Paris Peace Conference & Aftermath: Reshaping Europe After WWI
Peace Treaties (1919-1920)
The Peace of Paris
In 1918, before the end of the war, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson’s Fourteen Points enunciated the principles upon which peace should be based.
At the Paris Peace Conference, attended only by the victorious powers, peace was organized, partly inspired by Wilson’s proposals. Five treaties were signed with the defeated nations, designing a new map of Europe and establishing the League of Nations to ensure future peace.
The Treaty of Versailles, signed with Germany, assigned responsibility for the war to Germany, imposed reparations, reduced its army to 100,000 men, returned Alsace-Lorraine to France, and transferred its colonies to Great Britain, France, Belgium, and South Africa. Germany felt humiliated by this imposed peace and harbored a desire for revenge.
The New Map of Europe
The treaties signed after the war established a new map of Europe, resulting from the territorial losses of the defeated nations:
- New states emerged, formed from territories of the German, Austro-Hungarian, and Russian Empires. Poland re-emerged from territories of Austria-Hungary, Russia, and Germany. Austria, Hungary, Yugoslavia, and Czechoslovakia were created after the division of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Finland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania emerged from the Russian Empire.
- Territorial concessions were carried out: Germany ceded Alsace-Lorraine to France; Austria-Hungary gave Istria and Trento to Italy; and the Turkish Empire was reduced to Turkey, ceding its Balkan possessions to Greece and Romania, and its possessions in Mesopotamia, Palestine, and Syria to Britain and France.
League of Nations
The League of Nations, based in Geneva (Switzerland), was conceived as an international organization to promote cooperation, peace, and security. However, it faced significant limitations because the United States rejected the Treaty of Paris and did not join, nor did the USSR or the defeated countries initially, although some were later admitted.
The Consequences of War
- Politically, the dynasties that ruled the great empires were abolished. Universal male suffrage became widespread, and women gained the right to vote in many countries.
- Internationally, the war ended European hegemony, which was replaced by the dominance of the United States.
- Economically, the war caused severe material losses (crop fields, industries, transport, buildings), and Europe became heavily indebted to the U.S.
- Demographically, the war resulted in over nine million deaths, especially young males, and numerous orphans, injured, maimed, and disabled individuals.
- Socially, the war sharpened the contrasts between the working class and the middle class, impoverished by the conflict, and a minority of businesses enriched by the war. Moreover, the war favored women’s work outside the home to fill the vacancies left by men in fields, factories, transport, hospitals, etc.
- Ideologically, the war fostered pacifism and anti-militarism among intellectuals and broad sectors of society, but also resentment and a desire for revenge among the defeated, especially Germany, who felt humiliated by the peace treaty.