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Ferdinand and Sophie's Assassination
On June 28, 1914, Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his spouse Sophie were shot at point blank range as they rode the streets of Sarajevo. -
Declaring War
On July 28, 1914, Austria rejected Serbia's offer and declared war. That same day, Serbia's ally, Russia, took action. Russian leaders ordered the mobilization of troops toward the Austrian border. -
Strategy of the Western Front
By mid-August 1914, the battle lines were clearly drawn. On one side were Germany and Austria-Hungary. They were known as the Central Powers, because of their location in the heart of Europe. Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire would later join the Central Powers in the hopes of regaining lost territories. On the other side were Great Britain, France and Russia. They were known as the Allied Powers. -
Attack of the Allies.
On September 5, the Allies attacked the Germans northeast of Paris, in the valley of the Marne River. Every available soilder was hurled into the striggle. When reinforcements were needed, more than 600 taxicabs rushed soldiers from Paris to the front. After four days of fighting, the German generals fave the order to retreat. -
The Eastern Front
The Eastern Front was a stretch of battlefield along the German and Russian border. Here, Russians and Serbs battled Germans, Austrians, and Turks. The war in the east was a more mobile war than that in the west. Here too, however, slaughter and stalemate were common. -
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War in the Trenches
By early 1915, opposing armies on the Western Front had dug miles of parallel trenches to protect themselves from enemy fire. This set the stage for what became known as trench warfare. -
Attack on the French
The slaughter reached a peak in 1916. In February, the Germans launched a massive attack against the French near Verdun. Each side lost more than 300,000 men. -
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Battle on Western Front
In July of 1916, the British army tried to relieve the pressure on the French. British forces attacked the Germans northwest of Verdun, in the valley of the Somme River. In the first day of battle alone, more than 20,000 British soldiers were killed. By the time the Batlle of the Somme ended in November, each side had suffered over half a million casualties. -
USA Enters War
In 1917, the focus of the war shifted to the high seas. That year, the Germans intensified the submarine warfare that had raged in the Atlantic Oean since shortly after the war began. By 1917, failed crops, as well as a British naval blockade, caused severe food shortages in Germany. Desperate to strike back, Germany decided to establishits own naval blockade around Britain. In January 1917, the Germans announced that their submarines would sink without warning any ship. -
Declaring War
On April 2, 1917, President Wilson asked Congress to declare war. The United States entered the war on the side of the Allies. -
Seizing Power
In 1917 of November, Communist leder Vladimir Ilyich Lenin seized power. Lenin insisted on ending his country's involvment in the war. -
Signing the Treaty
In 1918 of March, Germany and Russua signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, which ended the war between them. -
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Battle on the Western Front (cont.)
The allies and Germans clashed at the Second Battle of the Marne. Leading the Allied attack were some 350 tanks that rumbled slowly forward, smashing throught the German Lines. -
Ending of World War I
On November 11 1918,, World War I came to an end. After four years of slaughter and destruction, the time had come to forge a peace settlement. -
League of Nations
On July 28th, 1919, five years tothe day after Ferdinand's death in Sarajevo. Adopting Wilson's fourteenth point, the treaty created a League of Nations.