The First World War

[tygrkhat40]

Originally Posted by Bruceov

Ennath's post. People write about how cruel the peace was to the Germs, Few people realize that the Germs did not comply with the terms of the peace after WWI.

This is true, but the Allies did little or nothing to make sure the Germans were complying with the terms of the peace.

[Ennath]

June 29, 1914
Austria-Hungary The Chief of the General Staff, Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf has been pressing for years for a showdown with the Empire’s enemies, particularly Italy and Serbia, who act as a beacon for Italian and Slavic minorities in the Empire. His moment has now come. An Austrian diplomat raises the possibility of Serbian complicity in the assassination. For four hours mobs of Croats and Moslems riot in Sarajevo, attacking Serbs and their businesses, homes and public institutions. Fifty people are wounded and one is killed. Other anti-Serbian riots erupt throughout Bosnia and in Vienna.
Serbia During the ensuing crisis, there is no Serbian investigation of the Sarajevo crime. This is either an oversight allowing Vienna to control events or a desire to prevent any embarrassing facts emerging about the Black Hand.

June 29, 1915
Eastern Front Austro-German forces advance toward the Vistula and the Bug. The Russians repulse an attack east of Halicz. The line on the Zlota Lipa is solidifying.
Dardanelles Turkish counterattacks near Krithia fail.
United States Suspicious American customs officials search the Annie Larsen and find the guns destined for India. The ship and its cargo are seized, over German protests.

June 29, 1916
Western Front, Verdun A German attack on Hill 304 fails.
Western Front, Elsewhere A French attack at Tahure in Champagne takes two lines of German trenches.
Britain Casement is found guilty of high treason and sentenced to death.
Eastern Front A German attack in the Vilna sector fails.

June 29, 1917
Western Front British troops enter Avion. The French lose some ground near Cerny.
Italian Front The Italians are forced back from advanced positions on the Asiago Plateau.
France Socialist deputy Pierre Laval, a Caillaux protégé, claims that the Stockholm Conference is France’s only hope, a chance to restore hope to the troops and confidence to the workers. Clemenceau complains “There are no ministers. There is no premier. There is no government!”
Russia Prince Lvov appeals to the Ukrainians, reassuring them that they are part of a free Russia and promising reforms.

June 29, 1918
Russia A White provisional government of Siberia is established at Vladivostok. The local Soviet leaders are arrested.
War in the Air German ace Ernst Udet (62 kills) becomes one of the first pilots to be saved by parachuting from a disabled aircraft. His chute does not open until he is 250 feet from the ground and he sprains an ankle.

[paulhuk]

Originally Posted by tygrkhat40

This is true, but the Allies did little or nothing to make sure the Germans were complying with the terms of the peace.

Actually, the Allies did quite a lot to enforce full compliance of the Versailles Treaty.

Occupation forces remained in Germany until 1930.

A Control Commission monitored the destruction of military equipment and reduction in size of the Army and Navy.

The territorial provisions of the treaty were fully enforced.

Paul

[palo5]

Originally Posted by paulhuk

Actually, the Allies did quite a lot to enforce full compliance of the Versailles Treaty...

Except we know they didn't, because it wasn't long until Germany was fully re-armed. The Germans didn't pay reparations either. Very cunning how they did it (or rather, didn't do it)

But it was a masterpiece the way the German people were kept ignorant of this, and still believing Versailles was a gross burden on them. Not even the KGB could have delivered a more effective disinformation

Clearly they had some very smart (criminal) operators

[Ennath]

June 30, 1905
Atomic Research Einstein publishes his Special Theory of Relativity, beginning the overturning of the Newtonian concept of the universe.

June 30, 1914
Germany Foreign Secretary Gottlieb von Jagow receives word from his ambassador in Vienna that Count Leopold von Berchtold, the Austrian Foreign Minister, insists that Serbia is responsible for the assassination. Aware that any action against Serbia might involve Russia, the Austrians decide that it is necessary to ascertain German support.
Diplomatic Relations The Serbian minister in Vienna disavows any foreknowledge of the plot and vows that Serbian territory will not be used for actions against Austria-Hungary.

