The Treaty of Versailles

Preliminaries

The Versailles peace treaty commenced in January 1919.

Public opinion was very important in shaping the peace settlement. The war had been conducted on an unprecedented scale. 10 million people had been killed, and many more had been maimed or gassed or suffered some other form of deprivation. At the time of the conference Europe was in the grip of an influenza epidemic that took about 40 million lives. It had been a total war involving all the levels of society so public opinion was bound to be influential. In Britain and France there was the tendency to blame Germany, and a strong desire to see the Kaiser hanged. The economic impact of the war was enormous. The cost of it was around £45 billion. The major industrial nations of Europe had lost markets to Japan and the United States. In Britain the cost of the war had been met mainly by the raising of loans, particularly from America. There was strong pressure on the peace-makers to recover the costs of the war by reparations from the defeated enemy. This was not consistent with the aim of reconstructing Europe, but public opinion in Britain and France did want Germany to pay. In addition, the negotiators at the peace conference had to make their agreements in the full glare of the public eye. The conference was reported on by hundreds of journalists.

Lloyd George was particularly constrained by public opinion, which had expressed itself in the election campaign in Britain in November 1918. In order to retain power Lloyd George had constructed a coalition of mainly Conservative support, coupled to sections of the Labour and Liberal parties. In December 1918 Lloyd George had been returned with a substantial majority, but this was on the basis of a campaign that had promised to punish Germany, and candidates who had adopted a more conciliatory attitude had not been elected in the main.

The French Prime Minister, Clemenceau, was also under pressure within France to maintain a hard line towards Germany. The Italians expected territorial and economic gains, and the Italian Prime Minister, Orlando, knew that nationalism within Italy forced him to pursue such gains stringently.

Italy had entered the war as a result of the secret Treaty of London, concluded by Britain, France, Russia and Italy on the 26 April 1915. Italy was promised a "just share" of the division of the Ottoman Empire, a part of the German colonies, and territory from the former Habsburg Empire. Such territory would not be in accordance with the Wilsonian principle of national self-determination since Italy would gain control over non-Italians.

The Bolshevik revolution in Russia saved Britain and France from the promise to the Russians to give them Constantinople and the Straits.

Britain's high commissioner in Egypt, Sir Henry McMahon, had promised to recognise the independence of all Arabs within an area identified in correspondence with the Sherif of Mecca in 1915. No mention was made of Palestine in this agreement, and in 1917 the Balfour declaration promised a national home for the Jews in Palestine. The Sykes-Picot agreement of 1916 between Britain, France and Russia made specific proposals for the partition of the Ottoman Empire. Britain and France had also agreed in April 1917 to permit the Italian sphere of influence to extend to Adalia and Smyrna. Greece had also entered the war on the Allied side in 1917 and was expecting to be rewarded.

Japan, which entered the war as a Britain's ally in 1914, had benefited greatly by seizing German Pacific colonies. In a secret agreement of 1917 Britain promised support for Japan's claims for these islands in return for Japanese naval assistance in the Mediterranean. In 1915 Japan had issued Twenty-One demands to China, requiring China to grant Japan extensive powers within China, especially in Manchuria.

In March 1918 the Russians, following the revolution, had accepted the treaty of Brest-Litovsk, which had made Finland, the Ukraine and the Baltic states independent. The defeat of Germany and Austria-Hungary made it possible to create an independent Poland and Czechoslovakia.

However, Germany had not been so thoroughly defeated as she was after the second world war. Peace had come about because Germany's High Command had recognised that defeat was inevitable, that Germany's allies were collapsing, and the grip of the military regime in Germany over the civilian population could no longer be guaranteed. So the High Command instructed civilian politicians to achieve peace on the best possible terms. Before this could be done, the Habsburg Empire had already fragmented.

In 1917 the United States entered the war on the Western allies side. This convinced the Germans that the military victory was no longer possible, especially after the failure of their 1918 spring offensive. But President Wilson had different aims from those of Britain, France and Italy. He stated that the war should be "to make the world safe for democracy". This was a view supported by American voters, when Wilson was re-elected in 1917 on a narrow majority. American public opinion was not interested in the territorial division of Europe. On the eighth in January 1918 Wilson made an address to the Congress advancing his "14 points". Among the points he made he advocated that the Habsburg and Turkish empires should be divided along the lines of national self-determination. He also called for the creation of an association of nations. In fact the United States did not enter the war as an ally but as an "associated power", meaning that America did not wish to support the war aims of the other allies.

