World War I: A Global Conflict

A Global Conflict

• World War I became a global conflict involving countries from multiple continents and requiring extensive resources.
• The war propelled the United States into a position of significant international power.
• Australia, Japan, and India joined the Allies, while the Ottoman Turks and Bulgaria sided with the Central Powers.
• Both sides looked for allies around the globe in order to gain an advantage, and also sought new war fronts.

War Affects the World

• Combatants looked beyond Europe for a way to end the stalemate.

• The Gallipoli Campaign:

  • Allied strategy to attack the Dardanelles in the Ottoman Empire, aiming to capture Constantinople, defeat the Turks, and establish a supply line to Russia.
  • The effort began in February 1915 with British, Australian, New Zealand, and French troops landing on the Gallipoli Peninsula.
  • Turkish troops, aided by German officers, defended the region, resulting in a bloody stalemate.
  • The Allies eventually gave up and evacuated in December, suffering approximately 250,000 casualties.

• Battles in Africa and Asia:

  • Germany's colonial possessions were attacked, with Japan quickly seizing German outposts in China and the Pacific.
  • English and French troops attacked Germany's African colonies.
  • The British and French recruited soldiers and laborers from their colonies in Asia and Africa.
  • Some colonial subjects volunteered in hopes of gaining independence.

America Joins the Fight

• In 1917, the focus of the war shifted to the seas with intensified German submarine warfare.
• Germany announced unrestricted submarine warfare, sinking ships without warning around Britain.
• The Germans had previously tried this policy before.
• On May 7, 1915, a German U-boat sank the British passenger ship Lusitania, killing 1,198 people, including 128 U.S. citizens.
• Germany claimed the Lusitania was carrying ammunition, which was true.
• The American public was outraged.
• President Wilson protested, and after more attacks, Germany agreed to stop attacking neutral ships.
• Germany resumed unrestricted submarine warfare in 1917, gambling that Britain would be defeated before the US mobilized.
• German U-boats sank three American ships, pushing the U.S. closer to war.
• The Zimmermann Telegram:
  • Intercepted telegram from Germany's foreign secretary, Arthur Zimmermann, proposing an alliance with Mexico and promising to help Mexico regain land lost to the U.S.
  • Became the "last straw" and shifted American sentiment further towards the Allies.
  • The U.S. declared war on Germany on April 2, 1917, and joined the Allies.

War Affects the Home Front

• By the time the U.S. joined, the war had raged for three years and had claimed millions of lives.
• World War I became a total war, with countries devoting all resources to the war effort.
• Governments controlled the economy, directing factories' production in support of the war.

Global Impact

• The Influenza Epidemic:

  • A deadly strain of influenza, known as the Spanish flu, emerged in the spring of 1918.
  • The pandemic spread through England, India, Europe, Russia, Asia, and the U.S.
  • The epidemic killed soldiers and civilians alike, killing 20 million people worldwide.

• Governments turned to rationing, limiting the amount of goods people could buy to support the war effort.

• Antiwar activity was suppressed.

• Governments censored news and used propaganda to maintain morale and support for the war.

• Women replaced men in the workforce.

• Women also served as nurses near the front.

The Allies Win the War

• With the United States in the war, the balance seemed to tip in the favor of the Allies.

• Russia withdrew from the war because of internal conflict:

  • Civil unrest due to shortages of food and fuel forced Czar Nicholas to step down in March 1917.
  • A provisional government pledged to continue fighting, but the Russian army refused to fight.
  • Communist leader Vladimir Ilyich Lenin seized power in November 1917 and offered Germany a truce.
  • Germany and Russia signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk in March 1918, ending the war between them.

• The Central Powers Collapse:

  • Russia's withdrawal allowed Germany to focus on the Western Front.
  • In March 1918, Germany launched a final massive attack on the Allies in France which reached the Marne River.
  • The Allies counterattacked in July 1918 at the Second Battle of the Marne, aided by arriving US troops.
  • Allied forces advanced to Germany.
  • First the Bulgarians and then the Ottoman Turks surrendered.
  • Revolution swept through Austria-Hungary.
  • On November 9, 1918, Kaiser Wilhelm II stepped down.
  • Germany declared itself a republic and agreed to an armistice on November 11, ending World War I.

The Legacy of the War

• World War I involved new technologies, encompassed a global scale, and resulted in death and destruction.
• About 8.5 million soldiers died, 21 million were wounded, and countless civilians died
• The conflict also devastated the economies of European countries and destroyed farmland, homes, villages and towns.
• The war left a sense of disillusionment and insecurity throughout the Western world, shown through creative works.
• The treaties ending World War I, despite attempts to bring peace through security, prompted mostly resentment.

A Flawed Peace

• The Allies dictated a harsh peace settlement after winning the war.
• Hard feelings left by the peace settlement would later contribute to the cause of World War II.
• On January 18, 1919, a conference to establish peace terms began at the Palace of Versailles, outside Paris, with delegates from 32 countries.

The Allies Meet and Debate

• The major decisions were made by the Big Four.

  • Woodrow Wilson (United States)
  • Georges Clemenceau (France)
  • David Lloyd George (Great Britain)
  • Vittorio Orlando (Italy)

• Russia was not represented, as well as Germany and its allies.

• Wilson's Plan for Peace:

  • President Wilson proposed the Fourteen Points in January 1918.
  • The first four points included an end to secret treaties, freedom of the seas, free trade, and reduced national armies and navies.
  • The fifth goal was the adjustment of colonial claims with fairness toward colonial peoples.
  • Points six through thirteen suggested changing borders and creating new nations, guided by self-determination.
  • Point fourteen proposed a "general association of nations".

• The Versailles Treaty:

  • Britain and France wanted national security and sought to strip Germany's war-making power.
  • Differences in aims led to arguments and compromise with the Treaty of Versailles, signed on June 28, 1919.
  • The treaty created the League of Nations to keep peace among nations, adopting Wilson's fourteenth point.
  • The treaty also punished Germany, taking substantial territory, restricting military operations, placing blame for the war on Germany, and demanding reparations.

A Troubled Treaty

• Agreements created bitterness and betrayal
• Separate peace treaties in 1919 and 1920 with each of the other defeated nations led to land losses for the Central Powers.
• New countries emerged from the Austro-Hungarian Empire: Austria, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, and Yugoslavia.
• The Ottoman Turks gave up nearly all their former empire, with Allies carving up Southwest Asia into mandates.
• Russia suffered land losses as well, and the United States rejected the Treaty of Versailles.

Treaty of Versailles: Major Provisions

• League of Nations: International peace organization, excluding enemy and neutral nations initially.

• Territorial Losses: Alsace-Lorraine returned to France, some of Germany’s borders were turned over, and Germany lost overseas colonies.

• Military Restrictions: Limits on German army size, prohibition against importing weapons and war material, and ban on submarines and air force.

• War Guilt: Germany held responsible for the war and forced to pay $33 billion in reparations.

• Other countries felt betrayed by the peace settlements.

• European colonialism continued in Asia and Africa, despite people wanting the Allies to let them be independent.

• The League of Nations lacked the power to act on the complaints, which led to Versailles settlements.

• This caused a legacy of bitterness.