June 30, 1915
Western Front German attacks in the Argonne and Metzeral make little progress. Although not a scene of major fighting, the Argonne is one of those sectors where both sides try to deplete the other’s resources of men and materiel by means of small-scale attacks.
Eastern Front German troops pass the Grila-Lipa line. Austro-German troops advance from Tomasow. The Germans claim to have taken 150,000 Russian prisoners in June. Austro-German casualties have been less than half that amount.
Russia War Minister Polivanov warns his colleagues that within the army “demoralization, surrender and desertions are assuming huge proportions.”
Italian Front After their seven day artillery preparation, the Italians attack along the entire 21-mile Isonzo front. Their objective is Gorizia. Resistance is fierce and gains few.
Dardanelles The French take several Turkish trench lines. General Gouraud is wounded and replaced as commander of the French contingent by General Bailloud.
Caucasus The Turks retake Shabin Karahisar and suppress the local Armenian rebels.

June 30, 1916
Western Front, Verdun After a week of relentless attacks,the Germans continue to hold on to the Fleury salient.
Eastern Front The Russians take Tlumacz, but lose it to a German counterattack.
United States In a speech before the New York Press Club, Wilson pleads for peace with Mexico, further easing the tensions resulting from Carrizal.

June 30, 1917
Western Front The British make minor gains near Lens.
Italian Front Austrian troops surprise the Italians and force them back to the northeastern slopes of the Porta Maora, recapturing the last of the positions lost to the Italian Trentino offensive. Cadorna’s failed offensive, accompanied by disproportionate losses, demoralizes the Italian troops. The offensive has cost them 24,000 casualties. Austrian losses are only 9000.
Eastern Front Over 1000 guns open up on Austro-German lines.
German East Africa British and Portuguese troops drive the Germans from Nyasaland to the Rovuma border.
Diplomatic Relations Greece declares war on Germany and Austria-Hungary.

June 30, 1918
Western Front A German attack on the Lys is repulsed.
Italian Front Italian troops capture Monte di Val Bella and Col del Rosso.
Allied Diplomacy France and Italy recognize Czechoslovakia.

June 30, 1919
Russia Tsaritsyn falls to Wrangel’s White forces after over a week of bitter fighting.

June 30, 1930
Diplomatic Relations The last Allied occupation troops leave Germany.

[Mal Hombre]

This was not the last time Tsaritsyn was a battleground,in 1925 it was renamed Stalingrad....

[Ennath]

July 1909
Crete Foreign forces are withdrawn and the island becomes a part of Greece.

July 1912
Britain With the Liberals and their Irish Nationalist allies moving toward Home Rule, Ulstermen pledge to oppose this by every means, including armed insurrection.

July 1915
War at Sea U-Boats sink 109,640 tons of shipping. Three U-Boats are sunk. British shipping losses in the first year of the war have totaled only 3.5% of total tonnage. The British establish a Board of Invention and Research to consider new technologies for detecting submarines.
Java Dutch colonial customs officers search the Henry S, finding arms intended for Indian rebels.
Siam Under British pressure, the government arrests several hundred Indian and Burmese revolutionaries.

July 1916
War at Sea U-Boats sink 118,215 tons of shipping. Two U-Boats are sunk.
Central Powers Command Falkenhayn’s enemies are multiplying, quietly abetted by Hindenburg and Ludendorff. Bulgaria is calling for a single eastern command under Hindenburg, as are prominent Hungarian politicians disgusted with Conrad. Conrad himself has not helped matters by divorcing his wife and marrying a young divorcee and installing her at his headquarters, where she is allowed to maintain a social salon, becoming the subject of vicious Vienna gossip.
Germany The Germanenorden newsletter begins featuring a swastika on its cover.
Macedonia The Bulgarian Army receives reports that French and Serbian troops are “ethnically cleansing” ethnic Bulgarians in northern Greece.
Persia Wassmuss is still at large, but as his supply of plundered British gold diminishes, so does the enthusiasm of his Persian followers, more and more of whom melt away. He remains in the field for the rest of the war, vainly attempting to stir up trouble for the British.
Central Asia Russian labor conscription sparks Muslim risings in Tashkent and Samarkand. There are smaller revolts in Kazakhstan.The riots spread, destroying crops in the fields of Russian settlers and killing local officials. The Russian army’s punitive response to these risings becomes brutal, leading to the massacre of thousands of Kazakhs and Uzbeks.

