Alternative settlements to Versailles

[unmerged(7027)]

I have to write a short essay describing a territorial settlement following WW1 that I think would have done a better job at securing peace and security of the continent than the settlements that were reached at the Paris Peace Conference and Brest-Litovsk.

What do you guys think could/should have been done differently?

Don't worry, I'm not asking you to do my homework, I just thought it was an interesting question and you guys might have some unique ideas. I plan on doing real research as well as asking you...

 

[saskganesh]

i think the war reparations issue had a bigger effect on undermining the intent of versailles than territorial readjustments.

 

[CMOTHodad]

I agree with saskganesh in that sense, the territorial alterations were alright. The only thing that could have made it work better, and perhaps prevented the problems with Checzoslovakia and in the Balkans with ethnic minorities would have been a forced relocation, but obviously Wilson would never have agreed to it, and the French and British didn't really care, but it would have definetly served to avoid a lot of tension in eastern europe later on.

The most crushing and terrible thing, of course, were the reparations.

 

[unmerged(5120)]

Given the course the war took I can't see how something significantly different could have been realistically achieved.

- Germany was completely free of Allied troops on 11/11/1918 and at that time was still in control of vast tracts of Russia, so for much of the German population it wasn't really defeated. Whatever territorial concessions would be considered excessive in retrospect.

- The Italians entered the war specifically in exchange of Austrian territory. They felt cheated with what they got as it was.

- It was at best extremely difficult to let the Italians have what they were promised while denying the Serbs their slavic kingdom.

Once you did this, given the internal state of Austria-Hungary, the Empire-Kingdom couldn't survive. Since there were significant minorities everywhere, problems were bound to arise sooner or later, and nobody could be 100% satisfied by the resulting settlement.

 

[unmerged(9600)]

Now, as odd as this is going to sound, I think that Germany was right to be made to give up the disputed lands of Moresnet and Malmedy to Belgium. Belgium did deserve that as compensation for four years of occupation. Axing up eastern Germany wasn't very cool though, since the Poles weren't really beligerents. I would have found it preferable to give the Poles large tracts of land that used to be Russian.

In the end though, I wouldn't dislike the Treaty so much if the Allies had actually been willing to enforce it. It's terribly unfair, but life is like that. If the Allies had been willing to listen to German liberals in the 20s and 30s, they would have put down the Third Reich before it even came about.

 

[Aetius]

The Middle East wasn't handled particularly well and the Chinese were deeply dissatisfied with the outcome as well.

 

[unmerged(2377)]

Moving the populations around in Eastern Europe to settle the ethnic issues.

 

[saskganesh]

Originally posted by Neil
Axing up eastern Germany wasn't very cool though, since the Poles weren't really beligerents. I would have found it preferable to give the Poles large tracts of land that used to be Russian.

versailles saw the recreation of "central europe" something missing from the European dynamic for at least a century. and it wasn't just the poles who benefitted. but the czechs, balts, romanians, serbs etc. who were rewarded with terrritory.

france also recieved territory from Germany as you know. hopefully you think that was "cool"

and poland did get much land form russia. but it wasnt "given" to them. they had to fight for it.

 

[unmerged(9600)]

Originally posted by saskganesh
versailles saw the recreation of "central europe" something missing from the European dynamic for at least a century. and it wasn't just the poles who benefitted. but the czechs, balts, romanians, serbs etc. who were rewarded with terrritory.

I much prefer Western dynamics to Eastern ones. In all cases.

france also recieved territory from Germany as you know. hopefully you think that was "cool"

Alsace-Lorraine was a given.

and poland did get much land form russia. but it wasnt "given" to them. they had to fight for it.

Well, considering all that land that was part of Germany after Brest-Litivosk, I would have used that land to craft the new countries. That way, Germany is punished, and the Reds aren't given any more land. I think that Austria-Hungary was getting the axe no matter what, since Wilson absolutely had to take it out, even more than Germany, for his scheme to work.

 

[saskganesh]

Originally posted by Neil
I much prefer Western dynamics to Eastern ones. In all cases.

i'm not sure why...

Originally posted by Neil
Well, considering all that land that was part of Germany after Brest-Litivosk, I would have used that land to craft the new countries. That way, Germany is punished, and the Reds aren't given any more land. I think that Austria-Hungary was getting the axe no matter what, since Wilson absolutely had to take it out, even more than Germany, for his scheme to work. [/B]

you gotta consider that all that land was in the soup: final borders in the east were settled not be B-L or Versailles or by the west but by the outcome of the Russian Civil War.

and punishing germany by taking away the spoils of war isn't much of a punishment is it?

 

[unmerged(9600)]

Originally posted by saskganesh
i'm not sure why...

It was a backhanded remark referring to my Westernism in internal Canadian politics, but also that I have a preference for the Great Powers of the west: Britain, Germany and France, over Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Yugoslavia.

you gotta consider that all that land was in the soup: final borders in the east were settled not be B-L or Versailles or by the west but by the outcome of the Russian Civil War.

and punishing germany by taking away the spoils of war isn't much of a punishment is it?

After Germany was forced to back down and repudiate her gains, yes it was. Had Germany simply had her new lands divyed up, it would be a much less humiliating loss.

Besides, the real punishment is the crippling reparations, and the dishonor of defeat.

 

[unmerged(5678)]

Everyone seems agreed that reparations were the main problem, but I’m not entirely convinced.

It seems to me that they only became a problem in 1929 when Wall Street crashed and American investment in Germany suddenly ceased. I’d say that US isolationism post-Wilson and the one dimensional nature of French foreign policy were at least equally significant factors.

 

[unmerged(469)]

Originally posted by Aetius
...the Chinese were deeply dissatisfied with the outcome as well.

I've never heard this before. Could you elaborate?

BTW, picked up this little bit in a FT article about the effect of embedded reporters on public opinion. It mentioned that Versailles was the first peace conference extensively reported in near-real time. According to the writer, this "feedback loop" of the media and public opinion had the effect of the Allied negotiators taking a harder line than they normally would have.

 

[saskganesh]

Originally posted by Neil
It was a backhanded remark referring to my Westernism in internal Canadian politics, but also that I have a preference for the Great Powers of the west: Britain, Germany and France, over Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Yugoslavia.

ya i was thinking that it might be that. i was worried that this was a german vrs slav thing

Originally posted by Neil
After Germany was forced to back down and repudiate her gains, yes it was. Had Germany simply had her new lands divyed up, it would be a much less humiliating loss.

Besides, the real punishment is the crippling reparations, and the dishonor of defeat. [/B]

as to a) sure. but i dont think it was advoidable.
b) i agree

 

[unmerged(7225)]

two major problems with post WWI Europe: Failure to establish a satisfactory german government (vis-a-vis Japan post WWII) and failure to deal with self-determination in a meaningful way.

Both of these seem to result from an outdated paradigm: That the winners of a war are due land from the losers; and that nations are plots of land under the control of a government. Certainly, the elimination of the major "Supra-national states" of the time (the german empire, the austro-hungarian empire, the russian empire, the ottoman/turkish empire) was a step in the right direction; but the treaty merely created more supra-national states that only led to more problems later ("czechoslovakia" which contained czechs, slovaks, germans, and hungarians in large numbers; Yugoslavia which contained serbs, montenegrans, croatians, muslims, bosnians, etc.)...