The Great War

The World on fire

by
Altin Elezi




World War One

World War I was an extremely bloody war that engulfed
Europe from 1914 to 1919, with huge losses of life and little ground
lost or won. World War I took place most in Europe, Austria-Hungar,
Russia, Germany, Britain, Italy, Japan..
The tension is so high like furnace. Probably more, every
country was bonding with each other by trying to be a power take
control of the world .
One Thing Led to another starts from:
Austria-Hungary, unsatisfied with Serbia's response to
her ultimatum declared war on Serbia on 28 July 1914.
Russia, bound by treaty to Serbia, announced mobilization
of its vast army in her defense, a slow process that would take around
six weeks to complete.
Austria-Hungary following a German declaration on 3
August.
Britain, allied to France by a more loosely worded treaty
which placed a "moral obligation" upon her to defend France, declared
war against Germany on 4 August.
United States President Woodrow Wilson declared a U.S. policy
of absolute neutrality, an official stance that would last until
1917 when Germany's policy of unrestricted submarine warfare -
which seriously threatened America's commercial shipping -
forced the U.S. to finally enter the war on 6 April 1917.


Archduke Franz Ferdinand Assassinated



June 28. 1914 the Austro- Hungarian empire Archduke Franz
Ferdinand was shot to death along with his wife by Serbian nationalist
in Sarajevo, Bosnia. June 28 was also Franz Ferdinand's wedding
anniversary. June 28, 1914, then, Franz Ferdinand and Sophie were
touring Sarajevo with a car and during the ride someone threw a bomb
at their car, by making the car to lose the control and injured both of
them till they did within the hour.
The assassination of Franz-Ferdinand and Sophie set off a rapid chain
of events: Austria-Hungary, like many in countries around the world,
blamed the Serbian government for the attack and hoped to use the
incident as justification for settling the question of Slav nationalism
once and for all, Russia supported Serbia, an Austro-Hungarian
declaration of war on Serbia. So, the name given Archduke Franz
Ferdinand assassinated was the beginning of WWI, Within a week,
Russia, Belgium, France, Great Britain and Serbia had lined up against
Austria-Hungary and Germany, and World War I had begun.






Christmas Truce of 1914

During World War I, on and around Christmas Day 1914, the sounds
of rifles firing and shells exploding faded in a number of places along
the Western Front in favor of holiday celebrations in the trenches and
gestures of goodwill between enemies, so-called Christmas Truce of
1914 came only five months after the outbreak of war in Europe and
was one of the last examples of the outdated notion of chivalry
between enemies in warfare. It was never repeatedfuture attempts
at holiday ceasefires were quashed by officers threats of disciplinary
actionbut it served as heartening proof, however brief, that beneath
the brutal clash of weapons, the soldiers essential humanity endured.
During World War I, the soldiers on the Western Front did not expect
to celebrate on the battlefield, but even a world war could not destroy
the Christmas spirit. The so-called Christmas Truce of 1914 came only
five months after the outbreak of war in Europe and was one of the
last examples of the outdated notion of chivalry between enemies in
warfare. It was never repeated.
During World War I, the soldiers on the Western Front did not
expect to celebrate on the battlefield, but even a world war could not
destroy the Christmas spirit.But some soldiers used this short-lived
ceasefire for a more somber task: the retrieval of the bodies of fellow
combatants who had fallen within the no-mans land between the lines.




The Treaty of Versailles

The Treaty of Versailles was the peace settlement signed after
WWI had ended in 1918.The treaty was signed at the vast Versailles
Palace near Paris - hence its title - between Germany and the
Allies.The Versailles Palace was considered the most appropriate
venue simply because of its size - many hundreds of people were
involved in the process . Months after taking the treaty was signed on
June 28th, 1919. The main characters played in this treaty were
David Lloyd George of Britain, Clemenceau of France and Woodrow
Wilson of America.
President Woodrow Wilson of America had been genuinely stunned by
the savagery of the Great War. Wilson developed the idea of a
League of Nations like the Fourteen Points. The main points in this
document were:


1) no more secret treaties
2) countries must seek to reduce their weapons and their armed
forces
3) national self-determination should allow people of the same
nationality to govern themselves and one nationality should not have
the power to govern another
4) all countries should belong to the League of Nations.










The most affected country was Germany.The following land was
taken away from Germany :Alsace-Lorraine (given to France), Eu pen
and Malady (given to Belgium), Northern Schlesinger (given to
Denmark), Hutchinson (given to Czechoslovakia), West Prussia, Posen
and Upper Silesia (given to Poland) Also with financial too ,the loss of
vital industrial territory would be a severe blow to any attempts by
Germany to rebuild her economy. Coal from the Saar and Upper
Silesia in particular was a vital economic loss. Combined with the
financial penalties linked to reparations, it seemed clear to Germany
that the Allies wanted nothing else but to bankrupt her.
The treaty was the only way of the ending of the war with
including the technology in the WWI.





















Tank and Technology in WWI


The development of Tank Technology was important to the outcome of
World War I. The presence of British tanks from 1915 to 1918 was a
radical era in which the newest of technologies were being ushered
onto the battlefield. Though tanks were the newest thing on the
battlefield, they were far from perfect. Most had at least one flaw
that could mean the worst for it and its crew. The tank was first
conceived by a British Major, Ernest Swinton in 1914. He believed that
an armor -covered vehicle with treads would be able to break through
the trenches, and win the war. The invention that made tanks a realistic
idea was the "Caterpillar treads." The "Cat" treads had been invented
as tractor treads for farming in California's soft soil in 1904, and
Major Swinton had read a newspaper article about them, and thought
that he could use the same technology for these tanks.








