CONFLICT AND TENSION GCSE HISTORY AQA

• Conflict and Tension


  This book covers a very significant 21-year period in modern world history. It focuses on the causes of the Second World War and seeks to show how and why conflict occurred and why it proved difficult to resolve the issues which caused it.
• January - The Saar plebiscite; the Saar re-joins Germany

  March - Hitler announces that he has built up the Luftwaffe and that conscription will be introduced to build up the German army; remilitarisation of the Rhineland

  June - The Anglo-German Naval Treaty

  October - Mussolini invades Abyssinia

  December - The Hoare Laval Pact is leaked to the press


  1935
• May - Germany and Italy sign the Pact of Steel; a military alliance

  August - The Nazi-Soviet Pact is signed

  September - Hitler invades Poland. Britain and France declare war on Germany


  1939
• SUNDAY 3 The Evening Bulletin

  EXTRA

  EXTRA 3

  EXTRA

  England and France At War With Germany; Hitler Announces He's Leaving for Front
• ADTRALIA PROLA STATE

  The War in Europe

  Paris Action Automatic

  When Deadline Set in

  Ultimatum Passes

  Allies Maie Pinal Decision After
• January - Paris Peace Conference

  June - The Treaty of Versailles is signed


  1919
• August - The Washington Naval Agreement

  October - Benito Mussolini becomes dictator in Italy after his march on Rome


  1922
• July - The Treaty of Lausanne overturns the Treaty of Sèvres

  August - The Corfu Crisis


  1923
• September - The Mukden Incident. The Japanese army invades Manchuria


  1931
• October - The Wall Street Crash leads to global depression


  1929
• July - The Nazi party in Austria assassinate the Austrian Chancellor, Dollfuss

  September - The USSR joins the League of Nations


  1934
• July - Outbreak of the Spanish Civil War

  October - The Rome-Berlin Axis is agreed

  November - Italy join The Anti-Comintern Pact which had originally been agreed between Germany and Japan


  1936
• 11 November - The Armistice is signed, ending the First World War


  1918
• 1922-1923 - Economic collapse in Austria and Hungary


  1922
• January - First meeting of the League of Nations

  August - The Treaty of Sevres signed


  1920
• Poland invades Vilna

  The Aaland Island crisis

  March - The League divides Upper Silesia between Germany and Poland


  1921
• October - The Greek-Bulgarian Dispute

  October-December - The Locarno Treaties


  1925
• Germany joins the League of Nations


  1926
• FULLER BLAMES FRANCE CALMLY

  WAR ON BAT

  INCLEMENT

  1934
• July - Japan launch a full-scale invasion on China


  1937
• CHURCHILL TAKEN GERMAN AIR RADS

  1939
• January - Adolf Hitler becomes Chancellor of Germany


  1933
• March - Hitler invades Austria to achieve Anschluss

  September - Chamberlain meets with Hitler over the Sudeten Crisis; the Munich Conference

  October - German troops invade and occupy the Sudetenland


  1938
• August - The Kellogg-Briand Pact

  October - Hitler leaves the Disarmament Conference


  1928
• Remember... One More Lollypop, and Then You All Go Home!
• Dr. Seussom
• The aims of Clemenceau, Wilson and Lloyd George


  The First World War devastated Europe. Around 8 million soldiers and a further 8 million civilians lay dead. Whole towns had been flattened, farms destroyed and railways blown up. The world would never be the same again. So when the leaders of the winning countries met to decide how to deal with the losing countries, they had a huge task in front of them. They could try to build a better and more peaceful world, or they could seek revenge.
• The Paris Peace Conference


  In January 1919, representatives from 32 winning countries met in the Palace of Versailles in Paris for what became known as the Paris Peace Conference. The discussions were led by the leaders of the most powerful victorious countries: Britain, France and the USA. The leaders of these countries were David Lloyd George, Prime Minister of Great Britain, Georges Clemenceau, Prime Minister of France and Woodrow Wilson, president of the USA. Collectively, they were known as the 'Big Three'.
• The 'Big Three' clearly had different ideas of what should happen at the peace talks.
• Woodrow Wilson, President of the USA


  During the war no fighting took place on American soil. America made lots of money selling weapons to the Allies, so most Americans didn't see the need for revenge. Like Lloyd George, Wilson was concerned that being too strict with the Germans would lead to another war. He was also an idealist; many people said that he was a dreamer who wasn't very practical. He wanted a future where everyone would be treated fairly. He suggested that a world parliament called the League of Nations was set i up, where countries could work and trade together so that war was less likely. He also believed in self-determination, allowing countries the freedom to rule themselves. Another of his ideas was 'freedom of the seas', which meant that everyone could sail trading ships wherever they wanted. In fact, he had many ideas for a better world and these are known as the Fourteen Points.
• Georges Clemenceau, Prime Minister of France


