“A compromise that satisfied nobody.” How far do you agree with this verdict on the treaty of versailles?’’ The treaty of versailles was the peace settlement signed after the WWI between the allied powers and Germany which aimed to make Germany accept the responsibility of causing the war and therefore pay for its consequences. It took six months of negotiations to conclude the treaty as nations had different aims. France urged to cripple Germany thoroughly through maximum reparations and disarmament while Britain and USA were on a more lenient stance. As a result, the final treaty failed to satisfy their individual aims completely. The peace treaty did not satisfy France as it was not harsh enough in the eyes of France.
I could blame the defeat which would have been the result of my action on him and come out as Peacemaker…But I had a greater obligation than to think only of the years of my administration and of the next election. I had to think of the effect of my decision on the next generation and on the future of peace and freedom in America and in the world.” However, this idealistic standpoint was mere propaganda. In private, President Nixon would favour a more militant and aggressive approach. This contradictory position not only exposed Nixon’s vulnerability to public opinion, but also his disillusion and misunderstanding of the complexities of such a war. It is imperative to understand the factors which influenced President Nixon’s strategies and decision making during the Vietnam War.
“It is more accurate to talk of a potential revolution which ran away into the sand than the genuine article” Before we can assess whether a ‘genuine’ revolution took place in 1918, or if held many promises and yet failed to deliver, we must look at the term ‘Revolution’. This often refers to a substantial change in power/structure that takes place within a short time span. Germany was in a vulnerable position, susceptible to change as the defeat in the war had shaken people’s faith in the government. There was undoubtedly political changes undergone in Germany but whether they fundamentally shook the German foundations of society can be seriously questioned. It can be argued that the ’Weimar Republic’ , the outcome of the revolution was a facade of the old authoritarian regime, carrying out change under false pretences of a democratic institution, with the Right Wing Conservatives still in control.
Firstly, the European powers avoided war up until 1914 because the Alliance System wasn’t as well developed until then. Many historians, such as Sidney Bradshaw Fay, who was writing in the late 1920s, blame the Alliance System as evidence of “shared responsibility” for the outbreak of war. However, this view doesn’t take into account that Germany was the nation largely responsible for the creation of this system. Given that the Triple Entente had existed since 1907, and the Triple Alliance even before that, then war should have broken out, if Fay’s view is to be accepted. What was not present pre-1914 which, during the July Crisis, led to war was the closeness between nations and build up of tensions that meant that the powers would follow each other into war.
After World War Two the United Kingdom lost its status as a world power. The stage of gradual progression and retreat between 1914 and 1945 turned into the period of “moderate dissolution” (Darwin, 1988: 6). This paper aims to examine why the role of Great Britain has changed since 1945, particularly, considering the issues of decline in economic sector, change in British society and change in political attitude towards colonial regime, and will focus on the causes and impacts on Britain’s retreat as a world power. The first challenge which the United Kingdom faced was economic decline. One of the reasons why the economy weakened after the Second World War was because of the resources Britain needed for warfare.
Therefore, instead of the introduction of social refore, opponents of the government had the impression that Attlee should have taken alot more time to rebuild the economy. By trying to make right the economic problems of a 'shattered postwar would', Attlee could have cut out a lot of the long-term problems Britain found themself suffering from such as unemployment and inflation. Furthermore, it was also argued that Attlee lived longer and beyong his means and therefore, the amount of time that was speant by Attlee to set up the so called achievements of 1948, they were overall not remarkable but were just for short term successess and became the expense of an unpopular long term
The League of Nations was a International body that emerged after the First World War, set-up to maintain peace after horrors that were experienced during The First World War, and yet despite the social ad territorial success it experienced in the first decade of its creation, it was ineffective in dealing the aggressive policies pursued by the rising dictators in the 1930’s, and was completely dissolved at the outbreak of the Second World War. My argument is that while some errors in the structure of the League, are credited to the problems faced by the League, it was also the unwillingness of the major participants of the league, i.e. Britain and France, to uphold the League’s principles due to personal priorities, that led to the demise of the organization The League of Nations was a genuine attempt at preventing any future wars, based upon a charter known as the Covenant of the League, which refers to the first 26 clauses of the Treaty of Versailles. The Covenant set up the basic organization of the league – the Assembly, the general meeting for all members, The Council, and the Secretariat, as well as the International Court of Justice. Here Clause 8: Stated that ‘mantainence of peace required the reduction of national armament to the lowest point’.
It is clear that if the Western Powers were against Hitler, war could have been avoided, it encouraged Hitler, Hitler could never be appeased, and that it prompted the Nazi-Soviet Pact. However due to its failure the policy of appeasement, to some extent was responsible for the collapse of International Pease by 1939, but not mainly responsible. There were superseded by other factors: Treaty of Versailles, the Great Depression, role of Hitler and the failure of League of Nations. Appeasement means giving into a nations demand in order to avoid further conflict or war. World War 1 caused the death of nearly nine million people and cost huge sums of money.
Peter Waldron claims that after the "near downfall of the tsarist regime in 1905" Stolypin's reforms could "have changed the face of politics and society, yet they left the unreformed autocracy to face the onslaught of the First World War and it's attendant social and economic strains". Despite the latter, it seems erroneous to attribute total failure to Stolypin's reforms. After the devastating actions of Bloody Sunday in 1905, the Tsar Nicholas II had been given two choices, which was to repress or reform. To stay in control, he had chose to reform, as he thought that he could control the situation by creating useful reforms. The pressure of the revolution on the autocracy made the Tsar take drastic political action to appease the revolting classes.
These aims were, Disarmament, Improving living and working conditions, Enforcing the Treaty of Versailles and Stopping future wars. The League of Nations was formed in 1919, though America did not join. Although, the covenants set down by Wilson were adopted by the Allies and other European countries. However, many historians argue that the League, for all its goodwill, was not entirely successful at achieving its aims due to many different factors in the 1920s. Aims of the League of Nation: One of the aims of the League of Nations was Disarmament.