Kingdom of Lithuania (1918)

The Kingdom of Lithuania was an attempt to establish an independent constitutional Lithuanian monarchy in 1918. It was created towards the end of World War I, while Lithuania was still under the military occupation of the German Imperial Army. The process of establishing Lithuania as a kingdom was conducted by the provisional Council of Lithuania, that had initially declared Lithuanian independence on 16 February 1918. Due to the continued presence of German military administration (Lithuania District), the Council was unable to form a government and other state institutions. The Germans presented various proposals to attach Lithuania to the German Empire, through personal union with the King of Prussia or some of the other ruling monarchs in the German Empire. The Lithuanians resisted this idea and hoped to achieve their independence by creating a separate constitutional monarchy. Trying to act autonomously and avoid personal union with any of the ruling German monarchs, leaders of the Council decided on 4 June to offer the Lithuanian throne to the non-ruling German prince Wilhelm Karl, Duke of Urach, who accepted the offer. On 11 July, the Council elected him formally as the King of Lithuania, under the regnal name Mindaugas II, but he remained in Germany and never visited Lithuania. The election of a German prince stirred up controversy among Lithuanian political leaders, and did not achieve the desired results. Opposition to those decisions was particularly strong among various proponents of the republican form of government. As Germany was losing the war and was engulfed in the Revolution, the Council decided to suspend the previous royal election, on 2 November 1918, thereby ending the attempt to constitute Lithuania as a kingdom.