There is a discussion about the Versailles Treaty. If it was to harsh or not harsh enough - so do pe
Nov 14, 2022 15:17:55 GMT
Post by steffen on Nov 14, 2022 15:17:55 GMT
Hi,
with the 11.11. had come and gone, there is the point about Versailles, why didn´t it avoided the raise of Nazism or why didn´t it avoided the second world war at all.
For me this isn´t the correct question - so i try to get a discussion here about it.
I give you some input about it from my POV.
First - the germans did something terrible stupid and evil as they retreated from belgian and french area, they destroyed tons of infrastructure, even KNOWING they were finished and could not hope to turn the tides of the war. Basically they burnt a lot of potential good will from the winning side.
Second - the military leadership (Hindenburg and Co) run away from Responsibility and dropped the Defeat onto the new weimar republic.
third - the Entente were out for blood, because they fought so hard and the war was so brutal, they wanted to "destroy" germany.
This lead to the treaty of Versailles, but it wasn´t a treaty, it was a dictate. I do not like to support the claim of nazis, but here they have a point. If you are not allowed to negotiate it is no treaty. This is - for me- the first and one of the biggest mistakes that happened. And even with the fuel of hate and the heated propaganda this could easily have been avoided.
So i think, this point was the easiest to avoid.
The next point, the treaty wasn´t about guilt or defeat, it was to destroy the ability to get economical value. People often oversea the most important point about Versailles. Germany could not sell stuff, could not deliver goods to pay the money, they had to pay in gold. a ressource germany did not have. Why was this? Because the british and french did not want germany regain economic strenght. It is true that - in OTL germany did not pay so much money as they could or should have paid. But the treaty was done in a way to show germany and esp. all germans that they should NOT get back on their feets.
A treaty that had had in mind repayment would have allowed germany to sell stuff, to pay in goods, not in gold. Also the countries that demanded money/gold from germany should not start a tariff war ONTO germany, with themselves allowing to sell cheapish products into germany. These points made clear that germany should not pay for "evil doing" (outside the discussion if this would have been justified) but should be slaughtered like a pig.
Then there was a move - primary by Wilson to paint it in a way of justice, freedom of people. So denmark, who wasn´t even part of the entente gained areas, but areas that were full german (Sudetenareas) were not allowed to join germany. Austria - after its dissolvment, was not allowed to be part of germany, even with the people there wanting to be part of it. All against the 14 points, that were the morale high ground they used. So either they act just, even with germany gaining these areas or they stop that BS and show their ugly imperialistic truth. But they decided to do both things and failed. Worse, they helped then the nazis to raise and be mild about their violations. So they did later on the worst of all. Had they been leninent about it with Weimar in the beginning, no Hitler, no Nazis had been raised to power.
Also there is the point that Versailles had nothing to do with the nazis raise. That is true and wrong in the same point. It is true, the economic crisis of 1929 was the main pusher for this, but this is connected with versailles.
Why? Because germany had to borrow money from the US of A to pay the Entente, who paid more or less to the US of A. A fine construct for everybody - outside germany. The moment this system crashes (and it crashed 100%) germany went down the toilette and the shit (aka the nazis) swam at the surface. So Versailles CAUSED the nazis and hitlers raise to the power. That doesn´t dimish the guilt of that time germans, everybody with a brain should have known that Hitler was a scumbag that needed to be killed the second you see him.
Another critical point, the germans not only were crippled by heavy tariffs, they lost ALL merchant fleet. How should germany achive succsess if they have no chance to rebuild their economy and could not move stuff in their own ships? This burden got reduced a bit later on, but the bitterness about this was set in the german society, too. It wasn´t the Dolchstoss alone, with german forces on foreign ground and then had to committ defeat. All these things added up.
The "War guilty"-stuff, even if only secondary in the treaty also caused huge uproar. Rightfully - because everybody knew that a lot countries caused WW1, not ONLY germany. If one had been guilty from the Entente point of view, it should have been Austria-Hungaria, but - that is also a fact - they couldn´t pay much, so they decided to do "german evil war morongers"-story.
