What was wilsons plan for peace

Because she will use them as submarine bases, because she will arm the blacks, because she uses the colonies as bases of intrigue, because she oppresses the natives. What are the "equitable" claims put forth by Germany? That she needs access to tropical raw material, that she needs a field for the expansion of her population, that under the principles of the peace proposed, conquest gives her enemies no title to her colonies.

What are the "interests of the populations? It would seem as if the principle involved in this proposition is that a colonial power acts not as owner of its colonies but as trustee for the natives and for the interests of the society of nations, that the terms on which the colonial administration is conducted are a matter of international concern and may legitimately be the subject of international inquiry, and that the peace conference may, therefore, write a code of colonial conduct binding upon [all] colonial powers.

The evacuation of all Russian territory and such a settlement of all questions affecting Russia as will secure the best and freest cooperation of the other nations of the world in obtaining for her an unhampered and unembarrassed opportunity for the independent determination of her own political development and national policy and assure her of a sincere welcome into the society of free nations under institutions of her own choosing; and, more than a welcome, assistance also of every kind that she may need and may herself desire.

The treatment accorded Russia by her sister nations in the months to come will be the acid test of their goodwill, of their comprehension of her needs as distinguished from their own interests, and of their intelligent and unselfish sympathy.

The first question is whether Russian territory is synonymous with territory belonging to the former Russian Empire. This is clearly not so because proposition 13 stipulates an independent Poland, a proposal which excludes the territorial reestablishment of the Empire. What is recognized as valid for the Poles will certainly have to be recognized for the Finns, the Lithuanians, the Letts, and perhaps also for the Ukrainians.

Since the formulating of this condition, these subject nationalities have emerged, and there can be no doubt that they will have to be granted an opportunity of free development. The problem of these nationalities is complicated by two facts: 1 that they have conflicting claims; 2 that the evacuation called for in the proposal may be followed by Bolshevist revolutions in all of them.

The chief conflicts are: a between the Letts and Germans in Courland; b between the Poles and the Lithuanians on the northeast; c between the Poles and the White Ruthenians on the east; d between the Poles and the Ukrainians on the southeast and in eastern Galicia. In this whole borderland the relations of the German Poles [sic] to the other nationalities is roughly speaking that of landlord to peasant.

Therefore the evacuating of the territory, if it resulted in class war, would very probably also take the form of a conflict of nationalities.

It is clearly to the interests of a good settlement that the real nation in each territory should be consulted rather than the ruling and possessing class. This can mean nothing less than the [recognition] by the peace conference of a series of [de facto] governments representing Finns, Esths, Lithuanians, Ukrainians.

This primary [act] of recognition should be conditional upon the calling of national assemblies for the creation of de facto governments as soon as the peace conference has drawn frontiers for these new states.

The frontiers should be drawn so far as possible on ethnic lines, but in [every] case the right of unhampered economic [transit] should be reserved. No dynastic ties with German [or] Austrian or Romanov princes should be permitted, and every inducement should be [given] to encourage federal [relations] between these new states. Under proposition 3 the economic sections of the treaty of Brest-Litovsk are obliterated, but this proposition should not be construed as forbidding a customs union, a monetary union, a railroad union, etc.

Provision should also be made by which Great Russia can federate with these states on the same terms. As for Great Russia and Siberia, the peace conference might well send a message asking for the creation of a government sufficiently [representative] to speak for these territories.

It should be understood that economic rehabilitation is offered provided a government carrying sufficient credentials can appear at the peace conference. The Allies should offer this provisional government any form of assistance it may need. The possibility of extending this will exist when the Dardanelles are opened. The essence of the Russian problem then in the immediate future would seem to be: 1 the recognition of provisional governments; 2 assistance extended to and through these governments.

The Caucasus should probably be treated as part of the problem of the Turkish Empire. No information exists justifying an opinion on the proper policy in regard to Mohammedan Russia--that is, briefly, Central Asia. It may well be that some power will have to be given a limited mandate to act as protector.

In any case the treaties of Brest-Litovsk and Bucharest must be canceled as palpably fraudulent. Provision must be made for the withdrawal of all German troops in Russia and the peace conference [will] have a clean slate on which to write a policy for all the Russian peoples. Belgium, the whole world will agree, must be evacuated and restored without any attempt to limit the sovereignty which she enjoys in common with all other free nations. No other single act will serve as this will serve to restore confidence among the nations in the laws which they have themselves set and determined for the government of their relations with one another.

Without this healing act the whole structure and validity of international law is forever impaired. The only problem raised here is in the word "restored.

Return of Alsace-Lorraine region and all French territories. Readjust Italian borders Austria-Hungary to be provided an opportunity for self-determination Redraw the borders of the Balkan region creating Roumania, Serbia and Montenegro Creation of a Turkish state with guaranteed free trade in the Dardanelles Creation of an independent Polish state The United States was a reluctant belligerent in the Great War, and the Wilson administration did its best to remain neutral.

Finally, however, in response to entreaties from the Allies and a renewed German U-boat campaign, the United States declared war on the Central Powers in April The United States, however, had not been a party to any of those agreements, and President Woodrow Wilson desperately sought a basis for ending the war that would allow both sides to participate fully in building a lasting peace.

Both before and after American entry into the conflict, Wilson called on the belligerents to state their war aims. But since many of these aims involved territorial ambitions, both sides refused. Finally Wilson lost patience, and on January 8, , went before Congress to enunciate what he considered the basic premises of a just and lasting peace. The Fourteen Points, as the program came to be called, consisted of certain basic principles, such as freedom of the seas and open covenants, a variety of geographic arrangements carrying out the principle of self-determination, and above all, a League of Nations that would enforce the peace.

The Fourteen Points are important for several reasons. First of all, they translated many of the principles of American domestic reform, known as Progressivism, into foreign policy. Notions of free trade, open agreements, democracy and self-determination were mere variants of domestic programs that reformers had been supporting for two decades.

Second, the Fourteen Points constituted the only statement by any of the belligerents of their war aims. They thus became the basis for German surrender, and the only criteria by which to judge the peace treaty. Most important, where many countries believed that only self-interest should guide foreign policy, in the Fourteen Points Wilson argued that morality and ethics had to be the basis for the foreign policy of a democratic society.

While subsequent American governments have not always shared that belief, many American presidents have agreed with the Wilsonian belief in morality as a key ingredient in foreign as well as domestic policy.

It will be our wish and purpose that the processes of peace, when they are begun, shall be absolutely open and that they shall involve and permit henceforth no secret understandings of any kind. Harvey Milk, the first openly gay elected official in the history of California, takes his place on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors on January 8, The first and, for years, most visible openly gay politician in America, Milk was a longtime activist and pioneering Just two weeks after the signing of the Treaty of Ghent, U.

In September , an impressive American naval victory on Lake Champlain forced invading British forces On January 8, , Gabrielle Giffords, a U. Six people died in the attack and another 13, including Over 2, dignitaries, including President John F. Kennedy, came out that evening to view the famous painting. The next day, the Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei dies in Italy at age The first person to use a On January 8, , Allied forces stage a full retreat from the shores of the Gallipoli Peninsula in Turkey, ending a disastrous invasion of the Ottoman Empire.

The Gallipoli Campaign resulted in , Allied casualties and greatly discredited Allied military command. On January 8, , Oglala Lakota warrior Crazy Horse and his men—outnumbered, low on ammunition and forced to use outdated weapons to defend themselves—fight their final losing battle against the U.

Cavalry in Montana.