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Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife was assassinated Serbians because they didn't agree with the Archduke's views.
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Austria-Hungary declares war on Serbia because of the assassination of the Archduke and his wife.
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Germany declares war on Russia. France and Belgium begin full mobilization.
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Germany declares war on France, and invades neutral Belgium.
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The Austro-Hungarian Empire declares war on Russia. French and British troops invade the German colony of Togo in West Africa. Twenty days later, the German governor there surrenders. The first British troops land in France.
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Great Britain and France declare war on Austria-Hungary. Serbia is invaded by Austria-Hungary.
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In their first confrontation on European soil since the Battle of Waterloo in 1815, four divisions of the British Expeditionary Force, commanded by Sir John French, struggle with the German 1st Army over the 60-foot-wide Mons Canal in Belgium, near the French frontier.
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The British Navy suffers its worst defeat in centuries during a sea battle in the Pacific. Two British ships, the Monmouth and Good Hope, are sunk with no survivors by a German squadron commanded by Admiral Graf von Spee.
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Germany declares the waters surrounding British Isles to be a war zone in which ships can be sunk without warning.
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Armenians formed voluntary troops at the beginning of the First World War and joined the Russian army and fought against the Ottoman army, which they were citizens of.
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The Australian and New Zealand Army Corps landed at Anzac Cove while British and French troops landed at Cape Helles to begin the Allied invasion of the Gallipoli peninsula in the Ottoman Empire.
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British ocean liner Lusitania is torpedoed without warning by a German submarine off the south coast of Ireland. Within 20 minutes, the vessel sank into the Celtic Sea. Of 1,959 passengers and crew, 1,198 people were drowned, including 128 Americans.
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The first day of the Battle of the Somme was the worst day in the history of the British Army. At 7:30am on July 1, 1916, thousands of British soldiers began an attack against a German trench line which was supposed to have been destroyed. It wasn't.
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The Britannic was on its way to pick up more wounded soldiers near the Gulf of Athens, when at 8:12 a.m., a violent explosion rocked the ship.
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the Battle of Rafa occurs near the Egyptian border with Palestine.
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1st major strike of the Russian "February Revolution" starts at the giant Putilov factory in Petrograd
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United States formally declared war against Germany and entered the conflict in Europe.
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The first American fighting troops landed in France.
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When China declared war on Germany on August 14, 1917, its major aim was to earn itself a place at the post-war bargaining table.
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Gen Pershing & US troops see action on Western Front for 1st time
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The Flu spreads worldwide starting in Kansas and then growing worldwide and heading to Spain
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The Fourteen Points speech of President Woodrow Wilson was an address delivered before a joint meeting of Congress on January 8, 1918, during which Wilson outlined his vision for a stable, long-lasting peace in Europe, the Americas and the rest of the world following World War I.
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First recorded case of Spanish flu at Funston Army Camp, Kanas; start of worldwide pandemic killing 50-100 million.
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On this day, 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 Compiegne, France.
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On January 18, 1919, a few months after the end of World War I, leaders from the Allied nations began a series of discussions that became known as the Paris Peace Conference to settle issues raised by the war and its aftermath.
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On June 28, 1919, Germany signed the Treaty of Versailles, officially ending its involvement in World War I. The treaty subjected Germany to a number of harsh penalties and restrictions that many historians believe contributed to the rise of Adolf Hitler.