Wilson's position in America had been weakened when in the mid-term elections, held on 5th November; the Republicans won majorities in both houses of Congress. Therefore, the President did not have the full backing of America. He was, in fact, the first President of the United States to travel overseas whilst still in office.

The Germans had based their acceptance of a ceasefire on the 14 points. On 14th October 1918 the German government had asked Wilson to negotiate a ceasefire on this basis. The British and French were uncomfortable about this. The second point ruled out future naval British blockades, and the French were worried about the omission from the 14 points of any commitment to punish Germany and make Germany pay compensation. However the United States threatened to make a separate peace with Germany, and these objections were not pressed at the time. Wilson also insisted on the removal of the Kaiser, and the Kaiser abdicated on the 9th November 1918. The armistice was signed in Marshall Foch's railway carriage on the 11th November 1918.

The French were determined, following the invasions of France by Germany in 1870 and 1914, to make Germany permanently incapable of launching another attack. They insisted that German troops were immediately withdrawn behind the Rhine, and German Territory on the left bank was also immediately occupied.

The Treaty

The key players at the conference were Britain, France, Italy, the United States and Japan. During the early stages of the conference, at Wilson's insistence, the smaller countries were involved, but as the debate concentrated more and more on territorial divisions the smaller countries were omitted from the discussions. Initially a council of ten, comprising two representatives of each of the major powers, was in charge of the conference, but this was replaced by a council of four, comprising the leaders of Britain France Italy and the United States. Agreements were eventually only reached by secret debates between the leaders.

President Wilson insisted that the conference began with a debate over the setting up of the League of Nations. The aim was to establish an organisation of states that would deal with international crises. It required member states to substantially disarm. Wilson had wanted the League of Nations to comprise a union of democratic countries, but it became in effect a military alliance, which was what the French had wanted. In fact, former enemy states would not be permitted to join the League unless they agreed to implement the Peace terms of the Versailles treaty.

In February Wilson returned to the United States to deal with Congress business. While he was there, United States membership of the League was severely criticised. Americans did not want to be committed to further international obligations, and they were concerned about possible League intervention in America's sphere of influence. As a result Wilson pressed for inclusion in the League covenant of additional clauses that upheld such regional understandings as the Monroe Doctrine. [The Monroe doctrine was stated in an address of President Monroe to Congress in December 1823. It basically says that the United States does not regard the American continents as open to European colonization. In others words the United States defined the American continents as its proper sphere of influence and warned European powers to stay out of the Americas, assuring them that they would not interfere in Europe in their turn.] He made the articles of the League covenant the first 26 articles of any Peace Treaty, hoping that this would make it impossible for Congress to reject the peace settlement. These changes weakened Wilson's bargaining position at the conference.

Wilson did not wish to see the victorious powers annex the former non-Turkish provinces of the Ottoman Empire, and distribute among themselves the former German colonies. But South Africa, Australia and New Zealand wished to annex German colonies for reasons of security, and Britain had already committed itself to supporting Japan's claim to keep German colonies north of the equator. Wilson opposed full annexation, but allowed the colonies to be held in trust and administered by the League of Nations. At the suggestion of South African delegate at the Peace Conference Jan Smuts, the idea of a mandate was created, and three categories of mandate were developed. Category A for the "most advanced areas" such as the Arab provinces of the former Ottoman empire; category B for the German colonies of East Africa, Togoland, and The Cameroons; category C for other German colonies and the rest.

The German fleet was taken to Scapa Flow in the Orkneys. France and Italy wished to divide the fleet among the powers in some ratio. Recognising that they would not be able to keep their fleet, the Germans sunk it on the 21st June 1918. The Peace Treaty limited Germany to a fleet of just six battleships, six cruisers, six destroyers, and twelve torpedo boats. The French were willing to allow the Germans an army 200,000 conscripted men, but this was opposed by Lloyd George, and eventually it was agreed that the German army would be reduced to a size of 100,000 professional soldiers. No time clauses for disarmament were included in the Treaty.

