The Treaty Of Versailles.

     The big threes aims (U.S.A, Britain and France) were to punish                                                           Germany for starting the war. They wanted to make their army small and not a threat, get ride of their navy and their air force, that is what Britain and America wanted any way. France had a different idea, they wanted to basically cripple Germany for all their worth. They wanted to split Germany into different states and pay for their military costs as well. France did not get this demand in the end because, if they did it would stop the trading between America and Germany and, Britain and Germany.

2. Germany’s reaction to the treaty was not good they denied that they started the war. They felt that it was far too harsh. Germany was upset that it had a small army to defend them selves. Their territory taken away from them they lost Alsace Lorraine to France, coalfields to France to compensate for some of the money they had to pay to Europe and some coalfields to Poland as well. This made Germany’s industry worse than before as well of having to pay millions of pounds to the League of Nations. Loosing all there over seas colonies, 10 per-cent of it’s land, 12.5 per-cent of it’s population, 16 per-cent of it’s coalfields and almost half of it’s iron and steel industries, it’s army reduced to 100,000 men no tanks, no air force and two light battle ships. This made Germany wanting revenge but they were in no position to carry on fighting, but Germany said they never gave up but just wanted a peace treaty. They were also very angry because they had no place in the League of Nations so they felt like they could not defend them selves at all. Germany could not reject the treaty because of Britain’s blockade out at sea stopping supply’s going to Germany, so they had to sign the treaty. This basically made Germany feel corned and trapped. The future of Germany did not look good at all.

3. Frances felt cheated by Britain and the USA because Britain and France prevented France getting what they wanted, to cripple Germany. They were upset that Clemenceau did not give what he promised. He did not split Germany into different states and did not make them pay for the military and civilian cost of the war. Because Britain and the USA said that would be too harsh and that they had all ready demanded a lot of money from Germany, as a compromise France was given the Saar coalfields. You could not put a price on the cost of the war because you can not put a price on a life let alone millions. France was in a worse state than Germany at the end of the war France wanted them to be seen as the worse victims of the war in most ways they were. Not getting everything they wanted they felt cheated by Britain and America. France thought they did not see about how bad a state they were in. And went a bit to soft on Germany.

4. The English thought that the treaty of Versailles was just they got a bit of Africa and money. Germany’s navy was no more so Britain did not have to worry about Germany. They were a defeated country no money, a small army and no colonies. Britain thought they had punished Germany fairly not to harsh and not to soft Britain was still changed from the war and was recovering from the war but they felt justice had taken place. Lloyd Williams had stated that Britain would not except the point out of the 14 point’s, “freedom of navigation at sea.” America had disapproved of how the British stopped and searched ships suspected of trading with Germany in the war.

5. Wilson thought that his fourteen were fair and would make world peace which Wilson wanted. He wanted to punish the Germans but not to harshly because he believed that if they did punish Germany to harshly that when they would recover they would want revenge, so there would be another world war. Wilson was a fair man he gave back land, formed the league of nations to discuss world problems before war and he split up Austria-Hungary to states to be self run, this was to help keep world peace.      

Conclusion: The treaty of Versailles was a fair treaty to America and Britain and maybe other countries, but France found it to soft they say that if Germany won the war they would have punished us a lot worse. France had suffered a lot and it is understandable why they want to punish Germany harshly other people or countries also wanted to punish Germany harshly. But Wilson believed that if you punished Germany to harshly when they bounce back they will want revenge. But if the league of nations believed it was fair or even to soft and there were all these things to make world peace and keep it why a world war two? This might mean it was not as fair as we thought were we to slack or were we to harsh either way it means the Treaty of Versailles was not fair.