WORLD WAR I

 We are currently living in a world that has seen countless conflicts and wars between

different nations and communities leaving devastating marks on the lively hood of

millions of people around the world. One of the major wars that took place was world

war I.

 Started in 1914 after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria.

Tensions had been brewing throughout Europe—especially in the troubled Balkan

region of southeast Europe—for years before World War I actually broke out. A number

of alliances involving European powers, the Ottoman Empire, Russia and other parties

had existed for years, but political instability in the Balkans (particularly Bosnia, Serbia

and Herzegovina) threatened to destroy these agreements.

 The Spark That Ignited World War I was struck in Sarajevo, Bosnia, where Archduke Franz Ferdinand—heir to the Austro-Hungarian Empire—was shot to death along with his wife, Sophie, by the

Serbian nationalist Gavrilo Princip on June 28, 1914.

 Princip and other nationalists were

struggling to end Austro-Hungarian rule over Bosnia and Herzegovina. This led to the

Austro-Hungarian government and some nations blaming Serbia for the death of the

Archduke Franz Ferdinand. Austria-Hungary waited to declare war until its leaders’

received assurance from German leader Kaiser Wilhelm II that Germany would support

their cause. 

Austro-Hungarian leaders feared that a Russian intervention would involve

Russia’s ally, France, and possibly Great Britain as well. Germany secretly went on to

agree to support Austria-Hungary in their cause. Convinced that Austria-Hungary was

readying for war, the Serbian government ordered the Serbian army to mobilize and

appealed to Russia for assistance. On July 28, Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia,

and the tenuous peace between Europe’s great powers quickly collapsed. 

Within a

week, Russia, Belgium, France, Great Britain and Serbia had lined up against Austria-

Hungary and Germany, and World War I had begun. Germany began fighting World War

I on two fronts, invading France through neutral Belgium in the west and confronting

Russia in the east. On August 4, 1914, German troops crossed the border into Belgium.

In the first battle of World War I, the Germans assaulted the heavily fortified city of

Liege, using the most powerful weapons in their arsenal—enormous siege cannons—to

capture the city by August 15. The Germans left death and destruction in their wake as

they advanced through Belgium toward France, shooting civilians and executing a

Belgian priest they had accused of inciting civilian resistance.

 French and British forces

confronted the invading German army, which had by then penetrated deep into

northeastern France, within 30 miles of Paris. The Allied troops checked the German

advance and mounted a successful counterattack, driving the Germans back to the

north of the Aisne River. The defeat meant the end of German plans for a quick victory

in France. Both sides dug into trenches, and the Western Front was the setting for a

hellish war of attrition that would last more than three years. At the outbreak of fighting

in 1914, the United States remained on the sidelines of World War I, adopting the policy

of neutrality favored by President Woodrow Wilson while continuing to engage in

commerce and shipping with European countries on both sides of the conflict. 

In 1915,

Germany declared the waters surrounding the British Isles to be a war zone, and

German U-boats sunk several commercial and passenger vessels, including some U.S.

ships. Widespread protest over the sinking by U-boat of the British ocean liner

Lusitania—traveling from New York to Liverpool, England with hundreds of American

passengers onboard—in May 1915 helped turn the tide of American public opinion

against Germany. In February 1917, Congress passed a $250 million arms

appropriations bill intended to make the United States ready for war. 

Germany sunk four

more U.S. merchant ships the following month, and on April 2 Woodrow Wilson

appeared before Congress and called for a declaration of war against Germany. World

War I took the lives of more than 9 million soldiers; 21 million more were wounded.

Civilian casualties numbered close to 10 million.

 The two nations most affected were

Germany and France, each of which sent some 80 percent of their male populations

between the ages of 15 and 49 into battle.  The political disruption surrounding World

War I also contributed to the fall of four venerable imperial dynasties: Germany, Austria-

Hungary, Russia and Turkey. The first global war also helped to spread one of the

world’s deadliest global pandemics, the Spanish flu epidemic of 1918, which killed an

estimated 20 to 50 million people.