Subscribe for fascinating stories connecting the past to the present. The French Revolution was a watershed event in modern European history that began in and ended in the late s with the ascent of Napoleon Bonaparte. Eleanor of Aquitaine was one of the most powerful and influential figures of the Middle Ages.
Inheriting a vast estate at the age of 15 made her the most sought-after bride of her generation. She would eventually become the queen of France, the queen of England and The Russian Revolution of was one of the most explosive political events of the twentieth century.
The violent revolution marked the end of the Romanov dynasty and centuries of Russian Imperial rule. During the Russian Revolution, the Bolsheviks, led by leftist The history of the legislative body—which meets in the Palace of Westminster in London—shows how it evolved almost organically, partly The plot was organized by Robert Catesby c.
Catesby and Notable outcomes of the wars included the The Industrial Revolution marked a period of development in the latter half of the 18th century that transformed largely rural, agrarian societies in Europe and America into industrialized, urban ones.
Goods that had once been painstakingly crafted by hand started to be The English philosopher and political theorist John Locke laid much of the groundwork for the Enlightenment and made central contributions to the development of liberalism. Trained in medicine, he was a key advocate of the empirical approaches of the Scientific Live TV. This Day In History.
History Vault. Their crippling conditions amounted to surrender. The definition of "indisputably Polish populations" was already problematic, but Danzig — the obvious port — was — equally obviously — German, whilst the ethnic composition of the lands needed for a "corridor" from the Polish heartland to Danzig was mixed. Here, as with the Saar coalfields, giving the League sovereignty provided a useful mechanism to reconcile the conflicting principles.
The armistice with Germany on 11 November completed the suspension of hostilities between the Allies and the Central Powers but conflict continued. Lansing recorded in his diary for 22 January , "all the races of Central Europe and the Balkans in fact are actually fighting or about to fight with one another Wilson expected resistance from his colleagues in Paris, but he was also aware of another threat.
Although Lenin had pragmatically sacrificed territory for the survival of his new regime in the Brest-Litovsk Treaty with Germany in March and made hinted offers to the Allies to extend trade and other opportunities in return for the withdrawal of their various interventionist forces in , many doubted whether co-existence represented his real objective. Despite such distractions Germany was the priority for the peacemakers.
Yet it took more than two months after the armistice before the conference opened, partly delayed by a general election in Britain in which Lloyd George sought to turn victory into political capital to consolidate his position as the Liberal leader of a predominantly Conservative coalition.
This he did on 14 December , but the popular perception that his government would secure massive German payments to offset the costs of the war and bring the ex-German Emperor Wilhelm II to trial and execution, represented hostages to fortune. Christmas and the New Year intervened and, although all were aware of the enormous task before them, it was difficult to refocus immediately.
In the inevitable relaxation of tension some key decision-makers fell ill during a virulent influenza epidemic, its spread aided by the massive wartime movement of people and goods, which proved a far greater killer than the war itself.
Wilson arrived in Europe to scenes of adulation in Paris, London and Rome and the various delegations gathered. Paris was itself a controversial choice. Wilson rejected Switzerland, fearing the country was "saturated with every kind of poisonous element and open to every hostile element in Europe", leaving Lloyd George powerless to resist Clemenceau: "I never wanted to hold the Conference in his bloody capital The French proposed on 29 November that peacemaking should follow the pattern established in The French presupposed an Allied dictation of terms to Germany and then a broader gathering to tackle more general questions.
The League was last on their agenda — a move hardly likely to endear the suggestion to Wilson, especially when they stated the Fourteen Points were "not sufficiently defined in their character to be taken as a basis for a concrete settlement of the war. Thus the conference opened without a clear agenda, with the German peace terms, the wider aspects of the European and world settlement and questions like the League all under consideration.
The British diplomat Harold Nicolson reflected: "Had it been known from the outset that no negotiations would ever take place with the enemy, it is certain that many of the less reasonable clauses of the Treaty would never have been inserted. After a month little progress had been made beyond a first draft of the Covenant of the League of Nations and agreement that Germany forfeit its colonies, though the expert commissions were considering their recommendations.
The leaders also had domestic responsibilities as they sought to manage the transition from war to peace. Lloyd George was absent until 5 March , whilst on 19 February , Clemenceau survived an assassination attempt.
The threat of Bolshevism and revolution emphasised the need for decisions. Its replacement, the Council of Four, evolved from informal and wide-ranging meetings in early March between the resilient Clemenceau, Lloyd George and Wilson.
Orlando joined them from 24 March Initially with only Professor Paul Mantoux in attendance as interpreter, in early April they recruited the British cabinet secretary, Sir Maurice Hankey , to record their decisions and offer his support to meetings that continued to tackle issues on an ad hoc basis. Keynes, a British Treasury expert in Paris, published his book in December , only six months after leaving the conference in despair.
