No one noticed how small the treaty was. That is the first important detail. The document that would eventually reorganize the structure of European civilization was surprisingly thin. Two clauses. A few pages of language. No sweeping territorial divisions. No triumphant declarations of empire. Just two ideas.
WORD. LOVE.
Historians would later spend entire careers analyzing the implications of this brevity. Some argued that the Big Four had simply been exhausted by the war. Others believed they were trying to create something elegantly minimal, a constitutional seed capable of growing into a stable peace.
Both explanations were wrong.
The Big Four were not tired. They were not minimalists. They were frightened.