ww2

• Paris Peace Conference

  1919

  meeting of "victors"

  delegates of 27 nations

  main decisions -> council of 4 (UK, USA, Fr, It)

  no Ger/AH delegation

  no Russia (excluded)
• Context of countries during Paris Peace Conference 1919

  (russia, new republics, central europe, germany, western europe)


  - Russia (bolsheviks) - excluded

  - new republics - Baltic Coast, - Poland, Danube (iffy)

  - central europe chaos (threat rev)

  - allied blockade of Germany

  - Western Europe devastated

  - europeans "in awe" over USA president
• The Fourteen Points


  1918 Congressional speech

  
  

  - prevent devastating warfare from happening again

  - keep Russia on allied side

  - boost morale

  - undermine central power
• Content of Fourteen Points

  -1/2 specific territorial issues between countries at war

  - vision for peace
• 5 big characteristics of Fourteen Points

  - transparency in international relations

  - peace without victory (stability instead of punishment)

  - liberal, free world (freedom of seas + reduction of arms by all)

  - national self-determination

  - international political organisation to prevent war (league of nations + keeping sov but conflict resolution)
• Explain national self- determination in the Fourteen Points


  grps bound by common language/lines of descent have a right to territorial independence

  
  

  -> evacuate occupied territories

  -> self-determ of nationalities

  -> redraw boundaries

  
  

  "colonial adjustments" colonisers and colonisees have equal weight
• Paris Peace Conference: what did France want

  - garantees against renewed German invasions

  - asked that the part of Germany west of the Rhine be an independent state under Allied control
• Paris Peace Conference: what did Britain want


  vetoed the freedom of the seas; sought to preserve British command of the sea
• Paris Peace Conference: what did Italy want

  wanted to gain "Italian" territories in former Austria-Hungary, Eastern-Europe; sought to manifest itself as one of the great European powers
• Treaty of Versailles (1919) how was Germany punished?

  - "guilt clause" (accept resonsibility for causing war + reparations)

  - german disarmament

  - enormous war reparations

  - German territorial losses

  - loss of all colonies (awarded to league of nations then redistributed)
• German Disarmament (Treaty of Versailles)


  no airforce, no tanks, no submarines, army reduced to 100.000 men; navy reduced to coastal defense force
• Enormous war reparations (Treaty of Versailles)


  (including war pensions; Germany not allowed to repair physical damages themselves)
• German territorial losses (Treaty of Versailles)

  • Rhineland:

  would remain German but demilitarised and under allied control for 15 years

  
  

  • Alsace and Lorraine; and the Saar:

  restored to France; coal-rich area of the Saar (W-Germany) would beunder allied control for 15 years (coal would serve as reparation to France)

  
  

  • Transfers of small territories to Belgium (Eupen-Malmédy), Denmark and Poland
• what happened to the Austrian-Hungarian empire after Treaty of Versailles?

  (Austria, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Poland, Romania)
• Czechoslovakia then split into two countries in...


  Czech Republic and Slovakia (1992)
• Yugoslavia was composed of...

  former Serbia

  territories from AH

  (South Slavic ppl)

  disintigrated in early 1990s
• Soviet Union territories after treaty of Versailles

  lost territory to new Baltic states and Poland
• Poland territories after treaty of Versailles

  Poland got parts of Germany
• Italy territories after treaty of versailles

  territorial demands resulted in major conflict; obtained Trieste and some Dalmatian islands from Austria

  
  

  • Istria was predominantly Slovene and should have gone to Yugoslavia (principleof self-determination)

  
  

  • Italian claims for African and Asian territory were not fulfilled
• Bulgaria territories after treaty of Versailles

  lost territory to Yugoslavia and connection to the Aegean Sea to Greece
• What happened to the Ottoman Empire after WW1?


  partitioned in 1922; British and French annexation of territories outside Arabian peninsula (Sykes-Picot agreement 1916); left a vast area of the Middle East unsettled ---complex legacy of Ottomon empire and Western mandates continues to shape conflicts up todate
• what happened to Germany colonies in Africa and China


  France and GB divided up most

  + Belgian Congo enlargened

  
  

  Japan received a mandate for German Pacific Islands north of the Equator; claimed rights over German concessions in China but only acquired about half of them
• German reaction to treaty of Versailles

  first refused to sign - threatened hostilities + blockade

  
  

  gov crisis in Berlin - new gov coalition signs
• Paris Peace Settlement: triumph of Western nationalism and yet...


