TEMA 7 : THE FIRST WORLD WAR(1914-

1918)

1- MARCHING TOWARDS WAR

At the beginning of the 20th century, the nations of Europe were in
peace some years and they wanted to keep that peace they had the
desire of peace .Therefore, They organise different organizations and
congress to maintain this peace. However, in some years explode The
Great War .

(RISING TENSIONS IN EUROPE)

In appearance Europe was in period of peace and harmony, but behind

there were some forces that finally brought the first world war. There are
the main reasons or causes: 1.The Rise of Nationalism. Nationalism
have some positive things as the union within a citizens of a country, but
also can be very dangerous as happened in xx century, as this brought a
big competition among European countries . The principal reasons of
the increase of rivalry were rivalry for resources and markets, and
territorial disputes.
The points of biggest tensions were Alsace and Lorraine (France and
Germany) and the Balkans (-Austro-Hungary and Russia ), because it
was a place with a lot of differents nations.
The next reasons was imperialism and militarism. European nations
fought among them to get foreign territories and this made that rivalry
and mistrust increased.

The las reason was the arms race. European powers started to prepare
their countries for war, as they believed that they have to be ready to
mobilize, or organize and move troops in case of a war.This policy was
called militarism.
(TANGLED ALLIANCES)

The tension brought the creation of some military alliances, that propel
the explode of war.

Otto Von Bismarck, who was the chancellor of German, after the union
and creation of Germany, he focused on keept peace . In that moment
Bismarck believed that the biggest risk was France, due to Alsace and
Lorraine. So he decided to create an alliance (against france) called the
Dual Alliance (1879) that was formed by Austria-Hungary and
Germany. Then Italy and Russia joined forming the Triple Alliance
(1882)
In 1890 However, this alliance is going to change with the change of
Germany's foreign policy when Kaiser Wilhelm II became ruler of
Germany and he forced Bismarck to resign.
So , Wilhelm broke the treaty with Russia. Then Russia responded
forming another alliance with France in 1892 and 1894. This alliance
was very dangerous, because in case of war Germany be forced to fight
a two-front war.
In front of shipbuilding program of Germany , in 1907 Great Britain
formed an alliance with Russia and France called The Triple Entente.
This way Europe was divided in two blocs, fight among two powers
could cause a war among all Europe.

(CRISIS IN THE BALKANS)

The Balcan Peninsula was a very troubles place, due to of the

concentration of different ethnic groups, so sooner or later would
explode a conflict there.

By 1900, Ottoman Empire that had controlled The Balcan Peninsula had
lost some places, due to nationalist movements, so Ottoman Empire was
in process of disappear.
Among this regions was Serbia that was very implied in the beginning of
the war. Nationalism had a big force in Serbia, they wanted to unite all
slavs of the peninsula,therefore he it received the support of Russia
that was a slav country.
This had a big rejection from Austria-Hungary, who was afraid of a slav
rebellion in its territory.

More later, Austria annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina, which caused a

big annoy among Serbians, as Bosnia and Herzegovina had a big slavs
population. This caused big tensions among these countries for get the
control of the place.

The spark of the conflict explode on June 28, 1914 when the heir to
the Austro-Hungarian throne, and his wife, Sophie were killed in
their visit to Sarajevo by an 19 year old serbian and member of the
Black Hand, that was a group that looked for liberate Bosnia from
Austria.

Then on july 23 Austria decided to present an ultimatum to Serbia

that contained numerous demands. Serbia accepted nearly all demands,
but also Serbians wanted to negotiate.

Finally, On July 28, Austria rejected Serbia’s offer and declared

war. Immediately the ally of Serbia, Russia, sent troops to Austrian
border . The rest of European countries asked for negotiation, but it
was too late, war is started.

2. EUROPE PLUNGES INTO WAR

The declaration of war against Serbia by Austria-Hungary caused a chain
reaction in the alliance system, so early all of Europe joined to the war,
beginning The World War I.

(THE GREAT WAR BEGINS)

After the declaration of war against Serbia by Austro-Hungary, Russia moved
her troops to the boundaries of Austrian and her ally Germany. So, On
August 1 Germany declared war on Russia.
Then, before France, the ally of Russia, had time to react Germany declared
war on France.Soon afterward Great Britain declared war on Germany.

