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Period: to
World War I/ Russian Revolution
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France loses Alsace & Loraine to Germany
The loss of Alsace-Lorraine was a major cause of anti-German feeling in France in the period from 1871 to 1914. France suffered economically from the loss of Alsace-Lorraine's valuable iron ore deposits, iron- and steelmaking plants, and other industries to Germany -
Russo-Japanese War
Following the Russian rejection of a Japanese plan to divide Manchuria and Korea into sphere of influence, Japan launches a surprise naval attack against Port Arthur, a Russian naval base in China. The Russian Fleet was decimated -
Bloody Sunday
Bloody Sunday is the name given to the events of Sunday, 22 January 1905 in Petersburg, Russia, when unarmed demonstrators led by Father Georgy Gapon were fired upon by soldiers of the Imperial Guard as they marched towards th Winter Palace -
Austria-Hungary annexes Bosina
The Dual Monarchy of Austria-Hungary announces its annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, dual provinces in the Balkan region of Europe formerly under the control of the Ottoman Empire, enraging Serbia and pan-Slavic nationalists throughout Europe -
Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinard
The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir presumptive to the Austro-Hungarian throne, and his wife Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg, occured on June 28,1914 in Sarajevo when they were shot dead by Gavrilo Princip -
Austria-Hungary declares war on Serbia
Threatened by Serbian ambition in the tumultuous Balkans region of Europe, Austria-Hungary determined that the proper response to the assassinations was to prepare for a possible military invasion of Serbia. -
Russia mobilizes army
Soon after, France urged Russia to mobilize because it was afraid of immediate attack from the Germans and they were right. Russia's allied country, France, gave western Russia money to build railways for the cause of mobilizing and transporting troops. -
Schlieffen Plan put into action
The Schlieffen Plan was the operational plan for a designated attack on France once Russia, in response to international tension, had started to mobilise her forces near the German border. -
Germany invades Belgium
Earlier, on 24 July, the Belgian government had announced that if war came it would uphold its neutrality. The Belgian government moblised its armed forces on 31 July and a state of Kriegsgefahr ("danger of war") was proclaimed in Germany -
Start of the Battle of Marne
The World War I First Battle of the Marne featured the first use of radio intercepts and automotive transport of troops in wartime. After French commander in chief Joseph Joffre ordered an offensive in September 1914, General Michel-Joseph Maunoury's French Sixth Army opened a gap between Germany's First and Second Armies. -
Sinking of the Lusitania
A German U-Boat sunk the British luxury liner, the RMS Lusitania. 1,198 people lost their lives, including 128 Americans. Its sinking caused moral outrage both in Britain and in the US and led, ultimately, to the USA declaring war against Germany. -
Start of the battle of Verdun
By the beginning of 1916, the war in France, from the Swiss border the English Channeerml, had settled into the long slog of trench warfare. Despite the hard conditions in the trenches, Erich von Falkenhayn, chief of staff of the German army. -
Start of the Battle of the Somme
It was one of the largest battles of World War I, in which more than 1,000,000 men were wounded killed, making it one of the bloodiest battles in human history. The Battle of the Somme was the battle that symbolised the horrors of warfare in World War One. -
Zimmerman Telegram Found
The Zimmerman Telegram was an internal diplomatic communication issued from the German Foreign Office in January, 1917 that proposed a military alliance between Germany and Mexico in the event of the United States' entering World War I against Germany. -
Russian Czar Nicholas II abdicates
During the February Revolution, Czar Nicholas II, ruler of Russia since 1984, is forced to abdicate the throne by the Petrograd insurgents, and a provincial government is installed in his place. -
U.S. Enter World War I
When World War I erupted in 1914, President Woodrow Wilson pledged neutrality for the United States, a position that the vast majority of Americans favored. Britain, however, was one of America's closest trading partners, and tension soon arose between the United States and Germany over latter's attempted quarantine of the British Isles. -
Russian Civil War
The Russian Civil War was to tear Russia apart for three years between 1918 and 1921. The civil war occured because after November 1917, many groups had formed that opposed Lenin's Bolsheviks. -
October Revolution
Lenin and other revolutionaries returned to Russia after having been permitted by the German government to cross Germany. The Germans hoped that the Bolsheviks would undermine the Russian war effort. -
Fourteen Points Proposed
The Fourteen Points was a statement of principles for world peace that was to be used for peace negotiations to end World War I. The principles were outlined in a January 8, 1918 speech on war aims and peace terms to the United States Congress by President Woodrow Wilson -
Russia signs Treaty of Brest-Litovsk
The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was a peace treaty signed on March 3,1918 between the new Bolshevik government of Soviet Russia and the Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, and Ottoman Empire), that ended Russia's participation in World War I. -
Kaiser Wilhelm II abdicates
Germany actively seeking an armistice and revolution threatening, calls for Kaiser Wilhelm II to abdicate grew in intensity. Wilhelm was himself deeplly reluctant to make such a sacrifice, instead expressing a preference to lead his armies back into Germany from the Western Front. -
Armistice Signed
The Armistice of November 11, 1918 was an armistice during the First World War between the Allies and Germany- also known as the Armistice of Compiegne after the location in which it was signed- and the agreement that ended the fighting on the Western Front. -
Treaty of Versailles Signed
The treaty, negotiated between January and June 1919 in Paris, was written by the Allies with almost no participation by the Germans. The negotiations revealed a split between the Fremch, who wanted to dismember Germany to make impossible for it to renew war with France.
