I'm genuinely perplexed. When taught about the Treaty of Versailles and the Paris Peace Conference, I was told the Allied interests were represented by the US, Britain and France. Britain and France I understand. But why the US? They only joined in 1917, suffered relatively little, and were seen as isolationist. Perhaps I'm being a bit presumptive, buy I would think that the European countries would tend to ignore the US because of these factors. Moreover, why wouldn't a country like Canada have a greater influence, considering they did substantially more and were more impacted? If anyone can shed any light on these questions, I'd appreciate it.
The US was essentially underwriting and the supplier of much of the Allied effort. France was devastated physically, the UK was essentially maxed out on credit, much of it to the US or US interests. For instance the UK borrowed a little over 4 Billion in 1917 dollars from the US Treasury during the war. And at one point France and the UK jointly borrowed from private US banks, orchestrated by JP Morgan, 500 million in one massive loan in late 1915. Germany attempted to have it squashed but Wilson allowed the private transaction as he saw it, to go through. Neutrality in name only increasingly became the position of the Wilson govt, particularly once William Jennings Bryant left following 1915. Germany was free to trade with US companies, the US was just not going to do anything to break the Royal Navy's blockade to allow it, meaning only sporadic blockade runners, and even a cargo submarine made it through.
The US's position of having a large army and navy, and more importantly major economy that was essentially untouched by the war, and key to the allied success, gave Wilson and the nation immense leverage. Especially if the armistice broke down there were few scenarios where the Entente could forcibly occupy Germany without US contributions.
Meanwhile at the time Canada's status as a Dominion of the Empire still allowed Britain to have broad control over foreign policy.