ABSTRACT
The treaty, and agreements subsequent to the treaty, had postponed until May 1921 the settlement - the final settlement as it was called with unconscious irony - of Germany's liability for reparations. For France, which depended so much less than we did on international trade, the war was not over and done with until it had been paid for. The fruits of victory must be gathered to the very last apple on the tree. If they could not be gathered in the form of reparation payments they must be gathered in some other form. Reparation was, after all, only a problem of compensation for past wrongs. Much more important was the establishment of the Rule of Right for the future, and it was to secure this that the League of Nations had been set up. Poland was annoyed by the establishment of an independent Lithuania since Lithuania had been united with the Polish state.