July 1917
War at Sea U-Boats sink 557,988 tons of shipping. Six U-Boats are sunk. The convoys are proving successful now; most sinkings now are of independents. The first submarine cruisers, displacing over 1500 tons and possessing a long range, enter service with the U-Boat force.
France There are pleas from the big manufacturing cities for Senegalese and cavalry to put down the swelling strikes. The politicians, however, refuse to break with the “workers” and there is anyhow a scarcity of troops who can be relied upon to fire on strikers. So the government tries to make do with stopgap negotiating teams or just letting strikes run their course. Production naturally suffers. Pacifist newspapers and defeatist pamphlets are still published with little hindrance, often making their way to the front. The authors are often names listed on Carnet B.
Russia Thanks to inflation and strikes, production has fallen 50% since the beginning of the year. Small groups of Ukrainian soldiers begin forming all-Ukrainian units.
Italy The situation on the home front has deteriorated to such an extent that even the High Command must take notice. There are shortages of coal and bread and spiraling inflation, causing the meager savings of peasants and workers to evaporate. Protests and riots are increasingly common, often led by women. One, in Turin, requires troops to be deployed. Cadorna, as usual, calls for a crackdown.
Italian Front Both sides begin creating battalions of specially trained assault troops, the Austrian sturmtruppen and Italian arditi.
India The Mohmand blockade is lifted when the tribe submits.

July 1918
War at Sea U-Boats sink 260,967 tons of shipping. Four German U-Boats and an Austrian boat are sunk. Extension of the convoys and the increasing effectiveness of the escorts are making the British east coast as dangerous for the U-Boats as the Channel.
Russia After serious defections to Makhno, the Red Army begins turning on the anarchist Black Army.
Central Powers Diplomacy The Ottomans make a formal request to Germany for the return of western Thrace. It appears that the Turks are on the verge of stabbing their Bulgarian allies in the back.
Macedonia There are only 18,000 German troops still in theater to provide a stiffening for the Bulgarian Army. The German High Command is aware of the Bulgarian difficulties, but tends to blame the Bulgarians themselves.

[Ennath]

July 1, 1890
Diplomatic Relations An Anglo-German treaty transfers Heligoland Island in the North Sea to Germany in return for its protectorate over Zanzibar off East Africa.

July 1 – November 4, 1911
Diplomatic Relations The 2nd Morocco Crisis. With full-scale rebellion engulfing Morocco, the French move to establish a full protectorate. Germany demands compensation for French gains and sends the gunboat Panther to Agadir, ostensibly to protect German property (there is none there to protect). The French, with British backing, again stand firm, and Germany, instead of pieces of Morocco, settles for a slice of the Congo to be added to German Cameroon. It is regarded in Germany as another diplomatic defeat.

July 1, 1915
Eastern Front German troops occupy Zamosc, near the Upper Bug. Other Germans cross the Grila-Lipa near Rohatyn. The Russians evacuate a Vistula bridgehead at Tarlov. Austrian attacks at Krasnik fail.
Southwest Africa South African troops occupy Otavi.
Dardanelles The Turks counterattack at Gully Ravine.

