The Crisis of the imperial Order, 1900-1929
*Origins of the Crisis in Europe and the Middle East
*The “Great War” and the Russian Revolutions, 1914-18
Peace and Dislocation in Europe, 1919-1929
China and Japan: Contrasting Destinies
*The New Middle East
Society, Culture, and Technology in the Industrialized World
Learning Objectives:
After reading and studying this chapter your should be able to discuss:
1. Be able to trace the course of World War I and discuss some of its most important consequences in Europe, the United States, and the Middle East.
2. Be able to describe the outbreak and early years of the Russian Revolution, as well as the development of the Soviet Union under Lenin.
3. Be able to compare and contrast the histories of China and Japan before and after World War I.
4. Be able to discuss the impact of late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century scientific, cultural, and technological innovations on society and the environment.
Focus and Essential Questions:
What led to the outbreak of the First World War?
How did the war lead to revolution in Russia?
What role did the war play in eroding European dominance in the world?
Why did China and Japan follow such divergent paths in this period?
How did the Middle East change as a result of the war?
How did European and North American society and technology change in the aftermath of the war?
Origins of the Crisis in Europe and the Middle East
Nationalism and the System of Alliances
The system of nation-states that emerged in Europe led
not to cooperation but to competition
At the same time, Europe’s great powers had been divided into two loose
alliances. Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Italy formed the *Triple Alliance
France, Great Britain, and Russia created the *Triple
Entente
A massive crisis emerged in the
Balkans between 1908 and 1913
Each state was guided by its own self-interest and
success
Militarism
The growth of mass armies after 1900 heightened the
existing tensions in Europe
*Conscription had been established as a regular
practice in most Western countries before 1914
European armies doubled in size between 1890 and 1914;
Militarism—aggressive preparation for war—was
growing
The rivalry between Austria-Hungary and Russia for domination
of these new states created serious tensions
in the region
*Serbia, supported by Russia, wished to create an independent Slavic
state in the Balkans
The Serbian Problem
The Outbreak of War: Summer 1914
Assassination in Sarajevo
*Archduke Francis Ferdinand, heir to the
throne of Austria-hungary, was assassinated
by the Black Hand, a Serbian terrorist
organization that wanted a free *Bosnia
*Gavrilo Princip shot the archduke and his wife
Austria-Hungary Responds
The Austro-Hungarian government did not know whether or not the Serbian
government had been directly involved in the archduke’s
assassination
*Emperor William II of Germany gave unlimited
support to Austria-Hungary
Austrian leaders sent an ultimatum to Serbia—but was a series of extreme demands
leading to war
Russia Mobilizes
*Czar Nicholas II ordered partial mobilization of
the Russian army against Austria-Hungary
Unable to partially mobilize, the czar
ordered a full mobilization of the
Russian army, knowing that Germany would
consider this order an act of war
The Conflict BroadensGermany declared war on
Russia
*General Alfred von Schlieffen created the German military plan of action known as the
*Schlieffen Plan
Germany would hold Russia back while conducting a rapid invasion of France—therefore,
declaring war on France
In retaliation, Great Britain declared war on Germany
The “Great War” and the Russian Revolutions, 1914-18
1914 to 1915: Illusions and
Stalemate
Government *propaganda
worked in stirring up national hatreds
before the war
Almost everyone believed that the
war would be over in a few weeks
The Western Front
The Schlieffen Plan had called for the German army
to make a vast encircling movement through
Belgium into northern France
The war quickly turned into a stalemate, as neither
the Germans nor the French could dislodge each
other from the trenches they had dug for shelter
The Eastern Front
Eastern Front was marked by mobility
The Russian army moved into eastern Germany but was defeated at the *Battle
of Tannenberg and the *Battle of Masurian Lakes
The Austrians had been defeated by the Russians in Galicia and thrown out of
Serbia as well
The Italians betrayed their German and Austrian
allies in the Triple Alliance by attacking Austria in
May 1915. Italy thus joined France, Great Britain, and Russia, who had formed the Triple Entente now
called the *Allied Powers
German-Austrian army defeated the Russian army in Galicia and pushed the
Russians far back into their own territory
1916 to 1917: The Great Slaughter
By 1916, the Trenches became an elaborate
system of defense: 5 feet high and 30 yards wide, concrete machine-gun
nest with heavy artillery
Troops lived in holes in the ground
Tactics of Trench Warfare
Breakthrough—throwing masses of men against enemy
lines that had first been battered by artillery
Millions of young men died in failed attempts at
breakthrough
World War I had turned into a *war of attrition, a war
based on wearing the other side down by constant
attacks and heavy losses
War in the AirBy the end of 1915, airplanes
had appeared on the battlefront for the first time
Fights for control of the air occurred and increased over
time
Hand pistols to machine guns
Germans used their giant airships—the zeppelins—to bomb London and eastern
England—though hydrogen gas became raging infernos
Widening of the War
Both sides sought to gain new allies who might provide a
winning advantage—the Ottoman Empire had joined Germany;
Bulgaria entered the war on the side of the Central Powers
In the Middle East, a British officer known as *Lawrence of Arabia urged Arab princes to revolt against their Ottoman
overlords
The British mobilized forces from India, Australia, and New
Zealand
Entry of the United States
At first, the United States tried to remain neutral
The British ship Lusitania was sunk by German forces
through unrestricted submarine warfare
*Admiral Holtzendorff wanted to continue the
attack method which drew the US into the war
The Home Front: The Impact of Total War
As World War I dragged on, it became a *total war,
involving a complete mobilization of resources
and people
Led to an increase in government powers and
the manipulation of public opinion to keep the war
effort going