By accepting the armistice, the Germans had agreed to pay compensation for war damages. The French hoped that stiffer reparations would keep Germany financially and economically weak for a long period of time. But British Treasury officials, particularly Keynes, were aware that Britain's economic recovery would require a general recovery of trade and reconstruction of the German economy. Before the war Germany had been an important trading partner of Britain. However, if reparations were to be made, then Britain was concerned that it should get its fair share. The Americans sought to base reparations on Germany's ability to pay. Nonetheless, article 231 of the Treaty of Versailles is a "war guilt" clause, modeled on a formula suggested by John Dulles, the American representative on the Reparations commission. The Americans came to support reparations payments because they were frightened of the British suggestion that there should be an all-round cancellation of war debts. But no figure could be agreed upon at Versailles, and a Reparations commission was established to settle the figure afterwards. In 1921 the figure was fixed at £6 billion.

There was also the question of the punishment of "war criminals", but the Dutch refused to hand over the Kaiser. A number of German military commanders were tried by a military German court at Leipzig, but they were given fines or short terms of imprisonment.

The French wanted the establishment of an independent state of Rhineland, but this was strongly opposed by Wilson who threatened in early April 1919 to return to the United States. In the compromise that followed France gained unrestricted access to the coal mines of the Saar. It was agreed that the Saar would be administered by the League of Nations for 15 years, after which they would be a plebiscite to determine whether the Saar would join France or Germany permanently. The French did not succeed in obtaining a full military guarantee by Britain and the United States to protect their borders. Whilst the Rhineland remained part of Germany, it was agreed that it would be occupied by allied troops for 15 years and divided into three zones.

The 13th point of Wilson's 14 points had promised the creation of an independent Poland with access to the sea. But this contradicted the principle of national self-determination, since the Danzig corridor was populated predominantly by Germans. In the compromise Danzig was made into a free city to be administered by the League of Nations. The economically important area of Upper Silesia was divided between Germany and Poland, with Poland acquiring the smaller but more economically important eastern section.

Independent countries of Finland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania were established. Czechoslovakia and Romania gained extensive Territory at the expense of Hungary.

The collapse of Austria Hungary made it possible to create a Serbo-Croate-Slovene state, which after 1929 was called Yugoslavia. The Italians wanted to annex Fiume. The other allies wanted to make Fiume into an independent free city administered by the League of Nations. This was unacceptable to Italy, and in fact independent Italian nationalists, led by the Italian poet, D'Annunzio, occupied the city. It remained under Italian occupation even when the Italian government drove D'Annunzio and his supporters out of the city.

The Peace Treaty dismembered the Ottoman Empire. Turkey lost Sudan and Libya. The French acquired recognition of protectorates in Morocco and Tunis. The British protectorate of Egypt and their annexation of Cyprus were recognised. Saudi Arabia, Syria, Mesopotamia and Palestine were all made into category A mandates. The Greeks occupied Smyrna. Constantinople and the Straits were opened permanently. The settlement for Turkey was concluded in the Treaty of Sevres in 1920, but not ratified by Turkey as a result of a nationalist revolt led by Mustapha Kemel, leading to the deposition of the Sultan in 1923. The Turks eventually drove the Greeks out of Smyrna.

In the Far East Japan was successful in retaining occupation of Kiachow and Shantung, but China refused to sign the Treaty, and this was one of the main reasons why the United States also failed to ratify the Treaty later.

The Treaty was handed to German representatives at Versailles on 7th May. They were given 15 days to comment on the Treaty. They made bitter objections to it, and there were some modifications as a result. The Germans signed the Treaty on 28th June 1919 in the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles. The treaty of St Germaine-en-Laye concluded the settlement with Austria (10th September 1919), The Treaty of Neuilly with Bulgaria (27th November), and the Treaty of Trianon with Hungary (4th June 1920).

In fact the Treaty of Versailles was not excessively punitive towards Germany. Germany lost 13.5% of its Territory, including Alsace-Lorraine, and 7 million of the population, and colonies. But it was the knowledge of defeat that the Germans found difficult to accept more than the terms of the Treaty itself.

