Peacemaking 1919

The First World War ended on 11 November 1918. Six months later, on 28 June 1919, Germany signed the Treaty of Versailles in the Hall of Mirrors at the Palace of Versailles — the same room where the German Empire had been proclaimed in 1871. The treaty, and the four others that followed (Saint-Germain, Trianon, Neuilly, Sèvres), reshaped Europe and the wider world. To answer GCSE questions you need: aims of the Big Three; main terms of Versailles; reaction in Germany; the strengths and weaknesses of the settlement.

The aims of the Big Three

Three leaders dominated the Paris Peace Conference (Jan–June 1919):

Woodrow Wilson (USA, idealist Democrat). Proposed his Fourteen Points — including national self-determination, freedom of the seas, free trade, disarmament, and a League of Nations to keep peace. He wanted a "peace without victors". Wilson refused to ride in a car flying the French flag — he saw himself as the impartial peacemaker.

Georges Clemenceau (France, "the Tiger"). Wanted maximum security and revenge: Germany weakened economically and militarily, Alsace-Lorraine returned, the Rhineland buffer demilitarised. France had suffered the worst land devastation; 1.4 million French dead.

David Lloyd George (UK, Liberal coalition). Pragmatic — needed to satisfy public opinion at home ("Hang the Kaiser! Make Germany pay!") but personally wanted a Germany strong enough to trade with Britain and stop communism spreading. Sought middle ground.

The Italians (Orlando) and Japanese were also at the table; the defeated powers and Russia were excluded.

Compromise and conflict at Versailles

• War Guilt Clause (Article 231). Germany sole blame for the war. Clemenceau insisted; Wilson disliked it but it was the legal basis for reparations.
• Reparations. Set in 1921 at £6.6 billion (132 billion gold marks) — pay until 1988. Lloyd George thought it too high; Clemenceau too low.
• Territorial losses (13% of land, 10% of population):
  • Alsace-Lorraine to France.
  • Eupen-Malmédy to Belgium.
  • North Schleswig to Denmark.
  • Posen, West Prussia, Upper Silesia to a re-created Poland.
  • Polish Corridor split East Prussia from rest of Germany; Danzig (Gdańsk) became a free city.
  • Saar coalfields to French control for 15 years.
  • Memel to Lithuania.
  • All German colonies confiscated as League of Nations "mandates".
• Military restrictions.
  • Army limited to 100,000.
  • No conscription, no air force, no tanks.
  • Navy limited to 6 battleships, no submarines.
  • Rhineland demilitarised.
• Forbidden Anschluss (union) with Austria.
• League of Nations founded; Germany not allowed to join until 1926.

German reactions

The treaty was profoundly unpopular in Germany:

• Called a Diktat — a dictated peace.
• The new democratic government had to sign or face renewed war.
• Right-wing politicians coined the "stab in the back" myth — blaming the SPD-led government rather than military defeat.
• The German army called the signers the November Criminals.
• Hyperinflation in 1923 was widely blamed on reparations.

Other 1919–20 treaties

Each defeated Central Power got its own treaty. They reshaped Eastern and Central Europe.

• Saint-Germain (Sept 1919) — Austria. Habsburg empire dissolved; new states of Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Hungary; Austria forbidden to join Germany.
• Trianon (June 1920) — Hungary. Lost two-thirds of its territory; new borders separated 3 million ethnic Hungarians from Hungary.
• Neuilly (Nov 1919) — Bulgaria. Lost land to Greece, Yugoslavia, Romania.
• Sèvres (Aug 1920) — Ottoman Empire. Empire dismembered; Smyrna to Greece. Replaced by Treaty of Lausanne (1923) after the Turkish War of Independence.

Was the settlement fair?

Strengths:

• Self-determination created new democracies (Poland, Czechoslovakia).
• Disarmament reduced immediate threat from Germany.
• League of Nations — first attempt at collective security.

Weaknesses:

• Germany excluded from negotiations — fed sense of injustice.
• Reparations economically destabilising.
• New states had ethnic minority problems (Sudeten Germans, Hungarian minorities).
• USA refused to ratify — Wilson's own Senate rejected the treaty in 1919.
• Russia uninvited — communist USSR resented the new buffer states.
• Self-determination was selectively applied — Germans in Sudetenland and Austria forbidden it.

A high-quality answer concludes the settlement was a compromise that satisfied nobody fully — leaving Germans with grievances they could exploit, and Britain/France with an unenforceable treaty.