What is this about?
How was World War I fought
Changes in Warfare
- Europeans initially thought World War I would be over quick and as such people were pretty positive about it
- Hundreds of thousands of young boys enlisted in the military, dreaming of heroism
- People thought their country would swiftly win and end the war with little damage
- However, new advances in war technology and tactics led to the horrific effects of the war
- Neither side was able to defeat each other, leading to a four year bloody stalemate where the death count kept going up with little accomplishment on both sides
Trench Warfare
- Trenches are long ditches dug in the ground in order to defend against enemy fire
- Was not glorious whatsoever
- Trenches were often cold, muddy, and rat-infested
- Conditions were so unhygienic that a good portion of soldiers died from disease
Poison Gas
- Were used to help break stalemates caused by trench warfare
- Caused massive casualties
Machine Guns & Barbed Wire
- Caused many areas that involved trench warfare to devolve into no man’s land and stalemates
- Machine guns invented in the 1880s and could fire 500 ammunitions per minute
Submarines
- Wreaked havoc on Atlantic Ocean shipping lanes
- Submarine warfare was also the official reason cited by the US for joining World War I
- German government kept sinking American ships, leading to loss of American ships and lives
Tanks and Airplanes
- Were experimental but still used to some extend in World War I
Factors leading to Entry of US
- Economic ties between Europe and US
- Allies took out large loans with American banks
- United States became increasingly committed economically to an Allied victory
- By spring of 1917, the Allies depleted their means of paying back the US,
- so in order for the US to be paid back, the Allies would have to win the war, and in order to win the war, the US had to join
- Submarine warfare
- German government kept sinking American ships, leading to loss of American ships and lives
- Zimmermann Telegram
- Telegram from Germany to Mexico intercepted by the US
- Said that Germany would help Mexico reclaim the territory it lost in 1848 if Mexico allied with Germany in the war
Total War
- Total war = when nations mobilize all available resources and population, including civilians, to achieve complete victory over the enemy, often leading to the total destruction of infrastructure, economies, and societies
- Basically the entire economy was dedicated to winning the war
- Millions of civilians, including women, worked in factories to produce war materials
- Demand for work was so high that unemployment basically vanished overnight
- Governments restricted individual freedoms and increasingly gave more domestic power to the military
- Governments also set production quotas and controlled prices and wages
Propaganda
- Governments ramped up wartime propaganda to encourage people to enlist
- Propaganda portrayed the enemy crudely and often dehumanized them
- Done on both sides
- Propaganda also worked to convince the people that losing would mean the destruction of everything worth living for
- People who criticized the war were often convicted as traitors
- Spurred hatred and bitterness for the other side, both among civilians and soldiers
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A Global War
- World War I was fought in Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans
- Britain seized most of Germany’s African colonies
- ANZAC = Special corps unit consisting of Australians and New Zealanders
- Britain and other European nations drafted Africans and Indians
- 1.3 million Indians fought in the war for the British
- French army included 450,000 Africans and 44,000 Indochinese
- Many fought as they were under the guise that if they fought for their colonizers they would be granted independence
- Arabs, who were long under the control of the Ottoman Empire, fought for the British because the British promised them self-rule after the war
Gallipoli
- Sought to weaken the Ottoman Empire
- The Gallipoli Campaign is remembered as a massive failure for the Allied powers
- Although the British directed the ill-fated campaign:
- It was mostly Canadians, Australians, and New Zealanders who suffered terrible casualties
- ANZAC fought in Gallipoli, for example
Women and the War
- While men marched off to war, women marched off to work in the factories and at farms
- Women’s wages did increase during the war, but the income gap between men and women still remained
- Extension of voting rights to women came in part thanks to the important role women assumed in World War I
- Britain gave rights to vote to women in 1918, Germany in 1919, Austria in 1919
- Most countries, however, forbade women from serving in combat
- Russia, Serbia, Romania, and Bulgaria allowed women to serve
- Russia in 1917 created an all-female military unit to shame men into joining the war
The Paris Peace Conference
- Occurred in 1919
- The Big Four at the Conference: the US, Britain, France, Italy
- Even though Italy was on the winning side, they left in a rage because they were not given the territory that they were promised
- Russia was not invited as by then it fell to the communist government which withdrew out of the war
- President Wilson of the US believed that no country should be severely punished or greatly rewarded
- France and Britain disagreed
Fourteen Points
- Wilson laid out his principles in a document called the Fourteen Points
- Points included:
- Called for the establishment of a League of Nations
- The US Senate however voted against joining it
- Believed everyone, even the defeated, had the right to self-determination
- Didn’t want the defeated to become colonies of the Allies
- A few new countries were created while other territories were incorporated into Britain or France
- Believed in “peace without victory”
- Meaning the winners should not be greatly rewarded and the losers should not be greatly punished
The Treaty of Versailles
- Treated Germany harshly
- Blamed the whole war on Germany
- Germany made to pay billions in reparations, give up all its colonies, disarm, and restrict the size of its armed forced
- Treaty was humiliating for Germany and caused tremendous hardships during the interwar period
- Germany’s economy faced sky-high inflation partly due to the reparations it was made to pay
- This resentment would later lead to the rise of the Nazis
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