  - failed to solve minority problems

  - germans in Czechoslovakia complained cut off from Germany

  - german nationalism +++
• How did the Treaty of Versailles fail

  - too severe - German revanchism

  - too lenient to destroy German power

  - conflict of interests between Great Powers

  - USA never ratified treaty, didn't enter League of Nations (isolationism)
• Conflict of interests after Paris Peace Settlement between great powers (Italy, China, Russia, France)

  Italy bitter over small territorial gains; China dissatisfied by Japanese gains, Russia objected to cordon sanitaire and loss of territory; France felt duped over Rhineland and Anglo-American guarantee of support against future German aggressions
• Creation of League of Nations

  1920

  
  

  - Council (permanent members + elected members)

  
  

  - Assembly (representatives of member states)

  
  

  - Secretariat (Geneva) and Court of International Justice (The Hague)
• Why was the League of Nations not able to prevent WW2?

  - no own army (relied on allied forces)

  - ppl saw as sticking up for GB/Fr

  - USA refused to sign

  - 1935: Abysinnian Crisis: Italy invades Ethiopia

  - Soviet Union (late and brief)
• Why was the Soviet Union expelled from League of Nations


  invaded Finland 1939
• The Great Depression


  1930s

  worlwide economic recession, originated in US (1929: crash of Wall Street)
• Steps of worldwide economic recession

  - war economy

  - "roaring twenties" and post-war optimism (easy credit)

  - production decline, drop in sales, agriculture over production

  - vicious economic cycle

  - 1929: panic on the stock market, no limitations on trading or measures to prevent panic sales; massive devaluation of stock bonds
• what country was affected the most by the Great Depression

  Germany

  -> war debt prevented investments that could've boosted economy

  -> crash of wall street - USA calls in international loans of germany

  -> german cuts on public spending made things worse
• How crash of wall street impacted germany economy

  - US calls in loans

  - German industry loses finance, lowers production, lays off workers

  - ppl spend less, prices drop, demain falls

  - industry loses more money, lowers production further, lays more workers off

  - ppl spend less, prices drop

  - depression
• vacuum of political power


  = collapse of monarchies
• how was inequality after ww1 and what did this lead to

  - heightened

  - radicalisation and working-class militancy
• what did labour shortages help the labour unions for (interbellum)

  enhanced negotiation power of labour unions
• was the left unified during interbellum?

  No

  (communists vs. social-democrats; participation in WWI or not)

  + 1917 Russian Revolution - fear of destabilization
• comparing russian rev with french rev


  - Fr: liberation against feudalism/despotism

  - Rus: liberation against capitalism/imperialism

  
  

  - Fr and Rus: unity to overthrow, conflict over founding new regime

  
  

  - Fr and Rus: minority of radicals organised and managed to suppress all opposition to defend rev cause
• what kind of position did the soviet union occupy vis-a-vis europe and the colonial world

  intermediate position between Europe and the colonial world

  
  

  • Feared/admired in Europe and USA for having the last word in social revolution (Rosa Luxemburg - political gap in Germany)

  
  

  • Conceived as an alternative pathway to modernity (without being capitalist/Western); a step in a potential world-wide rebellion against European supremacy
• comintern


  Communist International

  1919

  
  

  main focus: how to export revolution to other european countries and colonies?

  
  

  sceptic towards moderates (slow down rev)