There are tons of other things about this. Think about Treaty of Paris, very hard in economic terms, french pride took a heavy hit (because they were beaten senseless by the german armed forces), but there were NO limitations in fleet, army, anything. They had to pay a heafty sum, but it wasn´t as evil done as Versailles, it wasn´t in that manner of "we need to destroy france". Yes, they took Elsass-Lothringen, but they did not gave spain 50000sqkm of ground, did not remove all colonies from France (why?), did not forbid ships or guns etc. This peace, as hard as it was was at last fair to the defeated country in the sense of the 19th century kind of warfare. Versailles wasn´t. They took away any strength from germany, so basically poland could have conquered it and expected germany to accept this.
In the same way they ignored the fact that germany was way to strong, way to big to be down for long. Only some Morgenthau-style or even Kaufmann-plan-style genocide would have changed this, but even the insanest french morons did not think about that.
Modern people always look at versailles and think about the nazis. But that is the wrong POV. Rightfully the winning forces could have demand ressources, money, etc. But they should have acted fair. Not remove the german merchant fleet, do not reduce the size of the armed forces or forbid certain weapons (airplanes), but demand a huge sum that is to be payed. But not each year, but name a sum. Something the country can do in say 20 years. After that, no limitations. Do not remove all colonies, why did they do this? If they are worthless, they can keep em. If they are worth a thing, then at last if you remove them let em count on the money you want.
Also, they removed basically all patents germany had. That is often overlooked too. The value of these patents (all together) were 4 times the money they demanded from germany. Still, they took em additional to all they wanted. To remove the fleet was another point. Think about any treaty before. The defeated enemy was treated with honor, he could keep stuff. Not so in Versailles. They gave areas full of germans to other countries, called it just. They allowed votings but if the voting was pro-germany, they forced the area still to the other nation (in upper silesia, because they wanted to weaken german economy further). They gave parts of the country to poland, claiming it needed a port. But the chechs hadn´t had a port but had also tax free access by Hamburg. The list of things they did was so long because they wanted to benefit of the hate against the defeated nation. But they totally lacked the will to enforce this.
So the question about this is: What could they have done to push through?
Answer: Nothing. If they push to hard, germany turn red, then poland is history and france and propably great britain turn red, too. If they avoid this, they need to supress germany for centuries. Based on what? We do not talk about Nazi crimes, germany commited some nasty stuff in northern france and belgium, but basically at the early start of the war. Compared even with the mass starvation caused by the Royal Navy it was a little thing (even as bad as it was, but in numbers, 800.000 dead starved people were still some levels above this).
This does not make one evil lesser, just that in that time BOTH sides knew what they had done and were not in the "naziscum-mode", with all the genocidal massacres of ww2.
I suggest for a discussion the following treaty, that eventually could have been possible
1.) no war guilt, not directly, not indirect
2.) outside demands from belgium and france no areas lost. If areas were disputed they get a fair election and the results have to be binding. Even if it doesn´t suits the Entente forces
3.) a defined sum of money/reparations. How germany pay for it is open to them. If the currency is the british pound, that is fine, but not HOW the currency has to be paid (no gold binding)
4.) Poland territority is based on these fair votings, not the rigged ones.
5.) no limitations on the size of the army or fleet (outside of treaties true for all nations involved), if ships are taken, they are counted against the sums. If a battleship costed 2 million pound, the sum is reduced by this and UK gets 2 million LESS.
6.) the colonies are not taken away. If some are gone, they have to pay for them (again, if a colony is worth 20 million pound, the sum is reduced by this number). So they avoid the "we take what we want and create huge sums additional to this)
7. If weapons are banned - they are banned for everyone. No subs? Fine, but that mean NOBODY is allowed to build some. This is some just treatment, but if you reduce the ability of one side without following the same it is just plain BS.
8. Also - not forbidding germany in the League of Nations. Either it is for all nations, or it isn´t worth the ink they wrote it down.
9. If people want to unify with others, do not forbid it. So if austria and germany want to unify, let em do it. Make sure your treaty is just, so if Austria has to pay sums, too, these were accounted to germany if they unify. But do not forbid it.
10. No Tariff-wars. If you close the borders to foreign goods, you cannot force the other side to have to pay for your goods without taxes. Doing this poisioning the relationship for generations.
Maybe this is to much to ask for, but that could have worked, esp. after the Kaiser was gone. With such a start the Weimar republic may have a much better start, the hyperinflation could have been avoided (that wiped out the middle leveled people in germany) and overall Weimar could have survived, without the nazis or communists getting a chance to take over.
I guess, such kind of peace could have lasted longer, but for this you need to remove the demands of "we need to disable germany to pay for it, but press out everything from them"-mindseting they had. At last this could have been a peace in that all sides, shocked by the horror of war would have avoided another war.
