FIRST WORLD WAR

The first world war has been selected by Roberto Amati in relation to the real history of european integration, then enlisted in the People, Dates, Places and Events category, accompanied by own fact SHEET useful to the comprehension, completed of historical MAPS AND IMAGES or with a direct linking to the related Blog contents dedicated to the entire history of european integration and the future of Europe.

The First World War is one of the most important event in whole history of european integration and will probably have influence on the future of United Europe: the changement happened at the end of that period are in force still nowadays in Europe, whose political map had been transformed at all after hundreds centuries and every form of Imperium had disappear forever!

Indeed, in 1919 A.D. there has been the extinction of the "central empires" (II Reich, Austrian-Ungarian, Russia, Turkey) and with them the historic-political-cultural-juridical iheritance of the ancient Roman Empire and the ResPublica Christiana! They were replaced by lots of European states in Centre-East Europa to the extent that ended the rule of many ancient royal european genealogies (Hohenzollern, Wittelsbach, Habsburg-Lotrhingen, Romanov-Oldenburg), already marginalized at the Congress of Berlin in 1886 A.D. that had divided Europe a in influence areas while the western european states (Great Britain, France , Belgium, the Netherlands) launched the colonization of Africa.

The causes of the First World War are still unknown today! The boom of the industrial and financial markets and of the global tradings consequential to the general peace established in 1815 A.D. had been stopped by the great crisis of 1870 A.D. and succeeding first financiary crisis in the United States, that pushed the richest european states towards economic policies protectionist and imperialist (velt politik) and the institution of the Bank for International Banking Settlements seated in Basel and of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, to administer the currencies change with gold under control of the Bank of England. In addition, the condition for peace established in Wien and Berlin had been passed by the events at end of XIX century A.D., when the Second Industrial Revolution and the emerging of the great east asian powers of China and Japan had modified the global scenary, especially for the oldest european empires that were limited each other in the continental territory and in competition with the western coloniast powers increasing their military power. So it started an "arms race" that put Great Britain and the II Reich in direct conflict in the sea field, meantime Japan and Russian Empire fought a short war in 1905 A.D. that showed the world on the weakness of the immense Zarade, limited at South by the pression of Great Britain in Persia and Afghanistan.

Then it happened the "casus belli" of the First World War in 1914 A.D. when a serbian anarchic assassinated the Archiduke heir of the Austrian-Ungarian Empire in Sarajevo, provoking the reaction of the Austro-Ungarian Empire (that some years before annexed Bosnia) against the Kingdom of Serbia immediately defended by the panslavic Russian Empire, that called the "pangermanic" intervention of the II Reich aside Austria (allied in the "Triple Intesa" treaty subscibed together with Italy, that remained neutral). At that point, it was a regional war among the states that had subscribed the Saint Alleance in Wien a century before...but surprisingly, Germany invaded the neutral Kingdom of Belgium to pass through and attack France, so determine the intervention in war of Great Britain because the royal dinasty ruling both states was the same (Sassonia-Coburgo-Gotha), despite the common german origins of the british emperor and their direct cousins of the german kaiser and of the russian zar...So it began the First World War conducted as a trench conflict, meantime decisive naval battles happened in the Atlantic Ocean and the North Sea in favour of the british navy and the air war debutted with aiplanes and zeppelins that often used to bomb from the sky the ground troops. In few months many other states of Earth entered in war against the central empires such as Italy, Romania, Greece, Portugal, Brazil, Mexico, Japan and United States (the rest of the world was controlled by the European colonial powers), so that the new european war had became the First World War in Humankind History!

When also Bulgaria and Turkey entered the war aside the central empires, the whole Europe excepted for Switzerland, Spain and the northen kingdoms of Sweden, Denmark and Norway, was involved in the First World War! The main field battles happened along the french rivers of Marne and Somme and in the Ardenne region, at the Masuri Lakes on the german-russian front, in Galizia between Austro-Hungarians and Russians and in the Venetian Plain on the austrian-italian edge. What Pope Benedict XV had called "a senseless slaughter" ended in 1918 A.D. with circa 8 milions of soldiers died plus 21 milions of wounded and invalids of militars and civilians, without appreciable territory conquests except for the advancement of Italy in Trentino-Alto-Adige and Friuli-Istria regions.

The First World War changed forever the political and ethnic map of Europe: at East were founded the national states of Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia and Finland, while Poland returned independent since 1795 A.D. and the Republic of Czech-Slovakia included the norhern Slavs, separated by Hungary from the southern Slavs of the Kingdom of Jugoslavia under the serbian Karageorgevic dinasty. Austria and Germany became federal republics and the region of Alsace-Lothingen was annexed to France, while Russia had been overwhelmed by the Soviet Revolution and tranformed in a communist republic. In the end, Turkey lost all its territory in Middle East and all the islands in the Aegean Sea in favour of Greece, meantime the Bosforo and Dardanelli Staits became international free ways (that was the edge between Europa and Asia estabished at the end of the Persian Wars). Europe came out from the First World War destroyed and underponed to control of the Society of Nations with main seat in Geneva, under hegemony of France and Great Britain that obtained a mandate on Syria and Palestine reiogns and allowed Jews to occupy a piece of that land in honour to a promise ("Balfour letter").

Cause of the risk for expansion of Communism all over Europe, Great Britain abandoned its historical foreign policy of splendid isolation since 1707 A.D. to defend its vital interests on the continent and within the colonies spreaded all over Earth (quite 1/4 of the emerged lands!). There it started the new rivality between Italy and France for controlling the Mediterranean Sea and the Balcanic region, meantime the french republic imposed gravous war reparations and disfrutements of mines to Germany scaring for new attaks in future. At the end of First World War, Europe appeared weak and without an authority nor a political leadership able to front the social and economic troubles emerging and to mantain the balance of power inside. Even if the ‘Club Europa’ was substantially dissolved, as well as the ancient christian potestas that had managed the history of european integration since the Nicean Council in 325 A.D., no hegemonic entities succeeded and the European political scenario got worse towards the authoritarian regimes and the financiary crisis of the Thirties, always more submitted to the new globalist powers of United States, China and Japan. With the project of building the Israel state, as requested by the sionist movement, Europe had returned to the Crusades epoch and the "free Jerusalem" dream...

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