ShmoopTube
Where Monty Python meets your 10th grade teacher.
Search Thousands of Shmoop Videos
Modern World History 8.1 Treaty of Versailles 80 Views
Share It!
Description:
Peace in Europe after WWI sounded great, but the Treaty of Versailles felt just ever-so-slightly one-sided.
Transcript
- 00:03
With World War one over at long last President Woodrow Wilson hoped to [Wilson in office]
- 00:08
bring peace equality and freedom to the world of course the only way to
- 00:13
accomplish this was with the plan he come up with called the fourteen points
- 00:17
it was a pretty cool plan nice and shiny even had that new car smell too bad none [Fourteen point plan with a car air freshener]
- 00:22
of the other allies liked it you see France wanted to put the screws
Full Transcript
- 00:25
to Germany for all the damage done to France and its people during the
- 00:28
conflict when Great Britain wanted German naval power to be a thing of the
- 00:33
distant past so while the Germans were hoping for a peace treaty that wasn't
- 00:37
too terrible because after all they ditched war mongering Kaiser Wilhelm II
- 00:42
and embraced democracy, they really didn't have a say in what would [The treaty of peace document]
- 00:46
become the Treaty of Versailles.. German troops and fortifications were banned
- 00:50
from the area west of the Rhine River Allied troops however were not, Germany
- 00:55
lost all of the colonies and conquered territories it had spent so much time
- 00:59
and money acquiring Alsace Lorraine and the Saar
- 01:03
coalfields went to France the Baltic states were carved out of former German
- 01:07
territory and Poland got to be a nation-state of its very own again [Poland outlined on a map]
- 01:11
well the Treaty of Versailles completely disarmed Germany, the Germans lost
- 01:15
control of their Navy well their army was whittled down to like a dozen old [Old guy in German army]
- 01:19
guys on crutches they also weren't allowed to possess anything even
- 01:23
remotely weapony like submarines heavy artillery or particularly sharp crayons [Heavy war artillery and a crayon]
- 01:28
perhaps the nastiest part of the treaty from Germany's point of view involved
- 01:32
money essentially the Allies wanted compensation for all they had lost in
- 01:36
the war France was especially vocal on this point the numbers thrown about at
- 01:41
the treaty negotiations were nonsensical in the end there was no amount set for [People in treaty negotiations]
- 01:46
German reparations it was simply understood that the number
- 01:49
was going to be ridiculously big and then there was the war guilt clause this
- 01:55
to the Germans was the rotting cherry on top of the garbage sundae the Allies [A plate of garbage bags with a rotten cherry]
- 01:59
expected Germany to accept all responsibility for World War one the
- 02:03
millions of deaths the billions of dollars of destruction yeah all
- 02:06
Germany's fault well you can probably understand why the Germans we're a
- 02:10
little upset with final draft of the Treaty of Versailles
- 02:13
Not only did the treaty fail to embrace any of the peace and love that had been
- 02:17
present in Wilson's fourteen points but its requirements would make it virtually [Newspaper article on treaty]
- 02:21
impossible for the Germans to recover from the war
- 02:24
well furthermore the Germans thought it was complete BS that they should accept
- 02:28
sole responsibility for the conflict so in May of 1919 the Germans said nope and
- 02:34
boogied right out of the Treaty of Versailles
- 02:36
the Allies threatened to restart the war the crisis only resolved itself when two
- 02:41
guys no one had ever heard of from the German side were brought in to sign the
- 02:45
treaty while hindsight's 2020 it was pretty obvious from the get-go the
- 02:49
treaty was going to be a big fat failure really it's only success was in making
- 02:53
the German people really really really mad and unfortunately there was no way
- 02:58
for Europe to run away from the nest of Hornets it had created [Hitler appears next to a man]
Up Next
GED Social Studies 1.1 Civics and Government
Related Videos
When you're about to marry the love of your life, not many things could stop you. However, finding out that your future hubby is keeping his crazy...
Here at Shmoop, we work for kids, not just the bottom line. Founded by David Siminoff and his wife Ellen Siminoff, Shmoop was originally conceived...
ACT Math: Elementary Algebra Drill 4, Problem 5. What is the solution to the problem shown?