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France loses Alsace & Lorraine to Germany
Germany wanted these areas because of the people and history, but not being ruled by them but by France. Germany felt that they needed it back for their history and pride. -
Period: to
World War 1/ Russian Revolution
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Russo-Japanese War
The Russo-Japanese War was fought between the Russian Empire and the Empire of Japan over rival imperial ambitions in Manchuria and Korea. The war ended on September 5, 1905. -
Bloody Sunday
1905 in St Petersburg, Russia, when unarmed demonstrators led by Father Georgy Gapon were fired upon by soldiers of the Imperial Guard as they marched towards the Winter Palace to present a petition to Tsar Nicholas II of Russia. -
Austria-Hungary annexes Bosnia
On October 6, 1908, the Dual Monarchy of Austria-Hungary announces its annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, dual provinces in the Balkan region of Europe formerly under the control of the Ottoman Empire. -
Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand
On June 28, 1914, then, Franz Ferdinand and Sophie were touring Sarajevo in an open car, with surprisingly little security, when Serbian nationalist Nedjelko Cabrinovic threw a bomb at their car; it rolled off the back of the vehicle and wounded an officer and some bystanders. Later that day, on the way to visit the injured officer, the archduke’s procession took a wrong turn at the junction of Appel quay and Franzjosefstrasse, where one of Cabrinovic’s cohorts, 19-year-old Gavrilo Princip, happ -
Austria-Hungary Declares War on Serbia
On July 28, 1914, one month to the day after Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife were killed by a Serbian nationalist in Sarajevo, Austria-Hungary declares war on Serbia, effectively beginning the First World War.Threatened by Serbian ambition in the tumultuous Balkans region of Europe, Austria-Hungary determined that the proper response to the assassinations was to prepare for a possible military invasion of Serbia. -
Russia Mobilizies Army
One of the main causes of World War I was the mobilization of Russia. After facing defeat in the Franco Prussian War, Russia did not want to seem vulnerable to the other European countries. Russia entered the first world war, it had the largest standing army in the world with a total of 5 million soldiers. -
Germany Invades Belguim
German government sent an ultimatum to Belgium, demanding passage through the country and German forces invaded Luxembourg. -
Schlieffen Plan
The Schlieffen Plan was the operational plan for a designated attack on France once Russia, in response to international tension, had started to mobilise her forces near the German border. The execution of the Schlieffen Plan led to Britain declaring war on Germany on August 4th, 1914. -
Start of the Battle of Marne
The World War I First Battle of the Marne featured the first use of radio intercepts and automotive transport of troops in wartime. After French commander in chief Joseph Joffre ordered an offensive in September 1914, General Michel-Joseph Maunoury’s French Sixth Army opened a gap between Germany’s First and Second Armies. Maunoury exploited the gap with help from the French Fifth Army and British Expeditionary Force, while Ferdinand Foch’s Ninth Army thwarted the advances of the German Second a -
Sinking of the Lusitania
The sinking of the Cunard ocean liner RMS Lusitania occurred on Friday, 7 May 1915 during the First World War, as Germany waged submarine warfare against the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. The ship was identified and torpedoed by the German U-boat U-20 and sank in 18 minutes. -
Start of the Battle of Verdun
This World War I siege stemmed from German General Erich von Falkenhayn’s edict to elicit major bloodshed from the French defense of the fortress complex around Verdun. German forces advanced quickly in February 1916, claiming Fort Douaumont and Fort Vaux after brutal subterranean melees. Despite coming within two miles of Verdun cathedral, the Germans called off their offensive in mid-July, and Falkenhayn was relieved of his position. The French retook their forts and pushed back the line, and -
Start of the Battle of the Somme
The Battle of the Somme, also known as the Somme Offensive, was one of the largest battles of the First World War. Fought between July 1 and November 1, 1918 near the Somme River in France, it was also one of the bloodiest military battles in history. On the first day alone, the British suffered more than 57,000 casualties, and by the end of the campaign the Allies and Central Powers would lose more than 1.5 million men. -
