Describe the aims of the Fourteen Points.

The general aim of Woodrow Wilson’s 14 Points was to create a more just world order after WWI, an order that would make it less likely for further wars to take place.  The new order that he envisioned would have had free trade, respect for international law, open diplomacy, and self-determination for all people.  Let us see how these goals were laid out in each of the 14 Points.

1. Prevents countries from entering into secret diplomatic deals.


2. Provides for absolute freedom of the seas in war and peace time.


3. Calls for free trade.


4. Calls for reductions in countries’ arsenal of weaponry.


5. Says that colonies have to be divided up fairly with some attention paid to what the colonized people want.


6. Calls for withdrawal of other countries’ armies from Russia.


7. Calls for withdrawal from Belgium and restoration of its sovereignty.


8. Foreign armies must leave France and the question of Alsace-Lorraine be settled.


9. Italy’s borders should be redrawn to coincide with where Italian people live.


10. Various nationalities of Austria-Hungary should be able to have their own countries.


11. Says the Balkan region has to be split up between countries “along historically established lines of allegiance and nationality.”


12. The non-Turkish peoples of the Ottoman Empire should have their own countries.


13. An independent Polish state should be created and protected.


14. An organization should be created for all countries to join as a way to guarantee world peace (this became the League of Nations).