Blessed Are the Peacemakers

Ninety-two years ago yesterday, an answer to a plea that "called for the cessation of hostilities, general reduction of armaments, freedom of the seas and international arbitration of any territorial questions among the warring nations" — Central Powers respond to Papal Peace Note.

Weeks earlier, Woodrow Wilson's reply to Pope Benedict XV had rejected the offer and pledged instead to "deliver the free peoples of the world from the menace and the actual power of a vast military establishment controlled by an irresponsible Government."

Austria-Hungary later replied, "Guided by a spirit of moderation and consideration, we see in the proposals of your Holiness a suitable basis for initiating negotiations with a view to preparing a peace, just to all and lasting, and we earnestly hope our present enemies may be animated by the same ideals." Blessed Charles of Austria sadly did not prevail: "That same day, however, Austria’s more powerful ally, Germany, expressed its own inability to accept peace based on Benedict’s terms."

The report concludes, "Even after an armistice ended the war on November 11, 1918, the Vatican found itself on the outside, as its requests to be included in the peace negotiations were denied and it was excluded from the Paris Peace Conference at Versailles in 1919." Ergo, World War II.

[link via Wilson Revolution Unplugged]