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Great War Significance

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In this essay, I will introduce the Great War which was from 28 July 1914 to 11 November 1918 and took place in Europe. I will identify this transformative event, discuss the important background circumstances in this special period, and assess the historical significance.
The Great War, also called World War I (WWI), was the most significant historical event in the 20th Century, and many events happened in this period can be traced to it. Many countries directly or indirectly entered to WWI. When the Great War was end and the Allied Powers won the peace, approximately 10 million military died, 20 million wounded, and about 7 million civilians died as a result of this war. Moreover, due to failure of the Central Powers, Germany lost many colonies …show more content…
As the textbook states, “WWI hailed as a war to “make the world safe for democracy”, but in the end, it left the world in greater conflict and set the stage for an even more destructive war to come only two short decades later” (LP 100). It can be seen that the WWI only gave the world a very short time of peace, and the world became more conflict after the period of peace. It can be said that the Great War was a wrong turn for humanity.
In the 1900s, the tense atmosphere covered the whole of Europe. As the textbook states, “To protect imperial ambitions for global markets and resources, Europe`s armies grew by over 600% between 1900-1914, creating the most necessary condition for coming apocalypse” (LP 101). Because Germany had great ambition to enlarge its own lands and modernized its weapons, France and Britain felt threatened and were eager to hinder the expansion of Germany. Therefore, many alliances were made by countries in Europe before the WWI …show more content…
With Austria`s refusal to redraw borders based upon ethnic lines,a Serbian nationalist group, the Black Hand, became determined to force Austria out Bosnia by means of an act of terror” ( LP 101). Due to the Sarajevo Assassination that was made by the Black Hand in Bosnia on June 28 1914, Austria declared war on Serbia on July 28 1914. Moreover, because of various collective defense treaty agreements and complexity of international alliances, many Europe`s major powers entered to the war. Finally, Germany, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Ottoman Empire, and the Kingdom of Bulgaria composed the Central Powers and Allied Powers were made up of Great Britain, France, and Russia (Italy and United States joined the Allied Powers later). Furthermore, the United States stayed neutrality at the beginning; however, because the Zimmermann Telegram proposed an alliance between Germany and Mexico, the United States declared war on Germany in

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