Treaty of Peace with Germany, Reservations | U.S. Capitol (2024)

FAQs

What was the Treaty of peace with Germany? ›

The Treaty of Versailles was the primary treaty produced by the Paris Peace Conference at the end of World War I. It was signed on June 28, 1919, by the Allied and associated powers and by Germany in the Hall of Mirrors in the Palace of Versailles and went into effect on January 10, 1920.

According to French and British wishes, the Treaty of Versailles subjected Germany to strict punitive measures. The Treaty required the new German Government to surrender approximately 10 percent of its prewar territory in Europe and all of its overseas possessions.

Some senators who opposed the Treaty of Versailles believed the proposed League of Nations would infringe upon U.S. sovereignty and Congress's power to declare war. Following the Senate's defeat of the treaty, Congress formally declared the end of World War I by joint resolution in 1921.

The peace treaty at Versailles with the Allies was considered as harsh and humiliating because of the following reasons: Germany lost its overseas colonies, 110th of its population, 13% of its territories, 75% of its iron and 26% of its coal to France, Poland, Denmark and Lithuania.

The treaty stripped Germany of 65,000 km² (25,000 sq mi) of territory and 7 million people. It also required Germany to give up the gains made via the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk and grant independence to the protectorates that had been established.

The Treaty of Versailles included a plan to form a League of Nations that would serve as an international forum and an international collective security arrangement. U.S. President Woodrow Wilson was a strong advocate of the League as he believed it would prevent future wars.

“Reservationists,” led by Senator Henry Cabot Lodge of Massachusetts, wanted reservations (amendments) added to the treaty before approving it. Lodge added 14 reservations to reinforce U.S. policy and protect congressional war powers.

In 1919 the Senate rejected the Treaty of Versailles, which formally ended World War I, in part because President Woodrow Wilson had failed to take senators' objections to the agreement into consideration. They have made the French treaty subject to the authority of the League, which is not to be tolerated.

The Versailles Treaty forced Germany to give up territory to Belgium, Czechoslovakia and Poland, return Alsace and Lorraine to France and cede all of its overseas colonies in China, Pacific and Africa to the Allied nations.

The Germans felt that they should not have been blamed for the war. The loss of territory was considered extremely humiliating. Moreover, the sky-high reparations caused great poverty throughout the country.

What were three main reasons that the Germans hated the Versailles Treaty? ›

Germany accepted the “diktat”. It cannot be denied that the conditions were somewhat draconian. Germany accepted responsibility for the war and lost 68,000 km² of territory, including Alsace and Lorraine, which had been annexed in 1870, and 8 million inhabitants.

The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk lasted just over eight months. Germany renounced the treaty and broke diplomatic relations with Soviet Russia on November 5. The Ottoman Empire broke the treaty after just two months by invading the newly created First Republic of Armenia in May 1918.

As part of the Ostpolitik of Chancellor Willy Brandt, the treaty was signed on 21 December 1972 in East Berlin. The signing of the treaty in December 1972 paved the way for both German states to be recognised by the international community.

After four years of devastating fighting, the First World War came to an end in 1919 in Versailles. The treaty, which represented “peace” for some and a “diktat” for others, also sowed the seeds of the Second World War, which would break out twenty years later.

In the night of 23-24 August 1939, Germany and the Soviet Union signed a non-aggression pact., known as the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. The countries agreed that they would not attack each other and secretly divided the countries that lay between them.