I am interested in other opinions about this...
with the 11.11. had come and gone, there is the point about Versailles, why didn´t it avoided the raise of Nazism or why didn´t it avoided the second world war at all.
For me this isn´t the correct question - so i try to get a discussion here about it.
I give you some input about it from my POV.
First - the germans did something terrible stupid and evil as they retreated from belgian and french area, they destroyed tons of infrastructure, even KNOWING they were finished and could not hope to turn the tides of the war. Basically they burnt a lot of potential good will from the winning side.
Second - the military leadership (Hindenburg and Co) run away from Responsibility and dropped the Defeat onto the new weimar republic.
third - the Entente were out for blood, because they fought so hard and the war was so brutal, they wanted to "destroy" germany.
This lead to the treaty of Versailles, but it wasn´t a treaty, it was a dictate. I do not like to support the claim of nazis, but here they have a point. If you are not allowed to negotiate it is no treaty. This is - for me- the first and one of the biggest mistakes that happened. And even with the fuel of hate and the heated propaganda this could easily have been avoided.
So i think, this point was the easiest to avoid.
The next point, the treaty wasn´t about guilt or defeat, it was to destroy the ability to get economical value. People often oversea the most important point about Versailles. Germany could not sell stuff, could not deliver goods to pay the money, they had to pay in gold. a ressource germany did not have. Why was this? Because the british and french did not want germany regain economic strenght. It is true that - in OTL germany did not pay so much money as they could or should have paid. But the treaty was done in a way to show germany and esp. all germans that they should NOT get back on their feets.
A treaty that had had in mind repayment would have allowed germany to sell stuff, to pay in goods, not in gold. Also the countries that demanded money/gold from germany should not start a tariff war ONTO germany, with themselves allowing to sell cheapish products into germany. These points made clear that germany should not pay for "evil doing" (outside the discussion if this would have been justified) but should be slaughtered like a pig.
Then there was a move - primary by Wilson to paint it in a way of justice, freedom of people. So denmark, who wasn´t even part of the entente gained areas, but areas that were full german (Sudetenareas) were not allowed to join germany. Austria - after its dissolvment, was not allowed to be part of germany, even with the people there wanting to be part of it. All against the 14 points, that were the morale high ground they used. So either they act just, even with germany gaining these areas or they stop that BS and show their ugly imperialistic truth. But they decided to do both things and failed. Worse, they helped then the nazis to raise and be mild about their violations. So they did later on the worst of all. Had they been leninent about it with Weimar in the beginning, no Hitler, no Nazis had been raised to power.
Also there is the point that Versailles had nothing to do with the nazis raise. That is true and wrong in the same point. It is true, the economic crisis of 1929 was the main pusher for this, but this is connected with versailles.
Why? Because germany had to borrow money from the US of A to pay the Entente, who paid more or less to the US of A. A fine construct for everybody - outside germany. The moment this system crashes (and it crashed 100%) germany went down the toilette and the shit (aka the nazis) swam at the surface. So Versailles CAUSED the nazis and hitlers raise to the power. That doesn´t dimish the guilt of that time germans, everybody with a brain should have known that Hitler was a scumbag that needed to be killed the second you see him.
Another critical point, the germans not only were crippled by heavy tariffs, they lost ALL merchant fleet. How should germany achive succsess if they have no chance to rebuild their economy and could not move stuff in their own ships? This burden got reduced a bit later on, but the bitterness about this was set in the german society, too. It wasn´t the Dolchstoss alone, with german forces on foreign ground and then had to committ defeat. All these things added up.
The "War guilty"-stuff, even if only secondary in the treaty also caused huge uproar. Rightfully - because everybody knew that a lot countries caused WW1, not ONLY germany. If one had been guilty from the Entente point of view, it should have been Austria-Hungaria, but - that is also a fact - they couldn´t pay much, so they decided to do "german evil war morongers"-story.
There are tons of other things about this. Think about Treaty of Paris, very hard in economic terms, french pride took a heavy hit (because they were beaten senseless by the german armed forces), but there were NO limitations in fleet, army, anything. They had to pay a heafty sum, but it wasn´t as evil done as Versailles, it wasn´t in that manner of "we need to destroy france". Yes, they took Elsass-Lothringen, but they did not gave spain 50000sqkm of ground, did not remove all colonies from France (why?), did not forbid ships or guns etc. This peace, as hard as it was was at last fair to the defeated country in the sense of the 19th century kind of warfare. Versailles wasn´t. They took away any strength from germany, so basically poland could have conquered it and expected germany to accept this.