Aftermath

In December 1919 Keynes published his work on The Economic Consequences of the Peace. This helped to fuel United States Senate opposition to the Treaty and Wilson failed to obtain the necessary two-thirds majority to ratify it. In 1919 Wilson had a serious stroke, and once again the Congress failed to ratify the Treaty. It is this failure of United States ratification that undermined the Treaty. Thereafter, in March 1920, the United States made a separate peace treaty with Germany. The United States did not become a member of the League of Nations. The United States did not offer a guarantee to protect French borders, and as a result of this neither did the British. The French population, at 40 million, was insufficient to match the German population of close to 70 million in the event of war. As a result the French insisted upon strict enforcement of the Versailles peace treaty. The French also made military agreements with Poland and Czechoslovakia.

Meanwhile the United States sought to strengthen its Navy, and the loss of trading opportunities in South America and Far East created problems for Britain. Both Britain and France had serious difficulties in managing their empires, and Britain became preoccupied with problems in Ireland, Egypt and India. Britain did not want expensive military involvement on the continent, and sought to appease Germany in the pursuit of stability in Europe. But the French were opposed to any revision of the Treaty that would lead to the increased strength of Germany. Thus Britain and France did not agree on how peace in Europe following the conclusion of the First World War could be achieved.

In 1920 the Poles attacked Russia, but they were driven back even to Warsaw. In the subsequent Treaty of Riga, 3 million Russians were subsumed under Polish territory.

In Eastern Europe many of the new states, for example Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Romania, and Poland, created large armies. They were worried of the possibility of Hungary recovering. The settlement in Eastern Europe was particularly unstable, but Britain was not prepared to guarantee the settlement or become involved. Britain sought to make France and France's eastern allies agree to a peaceful territorial revision of the Treaty.

Divisions between Britain and France were highlighted by the Chanak crisis of 1922. Turkish forces drove the Greeks from Smyrna in 1922. The French made a secret agreement with the Turkish, and British forces were left to face the Turkish alone. A military confrontation was narrowly avoided, but the incident revealed disunity between France and Britain.

When Mussolini took over in Italy in 1922 the French were worried that Italy and Germany would combine against them. They sought to appease Italy and so win Italy has an ally.

Reparations continued to be a serious source of contention. There were 23 summit conferences between January 1920 and December 1922 held between France, Britain, Italy and Belgium. Britain sought to relax the reparations payments, but the French would only make small concessions, and on two occasions the French occupied German towns in the Rhur. Reparations were finally set in April 1921 at £6 billion.

In March 1922 Germany and Russia made the secret Treaty of Rapallo, which permitted Germany to manufacture and test tanks and aircraft in Russia, in return for which Russia obtained loans from Germany. The French were alarmed by this close German-Russian collaboration.

In December 1922 Germany was declared by the reparations commission to have defaulted on deliveries of timber. In January 1923 the Rhur was invaded by French and Belgian troops. The French hoped to create an independent Rhineland state, but the German people supported their government and adopted a campaign of passive resistance that brought all production to a halt. The German government began to print money and massive hyperinflation ensued. This inflation seriously weakened the German middle-classes, and reduced their support for the Weimar constitution. British public opinion was opposed to the French intervention in Germany.

The crisis was resolved when the United States sent General Dawes to Europe. In 1924 the Dawes settlement froze these reparations payments for two years, ended the military occupation of the Rhur, and established a £40 million loan for Germany. As a result, there developed a triangular flow of money in which United States lent money to Germany, Germany paid reparations to Europe, and Europe repaid war debts to the United States. Even before 1929 the Germans were still complaining about the size of the reparations, and a further commission set up under American economist Owen Young, was established, but the Great Depression happened before it could report.

The League of Nations had been established on the principle of disarmament, but only limited agreements on disarmament were reached by the major powers following the war. In 1922 the United States, Britain, Japan, France and Italy did agree on limitation of battleships to a fixed ratio. At the insistence of the United States Britain terminated her alliance with Japan. It was replaced by a Four Power Treaty between the United States, Britain, Japan and France. However, Britain and the United States were unable to agree on concerted action to resist Japanese expansion within the Pacific area, and they refused to intervene in Manchuria when Japan invaded Manchuria in September 1931.

