WHAT PRICE TREATIES?

Ninety two years ago on the 28^th June 1919, The Treaty of Versailles was signed. The treaty was registered by the Secretariat of the League of Nations on 21^st October 1919 and printed in the League of Nations Treaty Series. It came into force on the 10^th January 1920.

The Treaty was the first of a series of treaties, which came out of the Paris Peace Conference, which opened on the 18^th January 1919. Part I of the Treaty of Versailles contains the 26 Articles of the Covenant of The League of Nations.

THE HIGH CONTRACTING PARTIES,

IN ORDER TO PROMOTE international co-operation and to achieve international peace and security

by the acceptance of obligations not to resort to war

by the prescription of open, just and honourable relations between nations

by the firm establishment of the understandings of international law as the actual rule of conduct among Governments, and

by the maintenance of justice and a scrupulous respect for all treaty obligations in the dealings of organised peoples with one another

AGREE to this Covenant of the League of Nations.

The most controversial aspect of the Treaty, which would prove almost fatal to the allies, was contained in Part VIII, Reparation - Articles 231 to 247, which became known as the War Guilt Clauses.

Article 231

The Allied and Associated Governments affirm and Germany accepts the responsibility of Germany and her allies for causing all the loss and damage to which the Allied and Associated Governments and their nationals have been subjected as a consequence of the war imposed upon them by the aggression of Germany and her allies.

The following articles required that Germany, disarm, make substantial territorial concessions and pay heavy reparations to certain countries that had formed the Entente powers. The total cost was assessed at 132 billion Marks, which in 1921 was roughly equivalent, in 2011 terms, to £217 billion or $442 billion.

The treaty was undermined by subsequent events from 1930 on and was widely flouted by the mid 1930’s, Germany was not pacified or conciliated, nor permanently weakened, and the reaction to it would prove a factor leading to later conflicts, in particular the Second World War.

Here is some original footage taken at the time. One catches a glimpse of Lloyd-George, Clemenceau and Wilson arriving.

Here is a BBC documentary program - follow the episodes.