Transcript PPC and LON Fail PPOINT #9

• Evaluate the decisions made to the major issues at
the Paris Peace Conference
• Judge the lasting effect of the Paris Peace
Conference on Europe
The end of WWI…
A cause of WWII
• Europe in shambles
• About 10 million
dead from war
• Influenza outbreak at
the end of the war
kills even more than
the war itself!!
• Countries in political
shambles…(4)
• receives hero’s
welcome
• His weaknesses as a
politician will hurt…
– idealistic and
stubborn…
• insists on 14 points
– League of Nations
– ideas were ahead of
their time
• Leaves France in
1919 quietly
1. Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at, after which there shall be no private international understandings of any kind but diplomacy shall proceed
always frankly and in the public view.
2. Absolute freedom of navigation upon the seas, outside territorial waters, alike in peace and in war, except as the seas may be closed in whole or in part
by international action for the enforcement of international covenants.
3. The removal, so far as possible, of all economic barriers and the establishment of an equality of trade conditions among all the nations consenting to the
peace and associating themselves for its maintenance.
4. Adequate guarantees given and taken that national armaments will be reduced to the lowest point consistent with domestic safety.
5. A free, open-minded, and absolutely impartial adjustment of all colonial claims, based upon a strict observance of the principle that in determining all
such questions of sovereignty the interests of the populations concerned must have equal weight with the equitable claims of the government whose title
is to be determined.
6. The evacuation of all Russian territory and such a settlement of all questions affecting Russia as will secure the best and freest cooperation of the other
nations of the world in obtaining for her an unhampered and unembarrassed opportunity for the independent determination of her own political
development and national policy and assure her of a sincere welcome into the society of free nations under institutions of her own choosing; and, more
than a welcome, assistance also of every kind that she may need and may herself desire. The treatment accorded Russia by her sister nations in the
months to come will be the acid test of their good will, of their comprehension of her needs as distinguished from their own interests, and of their
intelligent and unselfish sympathy.
7. Belgium, the whole world will agree, must be evacuated and restored, without any attempt to limit the sovereignty which she enjoys in common with all
other free nations. No other single act will serve as this will serve to restore confidence among the nations in the laws which they have themselves set
and determined for the government of their relations with one another. Without this healing act the whole structure and validity of international law is
forever impaired.
8. All French territory should be freed and the invaded portions restored, and the wrong done to France by Prussia in 1871 in the matter of Alsace-Lorraine,
which has unsettled the peace of the world for nearly fifty years, should be righted, in order that peace may once more be made secure in the interest of
all.
9. A readjustment of the frontiers of Italy should be effected along clearly recognizable lines of nationality.
10. The peoples of Austria-Hungary, whose place among the nations we wish to see safeguarded and assured, should be accorded the freest opportunity to
autonomous development.
11. Rumania, Serbia, and Montenegro should be evacuated; occupied territories restored; Serbia accorded free and secure access to the sea; and the
relations of the several Balkan states to one another determined by friendly counsel along historically established lines of allegiance and nationality; and
international guarantees of the political and economic independence and territorial integrity of the several Balkan states should be entered into.
12. The turkish portion of the present Ottoman Empire should be assured a secure sovereignty, but the other nationalities which are now under Turkish rule
should be assured an undoubted security of life and an absolutely unmolested opportunity of autonomous development, and the Dardanelles should be
permanently opened as a free passage to the ships and commerce of all nations under international guarantees.
13. An independent Polish state should be erected which should include the territories inhabited by indisputably Polish populations, which should be assured
a free and secure access to the sea, and whose political and economic independence and territorial integrity should be guaranteed by international
covenant.
14. A general association of nations must be formed under specific covenants for the purpose of affording mutual guarantees of political independence and
territorial integrity to great and small states alike.
• Typical politician
• bitter hatred of
Germany
– wants Germany to
dismantled to fullest
extent
– Afraid of Germany’s
potential power of France
– Wants what land back?
• Has bargaining power
since France was
devastated the most
• Disliked Wilson and his
idealistic ideas
– “Mr. Wilson bores me with his
Fourteen Points. Why God
Almighty has only ten!”
