Reaction to the Treaty of Versailles

• Germans were outraged at the Treaty - the country was in turmoil and the Kaiser had fled. People felt the Treaty had left Germany in financial ruin
• In the 1920s and 1930s many people, especially in Britain and the USA, felt that Versailles had been too harsh and Germany was right to hate it
• Many argue that the Treaty gave Hitler the excuse to invade other countries he needed - if the Treaty hadn't been so harsh he wouldn't have had this excuse
• After WWII historians felt that Germany had actually rebuilt quickly - by 1929 it had recovered its pre-war strength - and so the treaty hadn't been as harsh as Germany had claimed at the time
• Margaret Macmillan (2004) felt the treaty wasn't too harsh. Germany only ended up paying a portion of it's reparations thanks to the Young Plan set by Stresemann in 1929
• Macmillan said the real problem was that the treaty wasn't properly enforced