Berlin Committee - World War I

World War I

At the outbreak of World War I, Indian nationalists looked for ways to use the enmities to support their goals. As early as 1912, the German Foreign Office had considered supporting the Pan-Islamist and Bengali revolutionary movement in India to weaken the British position.

The Kaiser had considered the option on 31 July 1914 when Russian mobilisation was confirmed, and the scope of British mobilisation against Germany was becoming evident. In September 1914, the German Chancellor, Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg, was authorised by the Kaiser to sanction German activity against British India. The German effort was headed by Max von Oppenheim, an archaeologist and the head of the newly formed Intelligence Bureau for the east. He was to organize the Indian student groups into a cohesive group. Oppenheim also convinced Har Dayal of the feasibility of the project.

A group of Indians resident in Germany, headed by M. Prabhakar (then teaching at Düsseldorf after graduating from Heidelberg), along with Abd ur Rahman and A Siddiqui, had issued statements condemning England and France for their support of the Czar in Russia. As these students were political novices, Oppenheim sought to find more prominent revolutionaries who would carry more weight in the community. Otto Gunther von Wesendonck, a young officer of the Auswärtiges Amt, was given the task of organising revolutionary outbreaks along the Indian and Russian border. with the help of their close acquaintance Anna Maria Simon, Abhinash Bhattacharya and Virendra Nath Chattopadhyay issued similar statements against Britain and France, which were distributed in Austria-Hungary, Switzerland and the Netherlands in addition to Germany, attracting editorial comments. The duo, with the help of Frau Simon, set up meetings with the Berlin Foreign office.