World War I
Last Updated       1/26/2008     1/25/2008      1/13/2008

Background
Tension grew between European countries.


Alliances were formed.
Countries built up its armed forces.

Assassination of the Archduke of Austria
There were warnings that something would happen to the archduke.
1914 June 28, Spark for WWI: Archduke Ferdinand and his wife Sophia were visiting in Sarajevo for St. Vitus Day.
In Austria, Sophie was not allowed to ride in the same car with her husband.
She was not of royal blood.


In Sarajevo, Sophia could ride with her husband.
Four cars were in the motorcade driving to the city hall.
A group of seven Bosnian-Serb youths, ages 19-27, planned the assassination.
A bomb was first thrown at the archduke's car.
The archduke deflected it into the street.
His wife suffered a small wound to the head from shrapnel.
The cars continued on to city hall.
The archduke wanted to go to the hospital to check on the bomb victims.
He begged his wife to stay behind.


Two cars drove to the hospital.
They took a wrong turn.


While the cars were turning around they stopped five feet in front Gavrilo Princip.
Princip fired twice.
The archduke was hit in the neck.
His wife Sophia was shot in the stomach.
They were both dead by 11:30 AM.
Gavrilo Princip tried first to kill himself by shooting himself and then poison.
He was found guilty and because of his young age, 19, he was given life imprisonment.
He died in prison in 1918.

Battle Lines
Austria-Hungary blamed Serbia, declared war.
28 July 1914, Austrian artillery opens up on Belgrade from across the Danube.
Russia begins to mobilize against Austria, not Germany.
Germany tells Russia to step down or Germany will declare war on Russia.
The French mobilize.
Germany declares war on Russia.
Germany declares war on France.
Germany violates Belgium's neutrality.
Great Britain tells Germany to get out of Belgium.
2 August 1914, Germany invades Luxembourg.
4 August 1914, Germany invades Belgium.
4 August 1914, Great Britain declares war on Germany.

Battles

Battle of Frontiers
14-24 August 1914, Battle of Frontiers fought in eastern France and southern Belgium.
The French Plan VII was to recapture the provinces of Alsace-Lorraine.
These were lost in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870.
The Schlieffen Plan anticipated the French plan.
They would hold the French at Alsace-Lorraine.
The right wing would then sweep through Belgium, France and on to Paris.

14 August 1914, Battle of Lorraine
21 August 1914, Battle of Ardennes
22 August 1914, Battle of Charleroi
22 August 1914, Battle of Namur

Battle of Tannenberg
22-29 August 1914, Battle of Tannenberg.
Samsonov's Russian army was encircled.
He attempted a retreat, but his troops were slaughtered.
Only 10,000 of 150,000 soldiers escaped.
Samsonov committed suicide.

Battle of Mons
23 August 1914, Battle of Mons
Germans attacked the front of the British lines.
The "Old Contempables" were professional soldiers.
Their massed rifle fire inflicted heavy casualties on the Germans who attacked without any cover.
The British retired to a second defensive line.
24 August 1914, the British disengaged.

25 August 1914, Battle of Le Cateau

Battle of the Marne
5-9 September 1914, Battle of the Marne fought between Paris and Verdune.
The French struck the flank of the advancing First German Army.
The French commander used taxicabs from Paris to get his troops to the front.
The German First and Second Armies withdrew to the Aisne River.
German forces went on the defensive instead of the offensive.

Second Battle of Ypres
Second Battle of Ypres in Belgium.
22 April 1915, German attack.
Germans use chlorine gas, outlawed by the Hauge Convention.
French colonials ran.
The Germans began to pour through a four mile wide gap.
Canadian troops were used to seal off the gap and hold the line against the Germans.
The Canadians were ordered to capture Kitchner's Woods.
The Germans had set up defenses there.
23 April 1915, the Canadians still held the line after retreating to consolidate troops.
24 April 1915, the Germans strike again.
They used gas again at the beginning of the attack.
The Canadians using only wet cloth had to withdraw.
They moved back a little and laid on their stomachs and waited.
The Germans advanced without artillery.
The Canadians opened up when the Germans were at 100 yards.
3 May 1915, the Canadians were relieved.

Battle of The Somme
1916, the second major front along the banks of the Somme River
British and French guns used 1.6 million shells on the German lines.


1  July 1916, sappers exploded two large mines under the German lines.
The sound of the explosions were heard in London.
British General Rawlinson marched his soldiers in parade formation.
He thought nothing could be alive.
Bullets from German Maxim machine guns massacred the soldiers.
Rawlinson wanted to stop the attack.


Haig, his superior, would not allow it.
This went on for four months.
The Allies lost 600,000 men.
The Germans lost 450,000 men.
19th century military tactics could not defeat 20th century weapons.

From 1914 to 1918
WWI: First war where civilians also attacked.
31 Countries, 65 million soldiers.
Machine guns, Trench Warfare, huge guns, bombs, submarines, tank, flame throwers.



Trench Warfare
German General Falkenhayn ordered trenches dug to provide protection.
The Allies could not break through.
They began to build trenches.


The British trenches are on the left.
German trenches to the right.
No Man's Land is in the middle.

