The occasion of the 1st world war. Causes and goals of the first world war
Ticket 1
Reasons, nature and the beginning of the First World War.
Prerequisites
1. Germany from a backward, fragmented state is becoming a strong power.
2. Formed two blocks of countries:
1) England, France and Russia;
2) Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy (new capitalist countries .; Common signs: high economy. pace of development, almost complete absence of colonies.).
3.80s: treaties between Germany, Italy and Austria-Hungary (first economic, then political, and then military)
"Triple Alliance" - 1st military alliance.
4. "Triple Alliance" - colonies are needed (for trade and extraction of raw materials), i.e. they are for the redistribution of the already "divided" world.
5. 90s: "Entente" - 2nd military block (England, France, Russia)
Common signs: low rates of econ. development; had colonies. they wanted to keep.
main reason- The desire of the leading powers to redistribute the world. The First World War was caused by the aggravation of contradictions between the leading powers of the world in the struggle for the redistribution of spheres of influence and the investment of capital.
At the beginning of the 20th century, Anglo-German, Franco-German, Russian-German, Russian-Austr. relationship.
1. Anglo-German. relations: England is trying to weaken Germany by pointing it at Russia.
2. Franco-German. relations: France wants revenge, Germany wants to stay in 1st place.
3. Russian-German., Russian-Austrian .: due to Russian influence in the Balkans, Austo-Hungarian. demands an end to aid to the Balkans.
The reason for the war. The reason for the war was the murder in Sarajevo by a Serbian student of the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, Archduke Ferdinand. The murder took place on June 28, 1914, on July 10, Austria-Hungary presented an obviously impracticable ultimatum to Serbia, and on July 28 declared war. Within a matter of days, all the major European powers entered the war.
The beginning of the first world war
Nicholas II announces the beginning of the war with Germany from the balcony of the Winter Palace.
August 1 Germany declared war on Russia, on the same day the Germans invaded Luxembourg without any declaration of war.
August 2 German troops finally occupied Luxembourg, and Belgium was given an ultimatum to allow the German armies to pass to the border with France. Only 12 hours were given for reflection.
August 3rd Germany declared war on France, accusing her of "organized attacks and aerial bombardments of Germany" and "violation of Belgian neutrality."
August 3rd Belgium rejected the German ultimatum. Germany declares war on Belgium.
4 august German troops invaded Belgium. King Albert of Belgium turned for help to the countries-guarantors of Belgian neutrality. London sent an ultimatum to Berlin: stop the invasion of Belgium, or England will declare war on Germany. At the end of the ultimatum, Great Britain declared war on Germany and sent troops to help France.
The nature of the war
All have an aggressive, for Serbia - just, because the conflict with her (presentation of an ultimatum on July 23, 1914) by Austria-Hungary was only a pretext for the outbreak of hostilities.
Over time, 38 countries of the world join the war. A total of 74 million people will be put under arms.
Easing international tensions in the 1970s and the role of the 1975 Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe.
Discharge- The period in international relations (70s of the twentieth century), which is characterized by the weakening of the confrontation between the superpowers and the normalization of relations between them, mutual concessions and compromises. During this period, measures are being taken to limit the arms race and develop cooperation in various fields.
Prerequisites:
Military-strategic parity of the USSR and the USA in the arms race.
Awareness of the catastrophe in the event of the use of nuclear weapons.
Milestones of detente
| Year | Foreign policy action |
| The Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons is open for signing. Entered into force in 1970. | |
| A quadripartite agreement between the USA, USSR, England and France on West Berlin. | |
| - Message (February 1972) of US President R. Nixon to Congress, which said that the USSR had reached military-strategic parity with the United States. - R. Nixon's visit to the USSR and the signing of the ABM Treaty (on the limitation of anti-missile defense systems) and SALT-1 (on the limitation of strategic offensive arms for a period of 5 years). | |
| - Leonid Brezhnev's visit to the United States, the signing of an agreement on the prevention of nuclear war. - Leonid Brezhnev's meeting in Vladivostok with US President J. Ford. Conclusion of a preliminary agreement on cooperation in the field of arms control. | |
| Treaty between the USSR and the USA on the limitation of underground nuclear tests. | |
| Joint flight of the Soviet and American spacecraft Soyuz and Apollo. | |
| August 1975 | Meeting on Security and Cooperation in Europe in Helsinki. Signing of the Helsinki Final Act. |
| Treaty between the USSR and the USA SALT-2 (was not ratified by the US Senate). |
The key event of detente in Europe was a meeting on security and cooperation on the continent, which took place in the Finnish capital Helsinki. August 1, 1975 leaders of 33 European states, as well as the USA and Canada signed the Final Act of the meeting. At its core is the Declaration of Principles by which the participating States will guide their mutual relations.
The declaration includes the following principles:
3. Preconditions and the beginning of the Great Patriotic War. Occupation of the Ukrainian SSR.
Prerequisites: The Second World War was engendered by the entire preceding course of the economic and political development of the capitalist world. On the eve of the war, there was a further increase in the uneven development of the capitalist countries, which led to a new balance of forces between the main capitalist powers, that is, the main cause of the war was the contradictions that arose between the states. And in international relations and the aggravation of the situation in the world, Germany played a particularly aggressive role. And after Hitler came to power, the situation in the world became much more complicated. Germany and Japan were eager to enter the markets, strived for domination, and the leading countries (USA, England, France) tried to keep their profits. Japan and Germany fought against US global financial hegemony. This is the main reason for the Second World War. The second reason was the natural fear of the leaders of developed countries (Churchill, Chamberlain, etc.) of the spread of the ideas and practice of socialism-communism. Thus, in the 30s, two main hotbeds of war were formed: in the East - led by Japan, in the West - with Germany.
Germany's goals in the war were:
1. Liquidation of the USSR and socialism as a state, system and ideology. Colonization of the country. Destruction of 140 million "superfluous people and nations."
2. Liquidation of the democratic states of Western Europe, deprivation of their national independence and subordination to Germany.
3. Conquest of world domination. The pretext for aggression is the imminent threat of an attack from the USSR.
The goals of the USSR were determined in the course of the war. It:
1. Protection of freedom and independence of the country and socialist ideas.
2. Liberation of the peoples of Europe enslaved by fascism.
3. Creation of democratic or socialist governments in neighboring countries.
4. Elimination of German fascism, Prussian and Japanese militarism.
At dawn June 22, 1941 Germany and its allies (Italy, Hungary, Romania, Finland) unleashed an unprecedented blow on the Soviet Union: 190 divisions, about 3 thousand tanks, more than 43 thousand guns and mortars, about 5 thousand aircraft, up to 200 ships. The Great Patriotic War began of the Soviet people against the German fascist aggressors.
The main military-political event of the summer campaign was the defense of Kiev, which lasted from July 7 to September 26, 1941... and diverted significant forces of the enemy. However, the German armies managed to encircle a large group of Kiev defenders: more than 665 thousand soldiers and officers were taken prisoner, the command of the South-Western Front was destroyed. September 19, 1941 Kiev was captured by the Germans. The tragedy was caused by the miscalculations of the high military command, in particular, the fact that Stalin did not give his consent to the withdrawal of troops from Kiev.
Major defensive battles on the territory of the Ukrainian SSR:
Defense of Odessa (August 5 - October 16, 1941) 73 days. Only after fresh German units approached did the Soviet troops leave the city.
Results: For 73 days, the defense of Odessa delayed the advance of the right wing of the troops of Army Group South, diverted and pinned down up to 18 divisions of German-Romanian troops with a total number of over 300 thousand servicemen. The total losses of the German-Romanian troops in the Odessa region amounted to over 160 thousand servicemen, about 200 aircraft and up to 100 tanks
At the beginning of July 1942. The Crimean front collapsed. The Germans captured the Kerch Peninsula, including Kerch.
Ticket 2
1. Military campaigns and major battles of 1914-1918.
By the beginning of the war, Germany had 8 armies (about 1.8 million people), France - 5 armies (about 1.3 million people), Russia - 6 armies (more than 1 million people), Austria-Hungary - 5 armies and 2 army groups (over 1 million people). The hostilities covered the territory of Europe, Asia and Africa. The main land fronts were the Western (French) and Eastern (Russian), the main naval theaters of military operations - the Northern, Mediterranean, Baltic and Black seas.
Eastern front
From the Russian side, the First World War 1914-1918. was conducted in order to counteract the expansionist policies of Germany and Austria-Hungary, to protect the Serbian and other Slavic peoples, to strengthen Russia's positions in the Balkans and the Caucasus. Russia’s allies in the war were England, France and other countries of the Entente, the main allies of Germany and Austria-Hungary were Turkey and Bulgaria. During the war, the Russian command deployed 5 fronts and 16 armies. In 1914, Russian troops failed in the East Prussian operation against German troops.
Battle of Galicia (1914)- the strategic offensive operation of the troops of the Southwestern Front under the command of General Nikolai Ivanov was carried out against the Austro-Hungarian troops August 5 - September 8, 1914... The offensive zone of the Russian troops was 320-400 km. As a result of the operation, Russian troops occupied Galicia and the Austrian part of Poland, creating a threat of invasion of Hungary and Silesia. This forced the German command to transfer part of the troops from the Western to the Eastern theater of operations.
Battle of Tannenberg (August 26-30, 1914)- a major battle between Russian and German troops during the East Prussian operation. The defeat of the Russian army.
Brusilov breakthrough (1916)
Front-line offensive operation of the Southwestern Front of the Russian Army under the command of General A.A. Brusilov during the First World War, carried out May 22 - July 31 (old style) 1916, during which the armies of Austria-Hungary and Germany were severely defeated and occupied by Bukovina and Eastern Galicia.
In March 1918, Russia withdrew from the war.
