanted to increase spending on the welfare state as the first step towards "Bolshevism".

[107] The Nazis by contrast were treated relatively kindly by the Hugenberg papers with a Der Tag editorial saying there were no differences between the DNVP and the NSDAP on "culture and religion, the attitude towards Jewry and the will towards reconstruction in individual social and economic questions".

[129] In early January 1933, Chancellor Kurt von Schleicher developed plans for an expanded coalition government, to include not only Hugenberg, but also dissident Nazi Gregor Strasser and Centre Party politician Adam Stegerwald.

[168] Hugenberg, who refused to hire a secretary and wrote all of his lengthy memos by hand as he did not know how to use a typewriter, proved to be a stubborn and unlikable man, whom even the other conservative ministers found difficult to deal with.

[180] Meanwhile, in June 1933, Hitler was forced to disavow the plan Hugenberg proposed while attending the London World Economic Conference, that a program of German colonial expansion in both Africa and Eastern Europe was the best way of ending the Great Depression, which created a major storm abroad.