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The Ottoman Empire, which had closed access to the straits, isolating Russia, went to war on the side of the central empires (German and Austro-Hungarian). -
Austria-Hungary declares war on Serbia
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A Serbian nationalist student, Gavrilo Princip, assassinates Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Habsburg, heir to the throne of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, in Sarajevo (Bosnia-Herzegovina). -
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Germany declares war on Russia. France and Germany decree general mobilisation. -
Russo-German hostilities began on 1 August 1914. A day later, Germany demanded neutrality from France, only to be met with a harsh response from Paris, which in turn ordered a general mobilisation. As the General Staffs relied for the success of the operations on the speed of the initial attack, the Germans decided to begin, without further ado, the invasion of France, not only across the common border, but using Belgium to provoke an enveloping movement. -
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"Border battle" in the north (Franco-Belgian border) and east (Franco-German border). French troops retreat 200 kilometres.
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Battle of Tannenberg. German General Hindenburg halts the advance of Russian forces on the East Prussian front.
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On the Western Front, the French and British on the one hand, and the Germans on the other, attempt manoeuvres to encircle their enemies. The fighting approaches the North Sea, where it reaches on 17 November. The front, which stretches to the Swiss border, will not change much until the spring of 1918. The war is buried in the trenches, unlike on the Eastern Front, where the war of movement continues throughout the conflict.
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First Battle of the Marne (east of Paris). A Franco-British counteroffensive halts the German advance, less than 40 kilometres from Paris, and pushes the Germans back to the north. Nearly a million French and British troops clash with 800,000 Germans.
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250,000 members (out of 400,000) of the Assyrian-Chaldean community established west of the Euphrates River and in southern Turkey are massacred.
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Allied defeat at the Battle of the Dardanelles, attempting to open the Straits, attacking the centre of the Ottoman Empire. On 25 April, British, New Zealand, Australian and French troops attempt to land on the Gallipoli peninsula, but are blocked by Turkish troops, leaving 180,000 Allied and 66,000 Turkish dead. The last Allied troops are evacuated on 9 January 1916. The southern front is blocked until the autumn of 1917.
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Germans launch the first poison gas attack on French and Canadian soldiers on the Western Front between Langemarck and Ypres (Belgium). -
Massacres of Armenians begin in Turkey. Turkey rejects the term 'genocide', although it acknowledges that there were massacres and that between 250,000 and 500,000 Armenians died in Anatolia between 1915 and 1917 during the Ottoman Empire. Armenians say there were 1.5 million killed. -
The British ship "Lusitania" is wrecked off the coast of Iceland, torpedoed by a German U-boat, leaving 1,198 missing.
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The British ship "Lusitania" is wrecked off the coast of Iceland, torpedoed by a German U-boat, leaving 1,198 missing. -
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The Ottoman Empire, which had closed off access to the straits, isolating Russia, went to war on the side of the Central Empires (German and Austro-Hungarian). -
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Start of the Battle of Verdun (until 18 December): 500,000 dead, French and Germans. -
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The Battle of the Somme (northern France), the deadliest (1.2 million dead) of the conflict, begins and lasts until 18 November. -
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Germany launches all-out submarine warfare, which precipitates the severance of diplomatic relations with Germany by the United States. -
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Failure of the French offensive on the Chemin des Dames on the Champagne front (north-east of Paris) leaves tens of thousands dead. French soldiers mutiny. There are also demonstrations of discontent in the armies of other countries throughout the year.
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British Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour promises Zionist leaders a 'Jewish National Home' in Palestine. -
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US President Wilson's 14-point declaration on the right of peoples to determine their own destiny, which would serve as a framework for the treaties signed after the war. The US military intervention, which took place in the spring of the year, would be decisive. -
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At 11 o'clock on the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918, the Great War ended. It was won by the Allies - France, Great Britain, the United States, Belgium, Italy, Portugal... - against the central empires - Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, the Turkish Empire
