Article 231 of the Treaty of Versailles
Article 231, often known as the war guilt clause, was the opening article of the reparations section of the Treaty of Versailles, which ended the First World War between the German Empire and the Allied and Associated Powers. The article did not use the word guilt but it served as a legal basis under which Germany was to pay reparations for damages caused during the war.
Article 231 was one of the most controversial points of the treaty. It specified:
Many German commentators viewed this clause as a national humiliation, forcing Germany to accept full responsibility for causing the war. German politicians were vocal in their opposition to the article in an attempt to generate international sympathy, while German historians worked to undermine the article with the objective of subverting the entire treaty. The Allied leaders were surprised at the German reaction; they saw the article only as a necessary legal basis to extract compensation from Germany. The article, with the signatory's name changed, was also included in the treaties signed by Germany's allies who did not view the clause with the same disdain as the Germans did. American diplomat John Foster Dulles—one of the two authors of the article—later regretted the wording used, believing it further aggravated the German people.
The historical consensus is that responsibility or guilt for the war was not attached to the article. Rather, the clause was a prerequisite to allow a legal basis to be laid out for the reparation payments that were to be made. Historians have also highlighted the unintended offence created by the clause, which caused anger and resentment amongst the German population.
Background
Course of the war
On 28 June 1914, Bosnian Serb youngster Gavrilo Princip assassinated the heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, in Sarajevo. The assassination was part of a plot conceived by the Pan-Slavic nationalist organization Young Bosnia and supported by the Black Hand, a secret society founded by senior Serbian military and intelligence officials. The assassination caused a diplomatic crisis, resulting in Austria-Hungary declaring war on Serbia. Declaration of war was supported by the German government, who then declared war on and invaded France and neutral Belgium, ultimately leading to the outbreak of the First World War. For a variety of reasons, within weeks the major powers of Europe—divided into two alliances known as the Central Powers and the Triple Entente—went to war. As the conflict progressed, additional countries from around the globe became drawn into the conflict on both sides.Fighting would rage across Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Asia for the next four years. On 8 January 1918, United States President Woodrow Wilson issued a statement that became known as the Fourteen Points. In part, this speech called for the Central Powers to withdraw from the territories they had occupied, for the creation of a Polish state, the redrawing of Europe's borders along ethnic lines, and the formation of a League of Nations. During the northern-hemisphere autumn of 1918, the Central Powers began to collapse. The German military suffered a decisive defeat on the Western Front, while on the Home Front the Imperial German Navy mutinied, prompting uprisings in Germany which became known as the German Revolution. The German government attempted to obtain a peace settlement based on the Fourteen Points, and maintained it was on this basis that Germany surrendered. Following negotiations, the Allied Powers and Germany signed an armistice, which came into effect on 11 November while German forces were still positioned in France and Belgium.
The armistice
The text of the 11 November armistice include a commitment from Germany to pay "reparation for damage done" to the Allied countries.On 18 January 1919 the Paris Peace Conference began. The conference aimed to establish peace between the war's belligerents and to establish the post-war world. The Treaty of Versailles resulting from the conference had solely with Germany. This treaty, along with the others that were signed during the conference, each took their name from the suburb of Paris where the signings took place. While 70 delegates from 26 nations participated in the Paris negotiations, representatives from Germany were barred from attending, nominally over fears that a German delegation would attempt to play one country off against the other and unfairly influence the proceedings.
Writing of the article
The Americans, British and French all differed on the issue of reparations settlement. The Western Front had been fought in France, and that countryside had been heavily scarred in the fighting. France's most industrialized region in the north-east had been laid to waste during the German retreat. Hundreds of mines and factories were destroyed along with railroads, bridges and villages. Georges Clemenceau, the Prime Minister of France, thought it appropriate that any just peace required Germany to pay reparations for the damage they had caused. He also saw reparations as a means to ensure that Germany could not again threaten France and as well to weaken the German ability to compete with France's industrialization. Reparations would also go towards the reconstruction costs in other countries, such as Belgium, also directly affected by the war. British Prime Minister David Lloyd George opposed harsh reparations in favour of a less crippling reparations settlement so that the German economy could remain a viable economic power and British trading partner. He furthermore argued that reparations should include war pensions for disabled veterans and allowances to be paid to war widows, which would reserve a larger share of the reparations for the British Empire. Wilson opposed these positions, and was adamant that there be no indemnity imposed upon Germany.During the peace conference the Commission on the Responsibility of the Authors of the War and on Enforcement of Penalties was established to examine the background of the war. The Commission reasoned that the "war was premeditated by the Central Powers ... and was the result of acts deliberately committed to make it unavoidable", concluding that Germany and Austria-Hungary had "deliberately worked to defeat all the many conciliatory proposals made by the Entente Powers and their repeated efforts to avoid war." This conclusion was duly incorporated into the Treaty of Versailles, led by Clemenceau and Lloyd George who were both insistent on the inclusion of an unequivocal statement of Germany's total liability. This left Wilson at odds with the other leaders of the conference. Instead, he proposed a repetition of a note sent by United States Secretary of State Robert Lansing to the German Government on 5 November 1918, stating that the "Allied Governments ... understand that compensation will be made by Germany for all damage done to the civilian population of the Allies and their property by the aggression of Germany ..."