Western front
Battle of the Marne(Battle of the Marne River) - one of the first major battles of the First World War. Occurred September 5-12, 1914... on the Marne River in northern France. Anglo-French troops, having launched a counteroffensive against the German troops advancing on Paris, stopped their advance and forced them to withdraw. The battle was attended by 5 German and 6 allied armies, the fighting was conducted on a front with a length of 180 km. The Battle of the Marne marked a turning point in the 1914 campaign for Western front... As a result of the battle, the strategic plan of the German command, aimed at the rapid defeat of France and its withdrawal from the war, was thwarted.
Battle of Verdun- one of the largest and bloodiest battles of the First World War. Occurred February 21 - December 21, 1916 on a narrow site in the area of the Verdun fortified region (northeastern France). After stubborn battles with heavy losses on both sides, the Germans managed to advance 6-8 km and take the forts of Duamon and Vaud, but their advance was stopped. As a result of the counter-offensive of the French army, which began on October 24, the Germans were pushed back to their original positions. The parties lost about a million people (600 thousand Germans, 358 thousand French). In this battle, for the first time, light machine guns, rifle grenade launchers, flamethrowers were widely used, and the principles of aircraft warfare were also worked out. Because of the huge sacrifices, it went down in history as the "Verdun meat grinder".
Naval battles
Battle of Jutland- the largest naval battle of the First World War. Occurred May 31 - June 1, 1916 between the German and British fleets in the North Sea off the Jutland Peninsula. Germany's goal was to destroy a part of the British fleet, which from the beginning of the war blocked the exit from the North Sea, which interrupted the supply of raw materials and food to Germany. The British command received intelligence about the German plans and was able to take countermeasures. The British forces significantly outnumbered the enemy forces: 148 ships against 99. At the end of the battle, both sides declared their victory: Great Britain - due to the inability of the German fleet to break the blockade, and Germany - due to heavy losses of the British fleet (Great Britain lost 14 ships in the battle and 6.8 thousand people, Germany - 11 ships and 3.1 thousand people). After the battle, Germany stopped actively using the surface fleet, and the continuation of the naval blockade led to the undermining of German industrial potential and an acute shortage of food. The battle also demonstrated the increased role of military intelligence.
Compiegne Armistice of 1918- Agreement on the cessation of hostilities in the First World War, concluded on November 11, 1918 between the Entente and Germany in the French region of Picardy near the city of Compiegne. The Versailles Peace Treaty summed up the final results of the war.
2. The Marshall Plan and its Role in Rebuilding Post-War Europe.
Marshall Plan(officially called "Europe Reconstruction Program") is a program of assistance to Europe after the Second World War. Nominated in 1947 by US Secretary of State George C. Marshall and took effect in April 1948. The plan involved 17 European countries, including West Germany.
The Marshall Plan began with April 4, 1948 when the US Congress passed the Economic Cooperation Act, which provided for a 4-year program of economic assistance to Europe. The total amount of appropriations under the Marshall plan (from April 4, 1948 to December 1951) amounted to about $ 13 billion, with the main share falling on England (2.8 billion), France (2.5 billion), Italy (1.3 billion), West Germany (1.3 billion), Holland (1 billion).
The provision of economic "aid" was carried out on the basis of bilateral agreements, subject to rather strict conditions. Among them:
Refusal to nationalize industry,
Providing freedom of private enterprise,
Unilateral reduction of customs tariffs on imports of American goods,
Withdrawal of the communists from the government,
Restricting trade with countries of "pro-socialist orientation".
I.V. Stalin viewed the Marshall Plan as interference in the internal affairs of sovereign states. The countries of the socialist camp refused to help.
The high efficiency of the Marshall Plan, combined with the implementation of their own economic programs of post-war revival in European countries, was manifested in the growth of output in basic industries in 1947-1950. more than half, and even higher for certain types of products - potash fertilizers - by 65%, steel - by 70%, cement - by 75%, vehicles - by 150%, petroleum products - by 200%.
Results:
· Industries, which, as it seemed earlier, were hopelessly outdated and lost efficiency, were restructured in a short time and without changing the national economic policies of the countries. As a result, the economies of European countries recovered from the effects of the war faster than could be expected.
· European countries were able to pay off their external debts.
· The influence of the communists and the USSR was weakened.
· The European middle class was restored and strengthened - the guarantor of political stability and sustainable development.
At the same time, against the background of the exacerbation of the international situation after World War II, already in 1951 the Marshall Plan began to turn into a program of military assistance, contributed to the post-war split of Europe, the formation of a military-political bloc of Western states, and the intensification of the Cold War. dependence of Western European states on the United States. The plan was scrapped, but in 1951 the United States and European countries signed a law on mutual security. On the basis of bilateral agreements, he facilitated foreign policy through grants and the supply of American goods and materials. However, the recipient countries, for their part, were forced to provide their territory for American military bases and stop trading in so-called strategic goods with the socialist countries.
3. The establishment of the Nazi "new order" in the Ukrainian SSR. Genocide. Holocaust.
1. Dismemberment of the territory of Ukraine. Having seized Ukraine, the Nazis, first of all, destroyed its integrity. The territory of Ukraine was dismembered by the Nazis into four parts, subordinate to different states and administrative bodies.
Chernivtsi and Izmail regions were included in the ally of Germany - Romania. Odessa region, southern regions of Vinnytsia, western regions of Mykolaiv region, left-bank regions of Moldova, the Nazis united into the governorship "Transnistria" and also included in Romania.
Western lands - Drohobych, Lviv, Ternopil, Stanislav regions - as a separate district (district) by name "Galicia" became part of a separate governorate, which also included Polish lands with a center in Krakow.
Chernihiv, Sumy, Kharkiv regions and Donbass as front-line zones were directly subordinate to German military command.
Other Ukrainian lands were part of the Reichskommissariat "Ukraine" with the center in the city of Rivne. It was divided into six districts. Erich Koch was appointed Reichskommissar of Ukraine.
Transcarpathian Ukraine has been occupied since 1939 Hungary.
2. Establishment of the Nazi "new order". The Nazis established a brutal occupation regime. They turned Ukraine into a German colony, which was part of the “German living space” and became a source of raw materials, food, labor for the “Third Reich”. 85% of all products exported to Germany during the war with the USSR were from Ukraine. The economic plunder took place with German thoroughness and pedantry. The Nazis created a whole system of predatory procurement bodies. The largest of these was the Central Society of the East, which had 30 commercial departments with 200 branches in cities.
Hitler's plan "Ost" provided for the transformation of Ukraine into an agrarian and raw material appendage of the Reich, a living space for the colonization of representatives of the "superior race". For 30 years, it was planned to evict 65% of the population of Ukraine, to the "lands freed", to resettle the Germans, and those local residents who will remain alive, to gradually "Germanize".
The occupation regime was carried out by the Gestapo, SS troops, and the Security Service (SB). There was also an auxiliary administration of local residents (burgomasters, headmen, police). The need to manage the occupied territories of Ukraine required a large and ramified administrative apparatus, which was difficult to create without the participation of the local population. And the Nazis had helpers - collaborators (local residents who collaborated with the occupation authorities. Most of them were those who became victims of the Stalinist repressive system, wanted to take revenge on the Soviet regime. They went to the occupation authorities, police, punitive units. It was the traitors who contributed to the arrests and destruction of the anti-Hitler underground in Kiev, Odessa and other cities, helped to find communists, Soviet activists, Jews, condemning them to destruction, sometimes collaborators directly participated in “actions of destruction”.
The Nazis in ideological work used as negative examples of the Bolsheviks' activities against the people of Ukraine. The invaders promised to carry out an agrarian reform, develop Ukrainian culture, return the soldiers home, but these were ways moral and psychological pressure, against the background of which the inhabitants of Ukraine were declared citizens of the "third grade", their life was strictly regulated by rules and orders, the violation of which led to a concentration camp or execution.
A great tragedy for Ukraine was export of people, primarily young people, to work v Germany. In 1941-1944, 2.8 million people were taken from the USSR into Nazi slavery, and 2.4 million of them were from Ukraine. Tens of thousands of them died in exile from exhaustion, disease and injury. Part ostarbeiters (as they called those exported to Germany), fearing reprisals from the Soviet government, they did not return to their homeland after the end of the war. In addition, forced labor of the population was organized in the occupied territories in order to strengthen the economic power of the Third Reich.
Humanity will never forget and will not forgive the Nazis for the mass destruction of the population. The Nazis used mass terror against the Ukrainian people with particular cruelty. SS units destroyed entire villages. V October 1941 Ukraine and all of Europe "saw their first Khatyn": the village of Obukhovka, Poltava region, was completely burnt down, and the entire population was shot. During the occupation, similar barbaric actions were committed by the Nazis in 250 settlements of Ukraine. There were dozens of “death camps” in Ukraine, and there were 50 ghettos.
The Nazis organized the mass extermination of prisoners of war. Hundreds of thousands of people were tortured to death in Lvov, Slavutsk, Kamenets-Podolsk and other concentration camps. Of the 5.8 million Soviet prisoners of war who fell into the hands of the Nazis, about 3.3 million died; of which almost 1.3 million are Ukrainians.
Holocaust. An integral part of the Nazi plans to conquer world domination, an essential element of ideology, politics and practice Nazi Germany 1933-1945 was anti-semitism - one of the forms of national intolerance, expressed in a hostile attitude towards Jews. In practice, it resulted in the desire for the universal physical extermination of Jews throughout the world. This tragic phenomenon in the history of mankind was named Holocaust.
Holocaust - the death of a significant part of the Jewish population of Europe as a result of the Nazi policy of systematic and organized physical destruction ( genocide ) Jews in Germany and in the territories it occupied in 1933-1945.
In Ukraine, anti-Jewish genocide had a particularly violent form. This was explained by the fact that, in the understanding of the Nazis, not just Jews lived here, but “Bolshevik” Jews, allegedly constituting the basis of Soviet power, who represented the driving force of the world revolution, to prevent which it was necessary to get rid of its carriers by any means.
