Versailles #68: American Matters
When Diplomacy Fails Podcast
Zack Twamley
4.8 • 773 Ratings
🗓️ 23 May 2019
⏱️ 47 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
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It's high time we considered the American angle once again. After several weeks of work, one would imagine that the American delegation and the American President would have their kinks all worked out by this stage, right? Unfortunately not. In fact, Woodrow Wilson faced several serious conflicts of interest and differences of opinion not only within the American delegation and the body politic back home, but also, so it seemed sometimes, from his old self. Wilson had undoubtedly been forced to compromise on several of his key ideals, and while he imagined that the League of Nations would justify these sacrifices for the sake of long term gains, there were those in his confidence that couldn't imagine allowing the President to get away with it.
Whether it was his inconsistency in treating the Italians over Fiume and the Japanese over Shantung, his inability to clarify what self-determination actually meant, or his consistent faux pas with each of the allied leaders, Wilson seemed a far cry from his triumphant, visionary self by mid-May 1919. In this episode, we'll get to grips with how his contemporaries and historians since weighed in on the question of Wilson's principles, from those he was willing to cling to relentlessly, and those which he seemed to throw aside as the German peace treaty loomed into view. If you want to be clued in on the latest developments in the American side, then this installment of our project is for you!
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello there, history friends. Zach Twomley here with the latest episode of the Versailles Anniversary Project. |
| 0:06.9 | Episode 67, in fact. We've been at this a long time and you know by now that the best way to get in contact with, inquire, support, this podcast, etc., etc., is to plug into all those different social media mediums, for lack of a better term. |
| 0:23.3 | Twitter and Facebook being the obvious too. |
| 0:25.6 | But maybe you've held off all this time because, to be quite honest with yourself, you're just |
| 0:29.5 | sick to death of Facebook and Twitter and not being able to get away from these things. |
| 0:34.5 | Maybe you'd like to go to a place where you can have a filter and essentially just look at what you want to look at and talk to people who are like-minded and interested in the |
| 0:42.0 | same things as you. If that sounds like you, or maybe if you like Twitter and Facebook, but you |
| 0:46.8 | want another way to join in the discussion with this podcast as well, then I would recommend the app |
| 0:51.6 | Flick. Flick is a great app because it helps us to talk to another about different topics that I can suggest, that you can suggest, that anyone can take part in. |
| 1:01.6 | The app itself is free to download, of course, and once you download it, and once you click on the link in the description of this podcast, you'll be taken to essentially the group |
| 1:12.3 | of this podcast where you can start taking part in all the relevant discussions. Every time I |
| 1:18.1 | release an episode, I'll also release a discussion talking about what was actually talked about |
| 1:24.0 | by me in that episode, if that makes sense. Maybe I'm not selling it that well, |
| 1:28.4 | but maybe you are interested. If you are, do click on the link in the description below. |
| 1:33.8 | Or search for the app, Flick, that's F-L-I-C-K, and don't put in Flickr by mistake because we're |
| 1:39.9 | not on that platform, and I don't plan on being on that platform, or Instagram for that matter, |
| 1:44.2 | trying to keep myself as grounded as possible. I am of course very active in all these social |
| 1:49.3 | media platforms and you may well be wondering what the heck is the point in joining yet another |
| 1:53.7 | one. But Flick is great because it helps you drown out the noise of all those people that you |
| 1:58.8 | may not really be all that interested in. |
| 2:05.0 | If Facebook is getting you down, if the only reason you're on Facebook is because of when diplomacy fails, who am I kidding? |
| 2:07.0 | Anyway, if the only reason you are on Facebook is because of your history friends, then you |
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