– will debate and argue over the
14 Points and anger Wilson
tremendously
• Gets shot in the conference
• Imperialistic, vengeful,
bitter mindset will create
future problems
• Another typical politician
• Stuck in the middle…
• Poor foreign policy
knowledge
• wants Germany to stay
strong to help British
economy
• also has imperialistic
mindset that creates
future problems
• sides with Clemenceau
often on most issues and
hurts Germany
1. Punishing
Germany
2. Soviet Union &
Communism
threat
3. SelfDetermination
good & bad
4. Woodrow
Wilson’s League
of Nations
1. Reparations
on Germany
– payments
for war
damage
– How much
should
Germany
pay in
1919?
– $30 billion
2. loses land
to…
–
–
–
–
–
–
France
Poland
Denmark
Belgium
Czech…
Lithuania
3. surrenders all
colonies
4. cannot unite
with Austria
or Czech…
5. limit
German
army
– 100K
standing
army
6. limit
German
navy
– 24 ships
– No subs
• War Guilt Clause
• Germany must admit it is to blame for WWI
• Germany signs
Versailles Treaty
Under Protest
• FORCED to sign…or
be invaded by Allies
• Germany was most
resentful of what
punishment?
• Winston Churchill,
Secretary of War
advised the Big 3 to
invade USSR and
overthrow the
Bolsheviks
• We had 4 options!!!
• “Invite”
Russians to
conference
• give aid to
opponents
to
overthrow
Bolsheviks
• ????
• Lenin
catches
them as
two-faces
• USSR gets even
more suspicious
of the Capitalist
west
• Allowing people in a land to
vote/decide what country
they want to be a part of
• Eastern Europe will choose
what government they
want to be part of
• Main European countries
that lose land or get broken
up (dismantled bubbles) 
– Austria Hungary
– Germany
– Russia
• Some
countries still
not recreated
the best way
– Czech…
– Poland
• Everyone
can’t be
pleased
– Italy
• Some
deserve it
and some
don’t 
• colonies in Middle
East, Africa and
Asia not allowed
Self-Determination
– mandates instead
• territories
administered by
western powers
– GB and France take
over German
colonies
– Imperialism still
around!!!! 
• Should the Big 3 keep the SykesPicot agreement and let GB &
France rule these newly created
countries temporarily?
• If no, then the Arabs rule their
own lands after WWI
• LON is like the UN
today
– Wilson’s idea is
ahead of its time
• 40 countries join
LON…
–but not USA
• It’s powerless!!
– No armed
forces
•Italy
•Germany
•Japan
• Republicans Senate in
1918!!!

• Right away voice
displeasure with the
Covenant (agreement)
– Crossroads…
– Against American ideals
and our own agendas…
– Worried what LON
would make the USA
do…
•  beats Wilson at the
2/3 Ratification Game…
I hate
Wilson!!...
Mr. President, the little group of men who sat in the secret
conclave for months at Versailles were not the peacemakers.
They were the war makers. They cut and slashed the map of the
Old World in violation of the terms of the armistice. They
patched up a new map of the Old World in consummation of the
terms of the secret treaties the existence of which they had
denied because they feared to expose the sordid aims and
purposes for which men were sent to death by the tens of
thousands. They betrayed China. They locked the chains on the
subject peoples of Ireland, Egypt, and India. They partitioned
territory and traded off peoples in mockery of that sanctified
formula of 14 points, and made it our Nation’s shame. Then,
fearing the wrath of outrage peoples, knowing that their new
map would be torn to rags and tatters by the conflicting warring
elements which they had bound together in wanton disregard of
racial animosities, they made a league of nations to stand guard
over the swag!
The Old World armies were exhausted. Their treasuries were
empty. It was imperative that they should be able to draw upon
the lusty man power and the rich material resources of the
United States to build a military cordon around the new
boundaries of the new States of the Old World.
Senators, if we go into this thing, it means a great standing Army;
it means conscription to fight in foreign wars, a blighting curse
upon the family life of every American home, every hour. It
means higher taxes, higher prices, harder times for the poor. It
means greater discontent; a deeper, more menacing unrest.
Mr. President, whatever course other Senators take, I shall never
vote to bind my country to the monstrous undertaking which this
covenant would impose.
Robert LaFollette…one of the 14 Irreconsilables
Biggest issue for many in Senate was…
• Goes on a speaking tour
through Midwest &
West…
• Fights for LON the most
and Article X…
• PPC exhausted
Wilson…this speaking
tour does too…
• Incapacitated Wilson
learns of Senate
rejection (<50%)
I wound up
going down the
internationalism
road…but only
to an extent!!