July 1, 1916
Western Front, Somme After seven days of bombardment – the longest bombardment yet known – British and French troops issue forth from their trenches at 7:30 AM along a 25-mile front, beginning the long-awaited offensive to relieve the trauma of Verdun. Along this front, the German defenses vary – for example, in some sectors the Allied bombardment has had little effect, in others no attack has been anticipated – so the attacking troops encounter different levels of resistance. In the south near Maricourt, the British quickly overrun weak German defenses to take one initial objective, Dublin Trench, while suffering heavy casualties in capturing the linked objective of Dublin Redoubt and the second goal of Montauban beyond. A little further upriver, at Carnoy, they take the Pommern Trench and Redoubt after severe fighting and massive casualties. They also find heavy going still farther north near Mametz and Fricourt, where they are stopped cold. The attack by British and Newfoundland troops at Beaumont Hamel is preceded by a great mine explosion, but the attack there is cut to pieces. Foch’s XXI French Corps readily succeeds near Hardecourt as does French 6th Army at the southern end of the front near Herbecourt. Overall the southern attacks are moderately successful, but the northern attacks meet chaos and disaster. Here German machine gun and artillery fire destroys the advancing British troops as they move across No-Man’s Land. The British commanders have simply overestimated the effects of their artillery barrage and underestimated the strength of the German line. The first day of the Battle of the Somme has cost the British a staggering 57,470 casualties, including 19,000 dead – the worst day in the history of the British Army. The Newfoundland Regiment begins the day with 801 men; only 68 answer the roll call after the attack. German losses, though not detailed, have apparently also been heavy, French losses relatively light. Now, fully certain that the Somme is the focus of the Allies’ summer offensive, General Fritz von Below, commanding 2nd Army, withdraws his troops from Fricourt and begins a counterattack on Montauban shortly before midnight. During the night, Falkenhayn orders troops redeployed from the Verdun front to reinforce the Somme defenses. As the night progresses, the British move up their reserves. Rawlinson, believing losses to be about 30,000, orders the attack to resume the following day.
Western Front, Verdun French troops recapture the Thiaumont works. Nivelle orders the reorganization of the front lines under the command of Mangin.
Eastern Front The Austro-Germans attack northwest of Tarnopol.
Persia The Turks drive a Russian force back toward Kermanshah.

July 1, 1917
Western Front A heavy German attack on the Aisne is repulsed.
Eastern Front The Russians open the Brusilov-Kerensky offensive with 7th, 8th and 11th armies on a 50-mile front. The defense consists of Bothmer’s composite South Army (4 German, 3 Austrian, and 1 Turkish divisions). Three lines of Central Powers trenches and 12,000 prisoners are taken.
Italian Front There is heavy fighting in the Trentino.
Diplomatic Relations The British assure the Dutch that Britain will not strike at Germany through the Netherlands if the Dutch remain neutral.
China General Chang Huan places the boy emperor Pu Yi on the throne of a restored empire, with himself as regent. President Li and Tuan Chijui march on Peking.

July 1, 1918
Western Front French troops take St. Pierre Aigle; American troops take Vaux, west of Chateau-Thierry.
Italian Front The Italians gain some ground near Monte Grappa.
Portuguese East Africa Lettow-Vorbeck, always searching for supplies, captures Nhamacurra, just inland from the coast, and finds aboard a river steamer a British doctor who provides needed medical supplies. At the railroad station, his troops defeat an Anglo-Portuguese force, taking 540 prisoners. Guessing correctly that the British and Portuguese are racing south to prevent him from reaching the port of Quilimane, Lettow-Vorbeck decides to avoid them by turning northward.
Britain There is a serious explosion at a shell factory in the Midlands; 100 are killed.

July 1, 1921
China The Chinese Communist Party is founded.

July 1, 1922
Palestine A British White Paper partially retreats from the Balfour Declaration, stating that “national home” referred to cultural autonomy without political overtones.
Russia The authorities have managed to suppress the peasant revolts.

[Ennath]

July 2, 1900
Technology The first Zeppelin airship is flown. The flight lasts 18 minutes.

July 2, 1908
Diplomatic Relations The Russian and Austrian foreign ministers begin an exchange of letters proposing joint demands on Turkey. Russia wishes for the opening of the Turkish Straits and Austria-Hungary for the annexation of Bosnia.

July 2, 1913
Balkans The Serbs and Greeks counterattack. The Bulgarians are driven back, but the Allied pursuit, too, soon slows.

