An Irish Independent book of the year. Did the Versailles Peace Treaty cause World War II? The Versailles Peace Treaty — the pact that ended World War I between the German empire and the Allies — has long been regarded as one of the key causes of World War II. Its requirements for massive reparation payments, it is argued, crippled Germany’s economy, de-stabilised the country’s political life, and paved the way for Hitler. Here, Jürgen Tampke disputes this commonplace view, suggesting that Germany got away with its responsibility for World War I, that the treaty was nowhere...