He portrayed Wilson as a ponderous Presbyterian bamboozled by Lloyd George, the "Welsh Wizard", and bullied by Clemenceau, the formidable "Tiger", into betraying his principles and creating a "Carthaginian peace", intent on ruining Germany as effectively as Rome had destroyed Carthage in BC. While neither true, nor certainly a full account of how the settlement was reached — much of which was determined by the Council of Five — nonetheless the "Big Four" did confront the contentious issues.
They had differing objectives and aspirations. Wilson insisted that the Covenant of the League of Nations be the first priority and its twenty-six articles the first chapter of all the Paris treaties. He sought to avoid the precipitate rush to war of by introducing delaying mechanisms before any state could legitimately resort to arms. His original draft included an automatic sanction of war against any member that broke its covenants but the dictates of national sovereignty undermined this revolutionary commitment by all members to defend their mutual political independence and territorial integrity against unprovoked aggression.
Instead League members could choose their response to such occurrences, thus rendering dubious the notion of collective security. Clemenceau spoke for many when he declared, "There is an old system of alliances called the Balance of Power — this system of alliances, which I do not renounce, will be my guiding thought at the Peace Conference. It was also passed responsibility for minority protection for some national groups left on the wrong side of the new frontiers.
Wilson exhorted his colleagues on his voyage to Europe, "Tell me what is right and I will fight for it. Acknowledging that "the hungry expect us to feed them, the roofless look to us for shelter, the sick of heart and body depend on us for cure", he feared "a tragedy of disappointment", a foreboding that cannot have been eased by his messianic welcomes in Europe. He sought a treaty which would inflict stern justice but without alienating the Germans unnecessarily, especially by assigning too many to foreign rule.
He wished, for sentimental as well as pragmatic motives, to create a new major British sphere of interest in the Middle East, an important source of the oil on which the Royal Navy now depended.
He was willing to back the Dominion premiers in their quests to control neighbouring former German colonies — though, as he warned Australian Premier Billy Hughes , not to the extent of quarrelling with the United States over the Solomon Islands.
He was determined that Britain should receive as much as possible of any German reparation payments, employing all his considerable political and linguistic skills in this pursuit.
He was also adamant, against domestic and foreign opposition, that the former Kaiser should be brought to trial. He enjoyed greater support to extend international law beyond prosecuting persons accused of wartime operational crimes to include arraignments of those responsible for the political and military decisions which had occasioned the war and the manner in which it had been fought.
In Britain, France and Russia made extravagant promises in the Treaty of London to secure Italian intervention in the war. He was successful in moving the Italian frontier to the Brenner with the acquisition of South Tyrol from Austria, which consigned some , German-speakers to Italian rule. In protest Orlando quit the conference in late April , returning, without concessions, in early May For seventy-seven year old Clemenceau, who had twice seen France invaded by a more populous and powerful Germany, security was key.
The French favoured a League with the military capability to enforce the settlement on Germany but Anglo-American opposition scotched this. Do not imagine that they will ever forgive us; they will seek only the chance to obtain revenge. The offer of Anglo-American support should Germany launch an unprovoked attack upon France, together with an agreement to occupy the Rhineland for fifteen years and to demilitarize it permanently, persuaded Clemenceau to drop his demands for its separation from Germany.
This eased the log-jam of problems and, on 7 May , the Germans received the draft treaty. He secured a plebiscite on the fate of Upper Silesia but little else. On 22 June , the German government was given an ultimatum — agree to sign within twenty-four hours or face war. They capitulated. France was awarded the Saar coal mines, with the territory ceded for fifteen years to the League, after which a plebiscite would determine its destiny. The Rhineland was demilitarized permanently and occupied by the Allies for fifteen years.
It was forbidden union with the rump state of Austria. It was forbidden an air force, heavy artillery , tanks , poison gas and a general staff. It was obligated to deliver as yet unnamed "war criminals" and as yet unspecified reparations to the victors.
Its overseas empire of over 1 million square miles was surrendered to the League for redistribution under mandates — a rather thin veneer for an imperial carve-up. It was a very different world to that of The British Dominions, their identities tempered by war, expected greater autonomy, whilst Irish nationalists sought independence.
Four great empires that for centuries had dominated eastern and central Europe and the Middle East had collapsed. The Ottoman Empire, shorn of its Middle Eastern territories, continued to exist, at least nominally, until, after a rebellion and a successful campaign against the occupying Greek forces, Mustafa Kemal expelled the Sultan and created the new secular state of Turkey in The Russian revolutions created a dilemma that the peacemakers never resolved.
