【1/19 今日美史】威尔逊因为这些努力，而拿到诺贝尔和平奖
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1/19
Versailles Peace Conference
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Leaders of the victorious Allied powers, including France, Great Britain, the U.S. and Italy, met to set the peace terms for the defeated Central Powers.
Wilson envisioned peace terms that would preempt another major conflict like the First World War. But he struggled to sell his idea of a “peace without victory” to the other leaders, and convince them not to treat Germany too harshly. The leaders of France and Britain insisted that Germany needed to be punished adequately to justify the immense costs of the war. In the end, Wilson compromised on the treatment of Germany in order to push through the creation of the League of Nations, which was a peacemaking organization that would mediate international disputes in the hope of preventing another world war.
Wary of the potential impact on America’s sovereignty, Congress refused to approve the covenant of the League of Nations. Wilson then tried to sell the idea directly to the American people, arguing that isolationism did not work in a world in which violent revolutions and nationalist fervor spilled over international borders, and stressed that the League of Nations embodied American values of self-government and the desire to settle conflicts peacefully. However, he eventually failed to get the League of Nations ratified. The League was still created, just without the participation of the U.S .
Representatives from Germany were excluded from the peace conference until May. They were deeply frustrated when they were presented with the Versailles Treaty, which required them to forfeit a great deal of territory and pay reparations. Even worse, the infamous Article 231 forced Germany to accept sole blame for the war.
Ultimately, the Treaty of Versailles was signed on June 28, 1919. In the decades to come, anger and resentment of the treaty festered in Germany. Extremists like Adolf Hitler’s National Socialist (Nazi) Party capitalized on these emotions to gain power, which led to the exact thing Wilson had wanted to prevent - another devastating world war.
Tags
WWI, President Woodrow Wilson, the Treaty of Versailles, Paris Peace Conference, Wilson Doctrine