San Remo, Conference of 1920

a meeting of the Supreme Council of the Entente powers, held in San Remo, Italy, from Apr. 19 to Apr. 26, 1920. Prime Minister D. Lloyd George represented Great Britain, Prime Minister A. Millerand represented France, and Prime Minister F. Nitti represented Italy. Japan was represented by the ambassador Matsui. An American representative was present only as an observer, and the representatives of Greece and Belgium took part only when the interests of their countries were discussed.

The conference considered several questions: a peace treaty with Turkey and the assignment of League of Nations mandates in the Arab countries, Germany’s fulfillment of the military articles of the Versailles Peace Treaty of 1919, and the position of the Allies toward Soviet Russia. It awarded Great Britain the mandates in Palestine and Iraq, including Mosul, and awarded France the mandates in Syria and Lebanon. Great Britain guaranteed France 25 percent of the oil production from Mosul, and France promised to ensure the delivery of oil to the Mediterranean. The draft peace treaty with Turkey approved at the conference was the basis for the treaty of Sèvres of 1920. The conference demanded that Germany meet the military and reparation stipulations of the Versailles Treaty. On the Russian question, the conference adopted a resolution favoring the restoration of trade with Soviet Russia. At the same time, however, a secret agreement was concluded at San Remo on the question of rendering support to the capitalist-landlord regime in Poland, a regime that attacked the Ukraine on Apr. 25, 1920. Although the San Remo Conference reached agreements on several questions, it did not mitigate the profound contradictions between the Entente powers, contradictions that grew sharper during the imperialist repartition of the postwar world.