In the same way they ignored the fact that germany was way to strong, way to big to be down for long. Only some Morgenthau-style or even Kaufmann-plan-style genocide would have changed this, but even the insanest french morons did not think about that.
Modern people always look at versailles and think about the nazis. But that is the wrong POV. Rightfully the winning forces could have demand ressources, money, etc. But they should have acted fair. Not remove the german merchant fleet, do not reduce the size of the armed forces or forbid certain weapons (airplanes), but demand a huge sum that is to be payed. But not each year, but name a sum. Something the country can do in say 20 years. After that, no limitations. Do not remove all colonies, why did they do this? If they are worthless, they can keep em. If they are worth a thing, then at last if you remove them let em count on the money you want.
Also, they removed basically all patents germany had. That is often overlooked too. The value of these patents (all together) were 4 times the money they demanded from germany. Still, they took em additional to all they wanted. To remove the fleet was another point. Think about any treaty before. The defeated enemy was treated with honor, he could keep stuff. Not so in Versailles. They gave areas full of germans to other countries, called it just. They allowed votings but if the voting was pro-germany, they forced the area still to the other nation (in upper silesia, because they wanted to weaken german economy further). They gave parts of the country to poland, claiming it needed a port. But the chechs hadn´t had a port but had also tax free access by Hamburg. The list of things they did was so long because they wanted to benefit of the hate against the defeated nation. But they totally lacked the will to enforce this.
So the question about this is: What could they have done to push through?
Answer: Nothing. If they push to hard, germany turn red, then poland is history and france and propably great britain turn red, too. If they avoid this, they need to supress germany for centuries. Based on what? We do not talk about Nazi crimes, germany commited some nasty stuff in northern france and belgium, but basically at the early start of the war. Compared even with the mass starvation caused by the Royal Navy it was a little thing (even as bad as it was, but in numbers, 800.000 dead starved people were still some levels above this).
This does not make one evil lesser, just that in that time BOTH sides knew what they had done and were not in the "naziscum-mode", with all the genocidal massacres of ww2.
I suggest for a discussion the following treaty, that eventually could have been possible
1.) no war guilt, not directly, not indirect
2.) outside demands from belgium and france no areas lost. If areas were disputed they get a fair election and the results have to be binding. Even if it doesn´t suits the Entente forces
3.) a defined sum of money/reparations. How germany pay for it is open to them. If the currency is the british pound, that is fine, but not HOW the currency has to be paid (no gold binding)
4.) Poland territority is based on these fair votings, not the rigged ones.
5.) no limitations on the size of the army or fleet (outside of treaties true for all nations involved), if ships are taken, they are counted against the sums. If a battleship costed 2 million pound, the sum is reduced by this and UK gets 2 million LESS.
6.) the colonies are not taken away. If some are gone, they have to pay for them (again, if a colony is worth 20 million pound, the sum is reduced by this number). So they avoid the "we take what we want and create huge sums additional to this)
7. If weapons are banned - they are banned for everyone. No subs? Fine, but that mean NOBODY is allowed to build some. This is some just treatment, but if you reduce the ability of one side without following the same it is just plain BS.
8. Also - not forbidding germany in the League of Nations. Either it is for all nations, or it isn´t worth the ink they wrote it down.
9. If people want to unify with others, do not forbid it. So if austria and germany want to unify, let em do it. Make sure your treaty is just, so if Austria has to pay sums, too, these were accounted to germany if they unify. But do not forbid it.
10. No Tariff-wars. If you close the borders to foreign goods, you cannot force the other side to have to pay for your goods without taxes. Doing this poisioning the relationship for generations.
Maybe this is to much to ask for, but that could have worked, esp. after the Kaiser was gone. With such a start the Weimar republic may have a much better start, the hyperinflation could have been avoided (that wiped out the middle leveled people in germany) and overall Weimar could have survived, without the nazis or communists getting a chance to take over.
I guess, such kind of peace could have lasted longer, but for this you need to remove the demands of "we need to disable germany to pay for it, but press out everything from them"-mindseting they had. At last this could have been a peace in that all sides, shocked by the horror of war would have avoided another war.
I am interested in other opinions about this...
