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From Versailles to war, 1918-1939

Twenty years after the "war to end all wars", Europe was at war again. This guide follows the three big questions: was the peace fair, why did the League of Nations fail, and why did war break out in 1939?

It fits AQA's Conflict and tension: The inter-war years, 1918-1939, and it's useful background for any course on Germany.

Part 1: The peace treaties

The Big Three wanted different things

Georges Clemenceau (France) wanted Germany weak, so it could never invade again, and to pay for the damage in northern France.
David Lloyd George (Britain) wanted Germany punished, which British voters demanded, but not so harshly that it couldn't trade with Britain or would want revenge.
Woodrow Wilson (USA) wanted a fair peace based on his Fourteen Points, including self-determination for nations and a League of Nations to keep the peace.

The terms of the Treaty of Versailles, 28 June 1919

An easy way to remember the terms is LAMB:

Land: Alsace-Lorraine went to France, land went to Poland (including the "Polish Corridor"), the Saar was run by the League for 15 years, and Germany lost its colonies. Union with Austria (Anschluss) was banned.
Army: cut to 100,000 men, with no tanks, no air force and no submarines, and only six battleships. The Rhineland was demilitarised.
Money: reparations, set in 1921 at £6,600 million.
Blame: Article 231, the "war guilt" clause, made Germany accept responsibility for the war.

Germans called it a Diktat, a dictated peace, because they had no say in it. Many believed the army had been "stabbed in the back" by politicians, so the treaty felt even more unjust. The other defeated countries signed separate treaties: Saint-Germain (Austria), Neuilly (Bulgaria), Trianon (Hungary) and Sèvres (Turkey).

Was it fair? Argue it was harsh (lost land and people, war guilt, reparations hit an already weak economy), then argue it could have been worse (Germany stayed united, kept most of its industry, and its treaty with Russia in 1918 had been harsher still). Then judge.

Try our Versailles card sort (PowerPoint): sort 16 arguments into fair and unfair, then make your own judgement.

Part 2: The League of Nations

The League started work in January 1920, based in Geneva. Members promised to settle disputes by talking, and to use collective security: if one member was attacked, all would act together, first with moral pressure, then economic sanctions, and in theory with force.

Its weaknesses were there from the start:

The USA never joined, even though Wilson had proposed it.
Germany was let in only in 1926 and the USSR only in 1934.
It had no army of its own, and decisions had to be unanimous.
Britain and France, its leading members, put their own interests first.

The 1920s: some real successes

The League settled disputes over the Åland Islands (1921) and Upper Silesia (1921), and stopped a Greek invasion of Bulgaria in 1925. Its agencies did lasting work: helping refugees and prisoners of war get home, fighting diseases and improving working conditions. But it failed when a stronger power was involved, as when Italy bullied Greece over Corfu in 1923. Agreements made outside the League, like the Locarno Treaties (1925) and the Kellogg-Briand Pact (1928), created a mood of hope.

For a two-page summary of this decade, download Why was there no major war in the 1920s? (PDF).

The 1930s: two fatal failures

Manchuria, 1931-33. Japan invaded Manchuria in China. The League's Lytton Report took a year and condemned Japan, which simply left the League in 1933.
Abyssinia, 1935-36. Mussolini's Italy invaded Abyssinia (Ethiopia). The League's sanctions didn't include oil, and the Suez Canal stayed open to Italian ships. When news leaked of the Hoare-Laval plan to give Italy much of Abyssinia, the League lost its credibility.

The Great Depression made everything worse: countries turned inward and were less willing to pay for sanctions or war.

Part 3: The road to war

1933	Hitler takes Germany out of the League and the Disarmament Conference
1935	The Saar votes to rejoin Germany; Hitler announces conscription; Anglo-German Naval Agreement
1936	German troops march into the Rhineland (March); Germany and Italy back Franco in the Spanish Civil War
1938	Anschluss with Austria (March); Munich Agreement gives Germany the Sudetenland (September)
1939	Germany takes the rest of Czechoslovakia (March); Nazi-Soviet Pact (23 August); Germany invades Poland (1 September); Britain and France declare war (3 September)

Appeasement

Appeasement was the British and French policy of giving Hitler some of what he wanted to avoid war. Neville Chamberlain, Prime Minister from 1937, is most linked to it.

Reasons for it: memories of the First World War, a feeling that Versailles had been too harsh, Britain wasn't ready to fight and needed time to rearm, fear of communism more than of Hitler, and the cost of war during the Depression.

Arguments against it: each success made Hitler bolder, Czechoslovakia's strong army and defences were given away at Munich, and the USSR was left out and turned to Germany instead.

Exam tip. For "Was Hitler's foreign policy the main cause of the war?", weigh Hitler against appeasement, the failures of the League, the Treaty of Versailles and the Nazi-Soviet Pact. Most strong answers argue Hitler was the main cause, but the other factors gave him the chance.

Updated 18 October 2026