People in the News

Alfred von Schlieffen

Schlieffen was a Chif of General Staff in the war. He feared that France and Russia would join together to fight Germany. He wanted to come up with a plan that could fight Russia in the east and France in the west if they teamed up against Germany. This eventually became known as the Schlieffen Plan. This plan was supposed to be a quick fight against Russia and France but instead it resulted in a stalemate and lasted for a couple of years.

Arthur Zimmermann

Arthur Zimmerman was responsible for the Zimmermann Telegram which resulted in the United States joining the war. Zimmermann was Germany's Foreign Secretary in November 1916. He sent the telegram to the German Embassy in Mexico on January 19, 1917. This telegram said that Germany would help Mexico reconquer the land that it had lost to the United States if Mexico would ally itself with Germany. When the British intercepted the telegram they decoded it and sent it to the United States. This cause the Americans to get involved in the war and fight against Germany.

Gavrilo Princip

Gavrilo Princip, 19 years old, was the man that assassinated the Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife when they visited Sarajevo, Bosnia. Princip was part of the Black Hand which was a secret society that wanted to rid Bosnia of Austrian rule. After he killed the archduke he was instructed to commit suicide. He was given a phial of cyanide, a revolver, and grenades.

Paul Nash

Paul Nash's painting the Void shows the extreme violence of the destruction in the wooded areas and the towns. This painting is a good decription of the landscapes off the war because it shows abandoned guns, flooded trenches, dead soldiers, smoke, and planes in the distance dropping bombs or being shot down.

John Nash

John Nash's painting Oppy Wood represents the different results of the war. It shows the destruction of nature, the detroyed plains, trenches and shelters that were dug into the grounds. He showed the plains being destroyed by shell-holes. This painting reflects how the looks of Europe had changed throughout the war.

Georges Grosz

George Grosz was another artist who was involved in World War I. He did not necessarily fight in the war and saw some of the gruesome scense but he still saw some bad things. After he was done serving in the war he painted this picture called the Explosion. This painting shows the destruction of towns during this time. It represents the bombardment of the war and how people could not escape from the destructivness that had taken over Europe.

Otto Dix

Otto Dix fought in World War I and while he was in the war he painted many paintings. The painting that is displayed below is called Self-portrait as Mars. In this picuture Dix displays death, he shows horses fleeing and going crazy, buildings and cities bursting in flames and crumbling, and he also displays himself as the God of War. He is the God of War because he survives through all of the fighting and craziness going on throughout the war. In the picture he shows he is God of War by using different ideas from cubism. Cubism is a non-objective way of painting that was developed by Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque. This style of painting emphasizes the process of construction and converting the represented forms into different geometric shapes.

Chapter 13

This blog is about Chapter 13 out of my Histroy book. This chapter talks about what caused World War I and the things that happened throughout World War I between the different powers. This chapter includes the assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the Armenian Massacre, what caused the United States to join in on the war and what it took to end the war. This chapter talks about the major people and countries involved in the war. My hope for this blog is to help myself learn about what went on during World War I, but also to help other people who may see my blog to better understand what happened during World War I.