The year is 1914. A perfect year. Europe is at peace, and everyone is happy. LET’S HAVE A WAR. Almost everyone knew a big war was coming, because everyone wanted something. France wanted some land from Germany. Germany wanted more of everyone’s land. Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire thought that pushing around smaller countries was cool, but the small countries (like Serbia, Albania, Romania etc.) didn’t think it was so cool, and with some help from their good friend Russia, they declared independence.
So, Europe was a mess. But here is the main thing that started this: In Sarajevo (which is in Austria-Hungary) lived some Serbs and Bosnians who hated Austria-Hungary, so Franz Ferdinand and his wife went for a nice ride in an open-top car, with their route published in advance, which went about as well as you’d expect. He was assassinated.
Austria-Hungary was super-freaked, and they thought that the Serbians had something to do with it. So, they declare war on Serbia. YAY. Ok, so who is helping who? Austria-Hungary and Germany are allies, Serbia and Russia are allies, and Russia is also allies with France. So, this means that Austria-Hungary and Germany are really declaring war on Russia, Serbia, France and even Montenegro, which is an incredibly small country next to Serbia (it’s about as big as London).
Britain and France are “sort of” allies. So here is Germany’s plan in a nutshell: They know that Russia is super slow, so it will take a while for them to get ready. So, while that’s happening, Germany wants to invade France, and then, when Russia is ready, invade Russia and win the war. Simple, right. Except, part 1 of the plan is not going to be easy. So, let’s begin.
Germany doesn’t want to attack France at the border, because France has a lot of forts and defences. So, they try to go around them, through Belgium. That’s a bit of an underhanded move, because Belgium is neutral. It’s also a bad idea, because when Britain saw this, they went: “What the flip are the Germans doing?!” so they send in some troops to help Belgium and declare war on Germany. Ding dong, it’s Russia and they’re ready for war. So, Germany’s like: “Hey Austria-Hungary, can you deal with that?’’ And Austria-Hungary is like: “Yeah, sure…” and then they get wrecked, so Germany needs to send some troops back to Austria-Hungary, and this makes the westerners’ job easier, but they enter a stalemate.
The entire war has entered a stalemate, except for Russia, who was getting kicked by Germany. So, this war was really going to be about who gave up first or who ran out of supplies. Great news, Italy also just declared war on Germany, but they were also stuck in stalemate.
Papp Mátyás V. B
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