The primitive tank technology never had much of an impact in the early
half of the war, and was never successful in breaking the stalemate on
the Western Front. Some of the things that tanks were successful in
doing, however, were:
Making the use of horses in warfare obsolete
Demoralizing soldiers in trenches
Led to the invention of much better armor plating
Provided the first motorized weapon of war
The main impact of the tank technology of WWI would actually come
decades later. In the beginning of WWII the tanks of WWI served as
a stepping stone for the development of the tank technology employed
in the Tiger and Pander tank corps. Because of this, WWII was fought
very differently.Because of tanks, there would be no more trench
warfare . They would also lead to greater emphasis on innovations such
as fighter planes and bomber planes to oppose tanks. Tanks would also
play an important part in Nazi Germany's new Blitzkrieg warfare in
WWII.












D- Day 6-25 June 1944


From 1941 to 1944 America and its allies pursued the goal of
defeating "Germany First." Their strategy rested on a key assumption,
ultimately there would have to be a massive invasion of Northwest
Europe aimed at the heart of the Axis empire. This would reduce
German pressure on the Soviet Union by creating a true "second front"
in Europe. Germany would be trapped between the Soviets in the east
and the Americans and British in the west.By 1943 success on the
battlefield and production in the factories made it possible to begin
formal planning for this bold operation,the largest amphibious invasion
in history. The target date was spring 1944.
In Berlin, Hitler understood that an invasion would
come. Fortification of the coast of Northwest Europe was already
underway. In 1943 its pace accelerated and more troops were posted
in the west. The Germans expected the invasion in early 1944. They
knew that it would determine the war's outcome. What they did not
know was precisely when and where the Allies would strike.
The background of the invasion start planning for the
operation began in the summer of 1942, the powerful offensive
capability of German ground forces in Western Europe, the need to
contain the U-boat threat to the Atlantic convoy routes, the strategic
decision to divert troops and amphibious craft to the Mediterranean,
and the ensuing difficulties of building up offensive forces in Britain, all
combined to prevent an invasion of France in the following year. By late
1943, however, detailed planning for the invasion had taken place and
significant forces and material had been gathered in Britain. After
overrunning the German beach defenses, the Allies rapidly expanded
the individual beachheads, and the workhorse amphibious craft quickly
reinforced the lodgement with new troops, munitions and supplies. By
25 July, the Allies were strong enough to launch Operation COBRA and
begin the liberation of France.
In a larger strategic sense, the successful Allied landing in
France was a psychological blow to the German occupation of Europe.
It called into question the German Army's ability to control western
Europe, dramatically increased partisan activity against enemy
occupation, and heartened the spirits of all those fighting against Nazi
tyranny. The balance of power on the continent, already weakened by
Soviet offensives into Poland, was decisively tipped into Allied favor.
From that point on, the Allies would begin the drive into Germany that
ultimately destroyed the Nazi regime on 7 May 1945.











Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki

On August 6, 1945, during World War II (1939-45), an American
B-29 bomber dropped the worlds first deployed atomic bomb over the
Japanese city of Hiroshima. The explosion wiped out 90 percent of the
city and immediately killed 80,000 people; tens of thousands more
would later die of radiation exposure. Three days later, a second B-29
dropped another A-bomb on Nagasaki, killing an estimated 40,000
people. Japans Emperor Hirohito announced his countrys unconditional
surrender in World War II in a radio address on August 15, citing the
devastating power of a new and most cruel bomb.In 1940, the U.S.
government began funding its own atomic weapons development
program, which came under the joint responsibility of the Office of
Scientific Research and Development and the War Department after
the U.S. entry into World War II.





Between mid-April 1945 President Harry Truman took office,General
Douglas MacArthur and other top military commanders favored
continuing the conventional bombing of Japan. So, Truman took the risk
for saying his word that they can start the mission by bombing Japan
.The bombs were name little boy and fat man. The first target was
Hiroshima, which plane dropped the bomb 'Little Boy' exploded
destroying half of the city, killed people and not leaving anything. U.S
told Japan to give up and to end the war,but they continued. The
second bomb called Fat Man, more powerful and weighed more
destroyed everything by August 15, 1945 the news was spread
everywhere and they called as U.S V-J Day .

















THE HOLOCAUST


To the anti-Semitic Nazi leader Adolf Hitler, Jews were an inferior
race, an alien threat to German racial purity and community. After
years of Nazi rule in Germany, during which Jews were consistently
persecuted, Hitlers final solutionnow known as the Holocaustcame
to fruition under the cover of world war, with mass killing centers
constructed in the concentration camps of occupied Poland.Beginning in
late 1941, the Germans began mass transports from the ghettos in
Poland to the concentration camps, starting with those people viewed as
the least useful: the sick, old and weak and the very young. From 1942
to 1945, Jews were deported to the camps from all over Europe,
including German-controlled territory as well as those countries allied
with Germany. The heaviest deportations took place during the summer
and fall of 1942, when more than 300,000 people were deported from
the Warsaw ghetto alone. German forces had begun evacuating many
of the death camps in the fall of 1944, sending inmates under guard to
march further from the advancing enemys front line. These so-called
death marches continued all the way up to the German surrender,
resulting in the deaths of some 250,000 to 375,000 people.

Increasing pressure on the Allied powers to create a homeland for
Jewish survivors of the Holocaust would lead to a mandate for the
creation of Israel in 1948.Over the decades that followed, ordinary
Germans struggled with the Holocausts bitter legacy, as survivors and
the families of victims sought restitution of wealth and property
confiscated during the Nazi years. Beginning in 1953, the German
government made payments to individual Jews and to the Jewish people
as a way of acknowledging the German peoples responsibility for the
crimes committed in their name.