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The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria began world War I, also known as the Great War, began in 1914 and lasted until 1918. During the conflict, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire (the Central Powers) fought against Great Britain, France, Russia, Italy, Romania, Japan and the United States (the Allied Powers). -
Before the Germans declared war on France, they needed free passage across Belgium. This would put German troops in position for a better attack on France, giving them the best chance at securing a victory. The problem was that Belgium was a neutral country. This means they didn’t support one side over the other, leading to Germany issuing an ultimatum. If Belgium refused to cooperate, then Germany would forcefully occupy the country as an enemy and they were invaded. -
The First Battle of the Marne was a battle of the First World War fought from 6 to 12 September 1914.The battle was France against the Germans. It resulted in an Allied victory against the German armies in the west. -
The Gallipoli campaign (25 April 1915 - 9 January 1916) was the land-based element of a strategy intended to allow Allied ships to pass through the Dardanelles, capture Constantinople (now Istanbul) and ultimately knock Ottoman Turkey out of the war. But Allied plans were based on the mistaken belief that the Ottomans could be easily overcome. -
The Battle of Verdun (21 February - 18 December 1916) was the longest battle of the First World War. It was also one of the costliest. It began in February 1916 with a German attack on the fortified French town of Verdun, where bitter fighting would continue for most of the year. -
The Battle of the Somme (1 July - 18 November 1916) was a joint operation between British and French forces intended to achieve a decisive victory over the Germans on the Western Front. For many in Britain, the resulting battle remains the most painful and infamous episode of the First World War. -
Rasputin was rumored to be the czarina's lover. Nicholas departed to lead Russian forces in World War I, Rasputin effectively ruled the country through Alexandra, contributing to the already-existing corruption and disorder of Romanov Russia. Fearful of Rasputin’s growing power, a group of nobles, led by Prince Felix Youssupov, and Grand Duke Dmitri Pavlovich, decided that the best way to bring him down was to kill him. -
On 15 March 1917 Tsar Nicholas II abdicated from the Russian throne. This brought to an end the Romanov dynasty that had ruled Russia for over three hundred years. The end was sealed in a short document in which Nicholas explained: "Internal popular disturbances threaten to have a disastrous effect on the future conduct of this persistent war.... We have thought it well to renounce the Throne of the Russian Empire and to lay down the supreme power." -
On April 16, 1917, Vladimir Lenin, leader of the revolutionary Bolshevik Party, returns to Petrograd after a decade of exile to take the reins of the Russian Revolution. After his exile ended in 1900, Lenin went to Western Europe, where he continued his revolutionary activity -
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. The United States later declared war on German ally Austria-Hungary on December 7, 1917. -
The result of the Brest-Litovsk Treaty (March 1918) was the end of Russian participation in World War 1. The terms of the treaty were harsh to Russia. It include a large territory loss and large financial payment. It also freed up a large number of Austrian and German troops to fight elsewhere -
At the 11th hour on the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918, the Great War ends. At 5 a.m. that morning, Germany, bereft of manpower and supplies and faced with imminent invasion, signed an armistice agreement with the Allies in a railroad car outside Compiégne, France. -
The Treaty of Versailles was the primary treaty produced by the Paris Peace Conference at the end of World War I. It was signed on June 28, 1919, by the Allied and associated powers and by Germany in the Hall of Mirrors in the Palace of Versailles and went into effect on January 10, 1920.