On the eve of the war, by the number of Jews living on its territory - 2.7 million people - Ukraine (within its modern borders) ranked first in Europe and second in the world.
The killing of Jews by the invaders began in Ukraine on June 22, 1941 and lasted more than three years. The first "Jewish actions" were directed mainly against the Jewish intelligentsia as a potential organizer of resistance to the invaders. Jews - party workers and civil servants - were also subject to destruction. Further, the occupiers proceeded to the total extermination of all Jews. The main role in these operations was given to the police and SD forces. Before the extermination of Jews in Eastern Galicia, Volyn, in Podolia, Transcarpathian Ukraine, in the Left-Bank Ukraine, they were forcibly collected in ghetto.
The ghettos created by the Nazis during the Second World War were conceived as intermediate residences on the way of Jews to the "death camps". On the rest of the territory of Ukraine, ghettos were not created, since the remaining Jews were exterminated almost straightaway after the occupation, maximum in a few months.
The execution of over 150 thousand people, most of whom were Jews, became a symbol of the Holocaust in Ukraine. Babi Yar(Kiev City). Massacres of the Jewish population also took place in Lvov, Berdichev, Kharkov, Odessa, Dnepropetrovsk and other cities of Ukraine. In addition, a significant part of the Jewish population of the Ukrainian SSR was taken out and destroyed on the territory of Poland - in the "death camps" Auschwitz, Majdanek, Treblinka, etc.
The total number of dead Ukrainian Jews can be estimated 1.8 million people In general, Ukraine has lost about 70% of the pre-war Jewish population.
It should be especially noted that many Ukrainians, risking their lives, they hid Jews in their homes, saving children, women and men from inevitable death. In modern Israel, they, like representatives of other nationalities, are called the "Righteous Among the World" and pay tribute to the courage and humanism of these people.
Ticket 3
1. Paris Peace Conference of 1919, its main decisions.
Paris Peace Conference(January 18, 1919 - January 21, 1920) - an international conference convened by the victorious powers to develop and sign peace treaties with the states defeated in the First World War. It was held intermittently from January 18, 1919 to January 21, 1920. It was attended by 27 states and five dominions of Great Britain. Germany and Russia were not invited to the conference.
The objectives of the peace conference:
1. To legally formalize the end of the First World War, for which it was supposed to develop and sign peace treaties with Germany and its allies.
2. During the war, the Russian, Austro-Hungarian, Ottoman and German empires collapsed and new independent states arose on their territory. Among them: Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia, Finland, Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Austria, Hungary, Czechoslovakia and the Kingdom of Serbo-Croatian-Slovenes. Each of the new countries strove to self-determine in the maximum territorial scope. And this could lead to new wars. Therefore, the task of the peace conference was to firmly establish the boundaries of new states and prevent wars between them.
3. During the war years, the idea that that war should be the last in the history of mankind was widely circulated, therefore it was supposed at the conference to create a comprehensive international organization that would stand up for the defense of world peace. Smets, the Prime Minister of the Union of South Africa, was the first to suggest such an idea. Then this idea was supported in many states.
Solutions:
The victorious powers should have concluded a number of peace treaties: with Germany, Bulgaria, Turkey, as well as with those states into which Austria-Hungary fell apart. The main issue The Paris Conference was a peace treaty with Germany. The conclusion of this treaty was complicated by disagreements between the victorious powers and the position of Germany itself. The fact is that at the Paris conference it was already necessary to deal with the new Germany - the revolution that had taken place destroyed the empire, while republican Germany refused to admit that it was guilty of the war. Based on the position expressed by Wilson, "we cannot trust Germany," the Entente had to present an ultimatum, only after which Count Brockdorf-Ransau, representing Germany, was forced to sign an agreement - June 28, 1919 Treaty of Versailles, signed at the Palace of Versailles in France, officially ending the First World War 1914-1918. After the conclusion of the Treaty of Versailles with Germany, similar treaties were concluded with Germany's allies:
Poland
In Poland, small partisan detachments first entered the struggle against the German fascist invaders, then the Home Army formed by the Polish émigré government and the Ludowa Guard created at the initiative of the Polish Workers' Party, whose number in 1943 reached 10 thousand people. In 1944, all democratic forces united in the Army of Ludov. With the beginning of the liberation of Poland, the Army of Ludow and the formations of the 1st Polish Army, formed on the territory of the USSR, merged into the regular Polish Army, which made a significant contribution to the liberation of their homeland.
Western Europe
A powerful Resistance Movement developed in the countries of Western Europe. In France, for example, the National Council of Resistance has been operating since 1943, and since 1941 - the French Internal Armed Forces. In France, the resistance movement was led by General Charles de Gaulle. France - in 1943, the movement intensified, the Paris uprising of June 6, 1944, which brought victory, became the top.
In Belgium, the Independence Front and the Belgian Partisan Army operated; in Italy - the Garibaldi shock brigades. In Germany itself and in a number of other countries of the fascist bloc, under the conditions of brutal terror and repression, groups of anti-fascists, known as the Red Capella and the International Anti-Fascist Committee, operated.
Thanks to the Resistance movement, the defeat of Nazi Germany and its allies was significantly accelerated. The movement also became a shining example of the struggle against imperialist reaction; the destruction of civilians and other war crimes; for world peace.
3. Historical meaning The Battle of Stalingrad and the defeat of German troops on the Oryol-Kursk Bulge.
The Battle of Stalingrad, its consequences and significance. The battle for Stalingrad began on July 17, 1942. This city on the Volga has become a symbol of fortitude, courage and unheard-of heroism of Soviet soldiers. The capture of the city by the enemy would mean not only the loss of one of the industrial centers, but would also interrupt important transport arteries connecting the center of the country with the southern regions. Besides, new victory would strengthen the authority of fascist Germany and push its allies to more active actions against the USSR. The Sixth German Army was advancing on Stalingrad under the command of General F. Paulus, a well-known military leader, one of the developers of the Barbarossa plan. The period from July to November 1942 is called defensive in Soviet historical literature. The city was defended by the sixty-second (commander V.I. Chuikov) and 64th (commander M.S.Shumilov) armies. During this period, German troops carried out more than 700 attacks on the positions of the Soviet troops. For almost two months, a small detachment under the command of Sergeant Ya. V. Pavlov defended the house on Penza Street, the Nazis could not take it. The resilience of the Soviet soldiers, despite the huge losses suffered, did not allow the Nazis to take control of the entire city. For 4 months of fighting, the qualifying German fascist troops lost at Stalingrad up to 700 thousand soldiers and officers, over 1000 tanks, 2000 guns and mortars, 1400 aircraft. In mid-November 1942, the enemy forces were forced to halt the offensive.
The battles in Stalingrad ended the defensive period of the Great Patriotic War. The perseverance and courage of the defenders of Stalingrad allowed the Soviet command to achieve a general superiority of forces over the Nazi troops by mid-November and proceed to defeat the enemy.
According to the plan "Uranus", developed by G.K. Zhukov, the forces of the South-West (N.F. Vatutin), Donskoy (K.K.Rokossovsky) and Stalingrad (A.I. Volga and Don. During Operation Uranus, which began on November 19, 1942, there was a surrounded enemy force grouping of 330 thousand people.
All the Nazis' attempts to unblock the encircled armies were repelled by units of the Second Guards Army under the command of R. Ya. Malinovsky. On February 2, 1943, the remnants of the encircled group (90 thousand soldiers and officers) led by Field Marshal F. Paulus surrendered to the Soviet troops. During the Battle of Stalingrad, the Germans lost about the same amount of equipment as in all previous battles on the Soviet-German front. In Germany, a four-day mourning period was declared. The victory at Stalingrad marked the beginning of a radical change in the Great Patriotic War. She demonstrated to the whole world the power of the Red Army, the skill of Soviet commanders, the increased strength of the rear, provided the front with a sufficient amount of weapons, military equipment and equipment. The international prestige of the Soviet Union grew immeasurably, and the positions of fascist Germany were seriously shaken. Having seized the strategic initiative, the Soviet troops launched a general offensive. They freed North Caucasus, broke through the blockade of Leningrad and defeated a group of Germans in the central sector of the front. The Wehrmacht, on the other hand, was able to respond with only one, albeit quite tangible, counterstrike near Kharkov.
The defeat of the German troops on the Oryol-Kursk Bulge In the summer of 1943, the Nazis tried to seize the strategic initiative. Having carried out a total mobilization (which was subject to all men from 16 to 65 years old and women from 17 to 45 years old), Hitler was able to replenish huge human losses and dramatically (by 70% per year) increase output military equipment, including new designs. The plan of Operation Citadel, developed by the Hitlerite command, provided for the encirclement and destruction of Soviet troops in the Kursk salient area and thereby open the road to Moscow. The Hitlerite command pulled its best formations and the latest armored equipment - Tiger and Panther tanks, Ferdinand assault guns - to the central sector of the front. Soviet intelligence was able to establish the exact date for the start of the German offensive - July 5, 1943 Representatives of the Headquarters G.K. Zhukov and A.M. Vasilevsky made a decision to wear down enemy units that were advancing with deliberate defensive actions, and then go on a counteroffensive.
