Timeline

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    World War I was World's First "Total War"

  • The assassination of the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne in Sarajevo, Bosnia

  • President Woodrow Wilson declared that the United States would remain neutraL

  • World War I swept across Europe in the summer, igniting a global struggle

  • The assassination of the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne in Sarajevo, Bosnia, in June of 1914 led to Germany’s attack on Belgium and France in August 1914

  • In 1914, President Woodrow Wilson declared that the United States would remain neutral

  • Wilson lifted the ban

  • Wilson lifted the ban in 1915.

  • On May 7, 1915, a German U-boat sank the Lusitania, a British passenger ship sailing off the coast of Ireland; 123 Americans were among the victims.

  • These promises helped keep the United States out of the war in 1915 and 1916.

  • By 1917, American banks were loaning England an average of $10 million a day to buy U.S. goods

  • In January 1917, however, Germany didn't think the United States was prepared to fight a war.

  • on April 2, 1917, but stated that the U.S. had “no quarrel with the German people.”

  • ” The United States officially declared war against Germany on April 6, 1917

  • but did not declare war against Austria-Hungary until December 7, 1917. The U.S. was never at war with the Ottoman Empire or Bulgaria.

  • Meanwhile, the 1917 Espionage Act made it a crime to keep people from joining the army and to help the enemy by spreading lies.

  • The Russian Revolution began in the spring of 1917 and by November, Russia left the Allies and stopped fighting in the war.

  • In the spring of 1918, they climbed out of their trenches to push the Germans out of France and back to their own border.

  • Most died from the Spanish influenza, which eventually spread to the United States and killed more than half a million Americans in 1918.

  • on January 8, 1918, Wilson gave his "Fourteen Points" speech to Congress about what would happen at the end of the wa

  • The 1918 Sedition Act prohibited uttering, writing or publishing “any abusive or disloyal language” concerning the flag, U.S. Constitution, government or armed forces. This was challenged in the Supreme Court.

  • The Versailles Peace Treaty was signed in 1919 by 27 countries.

  • He was too sick to get more support for the treaty, which was rejected by the Senate twice in 1919 and 1920.

  • Instead, the war officially ended for the United States in October of 1921 when the Senate ratified separate peace treaties with Germany, Austria and Hungary.