Zimmerman Telegraph found
January 11,1917 a message from the German foreign secretary, Arthur Zimmermann, to the German ambassador to Mexico proposing a Mexican-German alliance in the case of war between the United States and Germany, is published on the front pages of newspapers across America. -
Russian Czar Nicholas II abdicates
In March 1917, the army garrison at Petrograd joined striking workers in demanding socialist reforms, and Czar Nicholas II was forced to abdicate. Nicholas and his family were first held at the Czarskoye Selo palace, then in the Yekaterinburg palace near Tobolsk. In July 1918, the advance of counterrevolutionary forces caused the Yekaterinburg Soviet forces to fear that Nicholas might be rescued. After a secret meeting, a death sentence was passed on the imperial family, and Nicholas, his wife, -
U.S. Enters World War I
On April 2, 1917, President Woodrow Wilson went before a joint session of Congress to request a declaration of war against Germany. Wilson cited Germany’s violation of its pledge to suspend unrestricted submarine warfare in the North Atlantic and the Mediterranean, as well as its attempts to entice Mexico into an alliance against the United States, as his reasons for declaring war. On April 4, 1917, the U.S. Senate voted in support of the measure to declare war on Germany. -
Russian Civil War
The Russian Civil War was to tear Russia apart for three years between 1918 and 1921. The civil war occurred because after November 1917, many groups had formed that opposed Lenin’s Bolsheviks. These groups included monarchists, militarists, and, for a short time, foreign nations. Collectively, they were known as the Whites while the Bolsheviks were known as the Reds. -
October Revolution
October Revolution, also called Bolshevik Revolution, the second and last major phase of the Russian Revolution of 1917, in which the Bolshevik Party seized power in Russia, inaugurating the Soviet regime -
Fourteen Points Proposed
The immediate cause of the United States’ entry into World War I in April 1917 was the German announcement of unrestricted submarine warfare and the subsequent sinking of ships with U.S. citizens on board. But President Woodrow Wilson’s war aims went beyond the defense of U.S. maritime interests. In his War Message to Congress, President Wilson declared that the U.S. objective was “to vindicate the principles of peace and justice in the life of the world.” -
Russia Signs Treay of Brest-Litovsk
On March 3, 1918, in the city of Brest-Litovsk, located in modern-day Belarus near the Polish border, Russia signed a treaty with the Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Ottoman Empire, Bulgaria) ending its participation in World War I . With the November 11, 1918, armistice ending World War I and marking the Allies’ victory over Germany, the treaty was annulled. By the terms of the 1919 Treaty of Versailles, Germany was forced to give up its territorial gains from the Treaty of B -
Kaiser Wilhem II Abdicates
Wilhelm II, the German kaiser and king of Prussia from 1888 to 1918, was one of the most recognizable public figures of World War I . He gained a reputation as a swaggering militarist through his speeches and ill-advised newspaper interviews. While Wilhelm did not actively seek war, and tried to hold back his generals from mobilizing the German army in the summer of 1914, his verbal outbursts and his open enjoyment of the title of Supreme War Lord helped bolster th -
Armistice Signed
The Armistice was an agreement signed by representatives of France, Great Britain and Germany. It was an agreement to end fighting as a prelude to peace negotiations. The Treaty of Versailles signed six months later would act as the peace treaty between the nations. Although "armistice" is used as a term to describe any agreement to end fighting in wars, "The Armistice" commonly refers to the agreement to end the fighting of the First World War. -
Treaty of Versailles Signed
World War I officially ended with the signing of the Treaty of Versailles on June 28, 1919. Negotiated among the Allied powers with little participation by Germany, its 15 parts and 440 articles reassigned German boundaries and assigned liability for reparations. After strict enforcement for five years, the French assented to the modification of important provisions. Germany agreed to pay reparations under the Dawes Plan and the Young Plan, but those plans were cancelled in 1932, and Hitler’s ri
