Losing the Peace

1. Losing the Peace

2. The New German Government • Prince Max named Chancellor in October • Favored democratic reforms; hoped to use 14 Points as basis for talks • Two “Peace Notes” • US unwilling to negotiate with him until Kaiser abdicates

3. Fourteen Points (abridged) • I. Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at. • II. Absolute freedom of navigation • III. The removal of all economic barriers • IV. national armaments will be reduced to the lowest point consistent with domestic safety. • V. A free, open-minded, and absolutely impartial adjustment of all colonial claims, • VI. The evacuation of all Russian territory. • VII. Belgium, the whole world will agree, must be evacuated and restored. • VIII. 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, should be righted.

4. IX. A readjustment of the frontiers of Italy should be effected along clearly recognizable lines of nationality. • X. 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. • XI. The relations of the several Balkan states to one another [should be] determined by friendly counsel along historically established lines of allegiance and nationality. • XII. The nationalities which are now under Turkish rule should be assured an undoubted security of life, and the Dardanelles should be permanently opened as a free passage to the ships. • XIII. 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. • XIV. 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.

5. Germany Unravels • Collapse of Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian empires • 30 October 600 sailors mutinied at Kiel • Nov. 4 10,000 sailors mutinied • Socialist Free State declared in Bavaria • Army commanders warned Hindenburg that troops would not obey orders to attack

6. Armistice • German decision to seek armistice on Nov 7 broadcast to Eiffel Tower radio station • Ludendorff fled to Sweden, Kaiser abdicated to Holland • Who is in charge? Matthias Erzberger, told by Hindenburg to “sign a peace at any cost.”

7. Meeting at Compiègne

8. Armistice Terms • Germany evacuates all occupied territory (including Alsace and Lorraine) without damaging civilian and military equipment contained therein. • Germany surrenders: • 5,000 heavy guns; • 30,000 machine guns; • 5,000 locomotives; • 150,000 railway cars; • 150 submarines. • Blockade of Germany continues until the conclusion of a final peace treaty.

10. 6 10 5 7 Trouble Spots: 1 Saar/Rhineland 2 South Tyrol 3 Fiume 4 Sudetenland 5 Danzig 6 Memel 7 Curzon Line 8 Smyrna 9 Upper Silesia 10 Ireland 9 1 4 2 3 8

11. Wilson in Paris • First trip outside USA by a sitting president • Select group of advisors; no Republicans invited • The Inquiry • Wilson’s refusal to see the battlefields Wilson leaves New York for Paris in circumstances quite different from Pershing and Marshall less than two years earlier

12. The Paris Peace Conference:19 January to 28 June 1919 • Signing a final peace • Bolshevism • Imperialism • Blockade • Divergent goals of the allies • US Midterm Elections of 1918 The Big Four

13. Clemenceau and France • How to protect France? • Alliance? • Separate Rhenish Republic? • Disarmament? • Assassination attempt in February • Germany still strong, Russia gone • Disagreements with Foch

14. Lloyd George and Britain • The “Khaki Election” • Lord Northcliffe and the British Media • Fears of Bolshevism and “a new French Empire” • Avoid “Alsace-Lorraines in Reverse” • Imperial overstretch

15. Vittorio Orlando and Italy • Treaty of London, 1915 • The issues of the South Tyrol and Fiume • Gabriele D’Annunzio and the seizure of Fiume

16. Wilson and the USA • Idealism and internationalism • League of Nations • Democracy and capitalism • Elections of 1918 • Irreconcilables • Sen. Lodge • 14 Points

17. The Europeans View Wilson • “God Himself only gave mankind ten, and we soon learned how to break those” – Georges Clemenceau on the 14 Points • “Not bad, considering that I was seated between Jesus Christ and Napoleon” – Lloyd George, assessing his performance in Paris

18. Fourteen Points (abridged) • I. Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at. • II. Absolute freedom of navigation • III. The removal of all economic barriers • IV. national armaments will be reduced to the lowest point consistent with domestic safety. • V. A free, open-minded, and absolutely impartial adjustment of all colonial claims, • VI. The evacuation of all Russian territory. • VII. Belgium, the whole world will agree, must be evacuated and restored. • VIII. 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, should be righted.

19. IX. A readjustment of the frontiers of Italy should be effected along clearly recognizable lines of nationality. • X. 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. • XI. The relations of the several Balkan states to one another [should be] determined by friendly counsel along historically established lines of allegiance and nationality. • XII. The nationalities which are now under Turkish rule should be assured an undoubted security of life, and the Dardanelles should be permanently opened as a free passage to the ships. • XIII. 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. • XIV. 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.

20. Loss of 1/7 of Germany’s European territories and overseas colonies Disarmament 100,000 man army No subs, planes, no heavy artillery, no general staff Demilitarization of Rhineland “It is all a great pity. We shall have to do the same thing all over again in 25 years at three times the cost” – David Lloyd George Treaty of Versailles:June 1919

21. Reparations To be determined by committee Final figure to be $56 billion, less than the cost to UK alone Germany can only pay $10 billion War Guilt League of Nations “This is not peace. It is an armistice for twenty years” – Ferdinand Foch “To bed, sick of life” – journal entry of British diplomat Harold Nicolson on the day of the signing Treaty of Versailles:June 1919

22. German reactions • Scapa Flow • Burning of flags • Fritz Ebert and the Stab in the Back • Freikorps • Italy • “Mutilated victory” • “If necessary we will create a new Pax Romana with a grenade in each hand and a knife between our teeth” – Mussolini

23. American Reactions • Treaty failed to pass Senate • Wilson’s campaign and stroke • Birth of modern American foreign policy

24. Further Reading • ErezManela, The Wilsonian Moment • Margaret Macmillan, Paris, 1919 • John M. Cooper, Breaking the Heart of the World