Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Introduction
- Prologue: 1919-1945-1989
- PART ONE PEACE PLANNING AND THE ACTUALITIES OF THE ARMISTICE
- PART TWO THE PEACEMAKERS AND THEIR HOME FRONTS
- PART THREE THE RECONSTRUCTION OF EUROPE AND THE SETTLEMENT OF ACCOUNTS
- 11 The Minorities Question at the Paris Peace Conference: The Polish Minority Treaty, June 28, 1919
- 12 The Rhineland Question: West European Security at the Paris Peace Conference of 1919
- 13 The Polish Question
- 14 Smoke and Mirrors: In Smoke-Filled Rooms and the Galerie des Glaces
- 15 The Making of the Economic Peace
- 16 The Balance of Payments Question: Versailles and After
- 17 A Comment
- PART FOUR THE LEGACY AND CONSEQUENCES OF VERSAILLES
- PART FIVE ANTECEDENTS AND AFTERMATHS REFLECTIONS ON THE WAR-GUILT QUESTION AND THE SETTLEMENT
- Bibliography
- Index
17 - A Comment
from PART THREE - THE RECONSTRUCTION OF EUROPE AND THE SETTLEMENT OF ACCOUNTS
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 January 2013
- Frontmatter
- Introduction
- Prologue: 1919-1945-1989
- PART ONE PEACE PLANNING AND THE ACTUALITIES OF THE ARMISTICE
- PART TWO THE PEACEMAKERS AND THEIR HOME FRONTS
- PART THREE THE RECONSTRUCTION OF EUROPE AND THE SETTLEMENT OF ACCOUNTS
- 11 The Minorities Question at the Paris Peace Conference: The Polish Minority Treaty, June 28, 1919
- 12 The Rhineland Question: West European Security at the Paris Peace Conference of 1919
- 13 The Polish Question
- 14 Smoke and Mirrors: In Smoke-Filled Rooms and the Galerie des Glaces
- 15 The Making of the Economic Peace
- 16 The Balance of Payments Question: Versailles and After
- 17 A Comment
- PART FOUR THE LEGACY AND CONSEQUENCES OF VERSAILLES
- PART FIVE ANTECEDENTS AND AFTERMATHS REFLECTIONS ON THE WAR-GUILT QUESTION AND THE SETTLEMENT
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
The title of this part of the book suggests an optimism and positive attitude in no way justified by its subject matter or content. The chapters here deal with two issues whose outcomes illuminate the failure of European reconstruction at Versailles and the economic and financial disasters of the two miserable decades between the smoke and mirrors surrounding the peace settlement and the explosive and shattering termination marked by the German invasion of Poland. The first of these issues is the territorial settlement; the second is the economic and financial settlement. Both were horrendous failures by any standard one wishes to employ and whatever position one takes on the historical debates surrounding them. At the heart of these debates has been the question of whether the arrangements made were too hard or too easy on Germany. Although most historians would agree that the terms were too hard in relation to the will and mechanisms available to enforce them and too easy to prevent a second German grasp for world power, the quarrel over what might have been done often tends to skirt the overdetermined nature of what actually happened at Versailles.
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- Information
- The Treaty of VersaillesA Reassessment after 75 Years, pp. 441 - 448Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1998
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