History Dept, Queens College

History Department

History 309 – Contemporary Europe – September 14, 2005

PEACE-MAKING, 1919

Note: The Treaty of Versailles, as well as the “minor treaties,” were human artifacts. Real human beings, just like us, argued over them, pounded them into texts, voted on them, and presented them to the public. So – imagine that you’re one of the “experts” at the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, and your job is to put together the key ideas of the peace treaty, especially with regard to Germany. What would be the arguments for and against the following:

Idea to be in the Treaty

Reasons for:

Reasons against:

1.Germans must promise to drastically reduce their army; abolish their high command; scrap just about all of their navy.

2. Land must be taken away from Germany – even if the land includes Germans. In the west, Alsace & Lorraine go to France; up north, a small chunk goes to Denmark; most import, in the east, large chunks go to the newly created Poland.

3. Germany must pay REPARATIONS to the victorious Allies. These money payments will go on for generations – maybe 50 years.

4. War Guilt – the treaty should include language that says that the Germans – AND THEY ALONE – were responsible for this awful war.

5. Now: on to the Austro-Hungarian Empire. It’s to be destroyed, broken up into a whole bunch of smaller countries.

6. We’re for “self-determination” – except in the case of Austria. Though German-speaking Austrians might want to join Germany – they can’t. Also, German-speaking minorities in newly created countries, like Czechoslovakia and Poland cannot break away and join Germany.

7. The Germans will be invited to Versailles to sign – they’ll be purposely humiliated to show that they really lost! They’ll be held behind barbed wire; they’ll have chairs shorter than ours; there’ll be no negotiation whatsoever ever; if they don’t sign, we’ll resume the war and invade Germany.

8. We’ll set up a League of Nations, a kind of international Parliament; its job will be to PREVENT wars like this from every happening again.

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Modified by: H. Kamerling

Idea to be in the Treaty	Reasons for:	Reasons against:
1.Germans must promise to drastically reduce their army; abolish their high command; scrap just about all of their navy.
2. Land must be taken away from Germany – even if the land includes Germans. In the west, Alsace & Lorraine go to France; up north, a small chunk goes to Denmark; most import, in the east, large chunks go to the newly created Poland.
3. Germany must pay REPARATIONS to the victorious Allies. These money payments will go on for generations – maybe 50 years.
4. War Guilt – the treaty should include language that says that the Germans – AND THEY ALONE – were responsible for this awful war.
5. Now: on to the Austro-Hungarian Empire. It’s to be destroyed, broken up into a whole bunch of smaller countries.
6. We’re for “self-determination” – except in the case of Austria. Though German-speaking Austrians might want to join Germany – they can’t. Also, German-speaking minorities in newly created countries, like Czechoslovakia and Poland cannot break away and join Germany.
7. The Germans will be invited to Versailles to sign – they’ll be purposely humiliated to show that they really lost! They’ll be held behind barbed wire; they’ll have chairs shorter than ours; there’ll be no negotiation whatsoever ever; if they don’t sign, we’ll resume the war and invade Germany.
8. We’ll set up a League of Nations, a kind of international Parliament; its job will be to PREVENT wars like this from every happening again.