  Much of the fighting that took place during the war was in France, particularly the north-east, and the Germans destroyed many mines, railways, factories, bridges and farmland. The French also suffered the most deaths. Many French people wanted revenge and put Clemenceau under a lot of pressure to make it happen. Clemenceau wanted to cripple Germany to make sure that it was never powerful enough to attack France again. He also wanted to have its armed forces dramatically reduced and Germany's border to be pushed back to the Rhine in Eastern Germany, taking away its defences and making France less vulnerable to attack. Clemenceau needed money to help rebuild France and thought Germany should have to pay compensation for the damage. He was willing to compromise with the other leaders, but prepared to fight for what his people wanted.
• David Lloyd George, Prime Minister of Britain


  Lloyd George was elected by the British public because he promised to 'Make Germany pay'. Many young British men died in the trenches and many people of Britain wanted revenge. However, Lloyd George was more cautious than Clemenceau. He was concerned that if Germany was treated too harshly it could lead to Germans wanting revenge and starting another war. Lloyd George also wanted to keep Germany quite strong so that Britain could trade with it, and to stop other countries in Europe from becoming too powerful. The British Empire was also an important source of income, so Lloyd George was determined to gain German colonies if he got the opportunity. And to make sure that the Empire was safe, he needed to keep the British navy powerful. He saw the peace talks as a good opportunity to reduce the German navy to stop it from rivalling Britain's.
• Why were the 'Big Three' willing to compromise when they disagreed on so much?

  When the 'Big Three' met at the Paris Peace Conference they all brought different ideas and views with them, having had different experiences of the war. Each man had to balance what they personally felt was morally and politically right, but they also had to ensure that they pleased the voters back home. With such contrasting aims and opinions, it was never going to be easy for the 'Big Three'! And these weren't the only problems that they faced...
• Armistice


  When Germany and its allies first surrendered they had agreed to sign an armistice. This is the agreement that countries at war make to stop fighting immediately. Politicians then meet to agree a final peace treaty. The armistice at the end of the First World War included Germany agreeing to pay reparations, giving the Alsace-Lorraine region back to France and moving its army out of the Rhineland. Clemenceau used the fact that Germany had agreed to these principles in the armistice to argue that they should also appear in the final treaty.
• The armistice was signed in a train carriage in a clearing in some woods just north of Paris. Here General Foch of France accepts Germany's surrender
• Prior agreements


  During the war the Allies (Britain, France and the USA] had made lots of promises to different countries in return for their support. At the end of the war these countries wanted to claim what they saw as being rightfully theirs, but this created something else for the 'Big Three' to argue over. For example, Italy had been promised land from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and Japan had been told that their claims on land in China would be supported.
• Conflicts of interest


  As you know, the 'Big Three' wanted very different things from the treaties signed with the losing countries. This made it very difficult for them to agree. Clemenceau wanted revenge for the destruction and death that France had suffered when it had been invaded; Wilson wanted a treaty that would build a fairer world (he even proposed the Fourteen Points, which was a list of rules that aimed to create fairness and peace); and Lloyd George was concerned what effect a harsh treaty would have, but was also under pressure from the British to make Germany pay. During the British general election of 1918 one MP, Eric Campbell Geddes, had promised 'We shall squeeze the German lemon until the pips squeak', and this had become one of the main slogans of the election.
• Time constraints


  The 'Big Three' met in Versailles in January 1919. The Treaty of Versailles was signed in June, but the conference lasted 12 months, which may sound like a long time, but in this time these men had to decide the fates of Germany and its allies. There were diplomats from 32 countries at the conference. They discussed each point in great detail, but were pressured to come to a decision quickly by the victorious countries who were keen to be given reparations so that they could start rebuilding their economies, towns and lives. As such, it could be argued that the discussions of the 'Big Three' were hurried.
• A changing Europe


  Since the start of the war Europe had changed considerably and the politics and economies of many countries had become very unstable. Austria-Hungary had owned a huge empire in Eastern Europe before the war, but now countries were breaking away and declaring independence. In Russia, a revolution had broken out in 1917. The Tsar (Russian Emperor] and his family had been assassinated and a new political group - the Communists - had taken over. This group believed that all wealth and land should be shared equally, and all towns and cities should be run by elected councils. Europe lay in tatters and people feared that poverty caused by the war, along with instability in the way countries were governed, could easily lead to more trouble. The 'Big Three' needed to agree their treaties as quickly as possible.
• Some of Wilson's Fourteen Points:

  No secret treaties

  Ships of all nations have the right to sail the seas without interference

  Disarmament

  Alsace-Lorraine returned to France

  Self-determination in the Austrio-Hungarian and Ottoman (Turkish) empires

  Independence to be given to Romania, Serbia and Montenegro

  An independent Polish state to be created, with access to the sea

  The League of Nations to be formed - a group of countries who would work together to encourage trade and peace