World War I – Treaty of Versailles

signed in June of 1919 the Treaty of
Versailles ended the state of war
between Germany and the Allied powers hi
I’m Rebecca Brayton and welcome to
watchmojo.com and today we’ll be taking
a look at what is arguably one of the
most important and controversial
documents of the 20th century an
armistice to end World War one was
signed on November 11th 1918 however it
took over half a year of negotiations
following that date for Germany and the
Allied powers to officially end the
state of war the negotiations had begun
in Paris on January 18th 1919
initially 27 nations from the Allied
side participated a notable exception
was Russia who had agreed to a separate
treaty with Germany the previous year
Germany in addition to the newly
separated nations of Austria and Hungary
were excluded from negotiations because
they had lost the war the five major
victors were considered the United
States Great Britain France Japan and
Italy as such these five nations were
responsible for the most important terms
of the peace treaty however the process
proved slow and difficult as each nation
had its own motives Japan’s
representatives were the first to bow
out Italy was next to leave negotiations
when the country’s territorial claims to
the fumer region were rejected the
remaining three nations at this point
were Great Britain France and the u.s.
despite the conflicting aims of these
countries by June 28 they had finally
agreed upon a treaty considered harsh by
many and too lenient by others the
Treaty of Versailles forced Germany to
accept sole responsibility for causing
the war Germany was therefore forced to
make reparations to the price of 32
billion dollars which equals roughly 393
billion dollars today
in addition Germany’s economy was
already in complete disarray because of
this a good portion of the compensation
took the form of coal steel and
agricultural products Germany was also
made to see large areas of its territory
and to surrender control of its colonies
the treaty proved unpopular with many
especially throughout Germany the
country initially refused to sign the
treaty claiming the war guilt clause was
a violation of honor however Germany was
offered no other option and event
please sign the treaty under a new
government popular opinion theorized
that the failure of the German public to
support the war was akin to stabbing the
country in the back the Jewish people
received the majority of the blame with
many claiming they sold Germany out to
the Allies this stab-in-the-back legend
proved instrumental in the rise of the
Nazi Party and the political ascension
of Adolf Hitler in the years that
followed at the time of the signing many
believe the treaty did nothing to pacify
or permanently weaken the Germans
because of this the Treaty of Versailles
was widely expected to lead to future
conflict the French field marshal
Ferdinand Fache famously claimed this is
not peace it is an armistice for 20
years sure enough just slightly over 20
years after the signing of the Treaty of
else.i World War two began and became
the most widespread war in history