The actual wording of the article was chosen by American diplomats Norman Davis, and Secretary of State Robert Lansing's nephew, John Foster Dulles. Davis and Dulles produced a compromise between the Anglo-French and American positions, wording Article 231 and 232 to reflect that Germany "should, morally, pay for all war costs, but, because it could not possibly afford this, would be asked only to pay for civilian damages." Article 231, in which Germany accepted the responsibility of Germany and its allies for the damages resulting from the First World War, therefore served as a legal basis for the articles following it within the reparations chapter, obliging Germany to pay compensation limited to civilian damages. Similar clauses, with slight modification in wording, were present in the peace treaties signed by the other members of the Central Powers.
Reaction
German interpretation
headed the 180-strong German peace delegation. They departed Berlin on 18 April 1919, anticipating that the peace talks would soon start and that they and the Allied Powers would negotiate a settlement. Earlier, in February of that year, Brockdorff-Rantzau had informed the Weimar National Assembly that Germany would have to pay reparations for the devastation caused by the war, but would not pay for actual war costs. The German government had also taken the position that it would be "inadvisable ... to elevate the question of war guilt". On 5 May, Brockdorff-Rantzau was informed that there would be no negotiations. Once the German delegation received the conditions of peace they would have fifteen days to reply. Following the drafting of the treaty, on 7 May the German and Allied delegations met and the Treaty of Versailles was handed off to be translated and for a response to be issued. At this meeting Brockdorff-Rantzau stated that "We know the intensity of the hatred which meets us, and we have heard the victors' passionate demand that as the vanquished we shall be made to pay, and as the guilty we shall be punished". However, he proceeded to deny that Germany was solely responsible for the war. Following the meeting, the German delegation retired to translate the 80,000 word document. As soon as the delegation realized the terms of peace, they agreed that they could not accept it without revision. They then proceeded to send their Allied counterparts, message after message attacking each part of the treaty. On 18 June, having disregarded the repeated explicit decisions of the government, Brockdorff-Rantzau declared that Article 231 would have Germany accept full responsibility for the war by force. Max Weber, an advisor with the German delegation, agreed with Brockdorff-Rantzau, also challenging the Allies over the issue of war guilt. He preferred to reject the treaty than submit to what he called a "rotten peace".On 16 June, the Allied Powers demanded that Germany unconditionally sign the treaty within seven days or face the resumption of hostilities. The German government was divided on whether to sign or reject the peace treaty. On 20 June, Chancellor Philipp Scheidemann resigned rather than sign the treaty and was followed by Brockdorff-Rantzau and other members of the government. After being advised by Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg that Germany was in no condition to resume the war, President Friedrich Ebert and the new Chancellor, Gustav Bauer, recommended that the Weimar National Assembly ratify the treaty. The Assembly did so by a large majority, and Clemenceau was informed nineteen minutes before the deadline expired. Germany unconditionally signed the peace treaty on 28 June.
Initially, Article 231 was not correctly translated. Rather than stating "... Germany accepts responsibility of Germany and her allies causing all the loss and damage ...", the German Government's edition read "Germany admits it, that Germany and her allies, as authors of the war, are responsible for all losses and damages ...". Germans felt that they the country had signed away her honor, and there was a prevailing belief of humiliation as the article was seen, overall, as an injustice. Historian Wolfgang Mommsen commented that despite the public outrage, German government officials were aware "that Germany's position on this matter was not nearly so favorable as the imperial government had led the German public to believe during the war." Additionally, although the article was in a different section entitled "Reparations", the placing of Article 231 in numerical order after Articles 227-230, which dealt with war crimes trials and were based on the report of the Allied Commission for Responsibility, linked Article 231 in the mind of the Germans to this report and by extension their responsibility for the war, rather than to damages caused by Germany during the war. Article 231 was instead based on the report of the Commission on Reparation of Damage.