<P> In the Pacific, Britain's ally Japan declared war on Germany in 1914 and quickly seized several of Germany's island colonies, the Mariana, Caroline and Marshall Islands, with virtually no resistance . </P> <P> By 1916 only in remote jungle regions in East Africa did the German forces hold out . South Africa's J.C. Smuts, now in Britain's small War Cabinet, spoke of German schemes for world power, militarisation and exploitation of resources, indicating Germany threatened western civilisation itself . Smuts' warnings were repeated in the press . The idea took hold that they should not be returned to Germany after the war . </P> <P> Germany's overseas empire was dismantled following defeat in World War I. With the concluding Treaty of Versailles, Article 22, German colonies were transformed into League of Nations mandates and divided between Belgium, the United Kingdom, and certain British Dominions, France and Japan with the determination not to see any of them returned to Germany--a guarantee secured by Article 119 . </P> <P> In Africa, the United Kingdom and France divided German Kamerun (Cameroons) and Togoland . Belgium gained Ruanda - Urundi in northwestern German East Africa, the United Kingdom obtained by far the greater land mass of this colony, thus gaining the "missing link" in the chain of British possessions stretching from South Africa to Egypt (Cape to Cairo), and Portugal received the Kionga Triangle, a sliver of German East Africa . German South - West Africa was taken under mandate by the Union of South Africa . In terms of the population of 12.5 million people in 1914, 42 percent were transferred to mandates of Britain and its dominions. 33 percent to France, and 25 percent to Belgium . </P>

What happened to germany's colonies after ww1
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