World War I Lecture

History M01B – Krister Swanson – Moorpark College

Alliances Form

• Tension over colonies & the Balkans leads to new alliances
• Triple Alliance: Germany, Austria Hungary, Italy
• Triple Entente: Russia, France & Great Britain
• Germany is exposed to possible two front war
• Diplomacy increasingly based on brinksmanship - requires large standing armies

Assassination & Aftermath

• 6/28/14- Archduke FF killed, Serbs involved?, act condemned
• A-H needs German support for attack on Serbia
• 7/24- A-H issues ultimatum, Serbs concede, A-H declares war anyway
• Russia split on war, (humiliation of 1905)
• Germany & Russia - Who mobilizes 1st?
• France & GB don’t want war

Ready to Rumble?

• Russians mobilize, then Germans
• Schlieffen Plan:
• starts in 8/14
• strong right, thru Belgium (neutral)
• sweep thru France
• hold east until army swings thru
• GB comes in to back Belgium & France

New Style War

• 1st big war since Napoleon (romance, nationalism)
• new weapons (machine gun, poison gas, tank, sub, plane) change warfare
• Strengths:
• Allies: #s, ind. strength, navy
• Central Powers: 1st attack, communication

The War Bogs Down in the West

• Schlieffen Plan bites it (weak right)
• French attack on Germany fails
• 9/14- Allies stop Germany at Marne & everybody digs in
• 2/16- Germans attack Verdun- “They shall not pass” (350,000 die)
• 7/16- Allies try to end it @ Somme & fail (420,000 die)

Trench Warfare

• massive assaults that gain nothing (defense better than offense)
• All resources of nation & industry poured in to the killing machine
• trench foot, rats, disease, boredom, shell shock, brutal deaths & total destruction of the landscape
• 3 years front moves 2 miles

War in East

• Russia wins early
• CP reverses & drives into Balkans
• trenches, Russia’s “human sea” attacks
• 1915- Italy & Japan join Allies
• 1915- Allies fail in attack on Turkey (Galipoli)
• Russia continues to wear down & conditions worsen

In the Sea

• British blockade everything
• Germans counter with U-Boats
• Lusitania & Zimmerman Telegram bring in U.S. into the war in April, 1917

Causes of Russian Revolution

• Revolution of 1905- Oct. Manifesto (sets up Duma)
• Nicholas II is inept, influence of Rasputin
• by 1916 Army’s getting whupped, ill prepared for modern war
• widespread hunger, poor working & living conditions
• 1916- Nicholas dismisses Duma, faces open dissent from all sides

February (March) Revolution

• 3/8/17- strikes & demonstrations in Petrograd - troops refuse to fire, Tsar’s lost control
• 3/12/17- Provisional Gov’t (Kerensky) set up by Duma - based on liberal ideals
• 3/15/17-Nicholas II abdicates throne
• almost all groups want revolution for one reason or another
• Worker councils, or soviets, organized (rivals to provisional gov‘t)
• Bolsheviks waiting for Bourg. period
• Provisional gov’t sticks w/ alliance & War (big mistake
• army lacks discipline, things continue to worsen

Lenin & Bolsheviks (Oct. Rev.)

• 4/17- Germans sneak Lenin back in to stir pot
• motto is “peace, bread and land”
• 7/17- Bolsheviks’ 1st coup fails, right wing countercoup fails
• 11/7/17 Trotsky (red army) & Lenin try again & succeed, declare power is now w/ Soviets
• Capital back to Moscow

Maintaining Control

• First priority is to fulfill promises & maintain security
• other parties shut down (like French convention)
• land over to peasants
• Confiscate grain, take over banks
• 3/18: withdraw from war, give territory to Ger in Treaty of Brest-Litovsk
• “Comm Revs will spring up all over”

Bols Face Mucho Resistance

• Czarists
• Peasants who support Social Revs
• Allied troops who support “White Russians” (liberal Moderates)

The U.S. Swings the Tide

• Russia collapses, Germany gains in west (June & July of 1918)
• U.S. troops help with defending Paris & counter-offensives
• Battles of Belleau Wood & the Argonne Forest
• Germany surrenders 11/11 in the 11th hour (Treaty of Versailles)
• Massive casualties & destruction

Defeat Hits Germany

• Mini revolution leads to abdication of Wilhelm II, republican gov’t to power
• Repub. gov’t accepts peace
• Germans expect mild, get brutal peace
• dictated, not negotiated
• give up Al-Lor, demilitarize Rhineland
• mini-army (100K men), in Germany?
• massive reparations ($5b/yr., no term)
• take whole blame for war

Impact of Peace

• Weimar Republic doomed
• France alone on continent to keep peace
• Germany shamed & overburdened
• GB & United States become isolationist
• Austria-Hungary turns into an economic & nationalist mess
• doesn’t follow liberal or nationalist aims – creating future problems (WWII)

Overall Impact of War

• 10m dead, 20m wounded
• Old Order gone (A-H split, Bolsheviks)
• Europe no longer all powerful
• shatters confidence in human progress

Swanson’s WWI Timeline

• July 1914: Assassination triggers alliances into war
• Aug. 1914: Germany attacks France with Schlieffen Plan – stopped dead along western front
• Sept. 1914: Major offensives on both sides fail, trenches dug starting 3 years of trench warfare
• Summer 1915: GB & France try to break through at Galipoli and fail
• 1915-1918: GB blockades German coast, Ger. responds with sub warfare (Lusitania 1915)
• 1916: Year of major battles on Western Front (Verdun and Somme)
• 1917: U.S. enters war (Lusitania (1915) & Zimm. Telegram)
• 1917: Russian Revolution, they pull out of war
• 1918: Germany launches all out offensive, Allies hold with help from U.S. & then break through German lines
• 1918: Germany surrenders hoping for peace based on Wilson’s 14 Points – instead they are harshly punished by the Treaty of Versailles