1. The players: World War I was fought between the allies (UK, France, Russia plus all green regions below - including Japan & Italy) and the central powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Ottoman Turks plus all the orange regions below).
2. The cause: A Bosnian-Serb student (Gavrilo Princip) suspected to be a Serbian fanatic assassinated the Archduke of Austria in Sarajevo on June 28, 1914 leading to a war between Austria (supported by Germany) and Serbia (supported by Britian, France).
3. The actual cause: Throughout the 19th century, old European powers formed a network of war alliances to keep their status quo on colonialism, putting "barriers" to entry for new powers such as Germany leading the latter to explode.
4. The innovations: Technology played a key role in the warfare with the introduction of new innovations such as tanks, trenches, airplanes, machine guns, railroads, submarines and poison gas, taking warfare to a whole new level.
5. The Theatres: The war's primary theatres were the Western Front (around Belgium), Eastern Front (Russia-Bulgaria) and Southern Theatre (Balkans, Turkey).
6. The American Entry. America kept out of the war until April 6, 1917 - until Germany hit where it hurts Yanks the most (commerce) - sinking five American Merchant ships in March 1917, along with provoking Mexico to join Germany (Zimmermann Telegram).
7. The epidemics. In the middle of war two deadly epidemics devastated the world: the Spanish flu in January 1918 (1918 flu pandemic) the deadliest disease ever (affecting 500 million people, killing close to 100 million - 17 million in India alone) and Soviet Communism in November 1917 (Russian Revolution).
8. The end. The turning point came during the Hundred Days Offensive The war officially when the central powers surrendered one after another and the war ended on June 28, 1919 (exactly 5 years after the start with 37 million lives lost) with victory to Allies humiliating Germany at the Treaty of Versailles (Paris) -> leading to a much bigger war 20 years later.
9. The legacy: Russia went through a revolution leading to the arrival of communism, US overtook the British Empire as the world leader and Ottoman empire of Turkey disintegrated causing a huge rewriting of the West Asian map.
10. The lesson. Never sink American ships (hello Japanese), don't do anything stupid on June 28 (hello Serbia, France, Germany)* and never humiliate losing powers (hello France).
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A side note to help you remember the date:
* Key world changing events that happened on June 28
2. The cause: A Bosnian-Serb student (Gavrilo Princip) suspected to be a Serbian fanatic assassinated the Archduke of Austria in Sarajevo on June 28, 1914 leading to a war between Austria (supported by Germany) and Serbia (supported by Britian, France).
3. The actual cause: Throughout the 19th century, old European powers formed a network of war alliances to keep their status quo on colonialism, putting "barriers" to entry for new powers such as Germany leading the latter to explode.
4. The innovations: Technology played a key role in the warfare with the introduction of new innovations such as tanks, trenches, airplanes, machine guns, railroads, submarines and poison gas, taking warfare to a whole new level.
5. The Theatres: The war's primary theatres were the Western Front (around Belgium), Eastern Front (Russia-Bulgaria) and Southern Theatre (Balkans, Turkey).
6. The American Entry. America kept out of the war until April 6, 1917 - until Germany hit where it hurts Yanks the most (commerce) - sinking five American Merchant ships in March 1917, along with provoking Mexico to join Germany (Zimmermann Telegram).
7. The epidemics. In the middle of war two deadly epidemics devastated the world: the Spanish flu in January 1918 (1918 flu pandemic) the deadliest disease ever (affecting 500 million people, killing close to 100 million - 17 million in India alone) and Soviet Communism in November 1917 (Russian Revolution).
8. The end. The turning point came during the Hundred Days Offensive The war officially when the central powers surrendered one after another and the war ended on June 28, 1919 (exactly 5 years after the start with 37 million lives lost) with victory to Allies humiliating Germany at the Treaty of Versailles (Paris) -> leading to a much bigger war 20 years later.
9. The legacy: Russia went through a revolution leading to the arrival of communism, US overtook the British Empire as the world leader and Ottoman empire of Turkey disintegrated causing a huge rewriting of the West Asian map.
10. The lesson. Never sink American ships (hello Japanese), don't do anything stupid on June 28 (hello Serbia, France, Germany)* and never humiliate losing powers (hello France).
-------------------------
A side note to help you remember the date:
* Key world changing events that happened on June 28
- The Serbian assassination of the Archduke (1914) -- leading to the World War I. The date is a key one in Serbian culture (Battle of Kosovo)
- The treaty of Versailles (1919) -- leading to World War II.
- Germany makes its stupidest move in WW II with operation Case Blue (1942) (invading Russia). They made the exact same move almost exactly one year before that (Operation Barbarossa) and with the same results.
- Milosevic delivered his famous Gazimestan speech (1989) that would indirectly lead to Yugoslavian war and the war in Kosovo.
- Israel captures East Jerusalem (1967) at the end of the Six-day war with the Arabs, leading to decades of unrest in West Asia.
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