How was Germany able to get back on its feet so fast after the losses it suffered in WW1 and be completely rearmed for WW2?
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Because they invaded other countries in WWI, and there were no strategic bombers or missiles back then, so Germany wasn’t really damaged. That’s also why Germans thought that there must’ve been some kind of betrayal when they had to surrender – it *felt* like they were winning. But they were really just plowing more and more blood and treasure into keeping the land they conquered in the first months of WWI. When they couldn’t keep up with the production of the WWI allies (including the US), they had to surrender on terms that included disarmament, separation of German populations, and reparations, to ensure they wouldn’t try attacking again.
When Hitler took over, he started rearming and refusing to pay the reparations, and their industrial base was still strong enough that they could quickly prepare for another war, especially once they reunited with the other German-speaking countries. So you might think of the European part of WWI and WWII as two parts of a single war, with a long cease fire in the middle.
Tl;Dr – Germany surrendered before their industrial might was destroyed in WWI, so in WWII, they still had the pieces necessary to resume the war.
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