James Headlam-Morley , a British expert in Paris, observed: "In the discussions everything inevitably leads up to Russia. Then there is a discursive discussion; it is agreed that the point at issue cannot be determined until the general policy on Russia has been settled; having agreed on this, instead of settling it, they pass on to some other subject.
Only later, and with great reluctance, did other states acknowledge the existence of the Soviet Union and the new Baltic nations. In Europe thousands of miles of new frontiers came into existence. Beyond that, deprived of any reliable means of enforcing their will, the new map depended more upon the outcome of wars and armed struggles — as the Chief of the British Imperial General Staff, Sir Henry Wilson , observed, "The root of evil is that the Paris writ does not run.
The Balkans changed significantly with Austria, Hungary and Turkey the main losers. The major winner was Yugoslavia technically, until , the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes. In Serbia had 33, square miles and 4,, people; Yugoslavia by had , square miles and a population of 13,, Its loss of Western Thrace to Greece deprived it of access to the Aegean and, proportionate to its size and wealth, it faced the highest reparations bill of all the Central Powers.
The settlement consolidated the Balkans but fragmented Eastern Europe. Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania , Poland, Czechoslovakia , Austria and Hungary, together with the Soviet Union, filled the political vacuum left by the collapsed empires. Hungary, which lost two-thirds of its pre-war territory and 58 percent of its population, suffered the heaviest deprivations of any of the defeated powers, losing a third of its Magyar people.
After the war with Russia , Poland established this new frontier far to the east of the Curzon line recommended by the conference, creating a state where only 69 percent of the population was Polish and whose neighbours all had grievances against it. Both proselytised hard in exile, eventually gaining Allied endorsement in The fate of 3 million German-speaking former subjects of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, to whom Germany laid claim, caused the peacemakers much disquiet.
Torn between the principles of self-determination and the need to offer Czechoslovakia secure frontiers and economic prosperity, they allocated the area to the Czechs. The Nazi Party used the atmosphere of panic to their advantage, encouraging anti-communism.
This hysteria helped to turn the public against the communists, one of the Nazis main opponents, and people were imprisoned. This decree suspended the democratic aspects of the Weimar Republic and declared a state of emergency.
This decree gave the Nazis a legal basis for the persecution and oppression of any opponents, who were be framed as traitors to the republic.
People could be imprisoned for any or no reason. The decree also removed basic personal freedoms, such as the freedom of speech, the right to own property, and the right to trial before imprisonment. Through these aspects the Nazis suppressed any opposition to their power, and were able to start the road from democracy to a dictatorship.
The atmosphere of uncertainty following the Reichstag Fire secured many voters for the Nazi party. The SA also ran a violent campaign of terror against any and all opponents of the Nazi regime. Many were terrified of voting of at all, and many turned to voting for the Nazi Party out of fear for their own safety. The elections were neither free or fair. The Nazis secured Despite this improvement, the Nazis still did not command a majority in the Reichstag. This new law gave Hitler the power to rule by decree rather than passing laws through the Reichstag and the president.
If passed, the law would establish the conditions needed for dictatorial rule. The law needed two thirds of the Reichstag to vote for it to pass. The SA and the SS had also been on a month long campaign of violence to scare or imprison other opponents to the party. They had placed many in the first concentration camp , Dachau , which opened just a few days before the vote on the 20 March After Hitler had promised to protect the interests of the Catholic Church, the party conceded and supported the bill.
Only the SPD opposed it. Although President Hindenburg and the Reichstag continued to exist, Hitler could now govern by decree. Carried out primarily by the SS and the Gestapo, over people were murdered and hundreds more were arrested. In August there were approximately , members of the SA. By June this had grown to over 3,, members.
They were often given a free rein on their activities and were violent and difficult to control. In addition to this, there was a mutual dislike between the traditional conservative elite — who maintained many key positions in the government and the army during the first years of the Third Reich — and the SA.
During the years of the rise of the Nazi Party, the SA had been instrumental in helping the party to gain support. Hitler and the rest of the Nazi leadership disagreed with their approach. They understood the need to appear moderate and take over slowly by democratic means where possible, maintaining the stability and illusion of a democracy. The tension between the SA and the Nazi leadership grew. On 30 June these tensions came to a head.
Over the next two days, most of the SA leadership were placed under arrest and murdered without trial. Refusing to take his own life, he was shot on 1 July by two SS guards. Whilst the purge focused on the SA, the Nazis also used the event to eliminate other political opponents, such as the former chancellor Kurt von Schleicher. From 20 August onwards, the Reichswehr , who had previously been a separate organisation, now swore a personal allegiance to Hitler.
As the SA were known for being violent and unruly, many saw this as a legitimate move by the government to ensure public order. On 13 July the Reichstag retrospectively approved a bill legalising the purge as emergency defence measures.
0コメント