Keynes believed that the reparations being proposed at the time of writing in 1919 (the monetary value and terms of payment were not decided until the 1921 London schedule was agreed), would result in the ruin of the Europe.

Woodrow Wilson, the President of the United States, who represented his country at the conference, refused to countenance forgiveness of war debts and US Treasury officials would not even discuss the credit programme.

Very few of us realize with conviction the intensely unusual, unstable, complicated, unreliable, temporary nature of the economic organization by which Western Europe has lived for the last half century.

On this sandy and false foundation we scheme for social improvement and dress our political platforms, pursue our animosities and particular ambitions, and feel ourselves with enough margin in hand to foster, not assuage, civil conflict in the European family.

The projects and politics of militarism and imperialism, of racial and cultural rivalries, of monopolies, restrictions, and exclusion, which were to play the serpent to this paradise, were little more than the amusements of his daily newspaper, and appeared to exercise almost no influence at all on the ordinary course of social and economic life, the internationalization of which was nearly complete in practice.Keynes described the conference as a clash of values and world views of the principal leaders, pitting what has been called "the cynical traditions of European power politics [against] the promise of a more enlightened order.

You cannot restore Central Europe to 1870 without setting up such strains in the European structure and letting loose such human and spiritual forces as, pushing beyond frontiers and races, will overwhelm not only you and your "guarantees," but your institutions, and the existing order of your Society.Keynes describes Wilson as guardian of the hopes of men of good will of all nations.

With what curiosity, anxiety, and hope we sought a glimpse of the features and bearing of the man of destiny who, coming from the West, was to bring healing to the wounds of the ancient parent of his civilisation and lay for us the foundations of the future.

From the belief that essentially the old order does not change, being based on human nature which is always the same, and from a consequent scepticism of all that class of doctrine which the League of Nations stands for, the policy of France and of Clemenceau followed logically.

For a peace of magnanimity or of fair and equal treatment, based on such 'ideology' as the Fourteen Points of the President, could only have the effect of shortening the interval of Germany's recovery and hastening the day when she will once again hurl at France her greater numbers and her superior resources and technical skill.

Secondly, the Allies had committed themselves in the Armistice agreement to critical principles regarding reparations, territorial adjustments, and evenhandedness in economic matters, which were materially breached by the treaty.

The President's reply of 8 October asked if he was to understand definitely that the German government accepted 'the terms laid down' in the Fourteen Points and in his subsequent addresses and 'that its object in entering into discussion would be only to agree upon the practical details of their application.'

It is an imperative principle of action which statesmen will henceforth ignore at their peril.... Every territorial settlement involved in this war must be made in the interest and for the benefit of the populations concerned, and not as a part of any mere adjustment or compromise of claims amongst rival States.

'[16]Keynes points to the material violation of the terms regarding reparations, territorial adjustments, and an equitable economic settlement as a blot on the honour of the western allies and a primary cause of a future war.

One of the most serious charges Keynes levelled against the Treaty and the men who created it is that it paid almost no attention whatever to the economic future of Europe: The Treaty includes no provisions for the economic rehabilitation of Europe,– nothing to make the defeated Central Powers into good neighbors, nothing to stabilize the new states of Europe, nothing to reclaim Russia; nor does it promote in any way a compact of solidarity amongst the Allies themselves; no arrangement was reached at Paris for restoring the disordered finances of France and Italy, or to adjust the systems of the Old World and the New.The Council of Four paid no attention to these issues, being preoccupied with others,– Clemenceau to crush the economic life of his enemy, Lloyd George to do a deal and bring home something that would pass muster for a week, the President to do nothing that was not just and right.

[17]Keynes predicted the causes of high inflation and economic stagnation in postwar Europe: Lenin is said to have declared that the best way to destroy the Capitalist System was to debauch the currency.

Physical efficiency and resistance to disease slowly diminish, but life proceeds somehow, until the limit of human endurance is reached at last and counsels of despair and madness stir the sufferers from the lethargy which precedes the crisis.

... How each one of the points of that treaty could be branded in the minds and hearts of the German people until sixty million men and women find their souls aflame with a feeling of rage and shame; and a torrent of fire bursts forth as from a furnace, and a will of steel is forged from it, with the common cry: "We will have arms again!

The Allies should have either totally destroyed and dismembered Germany or else have made a sincere effort to make a fair and just peace with her and bring her into the family of nations as a full partner.

The events of the coming year will not be shaped by the deliberate acts of statesmen, but by the hidden currents, flowing continually beneath the surface of political history, of which no one can predict the outcome.

Keynes accepted this representation, and parts of the text of The Economic Consequences roughly parallel the language of the German counter-proposals to the draft Allied proposal of terms.

And like them, he stressed that the loss of Germany's merchant marine, her overseas assets, her coal-rich territories and her sovereignty in matters of trade policy severely limited her capacity to pay reparations.

[8] The historian Ruth Henig wrote in 1995 that "most historians of the Paris peace conference now take the view that, in economic terms, the treaty was not unduly harsh on Germany and that, while obligations and damages were inevitably much stressed in the debates at Paris to satisfy electors reading the daily newspapers, the intention was quietly to give Germany substantial help towards paying her bills, and to meet many of the German objections by amendments to the way the reparations schedule was in practice carried out".

[38] Sally Marks claimed in 2013 that for "nearly forty years, historians of twentieth-century diplomacy have argued that the Versailles treaty was more reasonable than its reputation suggests and that it did not of itself cause the Depression, the rise of Hitler, or World War II".

Gideon Rose, for instance, sees it as "more balanced" than it seemed at the time, and "a mixture of discordant elements that was neither Carthaginian nor Metternichian",[42] while Max Hastings calls the peace treaty "clumsy" but writes that "[I]f the Germans had instead been dictating the terms as victors, European freedom, justice and democracy would have paid a dreadful forfeit".

[43] David Stevenson argues that neither the Armistice nor the Peace Treaty made World War II inevitable – as claimed by many scholars – and that "the peacemakers have had an undeservedly bad press.

... [T]hey were feeling their way in unprecedented circumstances, but the settlement that was constructed was more flexible than its critics acknowledged, and could either have accommodated a lasting reconciliation with the new Republican regime in Germany or ensured that it remained militarily harmless.

"[44] This, of course, is antithetical to the arguments of Keynes, or at least his followers, who draw a direct line between the economic conditions created by the Peace Treaty and the rise of belligerent regimes in Europe.

[47] In 2024, a book edited by Patricia Clavin, Giancarlo Corsetti, Adam Tooze, and Maurice Obstfeld was published, arguing that despite being laser focused on issues current back in 1919, The Economic Consequences of the Peace remains relevant.

They argue this is in part due to Keynes's central theme having been the contest between "myopic nationalism" versu "peaceful economic integration", a topic that has become more pressing with recent developments.

[48] The 2024 work also notes that the overall highly favourable economic reception enjoyed by Consequences was due in part to its professional and thought-provoking nature, which "generated a broad-based alliance of the initiated across the spectrum".