IB Note Comparison of Major 20th Century Wars
Famous Pictures from All Five
World War One "The Great War"
- World War One 1914-1918 (Total War)
- Parties & Causes
- Germany & Austro-Hungary vs. GB, France, Russia, US, Italy
- Arms Race
- Alliance Systems
- Colonialism and Nationalism
- Territorial gains
- Bismarck
- German imperial ambitions – “Weltpolitik”
- Assassination of Duke Ferdinand
- Austria attacks Serbia
- Russia attacks Austria
- Germany attacks Russia
- France & GB attack Germany
- 1917 US involvement
- Warfare/Strategies
- Schlieffen Plan, attack France from above.
- Naval expansion of Germany under admiral “Tirpitz”
- First air warfare
- Railroad & Lorries
- Trench warfare
- Static war
- Machine guns
- First Tanks
- British naval blockade
- War of attrition
- “Passchendaele”, “Somme”, “Verdun”
- Results
- Economic chaos
- More than 20 million dead
- Great depression
- Destroyed Germany
- League of Nations
- Wilson’s 14 points
- Versailles Settlement
- Weimar Republic
- Small European nations
Communist Russia
World War Two
- World War Two 1939-1945 (Total War)
- Parties/Causes
- Alliance system
- Imperialism
- Nazism & Hitler
- Appeasement
- German Ambitions
- Japanese expansion
- Versailles
- Weak League of Nations
- Hitler attacks Poland
- Japan attacks Pearl harbour
- Warfare/Strategies
- Blitzkrieg
- Bombings
- Tanks
- Submarines
- Kamikaze
- Atomic bombs
- “Final Solution” – Holocaust
- Island Skipping/hopping
- “D-day”, “Battle of the Bulge”, “El Alamein”, “Wake Island”, “Guadalcanal”, “Battle of Britain”, “Stalingrad”
- Results
- More than 50 million dead, many civilian casualties
- Marshall plan
- No US isolationism
- Division of Germany
- Cold war
- NATO
- Iron Curtain
- United Nations
The Korean War
- Korean War 1950-1953 (Total War with Limited Results)
- Parties/Causes
- USSR, North Korea, China vs. US/UN/South Korea
- Containment of Communism
- UN intervention
- Withdrawal of US/USSR troops in 1949
- Split along 38th parallel
- Cold War tensions
- 1950 North invade South
- Chinese & US & UN involvement
- Warfare/Strategies
- North vs. South movement
- UN/US navy landings
- Kim Il Sung vs. MacArthur/Eisenhower
- Napalm/Scorched earth
- N. Korea reach Pusan, pushed back to China
- China gets involved
- Armistice, Spilt at 38th Parallel again
- No peace treaty until today!
- Results
- More than 4 million dead
- Split
- Communist North
- Democratic South
1953 Armistice
The Vietnam War
- Vietnam War 1964-1975 (Total War, Limited Results)
- Parties/Causes
- Vietminh, Vietcong, Ho Chi Minh vs. USA/France
- US containment of communism
- South/North split of Vietnam
- Colonial History
- Domino Theory
- Bay of Tolkien Attack & Resolution
- Warfare/Strategies
- “Search & Destroy”
- Guerilla Warfare
- Carpet bombing
- Napalm
- Chemical Warfare – Agent Orange
- Flamethrowers for Deforestation
- Helicopters
- Vietnamisation
- “Tet offensive”
- “Operation Rolling Thunder”
- Heavy Losses
- Loss of US domestic support
- Results
- More than 5 million dead
- Loss of political trust in US
- Geneva Agreement Split
- Failed Containment
War again – unification of Communist Vietnam
The Russian Civil War
- Russian Civil War 1917 (Limited, Civil War)
- Parties/Causes
- Imperialists vs. Socialist (Bolsheviks)
- World War 1
- Economic Chaos
- Leninism
- November revolution
- Provisional government failure
- Tsar abdication
- Conditions in Russia
- Lenin’s seizure of power
- Warfare/Strategies
- Red Guard take Petrograd
- Supported by peasants
- Urban warfare
- Bolshevism
- Lenin & Trotsky
- Hunger Strikes
- Desertions during WW1
- General Kornilov
- Results
- USSR
- End of WW1 for Russia at Brest-Litovsk
- Lenin/Trotsky/Stalin
- Loss of Russian territories
Communism