Increased Government Powers
Wartime governments also
expanded their power over their
economies—*planned
economies directed by government
agencies
Manipulation of Public Opinion
Authoritarian regimes, such as those of Germany, Russia, and Austria-Hungary, relied
on force to subdue their populations
The British Parliament passed the Defense of the
Realm Act (DORA)—arrested protestors as traitors
General propaganda
Total War and WomenWorld War I created new roles for women
Women were asked to take over jobs that had not been available to them before—truck drivers,
farm laborers, and factory workers
Both men and women seemed to expect that many of the new
jobs for women were only temporary
The return to the old order and the right to vote
Background to Revolution
Russia was unprepared both military and technologically for
the total war of World War I
Lacking guns, soldiers using broomsticks to train and sent to
the front without rifles
The Russian army suffered incredible losses—two million
soldiers were killed, and another four to six million
wounded or six million wounded or captured
Beginnings of Upheaval
Czar Nicholas II was an autocratic ruler whose wife,
Alexandra was German born
*Grigori Rasputin, an uneducated Siberian peasant
who claimed to be a holy man—his influence made him an important power behind the
throne
Assassinated in 1916, poisoned, shot, beat, and
drowned
The March Revolution
A series of strikes led by working-class women broke out in the capital
city of *Petrograd
The government had started bread rationing after the price of bread
had skyrocketed—Strikes shut down
factories demanding “Peace and Bread”
The czar tried to dissolve the Duma, or legislative body. A provisional government was established which urged the
czar to step down, eventually doing so
*Alexander Kerensky, now head of provisional
government, continued the war
*The Soviets challenged this government and its policies—the *Bolsheviks came to power
The Rise of Lenin
The *Bolsheviks began as a small faction of Marxist party called the Russian Social Democrats led by
*V. I. Lenin
He believed that only a violent revolution could
destroy the capitalist system
German military leaders, hoping to create
disorder in Russia, shipped Lenin to Russia
—ushering in a new stage of the Revolution
They promised an end to the war the
redistribution of all land, etc.
“Peace, Land, Bread”
The Bolsheviks Seize Power
Lenin and Leon Trotsky took over the government
The Bolsheviks renamed themselves the Communists
and signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk—they gave up
eastern Poland, Ukraine, Finland, and the Baltic
Real peace did not come, however, because the country
soon sank into civil war
Civil War in Russia
Many people were opposed to the new
Communist regime—Liberals and anti-Leninist socialists
The Allies sent thousands of troops to various parts of Russia in the hope of bringing
Russia back into the war
The Red Army was forced to fight on
many fronts against these opponents
Members of the local soviet murdered the czar and his family and burned their
bodies in a nearby mine shaft
Triumph of the Communists
A policy of *war communism was used to ensure regular supplies for the Red Army
A new Red secret police (Cheka) began a Red Terror aimed at the
destruction of all those who opposed the new regime
Communism transformed Russia into a centralized state
and was largely hostile toward the Allied powers
The New Middle East
Decline and Fall of the Ottoman Empire
The empire of the Ottoman Turks had been growing
steadily weaker
“the sick man of Europe”
France seized Algeria and Tunisia and Great Britain took control of Egypt; Greece also declared its independence in
the 19th century
reformers seized control of the empire’s
government and adopted a constitution
*Abdulhamid II, suspended the new
constitution and ruled by authoritarian means
He feared of assassination and had pets taste all his food
Impact of World War I
World War I was the final blow
The British sought to undermine Ottoman rule in
the Arabian Peninsula by supporting Arab nationalist
T. E. Lawrence—”Lawrence of Arabia”, governor of Makkah declared Arabia independent
from Ottoman rule
British troops seized Palestine
Massacre of the Armenians
During the war, the Ottoman Turks had
alienated the Allies with their policies toward
minority subjects
The Christian Armenian minority had been pressing the Ottoman government
for its independence
Violent reaction killing Armenian men and
expelling women and children
1.5 million Armenians had been killed and
500,000 deported
*genocide or *ethnic cleansing—the deliberate mass
murder of a particular racial,
political, or cultural group
Emergence of the Turkish Republic
Ottoman Empire collapsed
Great Britain and France divided up the Ottoman
territories in the Middle East
Turkey remained under Ottoman control; Greece
invaded Turkey
*Colonel Mustafa Kemal—led the creation of a new
Republic of Turkey created in 1923
The Modernization of Turkey
President Kemal, known as *Atatürk (“Father Turk”) created the
modern state of Turkey
Turkish language with Roman Alphabet,
European style names, Factories, Secular state
“Religion is like a heavy blanket that keeps the
people of Turkey asleep”
Men were forbidden to wear the fez, the
brimless cap worn by Turkish Muslims
Women were forbidden to wear the veil (also
given the right to vote in 1934)
The Turkish Republic was the product of
Atatürk’s efforts
The Beginnings of Modern Iran
A similar process of modernization was underway in Persia
The discovery of oil in the southern part of the
country in 1908
In 1921, Reza Khan led a military mutiny that seized
control of *Tehran, the capital city
*Reza Shah Pahlavi tried to follow the example of
Kemal Atatürk in Turkey; Persia became
the modern state of *Iran in 1935
He created a Western-style education system
Reza Shah Pahlavi drew closer to Nazi Germany
Arab Nationalism
Iraq, Palestine, and Jordan were assigned to Great
Britain; Syria and Lebanon to France
For the most part, Europeans created these Middle Eastern states; Europeans determined
the nations’ borders and divided the peoples.
*Ibn Saud united Arabs in the northern part of the Arabian
Peninsula—*Saudi Arabia
The Problem of Palestine
In Palestine, the nationalism of Jews and Arabs came into conflict because both groups
viewed the area as a potential national state
Zionist movement and the Jewish state
*Balfour Declaration—Britain expressed support for a
national home for the Jews in Palestine