This way Europe was divide in two groups one of them was the Central
Powers (Germany and ahaustria-hungary) and the other group was the Allies
(russia,France and Britain).
Soon after, the Ottoman empire and Bulgary joined to Central Powers. The
Allies also had new members like Japan and then Italy that had been a
member of the Triple Alliance.
This way soldiers marched to the battle without imagining could happen in
summer of 1914. One of the few man that realize of the dangerous of the war
was Sir Edward Grey (Britain foreign minister)

(A BLOODY STALEMATE)
This war was a war of on two fronts among The Western Front which was a
region in northern France, and the Eastern Front.
In front of this Germany developed a battle strategy known as the Schlieffen
Plan designed by General Alfred Graf von Schlieffen. According to this plan
the idea was attack quickly to France in the west and then rushing east to fight
Russia.
Therefore German leaders needed a quickly victory against France.
Early on, Germany appeared as a possible winner against France, but Allies
attacked Germany in the valley of the Marne River. Finally, German generals
gave the order to retreat.
This way the Schlieffen Plan was in ruins, so they couldn't get a quickly
victory in the west.
At the same time, Russian troops were invading Germany, so german
generals sent thousand of troops from France to the East, leaving the
western Front stalemate. (estancado)

After this by early 1915 started the war in the Trenches in the western
front.This way big powers fought among them from trenches, causing
thousand of deaths.
The life in these trenches was horrible and very difficult.
The situation got worse with the invention of new tools of war such as new
machine guns, poison gas, artillery, aeroplanes, submarines, tanks, as
they only caused more deaths but no advance.
In 1916, Germany attacked French in the Battle of Verdun. Soon after,
England responded attacking Germans in The Battle of Somme. All this
battles causes thousands of deaths, without barely winning territory.

At the same time, the war also continued in the Eastern Front, where Serbia
and Russia fought against Germany and Austria-Hungary. The war in this
front was more mobile than in the west, but slaughter was very common.
(THE BATTLE ON THE EASTERN FRONT)
The war in the Eastern Front started earlier than in the west with the attack
from Russia to Germany and Austria . Soon after Germany responded, began
The Battle of Tannenberg in which finally Germany won.
The situation with Austria-Hungary was different. In the beginning Russia got
the victory, but finally Austria defeated Russia.

By 1916, the situation of Russia was very difficult for some reasons. The
first of them was that Russia hadn't industrialized yet , as a result, the
Russian army had always provision problems. In addition, the supply from the
Allies was very limited, because all surrounders seas were controlled by
Germany or the Ottomans.
Therefore, the Russia army only had an advantage the big number of soldiers.
Anyway, Russia managed to immobilize hundreds of thousands of German
troops.

However, the biggest problem and concern for The Triple Alliance was that
little by little the war was spreading around the world

3. A GLOBAL CONFLICT

World War I as the name says was much more than a European conflict, due
to foreign countries got into the war becoming ally of The Allies or ally of
central powers.

(. WAR AFFECTS THE WORLD)

the Powers and their allies tried to finish the conflict, but they didn't get it.
The Allies created a strategy called The Gallipoli Campaign. This strategy
consisted in attack the Dardanelles that was the entrance to Constantinople,
in order to defeat Turkish and establish a supply line to Russia. The effort to
take The Dardanelles started in 1915, where participate a lot of allies around
the world . Soon after, Gallipoli became dangerous, causing a lot of
deaths.Finally, The Allies gave up.

Then all of colonial possesions of Germany in Asia and Africa were

attack by the Allies.In order to get the control of the German lands in some
places The allies recruited subjects in their colonies many of them were
from India and African colonies. There were different functions and opinions
some of them were killed in the war, other worked keep the front lines
supplied, other participated as voluntaries and other didn't want to participate
in European conflicts.

On April 2, 1917, USA entered the war on the side of the Allies, after some
threats. In 1917, Germans focused in the submarine warfare (guerra) . They
returned to the policy that was called unrestricted (sin limites) submarine
warfare that consisted on sink some ships without warning.
However, this policy had been used in 1915 when Germnans sinked ship
Lusitania. This caused a big annoyed among Americans , because this attack
killed some Americans, so the president of USA sent an alert. Then Germans
decided to stop attacking neutral and passenger ships, but as we said in 1917
this changed .
Germans tried to block Great Britain and this caused that germans attacked
some Amercian submarines. However, the act that caused that USA entered
to war was when some officials intercepted a telegram written by Germany’s
foreign secretary, Arthur Zimmermann, that said that they would help
Mexico to recover the lands that American had conquered to Mexico, if Mexico
would ally with Germany.
Then USA that had a big connection with England, finally Wilson decided to
enter to war in the group of Allies.(1917 april 2)

(war affects the home front)

The war not only affected to soldiers, this war also had effects to everybody.
In front of war , al countries devoted all their resources to the war. This policy
was called militarism. Governments took the control of economy and
established what and the quantity of all that factories had to produce.
Factories became munitions factories and all civils started to work in them.

The products were so scarce that governments turned to rationing.Under

this system people can obtain the necessary goods.