July 2, 1915
Western Front There is heavy fighting in the Argonne; the Germans take Four de Paris, but are repulsed near Blanleuil.
German Planning At a war council with his generals, Kaiser Wilhelm II decides the Eastern Front offensive will continue. 12th Army will push toward the Narew River, 9th Army toward the Vistula and Mackensen’s troops will swing northward and clear the territory between the Vistula and Bug Rivers. Ludendorff and Hindenburg prefer the idea of enveloping all of Grand Duke Nicholas’s forces, but Falkenhayn advocates the adopted plan and has persuaded the kaiser. Falkenhayn, however, has rejected an important part of the plan originated by Mackensen’s chief of staff, Hans von Seeckt, that would have had Austrian 2nd Army join the offensive by traversing the Pripet Marshes and outflanking the Russians’ southern flank to the east of the Bug. Falkenhayn mistakenly believes that the marshes are impassible. He has also chosen to attack at the Narew rather than make the attack north of the Niemen River favored by Hindenburg and Ludendorff.
Eastern Front Austrian troops occupy Krasnik. There are heavy engagements between the Austrians and Russians between the Vistula and the Bug.
Baltic Sea A British submarine sinks the cruiser Pommern in Danzig Bay. A German squadron of an armored cruiser, 2 light cruisers, a cruiser-minelayer, and 7 torpedo boats clashes off Gotland with 2 Russian armored cruisers and 2 protected cruisers. The Germans lose the cruiser-minelayer Albatross. The armored cruiser Roon is damaged. The Russians also suffer some light damage. The clash leaves both sides feeling they should have accomplished more.
Italian Front 3rd Army gains a foothold on the Carso, but is pushed off again the next day.
Britain Parliament passes the important Munitions of War Act, introduced for consideration on June 23, that organizes British industry for war. It mandates compulsory arbitration of labor disputes, bans strikes or lockouts, limits profits, authorizes the Minister of Munitions to declare any plant a “controlled operation” and to approve all wage changes, and places other restrictions on both employers and wage earners.
United States Erich Muenter, a German instructor at Cornell University, explodes a bomb in the US Senate reception room.

July 2, 1916
Western Front, Somme In the early morning hours, Below’s attack on Montauban fails. At 10:30 Haig visits Rawlinson’s headquarters. Now somewhat better informed and aware of the confusion prevalent in his troops’ deployments and problems with his engineering and supply efforts, the 4th Army commander persuades Haig that a renewed offensive must await his army’s reorganization. During the evening, the Germans, having no reserves to bring forward, withdraw from the Flaucourt Plateau. The British take Fricourt. The French take Curlu and Herbecourt.
Eastern Front Evert finally attacks. Russian attacks at Smorgon and Baranovichi make some penetrations in German lines. The Germans are attacking near Lutsk and regain Tlumacz.
Macedonia There are skirmishes and artillery actions along the lower Vardar.
Persia The Turks take Kermanshah. Russian troops are driven east on the road to Hamadan.

July 2, 1917
Western Front The British lose some ground near Lens.
Eastern Front The Russians advance in the Zborow region, east of Lemberg, Another 6300 prisoners are taken. The Czech Legion distinguishes itself in thee actions.
United States A major race riot hits East St. Louis, IL as a white mob drives 6000 blacks from their homes; 40 are killed.

July 2, 1918
Western Front The Germans gain some ground northwest of Albert. The French gain northwest of Soissons.
Italian Front The Italians attack in the Piave delta region.

July 2, 1919
Syria The Syrian National Congress meets in Damascus, intending to create a Hashemite kingdom. Unrest erupts when Emir Faisal accepts a compromise with the French and the Zionists. Anti-Hashemite riots occur.

July 2, 1921
United States Harding signs a resolution terminating the war with Germany and Austria-Hungary.

[knobby109]

July 1 1916 as mentioned above was the opening of the Somme offensive.Losses were very heavy but as regiments were created on a regional basis the effect on some towns was devastating.It's said that 20 years after this day the local newspapers contained pages of "In Memoriam" notices from families and friends.Interestingly there were 5 such notices in last Saturday's Telegraph.