Italy undoubtedly gained a great deal by the war, into which she entered mainly for the purpose of achieving her unity and securing strong frontiers. But she signed the Peace Treaty convinced that she had not succeeded in either purpose, and that her allies were answerable for her failure. It was certainly part of their policy to build up a strong state on her frontier out of a race which she regards as her adversary and to give it command of some of her strategic positions. And the overt bearing manner in which this policy was sometimes carried out left as much bitterness behind as the object it aimed at. It is alleged that the Italian delegates were treated with an economy of consideration which bordered on something much worse, while the arguments officially invoked to non-suit them appeared to them in the light of bitter sarcasms. President Wilson, they complained, ignored his far-resonant principle of self-determination when Japan presented her claim for Shantung, but refused to swerve from it when Italy relied on her treaty rights in Dalmatia. And when the inhabitants of Fiume voted for union with the mother country, the President abandoned that principle and gave judgment for Jugoslavia on other grounds. He was right, but disappointing, they observed, when he told his fellow-citizens that his presence in Europe was indispensable in order to interpret his conceptions, for no other rational being could have construed them thus. The withdrawal of the Italian delegates was construed as an act of insubordination, and punished as such. The Marquis de Viti de Varche has since disclosed the fact that the Allied governments forthwith reduced the credits accorded to Italy during hostilities, whereupon hardships and distress were aggravated and the peasantry over a large area of the country suffered intensely.[227] For Italy is more dependent on her allies than ever, owing to the sacrifices which she offered up during the war, and she was made to feel her dependence painfully. The military assistance which they had received from her was fraught with financial and economic consequences which have not yet been realized by the unfortunate people who must endure them. Italy at the close of hostilities was burdened with a foreign debt of twenty milliards of lire, an internal debt of fifty millards, and a paper circulation four times more than what it was in pre-war days.[228] Raw materials were exhausted, traffic and production were stagnant, navigation had almost ceased, and the expenditure of the state had risen to eleven milliards a year.[229]