California State Standards: Students Analyze the Causes and Course of the First World War

SGQ World War I

Chapter 13 – Garratt

California State Standards: Students analyze the causes and course of the First World War.

1. Analyze the arguments for entering into war presented by leaders from all sides of the Great War and the role of political and economic rivalries, ethnic and ideological conflicts, domestic discontent and disorder, and propaganda and nationalism in mobilizing the civilian population in support of “total war.”
2. Examine the principal theaters of battle, major turning points, and the importance of geographic factors in military decisions and outcomes (e.g., topography, waterways, distance, climate).
3. Explain how the Russian Revolution and the entry of the United States affected the course and outcome of the war.
4. Understand the nature of the war and its human costs (military and civilian) on all sides of the conflict, including how colonial peoples contributed to the war effort.
5. Discuss human rights violations and genocide, including the Ottoman government’s actions against Armenian citizens.

10.6 Students analyze the effects of the First World War.

1. Analyze the aims and negotiating roles of world leaders, the terms and influence of the Treaty of Versailles and Woodrow Wilson’s Fourteen Points, and the causes and effects of the United States’s rejection of the League of Nations on world politics.
2. Describe the effects of the war and resulting peace treaties on population movement, the international economy, and shifts in the geographic and political borders of Europe and the Middle East.

Section 1: Marching Toward War pp. 407-410

1. What are some of the positive and negative attributes of nationalism?
2. What factors increased competition among European nations?
3. Why was the gradual demise of the Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian empires destabilizing?
4. How did imperialism contribute to the move toward war?
5. How did militarism manifest itself?
6. What was the purpose of the two great alliances?
7. Why did the German Chancellor Bismarck want to isolate France? How did he do so?
8. How did Kaiser Wilhelm II contribute to rising tensions in Europe?
9. Which nations comprised theTriple Alliance? the Triple Entente?
10. Why were the Balkans called the “powder keg” of Europe?
11. What were Serbian ambitions?
12. Why did Serbia pose a threat to the Austro-Hungarians?
13. Why did the terrorist group, the Black Hand, instruct Gavrilo Princip to assassinate Franz Ferdinand?
14. Why do you think that Austria issued an ultimatum that was difficult to accept without losing face?
15. Based on what you know was it surprising that Russia reacted by mobilizing its military?
16. Which of the long term forces in Europe played the greatest role in helping to prompt the outbreak of war

• Be able to distinguish between the four long-term causes of WWI and the immediate cause, the assassination.

Section 2: Europe Plunges into War: pp. 411-415

1. Be able to explain the chain reaction that occurred after the Serbian declaration of war.
2. During the war which nations comprised the Central Powers? The Allies?
3. Why did Italy refuse to honor its treaty obligations to Germany and Austria?
4. Explain why the Schlieffen Plan was so important militarily to Germany? Why did it ultimately collapse?
5. Why was the First Battle of the Marne considered by some to be the most important event of the war?
6. How did trench warfare and modern new weapons result in a stalemate?
7. What were the lessons from the Battles of Verdun and the Somme? Why would it be fair to say that no one won those battles
8. In addition to the airplane what were the other new weapons of this war?
9. Which country had the longest border with belligerents?
10. How was the Eastern Front different from the Western?
11. What was the military significance of the Battle of Tannenberg?
12. What were Russia’s military weaknesses? Strength(s)