Treaty of Versailles

• 1.      What was the ceasefire of November 1918 called?  

  ·        Armistice
• The Versailles Conference began in January 1919.
• 32 countries attended the Versailles Conference.
• Sir Eric Geddes wanted 'everything you can squeeze out of a lemon, and a bit more'.
• The three most important men at the Versailles Conference were Georges Clemenceau, Woodrow Wilson, and David Lloyd George, nicknamed 'The Big Three'.
• Georges Clemenceau was the Prime Minister of France and wanted revenge, punishment, Germany to pay reparations, and for Germany to be weakened.
• Woodrow Wilson was the President of America and wanted to make the world safe, end war, have a fair peace, implement the 14 Points, and establish a League of Nations.
• The 14 Points were the ideas for a better world that Woodrow Wilson proposed.
• The three main ideas of the Fourteen Points were disarmament, League of Nations, and self-determination.
• The assembly, where Wilson wanted countries to talk about their problems, instead of going to war, was called the League of Nations.
• David Lloyd George was the Prime Minister of Britain and wanted Germany to pay, but not too much, justice, not revenge, not too harsh, and a halfway point.
• The Treaty of Versailles had four main terms: Blame, Reparations, Armed forces, and Germany lost Territory.
• Clause 231 of the Treaty of Versailles blamed Germany for the war.
• Reparations were the money Germany had to pay for the damage done during the war.
• The amount of reparations was eventually set at £6,600 million.
• The Treaty of Versailles said five things about Germany’s armed forces: Germany was forbidden to have submarines, Germany was forbidden to have an air force, Germany could have a navy of only six battleships, Germany could have an Army of just 100,000 men, and Germany was not allowed to place any troops in the Rhineland.
• 1.      List 5 areas of land in Europe that Germany lost.  

  ·        Alsace-Lorraine

  ·        Schleswig

  ·        Polish Corridor

  ·        Saar

  ·        Danzig
• The word which means that troops were not allowed in the Rhineland is Demilitarisation.
• Germany’s colonies were given as League of Nations 'mandates' to Britain and France.
• Anschluss with Germany was forbidden in the Treaty for Austria.
• The Germans refused to agree to Clause 231 because they did not believe it was true and said Russia had started the war.
• The Germans paid reparations in January 1921 because Britain, France and Belgium invaded.
• The Germans were angry about their tiny army because they could not defend themselves.
• The German sailors scuttled (sank) the fleet.
• Germany lost 12% of its land as a result of the Treaty.
• The Germans thought the Treaty was unfair because they had not been asked to Versailles and few of the 14 Points got into the Treaty.
• When the Germans heard about the Treaty, they felt 'pain and anger' and called it 'the disgraceful Treaty'.
• The Treaty helped to rise to power people like Hitler.
• A German newspaper promised that they would never stop until they won back what they deserved.
• Clemenceau liked reparations, the small German army, the demilitarised zone in the Rhineland, and that France got Alsace-Lorraine and German colonies.
• Clemenceau disliked the Treaty because he wanted it to be harsher and for Germany to be split up into smaller countries.
• Wilson got the League of Nations and Self-determination.
• Wilson hated the Treaty because some of his 14 Points did not get into the Treaty.
• When Wilson went back to America, the Senate refused to join the League of Nations and even refused to sign the Treaty of Versailles.
• Lloyd George liked that Britain got some German colonies and the small German navy.
• Lloyd George disliked the Treaty because he thought it was too harsh and would start another war in 25 years' time.
• The four main principles of the Treaty of Versailles were reparations, disarmament, loss of land, and self-determination.
• Self-determination is the right to rule yourself.
• Five new nation-states were created by the treaties of 1919–20: Czechs and Slovaks in Czechoslovakia, Hungarians in Hungary, Austrians in Austria, Poles in Poland, and Slavs in Yugoslavia.
• The Austro-Hungarian Empire was split up to create these new nation-states.