Was The Treaty Of Versailles Fair?

The Versailles Settlement actually satisfied no one. Also, the American Senate was so disappointed by Versailles that they refused to confirm it. The British delegation thought it was 'neither just or wise'. The French were disappointed that Germany remained potentially powerful, and invaded only 2 years later. Nobody was satisfied by the Treaty, least of all the Germans, who would not have agreed to any of the outcomes advocated by the Great Powers, since they all fell short of Wilson's Fourteen Points of 1917. However, the Treaty satisfied no one because it was a compromise between very different aims, and was skilfully negotiated to acheive something out of an impossible situation. A compromise peace was thought to be better than no peace at all. Certainly the Peace was unfair to Germany, because Germany had lost the war. Even President Wilson supported justice less than he had before about 300,000 American soldiers had died. Clemenceau demanded revenge for the 1, 4000,000 French dead, which it was thought gave France, rather than Germany the moral right to demand resitution, because Germany had started the war and then lost it. Thus the Peace would be fairer to French losses than to German - it could never be fair to both. Equally, fairness was seen in the weakening of Germany's ability to attack France, rather in the application of the 'fair' principle of 'self-determination', which would have enlarged Germany by adding Austria. So the Peace was bound to be unfair to Germany. Was the Peace unfair because it satisfied no one? No, because the satisfaction of e.g. French desires, could only be at the cost of being more unfair to Germany, and more disobliging to American aims. Equally the other way round, the peace which would have dissatisfied the Allies most, was to have left German power intact.

On 15th Feb every year, all schools commemorate Total Defence Day.

a) Do you think it is relevant? Why?

I think that Total Defence is about the different things that we can do everyday in every sector of our society to strengthen our resilience as a nation. When we take National Service seriously, participate in civil emergency exercises, upgrade our skills, build strong bonds with different races and religions, and feel the pride of being Singaporean, we contribute to Total Defence.

Is history and the study of it important?

History is actually the study of the past and it is important for all of us to understand it, so that we can learn from the mistakes in the past and avoid them in the future. As such, I think that we have to improve ourselves to suit this competitive society and History also teaches us valuable and important lessons in which other subjects doesn't offer. It also let us learn more about the people, generations and the development of our ever-changing society. History also provides us with unlimited knowledge from the past, and that we can apply such knowledge in our daily lives, be it solutions to problems we face or to think of creative and fresh ideas.
Many people do not like to learn History and they don't know how to appreciate it. They think that History is boring which is just being about studying dead people or other forms of remnants. History on the other hand requires some kind of critical skill-thinking and improves our level of understanding through exercises like Source-based questions. These questions include using or making an inference, staing the purpose and also looking out for evdences to support it. It lets us decipher whether whether a sorce or rather, a report is reliable or not. then it also sometimes state whether it is a fact or opinion.
So, all in all, I personally feel that the study of History is counted as necesssary because, it not only improves our live skills, it also trains us to be a better person in future. This is actually my first time doing a blog so don't expect much from this......=)