The trenches spread from the North Sea to the Swiss Frontier.
For the next three years, neither side advanced more than a few miles.
This line became known as the Western Front.
Since the Germans were the first to build trenches they chose the best ground, the higher ground.
The Allies got the lowlands.
As the dug down a few feet they hit water.
Water-logged trenches were a problem.
Most fighting on the "Western Front", France & Germany.
Eastern Front 3.8 million soldiers killed.

Sinking of the Lusitania
7 June 1906, Lusitania was launched.
It captured the Blue Ribband for thr fastest Atlantic crossing.
1913, Lusitania had 12 guns installed.
It also began to carry nmunitions.
This was against Inernational Law.
The German Embassy warned the world in a newspaper ad that they would be traveling at their own risk.
1 May 1915, Lusitania set sail from New York for England.
Off the coast of Ireland Captain Schweiger, commanding the U 20 spotted the Lusitania.
7 May 1915 1:35 PM, Schweiger fired his last torpedo at the Lusitania.
The initial explosion of the torpedo warhead was followed by a much larger one that shook the entire ship.
Eighteen minutes later the giant liner was gone.
1,198 people perished, among them 124 Americans. 
The Germans accepted liability for the incident.
In February 1916, they agreed to pay reparations.
This incident was one of the reasons the United States entered the war.

Sussex Sinking
In 1916, Germany sinks the passenger liner Sussex.
Germany agreed to end unrestricted submarine warfare in the "Sussex pledge."

Mutiny of the French Army
Spring of 1917, one-hallf of the French soldiers mutiny.
Their demands were met and not many soldiers were punished.
The mutnied not about the war, but the way the general staff waged war.

Russian Revolution
The Russian army and civilian population refuse to fight.
15 March 1917, the Tsar of Russia abdicates.
Alexander Kerensky led the fragile democracy that emerged to govern Russia.
He made the catastrophic mistake of continuing the war.
He authorized women to be trained and sent to the front.
As Kerensky's offensive failed and army desertions increased, his popularity decreased.
Mobilizing anti-war sentiment, Lenin and his Bolsheviks quickly took over.


1918, Trotsky signed an armistice with Germany.
Russia up 1/3 of farmland, population, and almost all resources of coal, iron, oil to Germany.

United States Enters the War
22 January 1917, Germany resumes unrestricted submarine warfare.
By April, five United States ships have been sunk.
Wilson asks Congress for a declaration of war.
6 April 1917, Congress declares war.
Wison, "The world must be made safe for democracy."
The United States mobilizes.
The United States ends 2 million troops.
President Wilson names General Pershing to lead the American Expeditionary Force during WWI.
January 1918, Wilson defines the war aims of the Allies in his Fourteen Points.
In October 1918, the revolt of the German Navy triggered the final collapse of the German war effort.
November 1918, American forces help crack the Hindenburg Line.
In early Novemeber, 1918, the Kaiser abdicated and fled to neutral Holland.
11 Novemeber 1918, armistice declared.
13 million soldiers and 17 million civilians killed.

Making the Peace

Treaty of Versailles
Germany
Most of the blame for the war was placed on Germany.
Germany has to pay a large fine.
Germany lost land in Europe and overseas.
Alsace-Lorraine was returned to France.
Part of Germany became the restablished country of Poland.
Germany's African colonies were divided between France and Great Britain.
Germany's Pacific colonies were given to Japan.

RussiaRussia lost more territory than Germany.
Parts of Russian territory was lost to Poland amd Romania.
Part of Russia became the new countries of Finland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania.
Ukraine's desire for independence was ignored.
The treaty did not give India or Southeat Asia independence from Great Britain or France.

Central Powers
The other Central Powers were dealt with individually.
Austria Hungary was broken up.
Austria, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, and Yugoslavia were created.
France had the right to rule in Syria.
Great Britain had the right to rule in Iraq and Palastine.

League of Nations
League of Nations was created so countries could talk about their problems.
They hoped the League would prevent future wars.
The League had no army.
Countries could not be forced to obey the League.
The United State did not join the League.

Isolationists
Many Americans disagreed about the World War I treaties.
USA becomes an isolationist country in 1919.
It decided to stay out of European affairs and world problems.

Bibliography
"28-Jun-1914 - Assassination in Sarajevo" Trenches on the Web. 25 Jan. 2008. http://www.worldwar1.com/tlsara.htm.

"Archduke Franz Ferdinand - Photos." Trenches on the Web. 25 Jan. 2008. http://www.worldwar1.com/biohff2.htm.

Greenblatt, Miriam, and Lemmo, Peter. Human Heritage A World History. Columbus, Ohio: McGraw-Hill, 2001.

"The Second Battle of Ypres Apr-1915." Trenches on the Web. 25 Jan. 2008. http://www.worldwar1.com/sf2ypres.htm.

"The Somme 1916." Trenches on the Web. 25 Jan. 2008. http://www.worldwar1.com/pharc001.htm.

"Tragedy on the Somme: A Second Balaclava." Trenches on the Web. 25 Jan. 2008.  http://www.worldwar1.com/sfsomme.htm.

"United Staets Enters World War I." From Revolution to Reconstruction.26 Dec. 2006.  26 Jan. 2008. http://odur.let.rug.nl/~usa/H/1994/ch9_p2.htm.