For seven days of stubborn
1 military conflict of the worlds. scale 28.07.1914 – 11.11.18 part. 38 state., Battle. over 74 million, more than 10 million were killed, 20 million were wounded. The main opponents are from the Entente: England, France, Russia, Serbia, Japan, later Italy, Romania and the United States; from the side of the Triple Alliance: Germany, Austria-Hungary, Turkey, Bulgaria. Victory of the Entente. Main causes: contradictions between the countries of the Triple Alliance and the Triple Accord (Entente) in the economic, naval and colonial spheres. 1) chapters. between England and Germany - economy, naval, colonial .; 2) between France and Germany - because of Alsace and Lorraine, taken from France after the Franco-Prussian war of 1870-71; because of the Frenchman. colonies in Africa claimed by Germany; 3) contradictions between Europ. powers in the Balkans and the B. East - the problem of spheres of influence, political positions in the Balkans, issues of the Straits. Occasion: 28.06.14. in Sarajevo Serbian student, member of terror. op. G. Princip shot the heir to the Austrian throne. Outcomes: 4 empires collapsed - Ottoman, Russian, German and Austro-Hungarian (British survived); had a huge impact on the economy, politics, ideology, the system of the Ministry of Defense; the formation of a new geopolitical situation in the world. End: Compiegne Armistice - Agreement on the cessation of hostilities K.P. was concluded for 36 days, was extended until the signing of the Versailles MD. 07/28/1919 signed the Versailles MD, officially completing 1 MV. Russia, which concluded a separate peace with Germany (Brest-Lit. Peaceful d.) In March 1918, did not participate in the development of the Versailles system.
For reference:
Causes of the First World War:
1) the result of the aggravation of contradictions between the major powers at the beginning of the twentieth century. The rapid growth of the economic power of Germany prompted her to strive to redistribute the world and expand her colonial possessions.
2) Anglo-German contradictions: the rapid build-up of German naval power, Germany's desire to win positions in the traditional sphere of British interests in the Middle East.
2) The confrontation between Germany and France because of the capture of Alsace and Lorraine, + colonies were added: France seized Morocco, which Germany claimed.
3) The interests of Russia and Germany came into conflict because of the Balkan issue, G. supported Russia's rival, Austria-Hungary. + at the end of the 19th century. a customs war unfolded, Russia's interests prompted it to support France in order to prevent German hegemony in Europe.
Historians divide the course of the First World War into five separate military campaigns.
1914 year- military operations unfolded on the Western (France) and Eastern (Prussia, Russia) fronts, the Balkans and colonies (Oceania, Africa and China). Germany quickly captured Belgium and Luxembourg, and launched an offensive against France. Russia led a successful offensive in Prussia. In general, in 1914, none of the countries managed to fully implement their plans.
1915 year- fierce battles were fought on the Western Front, where France and Germany were desperate to turn the tide in their favor. On the Eastern Front, the situation changed for the worse for the Russian troops. Due to supply problems, the army began to retreat, losing Galicia and Poland.
1916 year- during this period, the bloodiest battle of Verdun took place on the Western Front, during which more than a million people died. Russia, trying to help the allies and pull the forces of the German army over to itself, made a successful counteroffensive attempt - the Brusilov breakthrough.
1917 year- the success of the Entente troops. The USA joins them. As a result of revolutionary events, Russia is actually leaving the war.
1918 year- Russia's conclusion on extremely unfavorable and difficult conditions of peace with Germany. The rest of Germany's allies conclude peace with the Entente countries. Germany remains alone and in November 1918 agrees to surrender.
How did the century of world wars begin? What are the reasons, culprits and true motives of the warring powers?
Causesfirst world war
The July crisis of 1914, which provoked the outbreak of the First World War, is one of those rare historical events that are surprisingly very thoroughly and fully documented in the annals of history.At the same time, the protagonists of the events of that European drama found it difficult to name its reasons.
In August 1914, shortly after Germany entered the war, a memorable conversation took place between former German Chancellor Bernhard von Bülow and his successor Theobald von Bethmann-Hollweg. Bülow then asked: "How did this happen?" And he received a discouraging answer: "Oh, if only I knew!"
Today, both historians and ordinary people who are not indifferent to history retain a certain sense of the deepest misunderstanding and absurdity of all the events that plunged Europe into a four-year nightmare of a war of extermination.
None of the countries that unleashed the conflict, in principle, had any reasonable reason to start a war. US President Woodrow Wilson summed up the bewilderment of his contemporaries in the following words: “Everyone is looking and cannot find the reason why the war began. Their attempts are in vain, they will not find a reason. The war did not start for any one reason, the war began for all reasons at once ”.
But this formulation is hardly correct. This idea was better expressed by the Russian philosopher L.P. Karsavin, who said that the very formulation of the problem of causality in the First World War, like any other historical event, is essentially unscientific (Philosophy of History, 1923). Historical research should be aimed not at finding the true or imaginary roots of the phenomenon, which can never be studied in its entirety, but at studying the flow of events in their totality.
Economic reasons for the outbreak of the first world war
Despite almost a century of efforts, historians have not been able to identify an objective economic or political cause of the Second World War.The economic rivalry between England and Germany (and, to a lesser extent, other major European powers) was striking long before August 1914. According to the generally accepted opinion, which was based on the doctrine of the inevitability of military conflicts under capitalism, which was well developed by the followers of Marx, the fault was imperialist competition. ... There was no newspaper that did not publish at least one detailed article on its pages, which clearly proved that England would never allow an increase in German economic power and navy. The reader was told that sooner or later the economic contradictions between the leading imperialist countries were bound to blow up the world.
Meanwhile, neither England nor Germany ever set themselves the goal of undermining the economic well-being of a competitor with the help of war. France and Russia were considered Germany's military enemies: but with the first the Germans had a territorial dispute (Alsace-Lorraine), and with the second they were quarreled by geopolitical contradictions.
Further, if one takes an "economic" point of view about the origins of the First World War, then England and Germany were supposed not to fight among themselves, but to act together as soon as possible against the United States of America, whose growing industry was challenging both the British and German economies. However, no one in Europe viewed the United States as a likely enemy. Consequently, economic competitors are by no means doomed to war with each other, even when it comes to world leadership.
In the same way, the most acute contradictions in the sphere of the colonial division of the world in England arose not with Germany, but with France, which created the second largest colonial empire in terms of the vastness of its possessions, and with Russia, which had a conflict with British interests practically along its entire southern border. Despite this, England, France and Russia ended up in the same military camp.
The role of warmongers has traditionally been attributed to arms companies and their associated banking community. But over the past hundred years, researchers have not been able to find those tycoons and industrial and financial corporations who would be vitally interested in unleashing a world war, that is, would associate their business interests exclusively with the profits of wartime and, more importantly, would have such political weight to be able to dictate their will to governments. Moreover, some major representatives of the military-industrial complex with the beginning of the war had to give up their monopoly positions in the arms market. Here is a characteristic story told by Louis Renault, one of the most adventurous and successful French industrialists, the father of the famous automobile brand. At the very beginning of the war, on August 8 or 9, he was summoned by the Minister of War. When Reno opened the door of his office, he walked from corner to corner with an extremely frustrated look, endlessly repeating: "We need to have shells, we need to have shells." Asked by one of the generals present if he could fire the shells, Reno replied that he did not know, since he had never seen them. However, he soon organized and launched the production of shells, after which the state arsenals and the arms concern Schneider-Creusot lost their monopoly.
In a word, if in the course of the war there were entrepreneurs who began to extract super-profits from military orders, this does not mean at all that they are responsible for its occurrence - there is absolutely no evidence in favor of this.
Political reasons for the war
The search for the political causes of the First World War also does not give objective results. Most historians agree that it is impossible to single out a country or a group of countries that set themselves the goal of asserting their supremacy through war and planned to carry out territorial conquests. In fact, all military plans did not have a pre-formed strategic vector; rather, the situation was developing haitically. The territorial claims of European states to each other were negligible in comparison with the material damage from the total war; colonial disputes were settled within the framework of gentlemen's agreements. Of course, in every major European country there were groups of adherents of world or regional domination. But their claims were mostly expressed at the level of sentiments and politically unformed ideas. As one German writer lamented in 1912, "the main reason why our situation sometimes gives an impression of doubtful, even unpleasant, when viewed from the outside, lies in the difficulty of presenting any understandable real goal for the policy necessary for the implementation of the German idea." ...A future military confrontation could be considered in government circles as inevitable and even desirable; however, no one wanted to look like an aggressor. They prepared for war and at the same time tried with all their might to delay or avoid it altogether. The main opposing military alliances and coalitions in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. were concluded not in order to pursue an aggressive policy, but in the hope that they would serve as a deterrent for the opposing side. Individuals from the circle of the Austrian emperor and the German Kaiser took a direct course towards the war - and only a few weeks before it began.
As Wilhelm II well noted, during the pre-war decades the European world resembled a sick heart: “he can live and live for himself, even for a very long time. And he can die with the same probability at any moment - suddenly and unexpectedly. "
Chauvinism of Europeans as the reason for the outbreak of war. National factor
The First World War was not led by one reason or another or their combination, but by a long chain of events and actions, held together by by no means an unconditional connection. And all we can do is sort them like a rosary on which grains are strung different sizes and dignity.The basis of lasting European world politicians saw in this or that combination of four great powers - Germany, England, France and Russia. Obviously, the most effective means of maintaining balance would be an Anglo-German alliance or an alliance of three continental states. However, in the way of these agreements stood an impregnable wall of nationalism, already flavored with a fair amount of the latest scientific delusion - racism.
England suffered the most from national arrogance - the only European country that nurtured a racist ideology on the basis of its own political culture. Too many of the orders and deeds of the British colonial administration had all the hallmarks of racial segregation and genocide.
The idea of national superiority over other peoples was presented in the English educational institutions as an immutable law of being. The largest racial theorist of the late Х1Х-beginning of the XX century. Houston Stuart Chamberlain, son of the admiral and nephew of Field Marshal Sir Neville Chamberlain, recalled: "From early childhood I absorbed this feeling of pride ... I was taught ... to consider the French as a lower class of people and not to mention them on a par with the British." Other peoples must envy the Indians and Irish, who are fortunate enough to be subjects of the British crown. “God himself could not have knocked out of an Englishman a sense of his own superiority” 3.
