Harshest treaty of Versailles possible

I think you are mistaken. Adding all of Schlesswick-Holstein to Denmark will be problematic. The people in southern Schleswick and certainly in Holstein want to be Germans not Danish. I didn't want to create an easy peace, I just wanted to create a harsh peace.

I just wanted to say that I think this is the least problematic bit. Compared with how someone from Baden thought about the French, the Holsteiners loved the Danes.
 
"Good argument"? That's just idiotic French wishful thinking. The Rhineland was just as German as, say, Hesse or Thuringia. The sheer idiocy of lunatics like Clemenceau who expected to be greeted as liberators in Mainz or Koblenz just amazes me.

In the 1919 peace conference for a few weeks people were active in looking into the claims that a "Rhineland" people in fact existed including Americans. This says to me that the idea of what Germany was is not so cut and dry as you make it. Do recall Germany is only 42 years old in 1919 and people Wilson, Orlando, Lyod George, and all the rest could remember a time when there was German states and not Germany.

Wilson's idea of self determination accepted such actions that one could be consider German but have a different culture.
 
Before Germany unified (which was, after all, the will of the majority of the population of ALL German states which later formed the German Empire), the Rhineland spent the time between 1815 and 1870 as Prussian/Bavarian provinces, and not independent in any way. I can only repeat what I have said earlier, their was about as much legitimate desire for independence anywhere north of the Alsace-Lorraine border as in Mecklenburg, Hesse, Thurinigia or Schaumburg-Lippe, and that was simply none at all. A plebiscite in the Rhineland between Germany, independence, or, even worse in the eyes of the people, annexation by France would give Germany a result of somewhere in between 99.9 and 99.99%.
 
Before Germany unified (which was, after all, the will of the majority of the population of ALL German states which later formed the German Empire), the Rhineland spent the time between 1815 and 1870 as Prussian/Bavarian provinces, and not independent in any way. I can only repeat what I have said earlier, their was about as much legitimate desire for independence anywhere north of the Alsace-Lorraine border as in Mecklenburg, Hesse, Thurinigia or Schaumburg-Lippe, and that was simply none at all. A plebiscite in the Rhineland between Germany, independence, or, even worse in the eyes of the people, annexation by France would give Germany a result of somewhere in between 99.9 and 99.99%.

Okay but that does not mean that some group of fellows would not decide to create a nation. Power makes people greedy. More over the idea for the Rhineland Republic was to be a nation would would recieve economic loans, pay nothing to the Allies, and have a very clean slate. All you need is some politicans willing to be a puppet, and nothing says that is impossible.

To me the Rhineland has a shot but would require a lot of occupation for a few years. Yet such a thing makes France and Belgium happy which could count for more than what the "people" wanted.
 
Yeah, of course you can create a puppet republic as soon as some local traitors are willing to prostitute themselves, but that puppet state will last exactly as long as France is willing to prop it up with bayonets against its own inhabitants. And, frankly speaking, nobody cares about whether the puppet government pays any reparations or not.
 
Before Germany unified (which was, after all, the will of the majority of the population of ALL German states which later formed the German Empire), the Rhineland spent the time between 1815 and 1870 as Prussian/Bavarian provinces, and not independent in any way. I can only repeat what I have said earlier, their was about as much legitimate desire for independence anywhere north of the Alsace-Lorraine border as in Mecklenburg, Hesse, Thurinigia or Schaumburg-Lippe, and that was simply none at all. A plebiscite in the Rhineland between Germany, independence, or, even worse in the eyes of the people, annexation by France would give Germany a result of somewhere in between 99.9 and 99.99%.


Well, over 90% anyway.

The Saar plebiscite in 1935 gave just over 90% for return to Germany, against under 10% for staying under League of Nations control. There's no reason to suppose that the rest of the Rhineland felt any differently.

Iirc about 0.4% voted for union with France, but I suppose every place has its lunatic fringe. :)
 
Well, over 90% anyway.

