Georges Clemenceau in the context of "Fourteen Points"

The Big Four or the Four Nations refer to the four top Allied powers of World War I and their leaders who met at the Paris Peace Conference in January 1919. The Big Four is also known as the Council of Four. It was composed of Georges Clemenceau of France, David Lloyd George of the United Kingdom, Vittorio Emanuele Orlando of Italy, and Woodrow Wilson of the United States.

Among the Big Four, only Clemenceau could speak and understand both English and French. Orlando didn't know English, while Lloyd George and Wilson didn't know French. Therefore Orlando and Wilson had no direct means of communication.

The seminal use of cordon sanitaire (French: [kɔʁdɔ̃ sanitɛʁ]; lit. 'sanitary cordon') as a metaphor for ideological containment referred to "the system of alliances instituted by France in interwar Europe that stretched from Finland to the Balkans" and which "completely ringed Germany and sealed off Russia from Western Europe, thereby isolating the two politically 'diseased' nations of Europe."

French Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau is credited with coining the usage, when, in March 1919, he urged the newly independent border states (also called limitrophe states) that had formed in Eastern Europe after World War I to form a defensive union. Such a system would both isolate the Soviet Union from Western Europe, and thus quarantine the spread of communism, while simultaneously threatening Germany's eastern border in the event of war, guaranteeing French security. He called such an alliance a cordon sanitaire. France subsequently put this policy into practice by creating an alliance with Poland in 1921, followed by alliances with each member of the French-backed Little Entente alliance (Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, and Romania) starting in 1924. The alliance was further reinforced by bilateral treaties among Eastern European states such as the Polish–Romanian alliance. This is still probably the most famous use of the phrase, though it is sometimes used more generally to describe a set of buffer states that form a barrier against a larger, ideologically hostile state.

Pope Benedict XV (Latin: Benedictus PP. XV; Italian: Benedetto XV; born Giacomo Paolo Giovanni Battista della Chiesa, Italian: [ˈdʒaːkomo ˈpaːolo dʒoˈvanni batˈtista della ˈkjɛːza]; 21 November 1854 – 22 January 1922) was head of the Catholic Church from 1914 until his death in January 1922. His pontificate was largely overshadowed by World War I and its political, social, and humanitarian consequences in Europe.

Between 1846 and 1903, the Catholic Church had experienced two of its longest pontificates in history up to that point. Together Pius IX and Leo XIII ruled for a total of 57 years. In 1914, the College of Cardinals chose della Chiesa at the relatively young age of 59 at the outbreak of World War I, which he labeled "the suicide of civilized Europe". The war and its consequences were the main focus of Benedict XV. He immediately declared the neutrality of the Holy See and attempted from that perspective to mediate peace in 1916 and 1917. Both sides rejected his initiatives. German Protestants rejected any "Papal Peace" as insulting. The French politician Georges Clemenceau regarded the Vatican initiative as being anti-French. Having failed with diplomatic initiatives, Benedict XV focused on humanitarian efforts to lessen the impacts of the war, such as attending prisoners of war, the exchange of wounded soldiers and food deliveries to needy populations in Europe. After the war, he repaired the difficult relations with France, which re-established relations with the Vatican in 1921. During his pontificate, relations with Italy improved as well, as Benedict XV now permitted Catholic politicians led by Don Luigi Sturzo to participate in national Italian politics.

The Clemenceau–Lloyd George Agreement of 1 December 1918 was a verbal agreement that modified the 1916 Sykes–Picot Agreement in respect to Palestine and the Mosul vilayet. The latter component is also known as the Mosul cession. The agreement was between British and French Prime Ministers David Lloyd George and Georges Clemenceau and took place at the French Embassy in London.

During World War I, the United Kingdom and France signed the secret Sykes–Picot Agreement in 1916, which effectively partitioned the Ottoman Empire into areas of British and French control and spheres of influence. Part of the Mosul vilayet, namely the city of Mosul and the area south to the Little Zab, was allocated to France by the agreement, and this accord was formally ratified in May 1916.

L'Aurore (French for 'The Dawn'; IPA: [loʁɔʁ]) was a literary, liberal, and socialist newspaper published in Paris, France, from 1897 to 1914. Its most famous headline was Émile Zola's J'accuse...! leading into his article on the Dreyfus Affair.

The newspaper was published by Georges Clemenceau, who later became the Prime Minister of France. Georges Mandel as a young man worked for the paper in its early years, and later was also recruited by Clemenceau to serve as his aide in government.