Since the other powers failed to implement arms limitation, the Germans continued in their policy of maintaining military expenditure.

France was unable to strengthen the League of Nations so that it would be able to assist France in resisting German aggression. The British rejected French proposals in this area: the Draft Treaty of Mutual Assistance (1924) and the Geneva Protocol (1925) were both rejected by Britain. In fact Britain simply did not have the manpower to support a military undertaking on the continent. The British army comprised 300,000 men and was reduced to 180,000 by the early 1930s, and these were committed to the Empire. In fact, Britain did not regard Germany as a threat to European peace during the 1920s. However in 1925 the Germans indicated that they would be willing to enter into an agreement with France for the guarantee of their frontier, and in 1925 a conference was held at Locarno in Italy, but despite the success of this conference neither Britain nor Italy agreed to underwrite this territorial settlement. However, Germany did join the League of Nations in 1926.

The League of Nations was flawed from the first. Significant world powers were not involved - the United States, Russia and Germany. Two of the members of the league, Italy and Japan, were intent on pursuing imperial ambitions regardless of being members. Since the United States was not a member the use of economic sanctions would only damage member states, because the United States would be in a position to reap the economic benefits of any loss of trade to the member states. Nonetheless, there were some early successes for League. It succeeded in resolving a dispute between Sweden and Finland over the Aaland Islands in favour of Finland. The League was also successful in organising a financial rescue package for Austria in 1922 and Hungary in 1923. In 1925 action by the League prevented a war between Greece and Bulgaria.

But the weakness of the League was demonstrated by its inability to deal with the aggression of Italy and Japan. In 1923 Italy seized the Greek island of Corfu, but the League was powerless to prevent this. The pretext for the Italian invasion of Corfu was the murder of an Italian official in Albania. The French were anxious not to upset Mussolini, and agreed that the crisis would not be settled by the League of Nations, but alternatively by a conference of ambassadors in Paris. In the settlement Italy agreed to withdraw from Corfu, but the Greeks were required to pay Italy an indemnity in respect of the murder, even though there was no proof that the Greeks had been involved.

Japan invaded Manchuria in 1931. This occurred at the time of the onset of the Great Depression. The Americans were not prepared to become involved, and this negated the weapon of economic sanctions. Lord Lytton was commissioned by the League to make a report on the affair, but the Japanese ignored its proposals. By the end of 1933 Japan having succeeded in occupying the whole of Manchuria, decided to withdraw from the League of Nations.

Although Russia joined the League in 1934, this did not enhance the capabilities of the League. Britain was militarily weak and could not respond at the same time to aggression from Germany, Italy and Japan. During the early 30s in Britain there was no general public support for rearmament. For example, the Oxford union had passed a resolution stating its unwillingness to "fight for King and country". France concentrated on the construction of the Maginot line, a series of defensive fortifications along the Franco-German border and confirmed their alliances with Poland and Czechoslovakia.

Appraisals

Opinion up to the 1950s was critical of the Treaty of Versailles. Since then, a great deal of primary material has been released, and this has enabled a reassessment of the Treaty. It is now generally thought that the peace treaty was the best that could have been achieved at the time.

The view that Germany was victimised by the settlement cannot really be sustained. The German delegation at Versailles was in favour of rejecting the Treaty, but resumption of the war would have crushed Germany, and the German government decided to accept the Treaty, and work at a later stage for revision of it. To this effect they began early to propagandise the treaty as "legally and morally untenable and at the same time impracticable". To this effect they exploited article 231, the "war guilt clause", as contrary to the spirit of the Fourteen points. They did make extensive criticisms of the Treaty, particularly over the division of Silesia. Lloyd George, in response, succeeded in revising the treaty so that Silesia would be divided along the lines of nationality following a plebiscite. All sections of German society were united in denunciation of the Versailles treaty.

Keynes's book, The Economic Consequences of the Peace, was instrumental at an early stage in damaging the Treaty. It portrayed Clemenceau, as vindictive, Woodrow Wilson as a weak idealist, and Lloyd George as unprincipled and manipulative. The publication, between 1920 — 24, of The History of the Peace Conference by Harold Temperley was a more balanced view of the conference but was not so influential.

