oh wilhelm...

wilhelm the second was quite a fascinating character. Not that i admire him or even really like him all that much. but he is really interesting to observe. his decision making process was just wild.
when "willie" was born there was a complication and this resulted in the laming of his arm. In photographs he was able to hide this disability but it plagued him emotionally. It undoubtedly influenced his emotional stability and growth through his childhood. not to mention his parents, the crown prince and princess of germany, were influenced to raise him harshly to compensate for his weakness. Not that they raised him themselves of course, this was not how it was done. but the tutors hired to watch over the boy were very strict. one in particular was extremely harsh and he remembers him as not ever uttering a word of praise but being a very harsh critic.
it is important to note, i believe, that the crown princess was a very significant woman in her own right. She was the eldest daughter of Queen Victoria and her husband Prince Albert (who was never crowned king). She was also her fathers favorite child. She was bright and precocious. her younger brother, the crown prince of england, was less so. he was tricky and rebellious. In many ways he was like willie. yet where Albert (later Edward VII) was a renegade, I feel that Willie was unstable.
Willie was a very jealous person given to fits of indecision. it is evident that his rearing in a society that glorified the military had a profound impact: he loved to dress up in uniform. he loved the discipline and "glory" of the military. of course he was not himself given to the hard work and discipline that the military required, but it was a nice idea.
Wilhelm II assumed the title Kaiser upon the early death of his father, Frederick III. Unfortunately, the cruelness in his nature became even more apparent. He had him mother placed under house arrest and charged her with sending state papers out of the country and into England (this charge is actually somewhat true. Frederick and Vicky were wary of their sons impending rise to the throne and had sent papers out of the country for safe keeping prior to fredericks death. what these papers were i dont remember...). But this cruel streak would reappear numerous times over the course of his rule. He did not have particularly sound relations with his family, particularly his elder sister Sophie, the Crown Princess and eventual Queen of Greece. He was a tyrant, bent on being the "patriarch" of the family. He felt that his siblings should acquiesce to his "almighty power". hah. His mother wrote numerous concerned letters to her daughter articualting her fear and concerns for her son.