Treaty of Versailles and The League of Nations.
June 28, 1919 saw the signing of the treaty of Versailles and the establishment of the League of Nations. With the treaty of Versailles, world war one (WW1) officially came to an end. Although an armistice between the Allied forces and Germany took place on the 11th of November 1918 at exactly 11AM, it was not until this treaty was signed that the greatest war humanity had up till that time ever known was brought to an end. Exactly five years before the treaty, the event that sparked a war that would come to be known as the ‘Great war or the first world war’ occurred. On the 28th of June 1914 at about 10:45am, the heir-apparent to the throne of the Austro-Hungarian empire: Archduke Franz Ferdinanard was assassinated in Sarajevo (in modern day Bosnia) by a 19 year old young Serbian nationalist.
Blaming Serbia for the assassination, Austro-Hungarian Empire which was a strong ally of the German empire decided to invade and annex Serbia. The Russian empire, seeing that annexation of Serbia would not favor its foreign interest, decided to ally itself with Serbia and warned Austria-Hungary not to attack its ally. When France saw the heated political tensions in the Balkans, it decided to seize the opportunity to resume hostilities against its enemy and rival, Germany. France had lost the 1870-1871 Franco-German war to Germany and amidst increasing economic, industrial, military and technological advancement of Germany, France decided to capitalize on the brewing conflict and allied itself with the British Empire. Britain, the super power of the time was not happy with the rise and advancement of Germany in Europe. On top of it all, Germany was a strong ally of one of Britain’s arch nemesis and hindrance to world dominion, the Ottoman Empire. When Britain and France realized that they have the same interest as far as Germany was concerned, they decided to ally themselves and together with the Russian Empire, they became known as the ‘triple entente’ also known as the ‘Allied powers’ of the Great War. While Germany, Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire formed the ‘triple alliance’ also known as ‘the Central powers’ of the Great war.
The war officially started on the 28th July, 1914 when the Austro-Hungarian armed forces invaded and occupied Serbia. In defense of Serbia, the Russian Empire declared war on Austria-Hungary and gave her an ultimatum to leave Serbia. The German empire, in defense of her Austro-Hungarian ally, declared war on Russia. But merely 3 days later, Britain and France declared war on Germany and the central powers. The war soon spread to involve almost all continents and most parts of the globe and will not end until almost 5 years later. Something that started as a two country affair became a global war and the cause of more that 22 million deaths worldwide.
In June 1919 (seven months after allied victory and seizure of hostilities), the victors of the Great War gathered in Paris for the Paris peace conference. Deliberations were carried out by allied countries especially the big four (Britain, United States of America, France and Italy). These four countries contrary to normal proceedings esclussively set all the terms of the peace treaty and forced Germany to sign it on June 28, 1919 in the palace of Versailles, Paris. The treaty basically imposed the wills and desires of the entente powers and blamed Germany and her allies for entirely responsible for the war. In fact, article 231(war guilt clause) of the treaty demanded that Germany pays to the entente powers a compensation of a total sum of $31.4billion which was the equivalent of $442billion in 2020. The treaty also stripped Germany of 25,000 square miles of its highly priced territory and 7 million people. Germany was also to make highly ridiculous military and industrial changes and was restricted to own very little. Germany was also to give up its colonial territories in Africa to the entente powers especially to France. The German, Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman Empires were dismantled and given as mandates to the allied powers.
This obviously one sided treaty placed profound pressure on the state of Germany and gave rise to the Nazi party of Germany with Adolf Hitler as its leader. Hitler was a world war one veteran and was among the numerous people who rebelled against the treaty of Versailles. Hitler not only exceptionally transformed a sanction crippled Germany into a super power as was seen in 1939, he also propagated demagoguery, anti-Semitism, fascism and nationalistic ideas in Germany. All these were the reasons for the Second World War. The treaty of Versailles, more like the ‘dictates of Versailles’, remains till date the foremost cause of a war (world war 2) that not only changed the political, economic, social and military dynamics of the world but also resulted in the death of more than 50 million people worldwide.
Along with the signing of the treaty of Versailles was the signing of the establishment of the League of Nations, the first world wide intergovernmental organization whose principal mission was to maintain world peace. Although Woodrow Wilson, the 28th president of the United States won a Nobel peace prize for his role as the leading architect of this league, it will woefully fail its mission 20 years later due to its sabotage by the big powers . In 1946, the league of nation seized to exist and the United Nations took its place and began to fulfill its mission.
Photo Credit: du.edu, Wikimedia, vocal media, history extra and university of Denver.
This article was initially written by the author for the “this day that year" column of At-tabeeb editorials and published on the 28th June, 2020.
