Quick questions on Consequences of WWI and the Treaty of Versailles 1919: VCE Modern History Unit 1

WWI ended four multi-ethnic empires:

The conference opened on 18 January 1919 with delegates from 32 Allied states. Real decisions were made by the Council of Four: Woodrow Wilson (USA), David Lloyd George (Britain), Georges Clemenceau (France) and Vittorio Orlando (Italy). Germany and the new Soviet Russia were excluded.

Germany signed the Treaty under duress on 28 June 1919 in the Hall of Mirrors, exactly five years after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. Key clauses:

The Covenant of the League of Nations (Part I of the Treaty of Versailles, in force 10 January 1920) created the first permanent international organisation. The League had an Assembly (all member states), a Council (permanent members Britain, France, Italy, Japan, plus rotating non-permanent seats), a Secretariat in Geneva, and the Permanent Court of International Justice at The Hague.

The Spartacist Uprising in Berlin (January 1919), the Bavarian Soviet Republic (April 1919), the Hungarian Soviet Republic under Bela Kun (March to August 1919), and the Italian Biennio Rosso (1919-1920) all alarmed European elites. Each was crushed but each pushed governments rightward.

Bolshevik victory, Western intervention (British, French, US, Japanese forces in Murmansk, Archangel, Vladivostok), and the formation of the Soviet Union (30 December 1922) sealed the East-West ideological divide for the rest of the century.

Britain and France were burdened by war debts to the United States. Germany defaulted on reparations in late 1922. France and Belgium occupied the Ruhr (11 January 1923).

Italy was promised Trieste, South Tyrol, Istria, parts of Dalmatia, and colonial gains by the secret Treaty of London (April 1915). Versailles delivered less. Gabriele D'Annunzio's seizure of Fiume (September 1919) and Mussolini's March on Rome (28 October 1922) followed.

"The Treaty of Versailles was responsible for the instability of Europe in the early 1920s." To what extent do you agree? [10 marks]

Outline the purpose and weaknesses of the League of Nations. [4 marks]

Analyse the consequences of the collapse of empires for Central and Eastern Europe. [6 marks]