World War 1

1. World War 1 By Kenneth Crouthamel

2. WW1 Time Period • WW1 lasted from July 28, 1914 to • November 11, 1918.

3. What caused WW1 • One of the main reasons is the assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand by GavriloPrincip on June 28th 1914. Here are the others. • Industrial Revolution • Militarism-Germany • Nationalism-Serbia • Alliancism-Triple Alliance= Germany, Aus- Hun, Bulgaria, and Turkey • Triple Entente • Serbia, Russia, France, Great Britain, and U.S.

4. Locations of WW1 • Serbia, Russia, France, Belgium, Great Britain, Liberia, Japan, Montenegro, Italy, San Marino, Portugal, Romania, Greece, China, U.S.A., Cuba, Nicaragua, Brazil, Siam, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Austria-Hungary, Germany, Ottoman Empire, Bulgaria, Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru, and Uruguay. That’s 31 countries. All of these countries were involved in WW1 in many ways for their military or political value meaning battles and deaths were brought among these countries.

5. Events of WW1 • Events • 1. The Lusitania was a British cruise liner, sunk by a German U-boat. • 2. Aus-Hun declared war on Serbia • 3. Germany aids Aus-Hun and declared war on Russia • 4. France mobilizes to aid Russia • 5. Germany declares war on France • 6. Germany invades Belgium • 7.UK declares war on Germany • 8. OE mobilizes to aid Germany and Aus-Hun • 9. Italy joins France, UK, and Russia • 10. Bulgaria joins OE, Germany, and Aus-Hun • 11. U.S. joins Italy , France, UK and Russia

6. Central Powers • The Central Powers were one of the sides involved in the First World War. The member nations of the Central Powers fought against the Triple Entente, also known as the Allied Powers, and the outcome of the war ultimately favored the Triple Entente. The roots of the alliance among the nations who fought on the losing side in the First World War lie in the 1870s, and several of these nations were also involved again on the losing side in the Second World War, in some cases because they were invaded and occupied. • In the late 1870s, the German Empire joined forces with the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Italy to form a secret alliance known as the Triple Alliance. After the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand and the outbreak of the First World War in 1914, Germany called upon members of the Triple Alliance to join forces to fight against the Kingdom of Serbia. Italy declined, switching sides to fight with the Allied Powers. • As the war progressed, the Kingdom of Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire joined the war on the side of Germany. These Central Powers were ideally located to deliver devastating military blows on multiple fronts throughout the war, as they were positioned between several key members of the Allied Powers. The war raged from 1914 to 1918, concluding officially with the Treaty of Versailles in 1919.

7. Allied Powers • In the beginning (1914) the Allied powers were: • 1.Great Britain • 2.Russia • 3.France. • 4.Belgium (Belgium fought alongside the allies, but they remained neutral. King Albert did not what to leave Belgium to become fully allied because then the Belgian army should have participated in the big battles of the French and Great Britain) • 5.Serbia • In 1917: • 6. The US joined. but the United States didn't join until the Zimmerman Telegram was sent; which was a telegram from the Foreign Secretary of the German Empire, Arthur Zimmerman, to Mexico stating that if the U.S. was to announce war on them, that Mexico was to declare war on them so as to distract the U.S. and hopefully stop the United States from joining WWI. The telegram was intercepted by Great Britain and publicly announced in the U.S. which caused the United States to enter WWI. The United States was also upset with the sinking of the British passenger ship (which really contained some war-ready materials, but that's a different story) the Lusitania. The ship was shot down by German submarines. This act angered the United States to become involved with the war. In addition, the United States wanted to make sure that all the money and resources they sent to Britain and France to be repaid. • These are the ones that you would normally learn about: • 1.Germany • 2.Russia • 3.United States • 4.Italy • 5.Poland • The Allied Forces or Triple Entente were Great Britain, France and Russia. The Triple Alliance was made up of Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy. In the middle of the war, Italy switched sides. • Here is a list of other Allies: • Australia* • Belgium • Canada • Greece • India* • Japan • Montenegro • New Zealand* • Portugal • Romania • South Africa* • * Countries were not independent at the time of World War 1, but were instead part of the British Empire and were given no option to join the cause or not.

8. End Result • WWI changed the face of warfare forever. Warfare became utterly impersonal with the invention of the tank, fighter airplane and automatic machine gun. • The allied powers emerged victorious and powerful, both economically and militarily. The German Empire, on the other hand was utterly decimated, culturally, militarily, and economically. WWI lead to a halt in imperialistic policy and the formation of the League of Nations, the ineffective predecessor to the United Nations. The main end result of WWI was Adolf Hitler's rise to power and WWII.

9. The Treaty of Versailles • The Treaty of Versailles was the peace treaty which officially ended World War I. It was signed by foreign German minister Hermann Müller. The armistice to end the fighting of WWI had been signed on 11 November 1918, but the Treaty of Versailles was the result of six months of negotiations at the Paris Peace Conference to conclude the terms of the peace treaty. The Treaty required that Germany accept sole responsibility for causing the war and that it make reparations to certain members of the Allied forces. Further conditions imposed by the Treaty included Germany losing a certain amount of its own territory to a number of surrounding countries and being stripped of all its overseas colonies. Germany was also required to substantially reduce its military to limit its ability to make war again. The Treaty of Versailles was a contentious one: none of the parties concerned were satisfied with its terms, and Germany was not permanently weakened. However, enough damage and humiliation was dealt to Germany to make them desire revenge to regain their pride, and as such this treaty can be seen as a cause of the Second World War.

10. Why is WW1 so Important? • Answer • World History - World War • Hundreds of thousands of deaths and dozens of countries. Pretty significant effect on the political and social landscape of the world. • The BIG one. • It was started w/one bullet. The first 'modern' war. It begun trench warfare, mechanized warfare, chemical warfare, multi-theater warfare, air warfare, and submarine warfare. It also ended the US isolationist policy & it's harsh axis surrender terms and it laid the groundwork for WWII. • -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- • The Most Important Event in the 20th Century • Modern historians consider WW1 to be *the* defining event of modern history, with virtually all significant events afterwards being directly or indirectly caused by the War. WW1 radically changed Western society on a huge number of levels, and the political fallout from the end of the war can be immediately traced to practically any major issue we face today. While WW2 was more materially destructive, WW1 changed the basic assumptions of virtually the entire global society. It ended the age of Empires, created the movements of ethnic national self-determination that plague us today, turned Communism from a pipe dream of academics to an actual "viable" government form, and radically changed governments from modest in scale to huge centralized ones, and put the USA on the road to superpower status, amongst a host of other consequences.