It will be our wish and purpose that the processes of peace, when they are begun, shall be absolutely open and that they shall involve and permit henceforth no secret understandings of any kind. (Intro. 1)

Remember, Wilson delivered the Fourteen Points speech before the war had actually ended. But this wasn't just Wilson being super-confident—part of the purpose of the speech was to convince Germans to stop going along with the Kaiser and start making peace.

By promising an "absolutely open" peace process, Wilson hoped to increase the likelihood of reconciling the warring powers early on. He also laid out his clearest goal: no more secret alliances.

World War I started in large part because of the complex networks of alliances between various European powers. In the future, Wilson thought, there should be no more "secret covenants" (Intro. 2). That way, one nation wouldn't risk attacking a small one…and realizing that the small nation had the equivalent of an angry mama bear: a group of powerful nations out for vengeance.