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The Treaty of Versailles
The Treaty of Versailles is imposed on defeated Germany by Britain, France, and The United States. Germany is forced to give territory to France, Poland, Denmark, and Belgium. Germany also must limit their army to 100,000 men, keep troops out of its western territories, and make heavy reparation payments for the damage that they caused in the war. -
League of Nations
The United States wanted to create some sort of world security organization. They recruit some other nations like France, Italy, and England to the idea that they had. When The League of Nations was created, The US actually didn't join because they didn't really want to be involved with the war even though they wanted to set up an organization. Russia and Germany were not involved with this group. -
Communist International
In the fall of 1920 the communist movement throughout the nations in Europe started to rise due to the Comintern, which was founded in March of 1919. -
Fascism in Italy
When Benito Mussolini took power in Italy he had achieved some of his goals.He and his ideas had started to gain some popularity throughout the nation. He wanted to bring Italy back to greatness and make them one of the leading powers in the world. The took control of the government without firing a shot. He started to share his beliefs with the entire country which was slowly making it a contending power -
Hopeful Years
In Europe, many countries had slowly recovered from The Great Depression. May people had a good feeling of life and people tried to make things better. Different countries started to reach out to each other to make amends. Treaties and agreements were made to increase relations and ease reparations. Germany was admitted into the League of Nations during this time. -
Stalin in Power of Russia
When Lenin died, Stalin rose to power in Russia. When Stalin defeated his last major political rival for power and take full control of the nation. Throughout the country he tries to make Russia an industrial power house. He used purges and the fear of what the government would do to keep people in line and make them meet production quotas. He also spread out his communist beliefs with everyone in the nation as well as outside of it. -
The Great Depression
In October the stock market crashed in the United States. Stock value was at an all time low and the amount of money for the demand was out of balance. This ends of causing a worldwide depression because of countries that the US were helping. When the depression hit, the US didn't have enough money to support itself. The depression was the worst in 1931 but it started to end near the end of 1929. In some places the depression lasted much longer and had lasting effects on some countries. -
Japan Invades Manchuria
Japan was not considered when The Treaty of Versailles was created back in June of 1919. In 1931, they invaded Manchuria in an undeclared war. The League of Nations tried to limit and constrain Japan but the attempts failed. This weakened the trust that people had in The League of Nations. -
Third Reich
Adolf Hitler becomes Chancellor of Germany. Within a couple of months the Nazi party had full command of the entire country. They started to expand their military against The Treaty of Versailles. He wants to start preparations for another war that will bring Germany back to power and gain reputation of being the strongest country -
Germany Starts To Go It Alone
9 months after Hitler had taken control of Germany he withdrew them from The League of Nations. He also leaves the disarmament conference. He has been building for a war and soon wants to act on his preparations.