The British took the view that the treaty had been to hard on Germany, but the French believed that it had not been hard enough. The French attitude, given their wartime experiences, in which ten of their richest provinces had been devastated, was not unreasonable in the circumstances. Indeed Germany had not been invaded. Marshall Foch commented, "This is not peace. It is an armistice for 20 years." Clemenceau subsequently failed to be re-elected as French President, which reflected the general French opinion that the treaty had not been sufficiently tough on the Germans.

The Italians had done territorially well out of the Treaty, but they were not satisfied. The Russians, in pursuit of their ideology, condemned the peace settlement. However, they played a double game, condemning the settlement as a capitalist scheme, whilst privately seeking an accommodation with capitalist powers.

American opinion was divided over the treaty, and as a result Wilson was unable to obtain a ratification of it. His public image suffered as a result of the publication of Keynes's book, but subsequently, Ray Stannard Baker, Wilson's press secretary published a pamphlet in November 1919, entitled What Wilson did at Paris, which portrayed Wilson in a more favourable light. He also went on to publish, in 1923, a three volumes study, entitled Woodrow Wilson and the World Settlement. This portrayed the European leaders, and Woodrow Wilson's adviser Colonel House, in a pejorative light, and the effect of this publication was to make public opinion in the United States even more convinced that the United States should not become involved in the League of Nations or with Europe. Colonel House's reputation was defended in 1928 by the publication by Charles Seymour of The Intimate Papers of Colonel House.

More detailed information about the process of the negotiations at Versailles came to light in 1924 with the publication of 21 volumes of the diaries of David Hunter Miller, the United States chief legal adviser. In 1928 further extracts were published in a work entitled The Drafting of the Covenant.

In 1933 Harold Nicolson published another first-hand account of the peace making process. It also promoted the idea that the peace conference was a betrayal of the idealism represented by Wilson's Fourteen points. However, he did write, "Given the atmosphere of the time, given the passions aroused in all democracies by four years of war, it would have been impossible even for supermen to devise a peace of moderation and righteousness."

Lloyd George sought to defend his reputation and in the mid-1930s he published his war memoirs and his The Truth about the Peace Treaties. However, Lloyd George again came under attack in 1947 with the publication of Old Diplomacy by Lord Hardinge which claimed that Lloyd George had the infuriating habit of listening to no one but himself.

Reviews of the Versailles Treaty include Nelson's Land and Power: British and Allied policy on Germany's frontiers, which was published in 1963. Another work by Seth Tillman, called Anglo-American relations at the Peace Conference was published in 1961. Rohan Butler has been influential through his contribution to the new Cambridge Modern History. Butler portrayed the Germans as maliciously endeavouring to divert attention from their own "treaty and vindictive war aims". He acknowledges that the peace treaty imposed severe restrictions upon the Germans, but argues that the problem with the treaty was the unwillingness of the Germans to accept that they had been defeated, and he also points out that the post-war situation left a power vacuum in Eastern Europe. In addition, the decision by the United States not to ratify the treaty undermined it.

Howard Elcock published in 1972 his Portrait of a Decision: The Council of Four at the Treaty of Versailles. This agrees with the view that the withdrawal of the United States from European affairs and the League was a crucial cause of the failure of the Versailles settlement.

The importance of the revolution in Russia has been emphasised by the work of the United States historian Arno Mayer in his works Political Origins of the New Diplomacy, published in 1959, and Politics and Diplomacy of Peace Making, published in 1967. Sally Marks's work The Illusion of Peace: International Relations in Europe, 1918 - 1933, argues that the Treaty was the best that could be achieved at the time. She observes that in fact the treaty left Germany both powerful and feeling resentment, and she also acknowledges the importance of the power vacuum in eastern Europe. It is not the treaty itself that was flawed, but the process of implementing and enforcing it.

A. J. P. Taylor's work, published in 1961, The Origins of the Second World War, observes that the Treaty was flawed in that it expected Germany to co-operate with her own disarmament and reparations repayments and to help an army of occupation. He also observes the power vacuum in Eastern Europe and Germany's position as "by far the greatest power on the continent of Europe".

