CHAPTER II
THE PRELIMINARIES OF THE PEACE CONFERENCE
When the wild joy of the armistice celebration had spent itself, public opinion in the victorious countries reacted against the terms of the armistice, against the very fact that an armistice had been signed. It was recognized that there had been no clean-cut, unquestioned military victory, such as generally decides the fortunes of a war. The enemy’s front was unbroken: he was still on the soil of France and had not been driven out of Belgium. The armistice conditions provided for a gradual withdrawal from France, Belgium, and Alsace-Lorraine, and the gradual occupation by the victors of the Rhine provinces and bridge-heads. The German army retired with artillery and arms and other war material, and the method of advance of the victors deprived the armies of appearing dramatically as liberators and conquerors. And then there were too many victors! The details of the advance were as meticulously arranged among allies as between the allies and the enemy.
It was felt that Germany, after four years of being the top dog, had suddenly managed to “get out from under” before the storm broke that would give her army and her people a taste of the medicine they had been administering in big doses ever since 1914. Consequently there was a determination that crying “Kamerad!” was not going to enable Germany to avoid the disagreeable consequences of losing the war. There was far more hatred, bitterness, resentment, than there would have been had the Allied armies beaten the Germans in the field, chased them back to their own country, and secured an unconditional surrender on German soil. The very fact of so much hatred after the armistice indicated that the military superiority of the victors had not been sufficiently demonstrated. For hatred is born of fear and nourished by fear. After a fight to the finish, the sane man with normal instincts simply cannot hate. If he knows that he has knocked out his opponent, his natural instinct is to extend a hand good-naturedly to help the other fellow to his feet. No matter what the opponent may have done, he is considered to have paid the penalty by the punishment he received in the losing fight.
The trouble with the world in November, 1918, was that there had been no knock-out. More than that, Germany had been worsted by a coalition which was doomed to disruption after the fighting was over, unless all its members should be willing to continue to grant to one another equal opportunities and privileges and assume for one another equal burdens and responsibilities, just as they had done during the war.
When the clamor arose to make Germany pay, Entente statesmen rode with the tide of hysterical indignation instead of trying to stem it. They did not point out from the beginning, as they should have done, that Germany had not made an unconditional surrender, throwing herself upon the mercy of her conquerors. However ignoble the motive that prompted it, her submission had been contingent upon the definite promise that a certain kind of peace, very clearly defined, would be made with her. In return for the pre-armistice concessions, the Allies had transformed suddenly a potential into an actual victory without having to shed further blood for the liberation of France and Belgium or to wrest Alsace-Lorraine from Germany. When Germany threw up the sponge, allowed portions of her territory to be occupied, surrendered most of her naval and much of her military equipment, and agreed to release prisoners of war without reciprocity, she thought that she was letting the victors discount their future military triumph by waiving their right to a victors’ peace. Wilsonian ideas had spread all over Germany and had helped to break down the morale of the army.
The world was so weary of war that strong men in Allied countries, men with vision and a sense of honor, might have been able to carry public opinion with them in favor of a durable world peace. But there were no such men in Europe in positions of authority, and by going personally to the Peace Conference President Wilson sacrificed the prestige and influence which, exercised from afar, might have enabled him to become and remain master of the situation.
Two months elapsed between the armistice and the opening of peace negotiations. During that time the victorious powers worked out the details of the military occupation of German territory. The French took over Alsace-Lorraine as an integral part of France, restoring, so far as the Germans and the outside world were concerned, the status quo of 1870. The victors had agreed to allow France a free hand in reannexing her “lost provinces.” What problems France had to face were to be solved as a purely internal French affair, and so the French went ahead to change the régime without waiting for a treaty of peace. The details of the military occupation of German territory, with the three bridge-heads on the right bank of the Rhine, were worked out among British and French and Americans, who established their headquarters respectively at Cologne, Mainz, and Coblenz. The German Government had no part in arranging for the Allied occupation. It was a military affair, and all orders were given directly to the local authorities in each of the zones.
Allied prisoners of war were released. The Germans surrendered their fleet. Allied commissions, to watch over the fulfilment of the armistice terms, were sent to all the defeated countries. For general questions affecting Germany, an Armistice Commission was created, with headquarters at Spa in Belgium.
Allied statesmen began to study the question of securing the confidence of the electorates and parliaments of their respective countries, without which they would be unable to act as plenipotentiaries. This was an essential consideration; for the executive power in Europe, unlike that of the United States, has no fixed tenure of office and is always dependent upon a parliamentary vote of confidence. In the two months between the armistice and the conference, the statesmen of the European powers, large and small, had to secure a parliamentary mandate, approving their general policy at the approaching conference.
As soon as the military terms of the armistice were fulfilled, so that the defeated peoples were no longer in a position to renew the war, an uncompromising attitude was adopted toward the Germans and their allies. The pre-armistice agreement was ignored. The five enemy states were told that they would have no part in the Peace Conference. The victors were to decide upon the terms of the treaties, which would then be communicated to the vanquished. In the meantime the food blockade was to be maintained and enemy prisoners of war held. The only dealings between the governments of the victors and of the vanquished were in connection with the measures decided upon to carry out the conditions of the armistices. The peace negotiations were to take the form simply of adjusting and harmonizing the conflicting ideas and ambitions and programs of the victorious powers, and were to be no concern of the defeated nations. Our enemies were regarded as criminals, to be arraigned and sentenced by men acting simultaneously as judges, jurors, prosecutors, and jailers. Right to counsel and right of appeal were alike denied.
Austrians and Hungarians were in a different situation from that of Germans, Bulgarians, and Turks. The two countries of the Dual Monarchy, in which they had been the dominant peoples, were separated at the time of the armistice. Far-reaching decisions had already been made before the Peace Conference met. The treaties dealing with the future of the Hapsburg dominions would take into account faits accomplis: (1) the political separation of Austria and Hungary; (2) the annexation to Italy of regions defined in the secret Treaty of London of 1915; (3) the resurrection of Poland; (4) the creation of Czechoslovakia; (5) the aggrandizement of Serbia and Rumania. De facto recognition of independence was granted to Poland and Czechoslovakia, and also to the Hedjaz, detached from the Ottoman Empire. These three new states, whose belligerency had been recognized as a war measure before the end of hostilities, although boundaries were not defined, were invited to participate in the Peace Conference.
The organization of the conference was undertaken by the four Entente Powers, France, Great Britain, Japan, and Italy (who had signed the Pact of London, obligating themselves not to make a separate peace), in agreement with the United States. It was decided to make a distinction between the “powers with general interests” and the “powers with particular interests.” The former were the United States, the British Empire, France, Italy, and Japan;