Events Leading To World War I

Trench Warfare

was a method of fighting where opposing armies fought from and defended their territories using a system of dug out trenches or ditches.

"Stab in the Back"

"Stab in the Back" was the loosing of the war and that it was the Jews fault that the Germanys lost WWI. The Jews were political leaders who came into power while Germany was trying to build a new government.

David Lloyd George (Great Britian)

(1863-1945) was a major British politician present at the Treaty of Versailles and while at Versailles. He tried to play the middle role between the total retribution of George Clemenceau and the seemingly mild rebuke of American's Woodrow Wilson.

Chancellor Max Von Baden

(1867-1929) Served as Germany's last imperial Chancellor prior to the revolution and consequent creation of a German republic in November 1918.

Versailles (Hall of Mirrors)

A large royal residence built in the seventeenth century by King Louis XIV of France in Versailles, near Paris. The palace, with its lavish gardens and fountains, is a spectacular example of French classical architecture

Chancellor Otto Van Bismarck

A political leader of Germany in the nineteenth Century, Known as the "Iron Chancellor". After the Franco-Prussian War had brought many small German states together as allies against France, Bismarck Persuaded them to unite in a single German Empire under a Kaiser, with Bismarck as First Chancellor, or Chief of Government. Enormous economic progress took place under Bismarck's leadership. He resigned over differences with Kaiser Wilhelm II, the emperor who was to rule during World War I.

Industrialization

A society or country transforms itself from a primarily agricultural society into one based on the manufacturing of goods and services. Individual manual labor is often replaced by mechanized mass production and craftsmen are replaced by assembly lines.

Balkan Wars

Balkan Wars: From 1912-1913, two successive military conflicts that deprived the Ottoman Empire of almost all its remaining territory in Europe. The First War: Serbia, Bulgaria, Greece and Montenegro Second War: Serbia, Bulgaria, Greece and Romania

Franco-Prussian War

Franco-Prussian War: From July 19th, 1870-May 10th, 1871 which a coalition of German states led by Prussia defeated France. The war marked the end of French hegemony in continental Europe and resulted in the creation of a unified Germany.

Isolationism

Isolationism: a policy of remaining apart from the affairs or interests of other groups, especially the political affairs of other countries.

Reinsurance Treaty

In 1887, a secret agreement between Germany and Russia arranged but the German chancellor Otto Von Bismarck after the German-Austrian-Russian Dreikaiserbund, or Three Emperor's League, collapsed in 1887 because of competition between Austria-Hungary and Russia for spheres of influence in the Balkans. The treaty provided that each party would remain neutral if the other became involved in a war with a third great power and that this would not apply if Germany attacked France or if Russia attacked attacked Austria. Bismarck showed the Russian ambassador the text of the German-Austrian alliance of 1879 to drive home the last point . Germany paid for Russian friendship by agreeing to the Russian sphere of influence in Bulgaria and Eastern Rumelia (now part of Southern Bulgaria) and by agreeing to support Russian action to keep the Black Sea as it's own preserve. When the treaty was not renewed in 1890, a Franco-Russian alliance rapidly began to take shape.

Entente Cordiale

In 1904, Anglo-French agreement that, by settling a number of controversial matters, ended antagonism between Great Britain and France and paved the way for their diplomatic cooperation against German pressures in the decade preceding World War I (1914-18) The agreement in no sense created an alliance and did not entangle Great Britain with a French commitment to Russia (1894)

Moroccan Crises

In 1905-05, 1911, two international crises centring on France's attempts to control Morocco and on Germany's concurrent attempts to stem French power

Bosnian Crisis

In 1908, state of severe international tension caused by the annexation by Austria-Hungary of the Balkan provinces of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The congress of Berlin (1878) had given Austria-Hungary that right to occupy and administer Bosnia and Herzegovina temporarily, but the provinces officially remained possessions of the Ottoman Empire. Still, the Austrian administration tried mightily and at great expense to improve the strategically valuable region economically and to link it closely with Austria-Hungary. When in July 1908 the Young Turks staged a revolution in Constantinople (Now Istanbul), established a constitutional government and inaugurated a reform program, the Austrian foreign Minister Graf Lexa Von Aehrenthal resolved to annex Bosnia and Herzegovina before the new Turkish regime could regain control over them.

The Economic Consequences of Peace

In 1920, At the Palace of Versailles outside Paris, Germany signs the Treaty of Versailles with the Allies, officially ending World War I. The English economist John Maynard Keynes, who had attended the peace conference but then left in protest of the treaty, was one of the most outspoken critics of the punitive agreement. In his The Economic Consequences of the Peace, published in December 1919, Keynes predicted that the stiff war reparations and other harsh terms imposed on Germany by the treaty would lead to the financial collapse of the country, which in turn would have serious economic and political repercussions on Europe and the world.

John Maynard Keynes

John Maynard Keynes: Radical economist who believed that it was the responsibility of the government to use fiscal resources to counteract the efforts of economic problems such as recessions. He has been hailed as one of the most influential economists of his time. His ideas and philosophies are still referred to in present day economic literature.