After moving to Germany, where he became Wagner's son-in-law, Chamberlain published his work "Foundations of the Nineteenth Century" (1899). The history of mankind was considered by him from a racial standpoint. He is not was here as a discoverer, many of his compatriots worked on this issue long before him. Their search, however, did not enjoy authority on the other side of the English Channel. The scientific charm of Chamberlain's book was such that racial doctrine was now unconditionally accepted by German professors (Winston Churchill and Bernard Shaw, who called his work "a masterpiece of truly scientific history", were Chamberlain's admirers in England).
The dragon's sown teeth sprouted abundantly. After the publication of Chamberlain's work, racist literature in Germany and Austria became popular reading (The Nineteenth Century Foundations themselves underwent 10 reprints in 12 years; before 1914, 100,000 copies were sold).
Chamberlain argued that the Germans saved Europe from the "eternal darkness" into which it plunged after the collapse of the Roman Empire. This is the chosen race of masters: "The entry of the German ... into world history is still far from complete: the German has yet to take over the whole world." He considered the Romanesque and other peoples of the Mediterranean to be half-breeds and "a parody of people." The Slavs hated everyone in a crowd, although there were more Russians than the rest, seeing in them "a new incarnation of the eternal empire of Tamerlane." Russian literature aroused in him a feeling of disgust.
Chamberlain formulated the immediate historical goal for the "Teutonic spirit" - the fight against "Yankee Anglo-Saxon and Tatarized Slavism."
In Germany, Chamberlain's ideas fell on fertile soil. The Germans were filled with pride in their brilliant victories in 1866 and 1870, and the overwhelming successes of German science, industry and trade gave birth to sweet dreams of a cultural right to rule the rest of the world.
On the way to world hegemony, of course, stood “ natural enemies»Germany. The fight against them was perceived within the framework of the theory of the struggle of races. The French, however, no longer caused concern - they were simply despised. It was believed that "the Latin peoples have passed the zenith of their development, they can no longer introduce new fertilizing elements into the development of the world as a whole" (Moltke). Dislike for England so far has been expressed in the emphasis on the hypocrisy of British politics, its adherence to exclusively mercantile interests. A common place in German historical and publicistic literature was the comparison of England with decrepit Carthage, and Germany with the rising Rome.
But the attitude towards Russia was panicky: they looked at us with hatred and fear. The idea of cultural and even intellectual backwardness, savagery and despotism of the Russian people is deeply rooted in European minds. At the same time, German historians extolled the role of the German element in Russian history in every possible way - from the notorious Varangians to the Ostsee (Baltic) Germans, who flooded the Russian chancelleries, ministries, military headquarters and universities. The most controversial exponent of such views was the Pan-Germanist V. Hen, who argued in his book Demoribus Ruthenorum (1892) that Russians “have no traditions, roots, culture to rely on,” “everything they have is imported from abroad"; they themselves are not able to add two and two, their souls "have been saturated with age-old despotism," therefore, "without any loss for humanity, they can be excluded from the list of civilized peoples." These monstrous nonsenses found connoisseurs in all strata of German society, and even the leader of the Social Democratic faction of the Reichstag August Bebel said more than once that, if necessary, he would take a gun on his shoulder and go to war to defend his homeland from Russian despotism.
The British, French and Russians paid the Germans in the same coin.
Inhabitants of the British Isles from the end of the XIX century. tormented by an irrational fear of a German invasion, fueled by the press and science fiction writers like William Le Quier, who devoted two of his novels to this topic - "The Great War in England in 1897" (1894) and The Invasion of 1910: With a Complete Account of the Siege of London (1906). The German "danger" was even more visible on the market, where it manifested itself in the dominance of German goods threatening to undermine British industry, trade, and sea transport.
The French could not forgive the Germans for the defeat at Sedan and the annexation of Alsace and Lorraine. Traumatized by this unheard-of humiliation, they preferred to "never talk about it, but constantly think." The catastrophe of 1870 was seen as an accidental concession of the "Gallo-Roman barrier" to the barbaric onslaught of Germanism. In the future, according to Victor Hugo, “France will strive for only one thing - to restore its strength, to stock up on energy, to nurture its sacred anger, to educate the young generation so as to create an army of the entire people, work continuously, study the methods and techniques of our enemies, so that to become the great France again in 1792, the France of the idea with the sword. Then one day she will become invincible. Then she will return Alsace-Lorraine. " The annexation of the lost provinces was associated with the return of France to its proper place among the great powers.
The image of the enemy - the German - was implanted in French mass literature. Popular novels were inhabited by numerous German spies (French writers even seriously argued that of all the peoples of Europe, the Germans were the most prone to espionage). They used stereotypical images of national characters: Latin gaiety and love of freedom were contrasted with the barbaric squalor of fat German "pigs" obsessed with beer and order and, in addition, smelling bad.
In Russian society, an unaccountable hostility traditionally dominated towards the "German", so fully expressed in the famous exclamation: "Scoundrels are Germans!" But some Russian thinkers, writers, and journalists were already beginning to worry about the brutal belligerence of the German character. Saltykov-Shchedrin, in his book Abroad, shared his impressions of a trip to Germany (1881): German “shyness was replaced by conceit, political evasiveness — an unjustified claim to universal domination, modesty — an unsuccessful desire to bribe foreigners with the bourgeois luxury of new quarters ... ". He expressed his disgust at German militarism in the following words: "Berlin is not needed for anything else, except for homicide"; “The whole essence of modern Berlin, all its world significance is concentrated at the present moment in the building, towering in view of the Royal Square and bearing the name: Main Headquarters...".
Meanwhile, Dostoevsky already mourned the "European cemetery": Germany is "a people who have outlived their strength, a dead people and without a future ..." everywhere in Europe - a passionate thirst to live and the loss of the highest meaning of life. "
According to the writer, an insurmountable abyss of alienation has opened up between Russia and Europe. “Lord, what prejudices we have about Europe!” He exclaimed in one of his letters abroad. Germans, "even if they are scientists, but they are terrible fools! .. All the local people are literate, but incredibly uneducated, stupid, stupid, with the most base interests." With all his skin, Dostoevsky felt “that constant, universal, based on some strong immediate and disgusting feeling of hostility to us in Europe; her disgust from us as from something contrary, partly even some superstitious fear of her in front of us ... ". "Europe hates us"; “Europe despises us, considers itself inferior as people, as a breed, and sometimes we freeze them, we freeze at all, especially when we throw ourselves on their necks with fraternal kisses”; "We are not Europeans for them, we interfere with them, we smell bad." The Europeans “cannot recognize us as their own. Turks, Semites are closer to them in spirit than we, Aryans. There is one extraordinary reason for all this: we are bringing an idea not at all the same as they are to humanity - that is the reason! " All Slavs in general "Europe is ready to brew with boiling water, like bedbug nests in old woman's wooden beds"; “Europe has decided to end Russia a long time ago. We cannot hide from their grinding, and someday they will rush at us and eat us. " And in order not to be eaten, you yourself have to eat Europe. This is the Russian Christian "all-service to humanity."
After the Berlin Congress of 1879, violent attacks on Germany and the Germans became commonplace in the Slavophil and liberal press. Bismarck in 1888 wrote about "ten years of falsification of public opinion by the Russian press, which in the reading part of the population created and nurtured an artificial hatred of everything German ...". German ambassador Petersburg, Lothar Schweinitz regretted the inability of the Russian government to cope with the anti-German campaigns of its own press.
Under the influence of these actions, the antipathy of Russians towards Germany took on more pronounced forms. In 1887, Alexander III shared with the ministers his observations about the anti-German sentiments of his subjects: "Before, I thought it was only Katkov, but now I am convinced that it is all of Russia."
The paranoid fears that gripped the European mind to a large extent contributed to the fact that the military-political alliances of the European countries adopted little logical configurations.
Schlieffen Plan or Plan of a Closing Door
The Schlieffen Plan and Its Political Consequences
In 1905, the General Staff of Germany to counter the Russian-French "encirclement" developed a rather serious strategic solution, which was called the Schlieffen Plan (Plan of the closing door).The author of this project, very important for the course of hostilities, was General Count Alfred von Schlieffen, a hereditary military man, from 1891 to 1906 headed the German General Staff.
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Deeply engaged in military history, from a young age he was fascinated by the Battle of Cannes (216 BC), which until the end of his life he considered the supreme example of military art. He was fascinated by the beauty of Hannibal's plan - the double flanking of the huge Roman square, which led to the almost complete extermination of the encircled legions. A detailed study of the famous battle led Schlieffen to the conviction that "a flank attack is the essence of the entire history of war." Until the moment when Schlieffen became the head of the General Staff, German military thought lived on the behests of Field Marshal Helmut von Moltke the Elder, or the great Moltke, the father of the brilliant victories of the Prussian army in the wars with Austria-Hungary (1866) and France (1870-1871). The military doctrine formulated by him was based on the fact that in a future war Germany would have to deal with not one, but two opponents - France and Russia. Moltke the elder considered a war on two fronts disastrous for Germany, so under him the General Staff concentrated its efforts on developing a strategy for the successive defeat of the allies. |
The most important thing here was not to miscalculate with the direction of the main blow. Since France, living in fear of a new German attack, turned its eastern border into a continuous chain of impregnable fortresses, Moltke the elder came to the conclusion that Germany should confine herself to defense in the west, and concentrate the main forces of the German army against Russian Empire... At that time it was still believed that "the boundless expanses of Russia are not of vital interest to Germany." Therefore, the defeat of the Russian army was planned to be carried out in the border areas and to end the war with the capture of the Russian part of Poland. After that, having transferred the troops to the west, it was possible to start offensive operations against France.
