Wilson's 14 Points and the Treaty of Versailles

Wilson's 14 points:

• Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at
• Freedom of the seas
• The removal so far as possible of all economic barriers
• The reduction of national armaments to the lowest point consistent with domestic safety
• Impartial adjustment of all colonial claims
• The evacuation of all Russian territory
• The evacuation and restoration of Belgium
• The liberation of France and return to her of Alsace and Lorraine
• Readjustment of the frontiers of Italy to conform to clearly recognizable lines of nationality
• The peoples of Austria-Hungary should be accorded the freest opportunity of autonomous development
• Evacuation of occupation forces from Romania, Serbia and Montenegro; Serbia should be accorded free and secure access to the sea
• Autonomous development for the non-Turkish peoples of the Ottoman empire; free passage of the Dardanelles to the ships and commerce of all nations
• An independent Poland to be established, with free and secure access to the sea
• A general association of nations to be formed to guarantee to its members political independence and territorial integrity (the genesis of the League of Nations)
• Treaty of Versailles

• The main terms of the Versailles Treaty were:

  • (1) The surrender of all German colonies as League of Nations mandates.

  • (2) The return of Alsace-Lorraine to France.

  • (3) Cession of Eupen-Malmedy to Belgium, Memel to Lithuania, the Hultschin district to Czechoslovakia.

  • (4) Poznania, parts of East Prussia and Upper Silesia to Poland.

  • (5) Danzig to become a free city;

  • (6) Plebiscites to be held in northern Schleswig to settle the Danish-German frontier.

  • (7) Occupation and special status for the Saar under French control.

  • (8) Demilitarization and a fifteen-year occupation of the Rhineland.

  • (9) German reparations of £6,600 billion.

  • (10) A ban on the union of Germany and Austria.

  • (11) An acceptance of Germany's guilt in causing the war.

  • (12) Provision for the trial of the former Kaiser and other war leaders.

  • (13) Limitation of Germany's army to 100,000 men with no conscription, no tanks, no heavy artillery, no poison-gas supplies, no aircraft and no airships;

  • (14) The German navy was allowed six pre-dreadnought battleships and was limited to a maximum of six light cruisers (not exceeding 6,100 tons), twelve destroyers (not exceeding 810 tons and twelve torpedo boats (not exceeding 200 tons) and was forbidden submarines.