Home / History / On This Day
The Treaty of Versailles is signed
Germany and the Allies sign the post-World War I treaty
The treaty was signed in the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles. It required Germany to accept blame for the war, pay reparations and give up territory. Many historians argue its terms fed later tensions.
The terms were drafted at the Paris Peace Conference by the Allied leaders, chiefly Britain's Lloyd George, France's Clemenceau and U.S. President Wilson. Germany was not allowed to negotiate and was given the text to accept or reject. German leaders protested, and a cabinet resigned over it before the new government agreed to sign under the threat of renewed Allied military action.
The treaty limited the German army to 100,000 men, banned tanks, military aircraft and submarines, demilitarized the Rhineland, and placed the Saar basin under League of Nations supervision. Germany lost territory, including Alsace-Lorraine to France, and its overseas colonies. The Allies later set reparations in 1921 at about 132 billion gold marks, a figure Britannica gives as roughly 33 billion dollars for civilian damage.
The so-called war guilt clause, Article 231, was meant to justify reparations by making Germany responsible for the damage, but Germans widely read it as an accusation of sole blame. The U.S. Senate declined to ratify the treaty, and it entered into force in January 1920. Historians still disagree about how much it caused later instability compared with the Depression and political choices in Germany.