Schlieffen abandoned the doctrine of his legendary predecessor, retaining from it only the Napoleonic idea of the "Vernichtungs-Strategie" - the "strategy of destruction" of the enemy. Unlike Moltke, who predicted that a future war could last for years or even decades, he believed that Germany's limited financial resources and the German economy's heavy dependence on commodity exports would prevent it from waging a protracted war. "The strategy of starvation," he wrote, "is inconceivable when the maintenance of millions of armed people requires billions in expenditures." The time factor was decisive in his strategic calculations. By the beginning of the XX century. Germany had a well-developed network of modern railways, thanks to which it could mobilize and concentrate troops both in the east and in the west in just a few days. Importance railway tracks The message was also realized by France, which, being engaged in reinforced railway construction, managed to equalize the terms of mobilization of its army with the German one. But in Russia, the density of the railway network in the western and central regions was much lower than in Germany and even in Austria-Hungary. In addition, due to the enormous length of the Russian Empire, the Russian General Staff was forced to plan the transfer of troops to a distance several times greater than that which the German military units had to overcome according to the mobilization order. According to the calculations of the German General Staff, the complete mobilization of the Russian army was to take from 40 to 50 days. Consequently, at the first stage of the war, it was possible not to be distracted by the Russian front, but to throw all the strike forces against France.
Schlieffen considered a frontal breakthrough through the first-class French fortresses a waste of time and energy. Repetition of Sedan at the beginning of XX century. it was already impossible. Meanwhile, the French army had to be destroyed with one mighty blow. And here Schlieffen suggested using the experience of Cannes. “A battle for destruction,” he wrote, “can be given even now according to Hannibal’s plan, drawn up in time immemorial. The enemy front is not the target of the main attack. It is not the concentration of the main forces and reserves against the enemy front that is essential, but pressure on the flanks. A flank attack should be directed not only at one extreme point of the front, but should capture the entire depth of the enemy's position. Destruction is complete only after the attack of the enemy rear. "
The plan he had conceived was not a blind copy of the battle of Cannes. Schlieffen wanted to encircle the French, but not by double envelopment, but by means of a powerful breakthrough of one right flank of the German army. To do this, he maximally weakened the line of forces on the left flank, stretching along the German-French border, for the protection of which only 8 divisions were allocated, and concentrated a strike fist from 53 divisions against Belgium and Luxembourg. In the rear, these countries did not have an insurmountable chain of French fortresses. The only fortress on the way of the right flank of the German army was the "eternal" neutrality of Belgium, guaranteed in 1839 by England, France, Russia, Austria-Hungary and Germany itself (then still Prussia). Shlif-fen looked at the matter from a purely military point of view, without taking into account political considerations. Belgium's neutrality had no power in his eyes. According to his plan, with the outbreak of the war, the main forces of the German army were to immediately invade Luxembourg and Belgium, go through them, then, carrying out a wide arc of the entry maneuver, cover Paris from the southwest and push the French troops to the left flank of the German army.
If, during the victorious march of the German wing of the entry, the French army rushed with all its might on the weakened left flank of the Germans, then the effect of a revolving door would be obtained: the more you push such a door forward, the more painfully it hits you on the back and back of the head. The German right flank, passing through the rear of the enemy, would have destroyed the French army in the fields of Alsace and Lorraine.
The whole operation against France - the grandiose "Cannes XX century." - was calculated with purely German punctuality, literally by the clock. Exactly six weeks were allotted for the encirclement and defeat of the French army. After that, the German corps should have been transferred to the east.
Schlieffen deliberately sacrificed East Prussia at the initial stage of the war. The 10 German divisions stationed there could not withstand the onslaught of the Russian "steam roller", which, as expected, would come into motion four to five weeks after the start of mobilization.
It is important to note here that the German Chancellor Bethmann-Hollve always forbade planting long-lived elms in his Brandenburg Hohenfin estate: it’s not worth the trouble, the Russians will get the estate anyway.
The main burden of the confrontation of the Russian army would have to be borne by 30 Austrian divisions deployed in Galicia and the southern regions of Russian Poland. But a week after the victory over France, half a million German soldiers who arrived from the western front were supposed to crush Russian power and end the war on the continent - eight to ten weeks after it began.
The effectiveness of the "Schlieffen plan" depended entirely on the accuracy of the implementation by each division, each regiment and battalion of the schedule of deployment and concentration developed for them. Any delay threatened to lose the whole case. And Schlieffen, with a manic passion, indulged in the details of his plan, trying to foresee any circumstances. At times he gave the impression of a madman. Once, during an inspection trip of the headquarters in East Prussia, Schlieffen's adjutant drew the attention of his boss to the picturesque view of the Pregel River seen in the distance. The general, casting a quick glance in the direction the officer was pointing, muttered, "Minor obstacle." It was said that before his death in 1912, he was terribly worried about the fate of his brainchild. His last words on his deathbed were: "Do not weaken the right flank."
Subsequently, it turned out that the "Schlieffen plan" was not free from major shortcomings. These included disregard for Belgium's neutrality, which pushed England into the camp of Germany's opponents, and underestimating the scale of England's participation in a land war. And nevertheless, the military doctrine of Schlieffen, which became the shrine of the General Staff, had a powerful psychological impact on an entire generation of German politicians and military personnel. It brought them freedom from the fear of "encirclement" and a war on two fronts. Wilhelm and his entourage firmly learned: ten weeks of energetic efforts - and all enemies will be defeated.
Agadir crisis in Morocco, the Balkan bloc and the arms race
Agadir crisis in Morocco
The death of King Edward VII, which occurred in May 1910, on a short time brought together all the monarchical courts of Europe. Some reassurance was brought to the tensions of the great powers.The good-natured mood that prevailed in Europe in 1910 prompted the authors of the eleventh edition of the Britannica encyclopedia to inform their readers that "soon national differences will remain only in the field of education and economics."
As if in a mockery of these words, one of the most acute crises in relations between Germany and the Entente broke out the following year.
In the spring of 1911, an uprising broke out in Morocco. The French government, under the pretext of protecting its citizens, sent troops into the capital of the Sultanate - the city of Fez. In fact, this meant that France acquired a new colony. The German presence in Morocco was limited to two firms operating in Agadir and Mogadore (on the west bank). In general, there was nothing to stir up the conflict. But the German State Secretary for foreign affairs Alfred von Kiederlen-Wächter, against the wishes of his direct superior, Chancellor Bethmann-Hollweg, persuaded the Kaiser to retaliate. His goal was to prevent the transition of Morocco to French rule, or, at worst, to get compensation - the French Congo or at least one port city on the Atlantic coast.
The German gunboat Panther entered the Agadir harbor. The arrival of reinforcements, the cruiser Berlin, was soon expected, also heading for Moroccan waters.
The "Panther Leap" provoked a serious resonance throughout the world, becoming also an important precursor and cause of the First World War. France was taken by surprise, German newspapers choked with delight. The general tension increased every day. And suddenly England intervened, standing shoulder to shoulder with France. The British government recognized the strengthening of Germany on the Atlantic coast as offending the interests of England. On behalf of the Cabinet, Chancellor of the Exchequer David Lloyd George publicly signaled to the German government that "if Germany wants to fight, it will find Great Britain on the opposite side." The British fleet was on alert.
For the Kaiser, England's sharp demarche came as a complete surprise. Until now, neither he nor anyone else among European politicians viewed the Entente as a military bloc. The British did not support France in the Moroccan crisis of 1905, and during the Bosnian crisis of 1909, they, together with the French, left Russia face to face against Austria-Hungary and Germany. The direct threat of war with England frightened Wilhelm, especially since Austria was not ready to support its ally. He did not dare to cross the line.
On August 17, the Kaiser held a meeting with his entourage. It was decided to yield. “At the moment of real danger,” Bülow sneered, “His Majesty was each time imbued with the unpleasant consciousness of the fact that he had never commanded armies in real battles - despite the marshal's baton, which he loved to brandish, despite the medals and orders that he he loved to adorn himself so much, despite the pseudo-victories that he was invariably awarded in maneuvers. He understood perfectly well that he was nothing more than an ordinary neurasthenic, devoid of any military leadership talents, and as for naval affairs, with all his enthusiasm for them, he was not able to command not only a squadron, but even one single ship.
In negotiations with By the French, Germany unconditionally recognized a French protectorate over Morocco and was content with worthless compensation in the form of a swampy area of the French Congo, inhabited mainly by tsetse flies.
By that time, nationalist sentiments in all countries involved in agadir crisis, reached their climax. The Reichstag deputies greeted Bethmann-Hollweg's message about the treaty with France with deathly silence, but the chief of the General Staff Moltke Jr. raged: “If we are once again forced to leave with our tail between our legs, if we again cannot dare to openly declare that we are ready to use the sword , then I will lose faith in the future of Germany and retire ... ". German newspapers poured out streams of hatred on the Entente. The press of the Entente countries, in turn, mockingly relished the diplomatic humiliation of Germany.
The next year, a dress rehearsal for the future war took place.
Balkan crisis and the partition of Turkey
This time, Italy and the Balkan states, united by the efforts of Russian diplomacy in “ balkan blo To". On November 5, 1911, the Italian government officially proclaimed the annexation of the North African possessions of the Ottoman Empire - Tripolitania and Cyrenaica. Italy was playing a win-win game. She knew that there would be no protest from the great powers - it never came. The Entente wanted to see Italy in their ranks, Germany and Austria were afraid of her withdrawal from the Triple Alliance. In the subsequent Italian-Turkish war, the Italian squadron bombarded Beirut, the Dardanelles fortifications and captured a dozen Turkish islands in the Aegean Sea.The Italians' victories demonstrated the complete impotence of the Turkish army. The Balkan states did not want to miss such an opportunity and hastily set about dividing the Turkish inheritance. In the fall of 1912 Montenegro, Serbia, Bulgaria and Greece declared war on Turkey. The military action resembled a triumphant march of the allied armies. A month later, the Turks lost all their possessions on the European coast, and the Bulgarian army was stationed 40 km from Constantinople. The Turkish government has asked the great powers for mediation.
