World War I: Key Phases and the Paris Peace Settlement

Phases of the War

1. Initial German Offensives (1914)

Germany put the Schlieffen Plan into effect. This consisted of launching a rapid offensive on the Western Front, invading Belgium and the north of France with the aim of reaching Paris. Once France was defeated, German troops planned to advance on the Eastern Front to fight the Russians. The German plan didn't succeed because the French and British armies stopped their advance at the First Battle of the Marne.

2. Trench Warfare (1915-1916)

The Western Front between Germany and the Allies stabilized, and a new phase of the war began. As they couldn't advance, both sides focused on defending their positions. To do this, they built trenches from where they could defend themselves using new weapons, such as machine guns, heavy artillery, tanks, and poison gas.

3. Incorporation and Withdrawal of Powers (1917)

The United States decided to join the war on the side of the Allies because German submarines had sunk neutral merchant ships. In the same year, a political and social revolution in the Russian Empire caused Russia to withdraw from the war.

4. The End of the War and the Armistice (1918)

The help of American troops and weapons allowed the Allied forces to advance on the Western Front (the Second Battle of the Marne). Exhaustion and an ever-increasing lack of resources drove the Central Powers to seek peace. Kaiser Wilhelm II abdicated, and on 11 November 1918, the Armistice was signed.

The Peace Settlement

In January 1919, representatives of the victorious countries met at the Paris Peace Conference (1919-1920) to decide on the peace conditions that would be imposed on the defeated countries.

The United States President, Woodrow Wilson, had proposed a peace agreement called the Fourteen Points, intended as a basis for peace negotiations. It was based on creating a League of Nations, the establishment of democratic states, freedom of trade, and respect for a nation’s right to self-determination.

The plan was rejected by Allied countries, which had been devastated during four years of war. France, in particular, insisted on severe conditions for the defeated countries. It considered Germany to be responsible for the war.

At the conference, the representatives of the victorious countries agreed on the Paris Peace Settlement. Five separate treaties were ratified by the Allied countries.

The Treaty of Versailles

The Treaty of Versailles established particularly severe terms for Germany:

• Prohibition of heavy artillery, planes, and submarines.
• Payment of huge economic reparations.
• Reduction of its territories, with the return of Alsace-Lorraine to France and the loss of the Sudetenland.
• Demilitarisation of the Rhineland region.
• Division of its eastern territories into two parts to give Poland access to the sea.

The German representatives protested against what they considered to be humiliating conditions, but ultimately, they had to accept them. The Treaty of Versailles was to become the source of future conflict.