The Treaty of Versailles and Clemenceau’s predictions
It was just after 3 pm, on June 28th, 1918, when the two German ministers elected for the ungrateful task of signing the Peace Treaty entered the great Hall of Mirrors in the Versailles Palace. German Foreign Minister Hermann Muller and Transport Minister Johannes...
Treaty of Versailles – “peace without victory” and German humiliation
The Treaty of Versailles, signed in June 1919 at the Palace of Versailles in Paris at the end of World War I, codified peace terms between the victorious Allies and Germany. The Treaty of Versailles held Germany responsible for starting the war and imposed harsh...
The French and the Russian Bolsheviks at the end of the First World War
French Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau was uncompromising in his attitude towards the Russian Bolsheviks. For Clemenceau, Lenin and Russia had betrayed the cause of the Allies, leaving France at the mercy of Germany. The conclusion of the Brest-Litovsk Peace Treaty...
How the Treaty of Versailles ended WWI and started WWII
European countries dealt a harsh punishment to Germany for its role in the First World War—a move that would soon come back to haunt the world. On June 28, 1919, on the outskirts of Paris, European dignitaries crowded into the Palace of Versailles to sign one of...
Romania, the Republic of Councils in Hungary and the Great Powers
On March 21st, 1919, the Hungarian Bolsheviks, led by Béla Kun, seized power in Hungary. This was a clear warning sign for Romania, which was the first country severely affected by the Bolshevik threat. Following the Bessarabian Country Council decision in early 1918...
February 1919: The discussion of the union of Transylvania with Romania at the Paris Peace Conference
On February 1st, 1919, the Romanian Prime Minister Ionel Brătianu appeared for the second time before the Supreme Council, this time to support the union of Transylvania with Romania. Ionel Brătianu began his plea with a long exposition of the stages that led him to...
The Armistice of Salonica – when Bulgaria left the war
The Armistice of Salonica (also known as the Armistice of Thessalonica) was signed on 29 September 1918 between Bulgaria and the Allied Powers in Thessaloniki. The convention followed after a request by the Bulgarian government on 24 September asking for a ceasefire....
Ukrainian Proclamation on Independence, 20 November 1917
Ultimately the Ukrainians sought protection from the Germans with whom they negotiated a peace treaty at Best-Litovsk in 1918. Exacting a heavy economic price for their support the Germans duly took the Ukrainians' side and obliged the Bolsheviks to accept an...
Armistice of 11 November 1918
With German military morale in evident decline on the Western Front and revolution brewing at home - Kaiser Wilhelm II was himself obliged to abdicate on 9 November 1918 - the German government determined to negotiate an armistice with the Allies on 6 November, having...
Treaty of Bucharest, 7 May 1918
Romania, having started the war as a neutral, entered on the side of the Allies in August 1916, led by Ion Bratianu, the Allies having promised support for the fullfilment of Romanian national unity. Revolution in Russia in 1917, followed by the Brest-Litovsk peace...
How the Treaty of Versailles ended WWI and started WWII
European countries dealt a harsh punishment to Germany for its role in the First World War—a move that would soon come back to haunt the world. On June 28, 1919, on the outskirts of Paris, European dignitaries crowded into the Palace of Versailles to sign one of...
Winston Churchill in 1919: “Of all the forms of tyranny in history, Bolshevik tyranny is the worst, most destructive and degrading”
Winston Churchill, who during the 1919 Paris Peace Conference was the British Secretary of State for War and Air, was one of the few Allied leaders who understood that Lenin and his Bolsheviks were a new phenomenon on the political scene and that, behind the Marxist...
August 1917: The Government of Romania requests US support to continue the fight against the Central Powers
In the summer of 1917, Romania was in an extremely difficult situation. Even though the Romanian army, supported by Russia, managed to achieve three extremely important victories against the Central Powers, at Mărăști, Mărășești and Oituz, the Romanian authorities...
The withdrawal of the Romanian army to Russia, an impossible option in the summer of 1917
In the summer of 1917, uncertainty prevailed among Romanian authorities. Despite the recovery of the army, after the catastrophic defeats in the autumn of the previous year, and some important victories against the Central Powers at Mărășești, Mărăști and Oituz,...
The mechanism of a decision: Why did Romania enter the First World War in the summer of 1916?
The entry of Romania into the First World War was not a reaction to the military situation in the summer of 1916, not even to the offensive of the Tsarist troops led by General Brusilov. It was the result of a political decision calculated to take a decisive step in...
Romania in the geo-strategic architecture after the First World War
Romania after the First World War was a profoundly changed country. The scars of the war were still felt, healed only by the fulfilment of its war objectives, namely the incorporation of the territories inhabited by Romanians from Austria-Hungary (with the notable...