Russia before the outbreak of the First World War
Reasons for Russia's participation in the First World War
The partition of Turkey by the Balkan states against the interests of Russia caused the strongest indignation of the domestic Ministry of Foreign Affairs, headed by D.S. Sazonov.When the naval flotilla of England and other great powers entered the Turkish ports, Russia lost the ability to capture and hold the Black Sea straits. In addition, the prospect of a war against Austria-Hungary and Germany had to be reckoned with. Finally, even the temporary closure by the Turks of the Dardanelles - the sea gate through which 60% of Russian grain exports passed - threatened the Russian economy with multimillion-dollar losses. Therefore, Russia acted in an unusual role of the defender of the territorial integrity of the Ottoman Empire. At her insistence, the other great powers agreed to decide at an international conference.
It was no longer possible to fix anything in the current situation: the division of the Ottoman Empire had become a fait accompli.
The military successes of the Serbs and Montenegrins terribly worried Austria, which sought to prevent Serbia from accessing the Adriatic Sea and the excessive strengthening of Montenegro. In November, Austria-Hungary carried out a partial mobilization and concentrated large forces on the Serbian border.
Russia, of course, did not stand aside. The reform of the Russian army, begun after the unsuccessful Russo-Japanese War, proceeded at an accelerated pace, and many members of the Council of Ministers were determined to "persist in defending our vital interests and not to be afraid of the specter of war." They said that it was time for Russia to stop “groveling before the Germans,” that the Russian people “understood better than we do the need to free themselves from foreign influence”. The Minister of War, Vladimir Aleksandrovich Sukhomlinov, with great success developed his thoughts before the sovereign that "all the same, we cannot escape the war, and it is more profitable for us to start it earlier", since "only one good thing will come from the war for us." He did his best to persuade Nicholas II to agree to the mobilization of two military districts bordering on Austria. At the same time, Sukhomlinov showed amazing frivolity: perfectly aware that the decree on mobilization could cause war, he at the same time petitioned for leave for him for a pleasure trip to the Riviera. In response to the bewilderment of other cabinet members, he said without a shadow of embarrassment: “What a problem, the minister of war is not personally mobilizing, and as long as all orders are carried out, I would always have time to return on time. I didn’t expect to be away for more than 2-3 weeks. ”
All this took place against the backdrop of noisy demonstrations in favor of the Balkan Slavs, in which tens of thousands of people participated.
The French government was also ready to pull the trigger, assuring St. Petersburg that if Germany intervened in the war, France would fully fulfill its allied obligations.
Chairman of the Council of Ministers Vladimir Nikolayevich Kokovtsov, a staunch supporter of the peace course, had a lot of work to cool the warlike ardor of his colleagues. On his advice, the entire last term of service was detained under the banners for six months - this measure made it possible to increase the composition of the army by a quarter, without resorting to mobilization, to which Austria would inevitably respond with war.
France and Serbia were sent unambiguous signals about Russia's unwillingness to get involved in the war with Austria-Hungary. The Russian military attaché in Paris, Count Alexei Alekseevich Ignatiev, in a conversation with the Minister of War of France Alexander Millerand, said that although “the Slavic question remains close to our hearts, history has, of course, taught us first of all to think about our own state interests, not sacrificing them in favor of abstract ideas ". To a direct question from the French Foreign Ministry: "What actions will Russia take in the event of an Austrian attack on Serbia?" The Russian answer was: "Russia will not fight." The Serbian government received a note from the Minister of Foreign Affairs Sazonov, which read: "We categorically warn Serbia not to expect to drag us along ..." Under the influence of Russian diplomacy, Serbia withdrew its territorial claims and refused access to the Adriatic Sea.
Germany's position in the Balkan crisis of 1912 was again influenced by the firm resolve of England.
At first, Austria, as in 1909, was promised full support, “regardless of the consequences,” according to the Kaiser. But last year's events sowed indecision in him. Wilhelm tried to figure out which side Great Britain would take. The answer was disappointing. In early December, messages were received through various channels: the British will not remain indifferent observers of the Austrian invasion of Serbia and will not allow France to be defeated.
At a military council on December 8 with the participation of the top leadership of the army and navy, Wilhelm could not contain his rage: “Because England ... so envies us and hates us so much, because of this, it turns out, no other power has no right to take up a sword to protect their interests, and they themselves ... are going to oppose us! Oh, this nation of shopkeepers! And they call this the politics of peace! Balance of power! In the decisive battle between the Germans and the Slavs, the Anglo-Saxons are on the side of the Slavs and Gauls! " The Kaiser was determined, but wanted to know what the chances of Germany in the war with the Entente were.
Moltke's opinion looked like a direct quote from Sukhomlinov's speech: "I consider war inevitable, and the sooner it starts, the better ...". But Grand Admiral Tirpitz spoke out against hasty decisions. According to him, the fleet was not yet ready to measure its strength with the British dreadnoughts, it took at least eighteen months to complete the expansion of the Kiel Canal and build a submarine base on the island of Helgoland. Moltke grimaced skeptically - there is no need to wait a year and a half, “even then the fleet will not be ready, and the army will be in a less favorable position by that time; the enemy is arming more intensively than we are, we do not have enough money. " Tirpitz still insisted on his own. The Germanic sword was not drawn from its scabbard. Bethmann-Hollweg was instructed to “educate the people through the press about the great national interests that will be set by Germany if the Austro-Serbian conflict escalates into a war. In the event of a war, the people should not wonder what Germany is fighting for. "
In general, it was in 1912 that the Kaiser's thinking took on a catastrophic character. Moreover, the coming European apocalypse was seen by him in the light of the theory of the struggle of races. Thus, on the margins of one diplomatic report, Wilhelm wrote: “Chapter two of the Great Nations Migration is over. Chapter three comes, in which the Germanic peoples will fight against the Russians and the Gauls. No future conference will be able to diminish the significance of this fact, for this is not a question of high politics, but a question of the survival of the race. " The Austrian general Count Sturck later heard from the Kaiser the following words: “I hate the Slavs. I know this is sinful. You shouldn't hate anyone, but I can't help it: I hate them. "
Contemporaries associated the Kaiser's racist remarks with the influence of Professor Schiemann, who was considered an expert on Russia. Wilhelm showed this Ostsee German, possessed by hatred of the Slavs, unfailing favor. Even earlier, the Kaiser had become acquainted with great interest with Chamberlain's "The Main Myth of the 19th Century"; the author was awarded the Iron Cross.
Apart from William, no other political leader at the time considered the confrontation between the Entente and the central powers in a racial aspect. A psychological break was also observed in the behavior of Nicholas II. The tsar seemed to be seized by some kind of fatigue, a fatalistic desire to let events take their course. Kokovtsov recalled one of his last reports to the sovereign. This was already in November 1913, after Kokovtsov's return from a trip to Berlin. The tsar received him at the Livadia Palace in the Crimea. Kokovtsov spoke about the warlike sentiments at the court of Wilhelm and his alarming belief in the proximity and inevitability of war. Nikolay listened attentively: “He never interrupted me during the whole time of my presentation and stubbornly looked straight into my eyes, as if he wanted to believe in the sincerity of my words. Then, turning to the window at which we were sitting, he peered for a long time into the boundless sea distance spread before him and, as if waking up from oblivion, again stubbornly looked at me and said: "Everything is God's Will!"
Apparently, Nicholas II was still under the impression of the magnificent celebration of the 300th anniversary of the Romanov dynasty. The celebrations began in February and continued throughout the year. The Tsar and his family made a long journey through Russian cities. Tens of thousands of people who stood along the route of the tsar's train, an endless series of ceremonial dinners, processions of the cross, prayer services, and folk festivals were to testify to the inextricable unity of the tsar with the people. The mystical mood of the sovereign could also be influenced by Rasputin, who then finally confirmed his exclusive position in the royal family. The tsar, like his Germanic cousin, was rapidly losing an adequate perception of reality.
The crisis of 1912 finally clarified the balance of power before the decisive battle.
The exchange of threats continued at the beginning of 1913. In the margins of Chancellor Bethmann-Hollweg's report on the situation in the Balkans, Wilhelm wrote: finally, a provocation is needed in order to be able to strike, “with more or less clever diplomacy and a cleverly directed press, such ( provocation) can be constructed ... and it must be constantly at hand. "
However, it was already clear that there would be no war again. In late January 1913, in a letter to Gorky, Lenin regretfully dropped: "A war between Austria and Russia would be very useful for the revolution (throughout Eastern Europe), but there is little likelihood that Franz Josef and Nikolasha would give us this pleasure."
Peace in the Balkans came in May. Turkey admitted defeat and lost almost all of the European possessions that went to the countries of the "Balkan bloc".
On May 24, the wedding of the Kaiser's only daughter Princess Victoria Louise and the Duke of Brunswick took place. Wilhelm invited both of his cousins to the celebration - Georgie (George V) and Niki (Nicholas II). Both arrived in person. Later, George V said that it was extremely difficult for him to have a heart-to-heart talk with the Russian sovereign: Wilhelm followed on their heels everywhere, fearing that Georgie and Nicky would collude against him. When they did manage to be left alone, Georg did not leave the feeling that "Wilhelm is standing with his ear pressed against the keyhole."
This was the last meeting of the three royal cousins.
The lull in the Balkans lasted only a month. The former allies were unable to divide the territories seized from Turkey, and at the end of June the Second Balkan War began. Now Greece, Serbia and Montenegro have turned against Bulgaria. Soon Romania and Turkey joined the anti-Bulgarian coalition. The great powers were much more restrained this time around. A month later, the war ended with the defeat of Bulgaria and a new redrawing of the borders between the Balkan states.
Following this, Russian-German relations again escalated. The Kaiser tried to strengthen German influence in Turkey. On July 30, 1913, Otto Liman von Sanders, one of the best German generals, arrived in Istanbul at the invitation of the Turkish government. A little later, forty instructor officers joined him. Sanders was tasked with overseeing the reorganization of the Turkish army. In addition, he was appointed commander of the army corps stationed in Istanbul and a member of the Turkish Military Council.