Kaiser Wilhelm I

King of Prussia (186-1888) and Kaiser of Germany (1871-1888) whose reign was marked by war with Austria (1866), the Franco-Prussian War (1870-1871), and the wide reforms introduced by Bismarck

U.S. Enter Warfare

On April 6th 1917, began two and half years after start of the war on July 28th, 1914. President Wilson had adopted a position of neutrality hoping to keep the US out of the European Conflict and strong entry into WWI included the sinking of the passenger ship the Lusitania which was including the Housatonic without warning. The Zimmermann telegram was then recover the territory it had ceded to the United States of America following the Mexican-American war. Wilson asked Congress to declare war against Germany, and the U.S. entry into WWI.

Casualties of World War I

Russia: 9,150,000 British Empire: 3,190,235 France: 6,160,800 Italy: 2,197,000 United States: 323,018 Japan: 1,210 Romania: 525,706 Belgium: 93,061 Greece: 27,000 Portugal: 33,291 Montenegro: 20,000 Germany: 7,142,558 Austria-Hungary: 7,020,000 Turkey: 975,000 Bulgaria: 266,919

Sarajevo & Archduke Ferdinand

Sarajevo & Archduke Ferdinand: June 28th, 1914, and Wife Sophie are shot to death by a Bosnian Serb nationalist during an official visit to the Bosnian capital of Sarajevo. The killings sparked a chain of events that led to the outbreak of World War I by early August. On June 28, 1919, five years to the day after Franz Ferdinand's death, Germany and the Allied Powers signed the Treaty of Versailles, officially marking the end of World War I.

Treaty of Versailles

The treaty that officially ended World War I, signed at the Palace of Versailles in France. The leading figures at the treaty negotiations were Premier George of Britain, and President Woodrow Wilson of the United States. The treaty was far more punitive toward Germany to give up land and much of its Army and Navy and to pay extensive reparations for damages to civilians in the war. The treaty also created the League of Nations.

Total War

a war that is unrestricted in terms of the weapons used, the territory of combatants involved, or the objectives pursued, especially one in which the laws of war are disregarded.

League of Nations

an international organization established after World War I under the provisions of the Treaty of . The League, the forerunner of the United Nations, brought about much international cooperation on health, labor problems, refugee affairs and the like.

Alsace & Lorraine

area comprising the present French departments of Hautrhin, Bas-Rhin and Moselle. Alsace-Lorraine was the name given to the 5,067 square miles (13,123 square km) of territory that was coded by France to Germany in 1871 after the Franco-German War. This territory was retroceded to France in 1919 after World War I, was ceded again to Germany in 1940 during World War II, and was again retroceded to France in 1945.

Unification of Germany

n 1871 The third and final act of Germany unification was the Franco-Prussian war of 1880-71, orchestrated by Bismarck to draw the Western German States into alliance with the North German Confederation. With the French defeat, the German Empire was proclaimed in January 1871 in the Palace at Versailles, France.

Chancellor Theobald von Bethmann-Hollweg

served as Chancellor of Germany from 1909-17, during which he fought to maintain social and political coherency as the increasingly vocal liberal elite clashed with reactionary forces typified but the German military machine and monarchist state.

Balkans

that their was a lot of tension in Bulgaria and what happened was that Archduke Francis Ferdinand and his wife are assassinated on their way to Sarajevo.

Woodrow Wilson (U.S.)

the 28th U.S president, served in office from 1913 to 1921 and led America through World War I (1914-18). An advocate fro democracy and world peace, Wilson is often ranked by historians as one of the nation's greatest presidents. Wilson was a college professor, university president and Democratic governor of New Jersey before winning the White House in 1912. Once in office, he pursued an ambitious agenda of progressive reform that included the establishment of the Federal Reserve and Federal Trade Commission. Wilson tried to keep the United States neutral during World War I but ultimately called on Congress to declare war on Germany in 1917. After the war, he helped negotiate a peace treaty that include d a plan for the League of Nations. Although the Senate rejected U.S. membership in the League, Wilson received the Nobel Prize for his peacemaking efforts.

Blank Check

the first truly fatal error made by Germany a promise of unconditional support for whatever action Austria-Hungary might take to punish Serbia.

Declaration of War

the first truly fatal error made by Germany a promise of unconditional support for whatever action Austria-Hungary might take to punish which began on 28th July 1914 with Austria-Hungary's declaration of war with Serbia, it began in Europe but quickly spread throughout the world. Many countries became embroiled within the war's first month; others joined in the ensuring four years, with Honduras announcing hostilities with Germany as late as 19th July 1918 (with the record going to Romania, who entered the war- albeit for the second time - one day before it finished, on 10th November 1918)

Kaiser Wilhelm II

was the Kaiser of Germany at the time of the First World War reigning from 1888-1918. He pushed for a more aggressive foreign policy by means of colonies and a strong navy to compete with Britain. His actions added to the growing tensions in pre-1914 Europe.

Georges Clemenceau (France)

was the senior French representative at the Versailles settlement. He wanted the terms of Versailles to smash Germany, whereas David Lloyd George of Britain privately wanted a non-emotive approach to Germany's punishment at Versailles. He was completely in tune with what the French wanted out of the peace treaty the destruction of Germany.