World War I

World War I is a war that began in 1914 and ended on 11 november 1918. This war has costed 20 million deaths and 21 million wounded. The axis in this war were Germany, Austria-Hungary, Ottoman Empire, Bulgaria and first also Italy, But Italy later came by the Allies. The allies in this war were France, UK, Russia and in 1917 also The USA and later also Italy. The first world war is called a world war because not only European countries fought, but also colonies all over the world were involved in the war.

Let's begin with the first cause, the first cause is the militarism. Due to industrialisation in factories, countries in Europe started making increasingly stronger weapons. increasingly strong weapons were made through the mechanisation of machines. Countries started to show their weapons and military to other countries to make other countries think that you have a very strong army.

The second cause of World War I was nationalism. They wanted to show how strong their country is and how proud they are of their country and what they are capable of. Great empires were founded all over the world in the hands of the Europeans. In this way they wanted to show their power compared to other competitors.

The third cause of World War I were the alliances. There first was peace in Europe, but war could break out at any moment. Because of this danger, many European countries entered into alliances with each other. This way they are stronger and enemies are more afraid than before. For example, Germany entered into an alliance with Austria- Hungary and France entered into an alliance with the United Kingdom and Russia.

The Fourth and last cause of World War I was the death on the heir apparent Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife by Serbian Nationalists in Sarajevo (Bosnia and Herzegovina).

After the Balkan incident, Germany declared Serbia the war. France and Russia then declare war on Germany. Germany. Germany first wanted to start by occupying Paris and then attack Russia to prevent a two-front war. The german soldiers therefore thought that they would conquer Paris in a few weeks and that thew would also have conquered Russia within a few weeks. But that turned out not to be the case. The Germans knew that the French would await the Germans in the northeast, so the Germans invaded France via Belgium (which was actually neutral) via the north. This is how Belgium also became involved in the war. France was underestimated and therefore a two-front war arose. Trenches were dug in France and Belgium, causing a trench warfare. There were also trenches on the eastern front, but not as many. In trench warfare, attempts were often made to defeat te enemy and take a piece of land, but that did not go smoothly. The attacks made no progress whatsoever on territory. The many attacks resulted in many deaths. During the trench warfare, new and stronger weapons were also created that sometimes made slightly more progress in the war. Examples are airplanes, tanks and poison gas.

On the other side, Russia was trying to attack Germany and Austria-Hungary.  Parts of Prussia were taken by the Russians but after a few weeks, Germany and Austria-Hungary successfully got the parts of Prussia back in it's on hands. But in 1917 Russia ended up in a revolution, which meant that Russia no longer participated in the war. Germany and Austria-Hungary therefore only focused on the western front. But that did not go smoothly, the final straw was that the United States got involved in 1917. The United States sent hundreds of thousands of fresh soldiers to the western front to help the French and British defeat the axis powers. The tired and worn out soldiers of the axis power were no match for the fresh American soldiers. As a result, Germany and Austria-Hungary are losing important areas. They also lost their colonies. And shortly afterwards there was the defeat of the axis powers by a truce.

The role of Italy: Italy joined the Allies in 1915. Italy was then directly opposed to Austria-Hungary. The Italians waited for the Austrians and Hungarians on top of the Alps. The Austrians and Hungarians had no chance because they were shot at from above the mountain and then you find yourself at the bottom. Progress had been made for a while by the Austrians and Hungarians. The were throwing TNT into the middle of a mountain. This way they could make a tunnel through the middle of the mountain and come out on the other side of the mountain. The Italians stopped this in most cases.

The role of the Ottoman Empire: The Ottoman empire were fighting against the allies because they were good friends with Germany and they also wanted parts of the black sea back that were lost by Russia. The allies invaded the Ottoman empire from all sides and that led to the end of the Ottoman empire in the war. The Ottoman empire was divided by the allies. The Armenians fought for the Russian army.

The role of Bulgaria: Bulgaria fought with the Austrian and Hungarians against Serbia. Then the allies moved soldiers to Thessaloniki (Greece) to invade Bulgaria from there. This works and Bulgaria is defeated.

The Treaty of Versailles was signed in 1919. It states that Germany must take all the blame. Germany also has to pay back everything to the allies and the lose a lot of territory. And lastly, there are no longer allowed to have a strong army.