#Aftermath of ww1 germany trial

By then, another world war was behind it. In 2010, ninety years after the Treaty of Versailles went into force, Germany finally paid off the last installment of its war debt. The staggering reparations payments reduced the country’s industrial output, and other forces thrust Germany into hyperinflation in the 1920s, which played into the economic instability of the Great Depression.Įuropean leaders were dissatisfied with the redrawn map of Europe and the concessions they each had made in the name of an uneasy peace, with some disappointed that Germany hadn’t been treated even more harshly. Furious at what they saw as a harsh “diktat” (a dictated peace), right-wing German politicians used the treaty as a nationalist rallying point. Though there was a real desire for peace in the wake of the disastrous war, the treaty did not achieve its intended effects. (The United States did not ratify the treaty due to political division between Democrats and Republicans.) The treaty’s aftermath It was a slap in the face to Germany, whose residents saw the famous “war guilt” clause as a humiliation.

And the treaty required Germany to pay 269 billion gold marks-the equivalent of $37 billion.Įuropean leaders signed the treaty in the Palace of Versailles’ Hall of Mirrors-the very place where the German Empire had been created, and Wilhelm II’s father made emperor, in 1871.

#Aftermath of ww1 germany trial

Germany was forced to put Wilhelm II, its emperor, on trial for war crimes. Its weapons were largely confiscated, and its navy stripped of large vessels. The German army was diminished to 100,000 men and the country was forbidden to draft soldiers. The Rhineland was occupied and demilitarized, and German colonies were taken over by the new League of Nations.

The document stripped Germany of 13 percent of its territory and one tenth of its population. The treaty itself was predicated on Germany’s guilt for the war. Much of that idealistic plan was scuttled during negotiations when the other Allied nations shifted their priorities toward reparations. From idealism to punishmentĭuring World War I, President Woodrow Wilson had proposed the Fourteen Points, a blueprint for world peace that included establishing an association of nations to ensure European security and prevent nations’ abilities to enter into secretive mutual protection treaties.