The Treaty of Versailles was a peace treaty signed on 28 June 1919. As the most important treaty of World War I, it ended the state of war between Germany and most of the Allied Powers. It was signed in the Palace of Versailles, exactly five years after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, which led to the war. The other Central Powers on the German side signed separate treaties. Although the armistice of 11 November 1918 ended the actual fighting, and agreed certain principles and conditions including the payment of reparations, it took six months of Allied negotiations at the Paris Peace Conference to conclude the peace treaty. Germany was not allowed to participate in the negotiations before signing the treaty.
Following their defeat in World War I, the Central Powers agreed to pay war reparations to the Allied Powers. Each defeated power was required to make payments in either cash or kind. Because of the financial situation in Austria, Hungary, and Turkey after the war, few to no reparations were paid and the requirements for reparations were cancelled. Bulgaria, having paid only a fraction of what was required, saw its reparation figure reduced and then cancelled. Historians have recognized the German requirement to pay reparations as the "chief battleground of the post-war era" and "the focus of the power struggle between France and Germany over whether the Versailles Treaty was to be enforced or revised."
The Weimar Republic, officially known as the German Reich, was a historical period of Germany from 9 November 1918 to 23 March 1933, during which it was a constitutional republic for the first time in history; hence it is also referred to, and unofficially proclaimed itself, as the German Republic. The period's informal name is derived from the city of Weimar, which hosted the constituent assembly that established its government. In English, the republic was usually simply called "Germany", with "Weimar Republic" not commonly used until the 1930s. The Weimar Republic had a semi-presidential system.
Reichswehr was the official name of the German armed forces during the Weimar Republic and the first years of the Third Reich. After Germany was defeated in World War I, the Imperial German Army was dissolved in order to be reshaped into a peacetime army. From it a provisional Reichswehr was formed in March 1919. Under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles, the rebuilt German Army was subject to severe limitations in size, structure and armament. The official formation of the Reichswehr took place on 1 January 1921 after the limitations had been met. The German armed forces kept the name Reichswehr until Adolf Hitler's 1935 proclamation of the "restoration of military sovereignty", at which point it became part of the new Wehrmacht.
Constantin Fehrenbach, sometimes erroneously Konstantin Fehrenbach,, was a German politician who was one of the major leaders of the Catholic Centre Party. He served as president of the Reichstag in 1918 and then as president of the Weimar National Assembly from 1919 to 1920. In June 1920, Fehrenbach became Chancellor of Germany. During his time in office, the central issue he had to face was German compliance with the terms of the Treaty of Versailles. He resigned in May 1921 when his cabinet was unable to reach a consensus on war reparations payments to the Allies. Fehrenbach remained in the Reichstag and headed the Centre Party's contingent there from 1923 until his death in 1926.
Events in the year 1920 in Germany.
The Armistice of 11 November 1918 was the armistice signed at Le Francport near Compiègne that ended fighting on land, at sea, and in the air in World War I between the Entente and their last remaining opponent, Germany. Previous armistices had been agreed with Bulgaria, the Ottoman Empire and Austria-Hungary. It was concluded after the German government sent a message to American president Woodrow Wilson to negotiate terms on the basis of a recent speech of his and the earlier declared "Fourteen Points", which later became the basis of the German surrender at the Paris Peace Conference, which took place the following year.
Matthias Erzberger was a politician of the Catholic Centre Party, member of the Reichstag and minister of finance of Germany from 1919 to 1920.
Article 231, often known as the "War Guilt" clause, was the opening article of the reparations section of the Treaty of Versailles, which ended the First World War between the German Empire and the Allied and Associated Powers. The article did not use the word guilt but it served as a legal basis under which Germany was to pay reparations for damages caused during the war.
The occupation of the Ruhr was the period from 11 January 1923 to 25 August 1925 when French and Belgian troops occupied the Ruhr region of Weimar Republic Germany.
The West Russian Volunteer Army or Bermontians was a pro-German military formation in Latvia and Lithuania during the Russian Civil War from November 1918 to December 1919.
