The Development of Treaty of Versailles

The Treaty of Versailles was the result of the capital of France Peace gathering, organized by the victors to settle the issues raised by the fight. The 27 nations represented at the Conference had conflicting plans for peace, so the sessions were tumultuous and the resulting treaties controversial. The conference convened on January 18, 1919. Germany and the other defeated central Powers were not permitted to sit at the conference tables, and the four study victorious powers--Britain, France, Italy, and the United States--dominated the proceedings. prexy Woodrow Wilson favored a conciliatory settlement based on the liberal principles of his Fourteen Points, which include national selfdetermination in Europe among its goals. French premier Georges Clemenceau, however, was most interested in securing his country against approaching German attack and took a different position. Many hope that the Treaty of Versailles and other treaties, agreements, and policies that emerged from this Conference contri entirelyed directly to the maintenance of tensions in Europe over the next two decades and led inevitably to World War II. The fact that the Treaty was dictated sort of than negotiated would be important in subsequent history, for the Germans never did engender a stake in the Treaty in scathe of having been involved in its creation. The Fourteen Points were adopted as a basis for the armistice because the U.S. threatened to make a cut off peace with Germa

Black, C.E. and E.C. Helmreich. Twentieth nose candy Europe. New York: Knopf, 1966.

Woodrow Wilson offers a good account of the Peace Conference, and he also sees the out interpose of the conference as an "immense tragedy which befell Woodrow Wilson and the whole world." Wilson arrived at the conference to find delegations from 27 nations of the assort and Associated Powers. Delegations from 7 other nations had also arrived, nations not yet " accepted" or standing as neutral in the war but now come to watch, concerned about their future. The delegations from the 5 enemy countries were also in attendance. The Communist were watching from their fort in Moscow, creating trouble for all in all the new nations.

In addition, individually of the 41 delegations of these nations had organized propaganda agencies and employed press agents, and to these were added representations from social, scientific, and economic organizations from all over the world. The American people were in support of Wilson and were no longer expressing prejudice against any of the Allied nations.

The moment President Wilson sits at the council table with these Prime Ministers and Foreign Secretaries he has broken all the power that comes from distance and detachment. Instead of remaining the heavy(p) arbiter of human freedom he become just a negotiator dealing with other negotiators. He is precisely one vote in a Peace Conference bound either to abide by the will of the absolute majority or disrupt its proceedings under circumstances which, having come to a climax in secret, can never be clearly explained to the public.

Cobb says that if Wilson is to win this battle, he must fight it on his own ground in Washington:

James Lees-Milne indicates a belief that the characteristics of many of the delegates contributed to the ultimate failure of the peace process. He writes specifically about Harold Nicolson, one of the junior advisers of the British delegation, but he discusses many other who were present at
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