The Treaty of Saint-Germain of 1919 (for Hungary the Treaty of Trianon
of 1920) confirmed and consolidated the new order of Central Europe which
to a great part had been established in November 1918, creating new states
and resizing others. However, over 3 million German Austrians found
themselves living outside of the newborn Austrian Republic in the
respective states of Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Hungary and Italy.
Between 1918 and 1919, Austria was officially known as the State of German
Austria (Staat Deutschösterreich).
Not only did the Entente powers forbid German Austria to unite with
Germany, they also ignored the name German Austria in the peace treaty to
be signed; it was therefore changed to Republic of Austria in late 1919.

In 1918, as World
War I was drawing to a close, the French Government was determined to
increase the size of Belgian territory at the expense of Germany. The
French attempted to annex the Saarland and to persuade the neutral
Netherlands to exchange territory claimed by Belgium in 1830 but
relinquished in 1839 (Dutch Limburg and Zeeuws Vlaanderen) with German
territory that had once been Dutch (Bentheim, Emden and the land of
Cleve).

Frustrated in these attempts, the French sided with Belgium's claim to
the "lost" cantons of Eupen, Malmedy and Sankt Vith. In 1920,
the Treaty of Versailles awarded all the communities on a provisional
basis to Belgium. A five-year transition period under the command of the
Royal High Commissioner, General Herman Baltia, ensued. Under pressure
from the United States, whose war aims had included popular sovereignty,
a plebiscite was planned, and between 26 January and 23 July 1920, it
was held on Baltia's orders under Article 34 of the Treaty. However it
was not a secret ballot - inhabitants of the cantons who objected to the
annexation had to register (by name) at the village hall. This procedure
led to mass intimidation - people were led to believe that anyone
objecting to annexation by Belgium would not receive Belgian
nationality, but be deported to Germany or at least have their food
ration cards taken away.

The Schleswig
Plebiscites were two plebiscites, organized according to section XII,
articles 109 to 114 of the Treaty of Versailles of June 28, 1919, in
order to determine the future border between Denmark and Germany through
the former duchy of Schleswig. The process was monitored by a commission
with representatives from France, the United Kngdom, Norway and Sweden.

The Danish-ruled
Duchy of Schleswig had been conquered by Prussia and Austria in the 1864
Second War of Schleswig along with the Danish-ruled German provinces of
Holstein and Lauenburg. Article 5 of the Austro-Prussian Peace of Prague
stipulated that a plebiscite should be held within 6 years to give the
people of the northern part of Schleswig the possibility of voting
between staying German or separating parts of Schleswig and
repartitioning them to Denmark, an arrangement already denied by Denmark
after the war of 1848 and again after the war of 1864, and then dropped
completely in 1878 in the Treaty of Gastein between Austria and Imperial
Germany. The border was respected later by both Denmark and Germany in
the Optant Treaty of Copenhagen 1907. After the defeat of Germany in
World War I Germany was forced to accept a plebiscite whose unilateral
conditions then were defined by Denmark.

The plebiscites
were held in two zones that were defined by Denmark according to the
ideas of the Danish historian Hans Victor Clausen. Zone I was
dimensioned as far towards the South as possible, therefore changing the
Clausen-Line southerly from Tondern instead of northerly, and had to
vote en bloc, i.e. as a unit with the majority deciding, while in the
following smaller Zone II each municipality was to decide its own
allegiance, this procedure allowing Denmark to gain further territory
and put the frontier further southwards according to eventual majorities
in northern municipalities.

The first
plebiscite was held in Zone I, the later Northern Schleswig on February
10, 1920. 74.9 % (75,431 votes) of the public voted to come under
Danish rule, 25.1 % (25,329 votes) to stay German, although in
three of the four major towns and especially in the southern region
directly at the frontier to Zone II German majorities existed,
especially a large German majority between 70 and 80 percent in and
around Tønder and Højer. It was mostly this area that caused
discussions after the voting, especially as this area had been regarded
also by Clausen to be south of an imaginary German-Danish border.

Central Schleswig
(Zone II) voted on March 14, 1920. 80.2 % (51,742 votes) fell to
Germany, 19.8 % (12,800) to Denmark. Since a Danish majority in
this zone was only produced in three small villages on the island of Föhr
not aligned with the coming border, the Commission Internationale de
Surveillance du Plébiscite Slésvig decided on a line almost completely
identical to the border between the two zones. The poor result for
Denmark in Central Schleswig - particularly in Flensburg, Schleswig's
largest city - triggered Denmark's 1920 Easter Crisis. A plebiscite was
not held in the southernmost third of the province as there was no doubt
about the outcome.

The East Prussia(n)
plebiscite (German: Abstimmung in Ostpreußen),
also known as the Allenstein and Marienwerder plebiscite or Warmia,
Masuria and Powiśle plebiscite (Polish: Plebiscyt
na Warmii, Mazurach i Powiślu), was a plebiscite for
self-determination of the regions Warmia (Ermland), Masuria (Mazury,
Masuren) and Powiśle, which had been in parts of East Prussia and
West Prussia, in accordance with Articles 94 to 97 of the Treaty of
Versailles. Prepared during early 1920, it took place on 11 July 1920. The
majority of voters selected East Prussia over Poland (over 97% in
Allenstein (Olsztyn) and 92% in Marienwerder (Kwidzyn)); most of the
territories in question thus remained in the Free State of Prussia, and
therefore, in Germany.

Despite the
six-month term determined by the Treaty of Saint-Germain, the referendum
was not held in Zone A until October 10, 1920. In addition to changing the
date of the plebiscite, other terms of the Treaty of Saint-Germain
allegedly were ignored or changed: an Austrian representative was accepted
into the commission, and the plebiscite commission changed rules by not
allowing the Yugoslav military to control the border between Zones A and B
(8.6.1920). The Yugoslav army had to withdraw from Zone A in accord with
the decision of the plebiscite commission (18.9.1920). Changes may also
have been made in electoral registers which allowed people from northern
zone B voting in zone A, which dramatically powered the German side.

The outcome of the
plebiscite held on October 10, 1920, was 22,025 votes (59.1% of the total
cast) in favor of adhesion to Austria and 15,279 (40.9%) in favor of
annexation by the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes. Because the
Austrian option gained a majority of votes in Slavic Zone A, the second
stage of the referendum in northern Zone B, populated chiefly by German
speakers, was not carried out.

The plebiscite
determined the border between Austria and the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats,
and Slovenes. The border remained unchanged after World War II, even as
the Kingdom of Yugoslavia gave way to Tito's Socialist Federal Republic of
Yugoslavia, though at the end of the war Yugoslav troops again briefly
occupied the area, including the capital city of Klagenfurt. Since the
disintegration of Yugoslavia, the border has separated Austria and
Slovenia.