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The Great War 1914-1918
"The Great War was without precedent ... never had so many
nations taken up arms at a single time. Never had the battlefield
been so vast… never had the fighting been so gruesome..."
• The World War of 1914-18 - The Great War, as
contemporaries called it -- was the first manmade catastrophe of the 20th century. Historians
can easily identify the literal "smoking gun" that
set the War in motion: a revolver used by a
Serbian nationalist to assassinate Archduke
Franz Ferdinand (heir apparent to the AustroHungarian throne) in Sarajevo on June 28,
1914.
• "World War I marked the first use of
chemical weapons, the first mass
bombardment of civilians from the sky,
and the century's first genocide..."
• True to the military alliances, Europe's
powers quickly drew up sides after the
assassination. The allies -- chiefly Russia,
France and Britain -- were pitted against
the Central Powers -- primarily Germany,
Austria-Hungary and Turkey. Eventually,
the War spread beyond Europe as the
warring continent turned to its colonies
and friends for help.
• This included the United States, which
joined the War in 1917 when President
Woodrow Wilson called on Americans to
"make the world safe for democracy."
• Most of the leaders in 1914 had no real
idea of the war machine they were putting
into motion. Many believed the War would
be over by Christmas 1914. But by the end
of the first year, a new kind of war
emerged on the battlefield that had never
been seen before -- or repeated since:
total war-producing stalemate, the result of
a war that went on for 1,500 days.
• Before the official Armistice was declared
on November 11, 1918, nine million people
had died on the battlefield and the world
was forever changed.
Quotes: Jay Winter & Blaine Baggett, The Great War, And the
Shaping of the 20th Century
• Both sides originally believed that the
Great War would be over quickly. In
Germany, this belief was based on a long
established war strategy called the
Schlieffen Plan.
• The German generals were so confident of
success that Kaiser Wilhelm II proclaimed
that he would have "Paris for lunch, St.
Petersburg for dinner." The plan required
precise timing, with no interruptions in the
timetable -- its first objective was to
capture Paris in precisely 42 days, and
force the French to surrender.
• The German armies would then shift their
focus to the eastern front and defeat the
Russians before they were fully prepared
to fight.
The Schlieffen plan got off to a quick start
with a German army invading Belgium to
reach Paris, and then soon began to
unravel.
The Trenches: Symbol of
Stalemate
• By the war's end, each side had dug at
least 12,000 miles of trenches.
The first major trench lines were completed
in late November 1914. At their peak, the
trenches built by both sides extended nearly
400 miles from Nieuport, on the Belgian
coast, to the Swiss border. Among the Allies,
the Belgians occupied 40 miles, the British
occupied 90 miles and the French occupied
the rest.
Organization of the trenches
• The Allies used four "types" of trenches.
The first, the front-line trench (or firingand-attack trench), was located from 50
yards to 1 mile from the German's front
trench. Several hundred yards behind the
front-line trench was the support trench,
with men and supplies that could
immediately assist those on the front line.
• The reserve trench was dug several hundred
yards further back and contained men and
supplies that were available in emergencies
should the first trenches be overrun.
Connecting these trenches were communication
trenches, which allowed movement of
messages, supplies, and men among the
trenches. Some underground networks
connected gun emplacements and bunkers with
the communication trenches.
• German trench life was much different.
They constructed elaborate and
sophisticated tunnel and trench structures,
sometimes with living quarters more than
50 feet below the surface. These trenches
had electricity, beds, toilets and other
niceties of life that contrasted sharply with
the open-air trenches of the Allies.
Morale Booster
• On average, daily losses for the British
soldiers were nearly 7,000 men killed,
disabled or wounded. This figure remained
fairly constant throughout the war. To keep
morale as high as possible and to keep
the soldiers on the front as fresh as
possible, the British established a threeweek rotation schedule.
• A week in the front trench was followed by
a week in the support trench, which was
followed by a week in the reserve
trenches. During this third week, the men
could relax with sports, concerts and
plays, keeping their minds away from life
on the front.
No man's land: The Territory
Between the Trenches
• By mid-November 1914, the territory
between the opposing front trenches was
marked with huge craters caused by the
shelling; nearly all vegetation was
destroyed. Whenever possible, both sides
filled this land with barbed wire to slow
down any rapid advances by the enemy.
The machine gun and the new long-range
rifles made movement in this area almost
impossible.
Timing of Movements at the Front
• Both sides quickly recognized that
assaults against the enemy trenches were
suicide if begun in broad daylight, so
attacks tended to take place just before
dawn or right at dawn.
• Poison gases tended to be more effective in the
mornings, as the colder air and absence of wind
allowed the gases to stay closer to the ground
for longer periods of time.
• Except for artillery shelling, daytime was
relatively safe for the soldiers on the front line.
Once the sun went down, men crawled out of
their trenches to conduct raids, investigate the
layout of the terrain, and eavesdrop near the
enemy lines to pick up information on their
strengths, weakness and strategies.
THE COUNTRIES OF EUROPE 1914
• During the War's early years Britain (supported loyally by
troops from her Empire and Commonwealth, such as;
Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa) and her
Allies, France and Russia, fought against Germany and
Austro-Hungary. At the War's end many more countries
were involved, including; the United States, Turkey,
Japan, Italy. What had started over the assassination of
the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the throne of the
decaying Austro-Hungarian Empire, in the Bosnian
capital of Sarajevo on 28th June, 1914 only concluded
after the deaths of tens of millions of soldiers and
civilians
THE BALKAN COUNTRIES - 1914
• The empires of Germany, Austro-Hungary,
Turkey, and Russia had disappeared,
countries had lost land or gained land,
new counties were created (for example,
Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia), and new
threatening political systems had taken
over, or were about to take over in Russia
and Germany respectively.