دانلود کتاب The origins of World War Two

in 1918 the Western World lay bleeding and exhausted after the greatest catastrophe it had ever experienced. Four major Empires— Russia, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Turkey—had collapsed. Nations had been split and the former economic structures were in shreds.
Yet World War One had settled nothing. The basic problems of Europe remained and had even been aggravated by the massive convulsion of conflict. Germany still felt encircled, France still felt threatened by Germany.
World War One had been fought to make the world safe for democracy and for small nations, declared President Wilson. From the very start, the invasion of Serbia and Belgium had made small-state independence an inherent war issue. This independence issue became a major factor in the peacemaking process. Small nations were created from old Empires and given democratic rule. But they were flimsy, vulnerable—and potential sources of renewed conflict.
The creation of these nations reflected the hopes of the victors. The war had been fought which would end all wars. The task of the peacemakers was to translate this idealism into the terms of peace and into international affairs. President Wilson’s famous ‘Fourteen Points’ of 1917 and other optimistic declarations of principles by the Allies were used as the basis. (Extracts from the Fourteen Points appear at the end of this Chapter.)
And yet America, after putting her hand into European affairs and drawing it out again bloody, retired once more into her own Continent. President Wilson, after insisting on the importance of his Points, and after insisting that the equally idealistic Covenant of the League of Nations should form the first part of the Treaty of Versailles, over-estimated his support at home. The Treaty was signed on 28 June 1919. In November, the American Congress refused to ratify the Covenant. Wilson was desperately disappointed.