The Saar plebiscite in 1935 gave just over 90% for return to Germany, against under 10% for staying under League of Nations control. There's no reason to suppose that the rest of the Rhineland felt any differently.

Iirc about 0.4% voted for union with France, but I suppose every place has its lunatic fringe. :)

The reason that 10% voted for staying under LoN control was that Germany in 1935 was ruled by the Nazis and those 10% had no desire to be ruled by evil incarnate. If Weimar had lasted until the plebiscite, I guess the OTL LoN votes would have gone to Germany as well, therefore making the result in the most Francophile region of the Rhineland 99.6% for Germany.
 
-Saarland would be given directly to France with no plebesite
-Rhineland is made an independent state under Entente occupation without plebesite
-All Polish-German plebesite territory is given directly to Poland
-East Prussia is broken off as an independent state under Franco-British occupation (the French occupied Memel OTL, so its not too far off)
-Denmark is given Schleswig and Holstein in their entirety
-Hamburg is made an "International City" under Franco-British occupation
-A new government is set up in Germany that is staunchly pro-Entente and ruthlessly crushes all nationalist movements
-the creation of a 40-mile-wide German-only DMZ running from the Holland to the Swiss frontier on the east bank of the Rhine (the Entente could still militarize in this belt)
-The Ruhr is used to pay back reparations
-capital is moved from Berlin to Frankfurt, inside the German DMZ
-a force of 100,000 Entente troops to be stationed in bases around Germany, including major cities
-no German company may exceed a certain growth limit
-the mark is set at a permanent 50-1 ratio with the French franc
-the Kaiser and the top government officials are sent into exile on the Falkland Islands
-all international trade must be conducted on Entente-approved ships, and no ships may enter or leave Germany without Entente clearance
-no public gatherings of over 75 invididuals are tolerated
-the German army is limited to a 25,000 man "police force," that is trained to only be effectively operational while in union with Entente forces
-Germany is allowed no tanks, warships, planes, zepplins, artillery, or rockets. All rifles carried by the German Army had to be pre-Great War make, and only small calibre, bolt action rifles were to be issued. No machine guns are permitted
-there is a strict population control limit on the German population
-large Entente propaganda radio, publications, and films are produced
-German school systems are under the control of the Entente
-30% of all profits of all corporations, industry, or farmers must go to reparations to the Entente
 
What you need for a really harsh *Versailles is for a non-Communist Russia to survive to the end of the war: without the fear of Red Revolution, there will be less trepidation about forcible intervention in German affairs, and with Russian forces as well as French ones available to send in, less worry about in terms of actual military difficulties.

Bruce
 
Loose the USA

One thing that could make the treaty even harsher is finding a way to get the USA to walk away from the negotiations early on, or be really mad at Germany. Either one removes whatever voice of restraint Wilson might have.

Alternatively, a fairly major unit violates the armistice in a big way.
 
Territory-Wise, this is about as harsh as I can imagine them going.

harshversaillestreaty.gif



East Prussia is its own nation. The Domestic measures have largely been covered by now in regards to............there extent.
 
Worst Possible Treaty of Versailles:

1. Making the various states that made up Germany independent states.
2. Restore Poland's pre-partition (1790s) borders.
3. Restore Alsace-Lorraine to France.
4. Carve up the German colonial territories between Belgium, France and Japan.
 

loughery111

Banned
I think the operative phrase here is "can force Germany to accept." Frankly, the Western Allies were completely exhausted and the Eastern flank was gone entirely. Germany was marginally worse off, but only marginally... and the US will to enforce a treaty even harsher than OTL was simply not there. I could, quite frankly, see the USA withdrawing its forces from Europe if the French or British tried to force through a treaty much harsher than the real one. At best, the French might get the Saarland, the Poles might get bits of East Prussia, and the Czech border might be a little more favorable to them... Trying to dismember the country further would have resulted in resumption of the war without American support, at which point no one really can do anything to the other side. Without the USN, U-Boats are a credible threat to the UK again, so they and Germany are blockading one another quite tightly... France and the UK alone can't take down the Reichsheer in any reasonable timeframe.
 
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