The governments also took some measures in order to avoid anti-war

activities some of them were the censorship of news ( in order to avoid people
appeared in contra) and the use of propaganda (to persuade and keep the
support for the war).
the Total war also supposed that women replaced men in factories and
shops. Women had to do all work that men had been doing until then.
Women also kept troops supplied and some of them were near the front
lines as nurses.
This showed that women were able to do more things than people believed.

(THE ALLIES WIN THE WAR)

After the entrance of Americans to war seemed that Allies were going to win.
However, the withdrawal of Russia changed the things,.

Russia was in a very difficult situation. There were a lot of conflicts within the
country due to shortage of food and fuel. Finally the Czar resigned and a
provisional government was established. However, government continued on
the war.
Russians were sick of war and of the situation, so finally a revolution shook
Russia. This way In November 1917, Communist leader Vladimir Ilyich Lenin
seized power and immediately he decided to withdraw from war.
So , Germany and Russia signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, which ended the
war between them.

After the withdrawal of Russia, Germany directed all of its efforts to western
front. As the beginning of the war, By late May 1918, the Germans had again
reached the Marne River, victory was very close. However, German army had
weakened.
The Allies Taking advantage of the weaken of germans and the help of
Americans launched a acounterattack.
In July 1918, the Allies and Germans clashed at the Second Battle of the
Marne.
Little by Little The Allies were advancing to Germany, meanwhile the central
powers began to crumble (desmoronar).
In front of this difficult situation revolts exploded in Germany that caused the
resign of the Kaiser Wilhelm II and thus way Germany became a republic.
Finally, Germans and French signed an armistice , ending the World War I on
November 11.
(THE LEGACY OF THE WAR)

The World War I left a big footprint on Europeans.n We have to say that war
implied the develop of new technologies
But this war had a lot of consequences in many aspects: first of all, the war
caused thousand of death between soldiers and civilians; secondly, economy
was very affected, as the treasuries of European countries drained (agotar);
thirdly, thousand of lands,cities and houses were destroyed and fourdly, war
caused a big psicological hit, people felt disillusionment and despair. Finally,
the treaties to end World War I prepared the scenery to the World War II.

4. FLAWED PEACE (PAZ DEFECTUOSA)

After the end of World War I, the powers gathered to establish the terms of the
peace On January 18, 1919 at the Palace of Versailles. This way started a period of
a lot of debates.

THE ALLIES MEET AND DEBATE

After the end of World War I, the powers gathered to establish the terms of the
peace On January 18, 1919 at the Palace of Versailles. This way started a period of
a lot of debates.

The major decisions were taken specially by the Big Four, despite of there were
representatives of many countries. The Big Four was formed by the representants or
presidents of the most important powers: Woodrow Wilson of the United States,
Georges Clemenceau of France, David Lloyd George of Great Britain, and
Vittorio Orlando of Italy.

The first attempt to establish some proposal for achieving a just and lasting peace
was the Fourteen Points of Woodrow Wilson.. The first four points consisted on
reduced military force and freedom of trade. The fifth was related with the distribution
and independence process of colonies
The sixth through thirteenth consisted on some suggestions establish new
nations.The guiding idea behind these points was self-determination, that is that
people could decide where they wanted to live. The last point proposed the creation
an international organization that could offer solutions to world conflicts.
More later, the powers got gather inThe Paris Peace Conference (1919-1920). In
the beginning The allies had a big differences with the visions of peace, as Great
Britain and France wanted that Germany would be more affected. Finally, The
Treaty of Versailles between Germany and the Allied powers was signed on June
28, 1919. After the conference and the treaty created a League of Nations based on
Wilson points.

The treaty had a big consequences to Germany. First, Germany suffered military
restrictions, lost her colonies that finally were controlled by Allies and in addition,
had to pay reparations to the allies.

(A TROUBLED TREATY)

All the treaties for peace that were signed only caused resentment feeling among the
victors and the defeated.

The western countries signed some treaties with each defeated countries:
Austria.Hunagary,Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire. After these treaties, these
empires disappeared and appeared new countries, such as
Austria,Hungary,Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia.In the same way, Ottoman Empire
only keep the territory that pertains to Turkey and the lands that had in Southeast
Asia were divided between The Allies as mandates.

Also Russia lost some lands such as Finland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania and also
Romania and Poland got Russian territory.
Finally, The Treaty of Versailles didn't establish a long-lasting peace.

More later USA signed some treaties with defeated countries, but these treaties only
caused a big hate and resentment among the citizen of Central Powers.
AS the same way, the mandates of Asia and Africa didn't get their independence,
continued being European colonies. This caused a big annoy among citizen.
Some allies such as Italy and Japan also annoyed, because they didn't get to obtain
all the lands that they wanted.
Finally, all this tensions would bring World War ii.