The Treaty of Versailles - Questions and ansewers.

The Treaty of Versailles

1) List the main features of the treaty of Versailles

The Paris Peace Conference opened on 12th January 1919, meetings were held at various locations in and around Paris until 20th January, 1920. Leaders of 32 states representing about 75% of the world's population, attended. However, negotiations were dominated by the five major powers responsible for defeating the Central Powers: the United States, Britain, France, Italy and Japan. Important figures in these negotiations included Georges Clemenceau(France) David Lloyd George (Britain), Vittorio Orlando(Italy), and Woodrow Wilson(United States).

The main terms of the Versailles Treaty were:

(1) The surrender of all German colonies as League of Nations mandates.

(2) The return of Alsace-Lorraine to France.

(3) Cession of Eupen-Malmedy to Belgium, Memel to Lithuania, the Hultschin district to

Czechoslovakia.

(4) Poznania, parts of East Prussia and Upper Silesia to Poland.

(5) Danzig to become a free city under league of nation control.

(6) Plebiscites had to be held in northern Schleswig to settle the Danish-German frontier;

(7) Occupation and special status for the Saar under French control;

(8) Demilitarization and a fifteen-year occupation of the Rhineland;

(9) German had to pay reparations of £6,600 million to all allies.

(10) A ban on the union of Germany and Austria;

(11) An acceptance of Germany's guilt in causing the war;

(12) Provision for the trial of the former Kaiser and other war leaders;

(13) Limitation of Germany's army to 100,000 men with no conscription, no tanks, no heavy artillery, no poison-gas supplies, no aircraft and no airships;

(14) The limitation of the German Navy to vessels under 100,000 tons, with no submarines;

Germany signed the Versailles Treaty under protest.

2a) What is the meaning of self-determination?

3a) What aspects of the Treaty would ANNOY Germany?

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2a) What is the meaning of self-determination?

3a) What aspects of the Treaty would ANNOY Germany?

I think that the main aspects, included in the Treaty of Versailles, that annoyed Germany are first of all the fact they were forced to accept their guilt of causing the war. This would lead to humiliation in front of all other nations. I would also include as aspect of the Treaty that annoyed Germany the fact that the nations army had a limited number of man with no conscriptions , no tanks, no heavy artillery, no poison-gas supplies, and no ships. This to surely dishonoured all Germans that have always been proud of their military power.

I think these are the only points that annoyed Germany because as a matter of fact all the other features actually damaged Germany.

3b) What aspects of the Treaty would DAMAGE Germany?

Germany was clearly damaged by the legitimate but harsh features of the treaty of Versailles. First of all Germany lost 13% of its territory, Eupen and Malmedy were transferred to Belgium, Saar was now controlled by the league of nations and remained such until 1935, northern Schleswig joined Denmark, Danzig became a free city, Memel was seized by Lithuania and the most important territorial losses were Alsace and Lorraine that passed under French control and the Polish corridor that basically divided Germany in two in order to give Poland access to sea.

These territorial losses lead to other problems, Germany lost 12% of the population that in digits sums up to be 6.5million people; half of whom were ethnic Germans. Furthermore Germany lost 48% of its iron ore production as well as 16% of its coal and agricultural production.

Another important aspect that clearly damaged the nation was the fact that Germany was made liable to pay for physical damage caused in the war,(most of which would go to France and Belgium) but also for war pensions in order to re-pay Britain for further reparations. In 1921 the Allies fixed a total amount at 132,000 million gold marks (or £6,600) over 30 years. This caused serious repercussions on Germany and massive inflation since it had to pay enormous amounts of money to the allies and still earn a total import that would enable the country to repair its own damages.

So we can see that Germany was strictly supervised by the allies in order to try and immobile a possible rebellion as we see in Hitler’s regime.

4) In what ways did the Treaty harm the prospects of the Weimar Democracy?

The Weimar Democracy had already risen under the “stab in the back” myth and so was not very appreciated by many German army supporters. So as time passed by and the Treaty was declared the Weimar Democracy fell under even more heavy contestation by the masses. The most important nationalist German newspaper wrote “ death rather than slavery” in response to the Treaty of Versailles . However it was not the Right that was furious for the Treaty. Virtually the whole German nation rejected it. Even the Government was split into whether to accept it but in the end it had no choice. So when in June 1919 the Treaty was voted the Constituent Assembly finally voted and the Treaty was passed.

The Germans citizens were in for a major shock. The 14 points were applied selectively so that millions of Germans were denied their national rights.

Throughout the Weimar Republic’s history its opponent s laid the blame for Germany’s humiliation at Versailles at the door of the new republic and the “November Criminals” who had “stabbed the army in the back”. Therefore the Treaty of Versailles reinforced the myth re-enforced he hostility of many Germans to the new Weimar system.

There were also other problems as the Hyperinflation due to due to reparation depts.

5) What arguments are there that in practice Germany was not greatly burdened by the Treaty of Versailles.

Disagreeing with what I wrote before some recent studies have come up that actually argue the fact the Germany was not actually harshly treated with the Treaty of Versailles. In this View Germany was still in strong position after Versailles for three main reasons;

the break up of the Tsarist, Austro-Hungarian and Turkish empires created opportunities for Germany, since it was now surrounded by small, weak states, especially in east.
France failed to achieve its aims of permanently weakened Germany and secured border.
Reparations were not so burdensome that they destroyed the German economy.

Furthermore, the hope that as time progressed the allies might modify at least the reparation terms proved justified. By mid-1920’s the issues of Versailles by itself was probably not a major obstacle to the consolidation of the Weimar Republic.

Marco Gastel 12C

History Mrs Stead