World War I

• Causes of World War I

  • Political and social conflicts mainly involving European countries
  • Belief that they can be dominant in their economic, political and military status led them to create strong militaries in preparation for a possible war
• Alliances formed during World War I

  • Allied Forces (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Turkey, Italy)
  • Central Powers (Russia, France, Belgium, Serbia)
• Assassination of Franz Ferdinand and Sofia Ferdinand


  Triggered the First World War
• Serbia held responsible for the assassination

  Led to a war between Austria and Serbia (together with their allies) in July 1914
• Specific wars in August 1914

  • Germany versus Russia
  • Germany versus France
  • Britain versus Germany
• Battle in the Western Front

  1. Series of battles from August 1914 to November 1918

  2. Between Allied Powers (France, United Kingdom, Belgium, USA, Portugal, Russia, Italy) and Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary)

  3. Key events: Battle of Marne, Battle of Ypres, Trench Warfare, Battle of Verdun, Battle of Somme
• Battle of Marne


  • Attack made by France and Britain against Germans who invaded Belgium
  • French and British forces won against Germans
• Battle of Ypres


  • Germans used poison gas against British and Canadian forces but failed to exploit such advantage
• Trench Warfare


  • Millions of armies from both conflicting forces met in a line of relatively permanent systems of trenches dug into the ground
• Battle of Verdun


  • One of the bloodiest war in which almost 300,000 soldiers were killed
• Battle of Somme


  • Unsuccessful attack of the Allied forces which became a metaphor for futile slaughter
• Battle in the Eastern Front


  1. Series of battles from August 1914 to May 1918

  2. Between Allied Powers (mainly Russia and Romania) and Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, Ottoman Empire)
• The war between Allied forces and Central Powers spread even to Asia Pacific with Middle East, Japan and the United States joining the conflict
• USA went into war

  Because it found out that Germany would help Mexico liberate its land from USA if Mexico would agree to join the Central Powers
• Germany formally surrendered


  November 11, 1918
• The casualties of this war included 21 million wounded soldiers and 20 million dead soldiers. Around 13 million civilians also died due to the war
• The 1918 Flu pandemic spread even more due to this war
• League of Nations


  • International organization founded during the Paris Peace Conference in 1919
  • Its goals included preventing war through collective security
• Treaty of Versailles


  • Made Germany held responsible for the war
  • Germany had to pay for the war damages called reparations
  • German territories divided and limitation of German troops
• Causes of WWI

  • Alliance system
  • Arms build-up
  • Secret treaties
  • Nationalism
  • Imperialism
• People's lives were affected by:
• Otto von Bismarck


  Declared Germany a "satisfied nation" after helping build its empire through starting wars
• Kaiser Wilhelm II


  Rattled the sword, called Bismarck's alliances an outmoded old man, canceled treaty with Russia which drove Russia to sign alliance with France in 1894, called for Germany to gain power around the world
• The French and British secretly built the "entente cordiale" alliance based on military cooperation and shared military plans
• The entente became a triple entente when Russia and Britain settled their colonial differences in 1907
• The main issue was the territory awarded to Bulgaria in the settlement, which made Austria-Hungary and Germany anxious as they were nervous Austria-Hungary's Slavic population might want to be part of the new Greater Serbia
• Archduke Franz Ferdinand


  Heir to the Habsburg imperial throne, wanted to restore absolutism and curtail individual freedoms
• In 1908, the Austro-Hungarian empire annexed Bosnia, which ticked off Bosnian nationalists who wanted to unify all southern Slavic countries under one government
• In 1914, Archduke Ferdinand decided to visit Bosnia, where he was likely to get assassinated
• Despite the danger, Ferdinand drove around Sarajevo with the top down in his limousine
• Nedeljko Cabrinovic, a member of the young Serbian nationalist movement, threw a bomb at Ferdinand's car but it missed
• After the bomb attack, Ferdinand decided to visit the wounded victims at the hospital, but his driver made a wrong turn onto the street where Gavrilo Princip was waiting
• Gavrilo Princip


  A nineteen-year-old Bosnian bookworm who became one of history's more famous teenagers, dreamed of his beloved homeland joining a Greater Serbia
• Princip shot and killed Archduke Ferdinand and his wife
• In response to the assassination, Austria-Hungary sought support from Germany, who agreed, and Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia
• Russia, Serbia's ally, mobilized its forces, causing Germany to declare war on Russia
• Russia's ally France then mobilized its forces, causing Germany to declare war on France
• Great Britain then entered the war
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