Harry Elmer Barnes was an American historian who, in his later years, was known for his historical revisionism and Holocaust denial.
The Lausanne Conference of 1932, held from 16 June to 9 July 1932 in Lausanne, Switzerland, was a meeting of representatives from the United Kingdom, France, Italy, Belgium, Japan and Germany that resulted in an agreement to lower Germany's World War I reparations obligations as imposed by the Treaty of Versailles and the 1929 Young Plan. The reduction of approximately 90 per cent was made as a result of the difficult economic circumstances during the Great Depression. The Lausanne Treaty never came into effect because it was dependent on an agreement with the United States on the repayment of the loans it had made to the Allied powers during World War I, and that agreement was never reached. The Lausanne Conference marked the de facto end of Germany's reparations payments until after World War II.
The Occupation of the Rhineland placed the region of Germany west of the Rhine river and four bridgeheads to its east under the control of the victorious Allies of World War I from 1 December 1918 until 30 June 1930. The occupation was imposed and regulated by articles in the Armistice of 11 November 1918, the Treaty of Versailles and the parallel agreement on the Rhineland occupation signed at the same time as the Versailles Treaty. The Rhineland was demilitarised, as was an area stretching fifty kilometres east of the Rhine, and put under the control of the Inter-Allied Rhineland High Commission, which was led by a French commissioner and had one member each from Belgium, Great Britain and the United States. The purpose of the occupation was to give France and Belgium security against any future German attack and serve as a guarantee for Germany's reparations obligations. After Germany fell behind on its payments in 1922, the occupation was expanded to include the industrial Ruhr valley from 1923 to 1925.
The Weimar National Assembly, officially the German National Constitutional Assembly, was the popularly elected constitutional convention and de facto parliament of Germany from 6 February 1919 to 21 May 1920. As part of its duties as the interim government, it debated and reluctantly approved the Treaty of Versailles that codified the peace terms between Germany and the victorious Allies of World War I. The Assembly drew up and approved the Weimar Constitution that was in force from 1919 to 1933. With its work completed, the National Assembly was dissolved on 21 May 1920. Following the election of 6 June 1920, the new Reichstag met for the first time on 24 June 1920, taking the place of the Assembly.
Historians writing about the origins of World War I have differed over the relative emphasis they place upon the factors involved. Changes in historical arguments over time are in part related to the delayed availability of classified historical archives. The deepest distinction among historians remains between those who focus on the actions of Germany and Austria-Hungary as key and those who focus on a wider group of actors. Meanwhile some historians, such as Fritz Fischer, maintain that Germany deliberately sought war while others do not. The main distinction among the latter is between those who believe that a war between the "Great Powers" was ultimately unplanned but still caused principally by Germany and Austria-Hungary taking risks, and those who believe that either all or some of the other powers, namely Russia, France, Serbia and Great Britain, played a more significant role in risking war than had been traditionally suggested.
Pierre Renouvin was a French historian of international relations.
The Scheidemann cabinet, headed by Minister President Philipp Scheidemann of the Social Democratic Party (SPD), was Germany's first democratically elected national government. It took office on 13 February 1919, three months after the collapse of the German Empire following Germany's defeat in World War I. Although the Weimar Constitution was not in force yet, it is generally counted as the first government of the Weimar Republic.
The war guilt question is the public debate that took place in Germany for the most part during the Weimar Republic, to establish Germany's share of responsibility in the causes of the First World War. Structured in several phases, and largely determined by the impact of the Treaty of Versailles and the attitude of the victorious Allies, this debate also took place in other countries involved in the conflict, such as in the French Third Republic and the United Kingdom.
The Reichstag inquiry into guilt for World War I was a parliamentary committee in Weimar Germany that was tasked with investigating the events that had led to the "outbreak, prolongation and loss of the First World War". It was established by the Reichstag on 21 August 1919, after Article 231 of the Treaty of Versailles had imposed sole responsibility for the war on Germany and her allies.