Anthony Lentin argues in Guilt at Versailles, published in 1984, that as victors the allies had neither conciliated Germany nor destroyed it. In fact Germany had not been crushed militarily, and was stronger than her neighbours and former enemies.

Alan Sharp, and in his work, published in 1991, The Versailles settlement: Peace Making in Paris, 1919, observes that the settlement had solved none of the problems that had initiated the First World War. There was still "a German problem", there was still a "nationalities problem" and added to this, there was the cost of the war and the emergence of a new Russian threat.

Thus, general opinion is now of the view that the Treaty was "relatively lenient", and Clemenceau and Lloyd George have been vindicated. Perhaps Woodrow Wilson is still viewed as an ineffective negotiator.

The reparations clauses have been much debated. Etienne Mantoux's work, The Carthaginian Peace, published immediately after the Second World War, argues against Keynes's thesis that Germany could not pay reparations. He also observed that the net flow of capital from America to Germany was positive, and that as a result Germany was able during the 1920s to rebuild its factories and modernise. Generally, Mantoux's view has been endorsed by recent historians. It is argued that the Germans could have done what the French did after the Franco Prussian war in 1871, which was to make immediate and determined efforts to pay the war indemnity as fast as possible. The Germans made use of the argument over the validity of reparations as part of their political leverage against the former allies. The argument over reparations was a further manifestation of the ongoing power struggle between France and Germany. Britain did not support France doing the post-war period, but rather sought appeasement with Germany from the beginning. However both France and Britain were crippled by the cost of the war. Between a third and half of the annual budgets were spent on servicing war debts.

The role of American economic policy in this area has been criticised. William MacDougall in France's Rhineland Diplomacy, published in 1978, observes that the Dawes plan served to lend Germany more then she would have paid in reparations, whilst squeezing France to pay higher war debts. Trachrenberg in Reparations in World Politics, published in 1980, criticised the role of Lloyd George in relation to reparations, for it was Lloyd George who finally tripled the size of the reparations bill, so that Britain and a dominions would get a larger share of the payments. However, as already noted, the British were very anxious in the following period to revise the treaty at France's expense. So once again the relative strength of Germany following the first world war is highlighted. American historian Stephen Shuker in his work the end of French predominance published in 1976, writes that Germany emerged from World War I, despite military defeat, less damaged in terms of human and economic resources than the other major European powers. German strength explains why the German opposition to the treaty was itself so strong. Germany did not accept that it had been defeated. They entered into the peace negotiations with many illusions believing that they would remain a world power and would become a member of the Council of the League of Nations. They expected to retain their overseas colonies, and to acquire only limited obligations to France and Belgium. Subsequently, they exaggerated the importance of the war guilt clause. Likewise, the allies suffered from the illusion that Germany would cooperate with the peace terms. On the contrary Germany took every opportunity to condemn the Treaty as contrary to Wilson's 14 points.

In the post-war period Britain and France were on the defensive, struggling to maintain their position in the world and their economic strength, which was challenged by the United States and Japan. Britain and France had lost important overseas markets to America and Japan. Britain had sold 25% of a pre-war foreign investments, and France 50%. The United States became the world's major creditor nation and increased its foreign investments. Prior to the First World War the world economy was stimulated by the free-trade policies of Britain, but in the post-war settlement this did not continue, and economic hegemony passed to the United States, which tended towards protectionism.

The collapse of the Habsburg and Ottoman Empires also created a power vacuum in eastern and south Eastern Europe.

In order to concentrate on her empire Britain wished to be released of obligations in Europe. France responded to the post-war situation by endeavouring to construct alliances with East European states. Britain wished to treat Germany as a potential trading partner. This is shown in Paul Kennedy's Work the Realities of Diplomacy and The Rise and Falle of British naval mastery show that Britain by 1919 had suffered a major reversal as a world power, but not all historians agree - for example, with Corelli Barnett, who maintains In the Collapse of the British power that Britain could have sustained a more active role in Europe.

The treaty of Locarno has also been criticised by Jon Jacobson in his work Locarno Diplomacy: Germany and the West, which observes that the Treaty did not genuinely solve the question of Germany's position in Europe, and did not settle the question of the eastern frontiers. It is also generally agreed that the Lead of Nations lacked the power to deal effectively with problems in Europe.