Petersburg took this news extremely painfully. The work of the German military mission was clearly intended to prepare the Turkish army for war with Russia. They also feared that the economic development of southern Russia would fall under German control. Kokovtsov's negotiations on this issue with Bethmann-Hollweg and Wilhelm II were unsuccessful. The conflict around the Sanders mission was somewhat defused only in January 1914, when the general, under a plausible pretext, was removed from the direct leadership of the Istanbul garrison - he was promoted to marshal of the Turkish army and appointed military inspector of all Turkish troops.
From the very beginning of the Balkan crisis of 1912-1913. the great powers have embarked on an intensified arms build-up. Thanks to continued economic growth, governments were able to afford previously unthinkable military spending.
Germany began to form two new army corps. The naval program, adopted by the Reichstag in May 1912, proposed to increase the size of the German fleet to 41 battleship and 20 armored cruisers, not counting light cruisers and destroyers.
In response, Churchill promised the House of Commons that the world would soon see the largest construction in the history of the British Navy: "One torpedo boat a week ... One light cruiser every thirty days ... one superdreadnought every forty-five days." In 1914, the British government acquired a controlling stake in the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company in order to be able to refuel ships with liquid fuel instead of coal.
The French government by law of August 7, 1913 increased the length of service from two to three years and lowered the draft age from 21 to 20 years. This allowed France to form the largest peacetime army in Europe - 882,907 people, including the colonial troops (the pre-war strength of the German army was brought to 808,280 people).
In the Russian budget, defense accounted for about a third of all government spending. At the end of 1913, the “Big Program for Strengthening the Army” was approved, which provided for an increase in the number of ground forces by almost 40%; great attention was paid to field artillery and naval construction. Within three years, the Russian government planned to have the most first-class army on the continent.
A significant increase in military spending was also approved by the Austrian and Italian parliaments. All records were broken by tiny Belgium, which expected to more than triple the peacetime army by 1918.
The celebration in 1913 of the centenary of the liberation of Germany from the rule of Napoleon resulted in a large-scale anti-French demonstration. The press reminded the Germans that the hour is not far off when they will again have to fight the same "historical" enemy of the German nation.
Militarization in Germany reached such a scale that it intrusively climbed into the eyes even on the street. Russian publicist Alexander Valentinovich Amfitheatrov recalled how Germany struck him in the spring of 1913: “It seemed to me as if it had been renewed and mighty grown. Delighted and horrified. A huge, brilliant culture - as if in an extension to an exemplary military camp. Everything that is strong, strong, healthy - in a military uniform: well-fed, rosy-cheeked, automatically gregarious, ideally trained for human destruction, armed people ... And as armed! Admire and tremble! And the civilian population is weak, sickly, pale and half-blind: for ten people, six in glasses. It was obvious that the state makes the country live in the military, and the military is feeding the country, of course, not for parades and maneuvers. "
“I don’t know,” Amphitheatrov sums up his impressions, “who then wanted war in Germany, and whether the Germans wanted war in general. But the air was filled with war - and, moreover, a war, obviously victorious "(" The fight against the German hero ").
Protopresbyter of the Russian army and navy, Georgy Shavelsky, who attended the celebration of the centenary of the Battle of the Nations at Leipzig in 1913, experienced the same feelings: “Here it is, Germany! Slender, close-knit, disciplined, patriotic. When it’s a national holiday, everyone is like a soldier; they all have one idea, one thought, one goal, and everywhere harmony and order. And in our country everyone is talking about the fight against it ... It is difficult for us, scattered, propagandized, to compete with it. "
However, the so-called common sense refused to dramatize the situation. Maxim Gorky, for example, found that Amphitheatrov exaggerated German power. The German military clique, according to the writer, was "not as strong as ... it seems that the German socialists would not allow the country to go to war, and if such happened, the fiery German onslaught would meet a stern rebuff in Russia, on which it would break its horns." ...
By the end of 1913, political passions had subsided. Chancellor Bethmann-Hollweg reminded the proponents of the preemptive strike: “Until now, no country has encroached on the honor or dignity of the Germans. Anyone who speaks about war under these conditions must convincingly formulate its goal and prove that it is impossible to achieve this goal in any other way ... not only the Hohenzollern dynasty, but Germany as a whole. Of course, we must show courage in our foreign policy, but simply swinging the sword on every occasion when neither honor, nor security, nor the future of Germany is affected is not only frivolous, but also criminal. "
US Secretary of State William Jennings Brian, observing the situation from the outside, concluded: "The conditions that promise world peace have never been as favorable as they are now."
At the very end of 1913, a special meeting was held with the participation of the foreign ministers, the military, the naval and the chief of the General Staff. We discussed the mission of General Sanders and the possibility of a joint Russian-Anglo-French strike on Turkey. Kokovtsov, chairing the meeting, directly put the question to the ministers: "Is war with Germany desirable and can Russia go to it?"
State Secretary Kokovtsev, considering the war to be the greatest disaster for Russia at present, adhered to the extreme undesirability of involving Russia in a European clash.
Foreign Minister Sazonov also held a fundamentally negative opinion about the war with Germany.
He explained this position by the fact that Russia, even together with France (from which assurances of unconditional support had already been received), hardly has a clear chance of winning the war with Germany. The minister pointed out that it is completely unclear how energetically Britain would be ready to act. Namely, the participation of British troops could really guarantee victory over Germany.
At the same time, Minister of War Sukhomlinov and Chief of the General Staff, General Yakov Grigorievich Zhilinsky "categorically declared Russia's full readiness for single combat with Germany, not to mention a one-on-one clash with Austria."
As a result of the Meeting, the following provisions were adopted:
1) It is necessary to continue to convince Germany of the inadmissibility, from the point of view of Russia's interests, of the command of a German general of a military unit in Constantinople, and even more of providing him with an inspection in the sense of commanding one or another district, but at the same time recognizing that it is permissible to grant the Chief of the German military mission powers on the general inspection of the Turkish army.
2) The negotiations in Berlin should be continued until their complete failure is clarified.
3) After that, with the consent of France and England, it is necessary to proceed to the intended measures of influence outside Berlin.
4) In the absence of active support from France and England, further pressure that could lead to a war with Germany is unacceptable.
These were the events that preceded Russia's entry into the First World War.
World War I
1914 - 1918
The reason for the First World War was the murder on June 15 (28), 1914 in Sarajevo (Bosnia) by Serbian nationalists of the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, Archduke Franz Ferdinand. Germany decided to use the favorable moment to unleash the war. Under pressure from Germany, Austria-Hungary on July 10 (23) presented an ultimatum to Serbia and, despite the Serbian government's agreement to fulfill almost all of its demands, on July 12 (25) broke off diplomatic relations with it, and on July 15 (28) declared war on it. The capital of Serbia, Belgrade, came under artillery fire. Russia on July 16 (29) began mobilization in the military districts bordering Austria-Hungary, and on July 17 (30) announced a general mobilization. Germany on July 18 (31) demanded that Russia stop mobilization and, having received no response, declared war on it on July 19 (August 1). July 21 (August 3) Germany declared war on France and Belgium; July 22 (August 4) Great Britain declared war on Germany, along with which her dominions entered the war - Canada, Australia, New Zealand, The Union of South Africa and the largest colony of India. On August 10 (23), Japan declared war on Germany. Italy, while formally remaining a member of the Triple Alliance, announced its neutrality on July 20 (August 2), 1914.
Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand - a cause or a pretext for the First World War?
On June 28, 1914, Gavrilo Princip committed an attempt on the life of the Austrian heir to the throne, Franz Ferdinand, in Sarajevo and his wife. It is believed that this incident was the pretext for the outbreak of the First World War.
Historians' opinions.
Konstantin Zalessky, historian
The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand is not the cause of the First World War, but only a pretext. And the reason is not very good. To unleash the war, they used the case that appeared at that moment. Moreover, the murder of Frans Ferdinand was not the work of a Serbian organization, but an organization that secretly operated on the territory of Austria-Hungary. Although certain circles in Serbia could have been involved in the murder, however, not the ruling circles. The Serbs responded pretty well to the Austro-Hungarian ultimatum. And after Serbia's answer, in principle, it followed that there was no reason for starting the war. As for whether Gavrilo Princip acted on his own initiative or was a puppet in the hands of others, I think that he acted solely for reasons of patriotism. That is, Principle shot at Franz Ferdinand and then at his wife, solely believing that this terrorist act would help liberate the South Slavs from the rule of Austria-Hungary. Another thing is that the entire organization came under the influence of certain terrorist and ultra-radical circles of the Serbian leadership. But I will emphasize that not the ruling circles in Serbia, but those who sought to unleash the conflict. For his part, the Principle acted honestly, he had an exclusively patriotic idea. Although, a terrorist - he is a terrorist, even if he acts with good intentions. And he, in principle, was not a puppet in the hands of others. This whole group that organized the assassination attempt on Frans Ferdinand acted absolutely deliberately.
Andrey Zubov, historian
The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, of course, was the reason for the outbreak of the First World War. If this were the reason, then the problem could be solved quite easily. And, in general, the incident could have been exhausted. Historians are well aware that Austria consulted with Germany, and Germany believed that the war could start now or never start. That is why the military programs, including the program of Russia, went ahead. And the plan for the rapid defeat of the French army on the Western Front, followed by the transfer of troops to the Eastern Front and the defeat of Russia, failed for a number of technical reasons. Consequently, Germany and Austria were extremely interested in starting the war as soon as possible. As for how Gavrilo Princip acted, he acted on behalf of the Serb nationalists. That is, he represented those people who believed that all Slavic lands should be united. Indeed, there was a movement at that time quite powerful, so it is quite possible that the Principle acted completely sincerely, and was not a double agent.
