Causes And Effects Of The Treaty Of Versailles

Section B: Summary of Evidence
Occupation:
The French invade the Ruhr Valley because the Germans where unable to pay back the reparations on schedule. They decided to take the money owed to them by force through the mines located in the Ruhr Valley. The US and Britain tried to negotiate with France to prevent the invasion but France refused (“Ruhr Valley Occupation”). The occupation angered the Germans since it took away their way to pay back reparations through natural resources. This lead to the Germany's decision to sabotage their own equipment so that the French could not use it (Llewellyn). The occupation caused the German's to refuse to work with or for the French and would have rather been out of work than anything. However, this caused
an economic shut down, the money became worthless and brought on a famine (Fischer).
Reparations:
The Treaty of Versailles imposed severe reparations on to Germany, because the French demand such extreme measures to be taken (“Ruhr Crisis”).
France's goal was to weaken Germany as much as possible so that they would be unable to invade France again. While their allies favored a reasonable amount of reparations to be paid in order to continue trading with Germany (“Ruhr Crisis, Locarno and the Locarno Spring”). They also required full compliance to the set schedule which was almost impossible to keep up with. Even though their allies the US and Britain were against the outrageous reparations and favored a relaxation(“Ruhr Crisis”). This caused the French to lose all diplomatic support from the United States (Nolan, 942).The force used to take over the Ruhr Valley caused for the Germans to cancel all reparations, and to not work for them at all. The French had wanted to directly collect the reparations through the mines with an additional cash payment. This eventually lead to the hyperinflation leaving Germany with worthless money which degraded the international community (Nolan, 432).Eventually the US and Britain along with others were able to extend the reparations payments with the Dawes Plan, to help restore German's economy (“Ruhr Crisis”). In addition, the young plan was also used to help lower the reparations to $26 million, the Germans quickly agreed to this but the French was completely against any leeway with the Germans (Young). The French were not worried
about possible effects upon the international community they were only concerned with receiving their payments and also paying back the US (“Ruhr Crisis, Locarno and the Locarno Spring”).

Isolationism:
Follow World War I the United States wanted to stay completely out of international affairs and became isolationists (“American Isolationism”).
This was the United States reasoning for not joining the League of Nations, they believed it would require them to deal with international problems that could cause another war (“US Isolationism 1920s”). Since the US was not a member of the League of Nations it made it more difficult for the League to handle the Ruhr Crisis. Thus the US could not be forced to handle the situation and others with less military resources made little to no impact trying to attain reparations (“American Isolationism”). The League was unable to create lasting peace without the US, the members were left to decided what they wanted to do rather than what needed to be done. There was not way to force a country to take action and there was no help available when the reparations stopped being paid and there was risk of invasion (“World War
II”).