WORLD WAR I THE WAR OF THE 20 th CENTURY

CONTENTS Page 1:Divided Europe Page 2:The Fatal Shot Page 3:War In The West Page 4:Fighting Men Page 5:Joining Up Page 6:Digging The Trenches Page 7:Life In The Trenches Page 8:Ready To Fight Page 9:The End

Divided Europe At the start of the 20 th century, the countries of Europe were increasingly hostile to each other. Britain, France and Germany competed for trade and influence overseas, while Austria-Hungary and Russia both tried to dominate the Balkan states of south-east Europe. Europe

THE FATAL SHOT On the 28 th June 1914 the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, was assassinated in Sarajevo, Bosnia. Bosnia had been part of Austria- Hungary since 1908, but it was claimed by neighbouring Serbia. Serbia

War In The West Ever since the 1890s, Germany had feared that it would face a war on two fronts – against Russia in the east and against France, Russia’s ally since 1894 in the west. Germany knew the chances of winning such a war were slim. France Russia

Fighting Men The outbreak of war in Europe in August 1914 changed the lives of millions of men. Regular soldiers, older reservists, eager recruits and unwilling conscripts all found themselves caught up in the war. Some of them are experienced soldiers, but many of them had barely held a rifle before. Rifle

Joining Up At the outbreak of war, every European country but one had a large standing army of conscripted troops ready to fight. The exception was Britain, which had a small army of volunteers. On 6 th of August 1914, the Secretary of War, Lord Kitchener, asked for 100,000 new recruits. Lord Kitchener

Digging The Trenches At the outbreak of war, both sides on the western front expected to take part in massive military manoeuvres over hundreds of kilometres of territory, and to fight fast-moving battles of advance and retreat. No-one expected a static fight between two evenly matched sides. A stalemate occurred, mainly because powerful long range artillery weapons and rapid-fire machine guns made it dangerous for soldiers to fight in unprotected, open ground. The only way to survive such weapons was to dig defensive trenches.

Life In The Trenches Daytime in the trenches alternated between periods of intense fear, when the enemy fired, and longer periods of boredom. Most of the work was done at night when patrols were sent out to observe and raid enemy trenches and to repair their own front-line parapets and other defences.

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