Old war debts never die, they just fade away.......In 2015, Britain finally paid off a large war loan issued in 1917 to finance the First World War. In 2010, Germany made the last payments on some 80-year-old debts originally used to finance part of its reparations bill imposed by the Treaty of Versailles in 1919. These were exceptions. The vast majority of the debts made during the Great War have never been paid back, including billion dollar loans from the US to western allies. These debts were the result of four years of almost unlimited spending by belligerent governments.