alternatehistory.com

…By the start of 1919 the death of the Hapsburg Empire was already sealed. December 1918 saw the Entente powers recognize at Pittsburgh a plan for a state for the Czechs and Slovaks, a Czechoslovakia, with an assembly for the Slovak minority established. The proposed state would contain a large German and Hungarian minority that would prove troublesome…

…As early as 1914 the Hungarian opposition had been willing to declare independence, as long as her territorial claims were recognized. The military success of the Central Powers had quieted Hungarian secessionism until the Fall of 1918 when it became clear that the war might be lost, and the economic damages inflicted by the war were becoming too great to bear. However the leader of the opposition, the pacifist Count Karolyi, was not yet ready to actively launch a revolt against the Hapsburg government. He was however willing to begin greater talks with the Entente…

…December of 1918 saw an agreement worked out between the Yugoslav committee that represented South Slavic interest abroad, the Serbian government in exile and the representatives of the opposition in Croatia, Slovenia and Bosnia. The three groups agreed to form a common state, a federation under the Karadordevic dynasty with constituent realms of Serbia, Slovenia, Bosnia and Croatia. Despite such a state being the goal of all parties involved, for the Serbian government it was a bitter pill to swallow, as they wanted a much stronger unitary state. However given that Serbia was a completely occupied nation whose only bargaining chip was a single corps of troops in Albania, they were forced to accept this compromise by their Entente backers.

The formal creation of a Yugoslav state would have to wait until the opposition in the Hapsburg Empire had a chance to successfully revolt…

…With victory now a real and distinct possibility within the year, the Entente began to look to the peace table. President Marshall, out of loyalty to Wilson, or his belief that his role required him to execute Wilson’s vision to the best of his abilities, supported a peace based on Wilson’s Fourteen Points. Certain elements of the Democratic party within the Senate were willing to agree with him on this matter, out of personal preference or loyalty to Wilson, and even a number of Republicans with strong internationalist sentiments agreed on it. Many minor nations and aspiring nationalities, the Czechs, Slovaks, Croats, and Armenians, agreed on the matter.

However even within the US there was great opposition. Some of it was purely personal, Woodrow Wilson had made a lot of enemies and many of them in the Senate were vindictive enough to oppose the matter out of pure spite. Others were more principled and based their opposition on their personal political views. Some were isolationist and were afraid of the proposed League of Nations and that it could draw the United States into a war without its consent and negatively impact its sovereignty in other ways. Still others feared that enforcement of some of the fourteen points could draw the United States into further fighting in the East, getting still more Americans killed, a view growing increasingly popular as the casualties mounted. Finally there were those with large Irish American and German American constituencies who were worried about their reelection chances.

In the other great powers their views of a peace treaty were rather different. In Britain there was perhaps the smallest difference in views, Lloyd George having done a similar speech a few days earlier that had been overshadowed by Wilson’s. Brtiain signed off on all points save the Freedom of the Seas, the idea of Britannia Ruling the Waves being too great to ignore. It was also Britain who first came up with the idea of forcing Germany to pay reparations, with Lloyd George wanting Germany to pay the pensions and medical costs for the British soldiers. Finally Britain wanted to eliminate both the heavy warships High Seas Fleet and the U-Boat arm, and further ensure Germany was never again able to threaten British naval supremacy.

For Italy they wanted rather more. They had done well through secret treaties and had no intention of repudiating them. They had paid much blood for the gains they had been promised, and had no intention of surrendering any of them in the name of self determination.

France was perhaps the strongest opponent of Wilson’s idea for a just peace. Clemenceau, upon hearing of Wilson’s points said, “The good lord had only ten!” Clemenceau, and the French as a whole, wanted to punish Germany. They had seen Germany win what was effectively an economic victory, with the war having devastated France while leaving Germany intact. To prevent this the French were determined to carve off as much territory as possible, no matter what the inhabitants thought of it and took up the British cause of reparations with a converts zeal. Furthermore, while it was Britain that was most insistent on the naval limitations, it was the French who wanted to abolish the German air force and reduce the German army to little more than a police force. Finally the French were the biggest proponents of intervening in the quagmire that was Russia, both to regain their greatest ally and to recoup part of the enormous amount they had invested in that country over the years.

Even Belgium was willing to compromise on the principal of self determination when it suited them, such as their demand for part of the neutral Netherlands, one which cost them quite a bit of sympathy when it came out…

-Excerpt from The Loss of Innocence: America in the Great War, Harper & Brothers, New York 2014