First World War : Armed conflict between 1914 and 1918, and that produced more than 10 million casualties. More than 60 million European soldiers were mobilized from 1914 to 1918.
Originated in Europe by rivalry between the imperialist powers, it became the first to cover more than half of the planet. It was at the time the bloodiest conflict in history. Before World War II, this war used to be called the great war or the war of wars.
How did world war 1 start?
The war started as a confrontation between Austria – Hungary and Serbia. The Russian Empire joined the conflict, considering itself protective of the Slavic countries and wishing to undermine the position of Austria-Hungary in the Balkans.
After the Austro – Hungarian declaration of war on Russia 1 of August of 1914 , the conflict was transformed into a military confrontation at European level.
Germany responded to Russia with war, bound by a secret pact with the Habsburg monarchy, and France mobilized to support its ally.
The hostilities involved 32 countries, 28 of them called “Allies”: France, Great Britain, Russia, Serbia, Belgium, Canada, Portugal, Japan, the United States (since 1917 ), as well as Italy, which had abandoned the triple alliance.
This group faced the coalition of the “Central Powers”, made up of the Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire.
What was the reason for World War 1?
Armed peace
At the end of the 19th century, England dominated the technological, financial, economic and above all political world. Germany and the United States disputed its industrial and commercial dominance.
During the second half of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, the division of Africa (with the exception of Liberia and Ethiopia ) and South Asia took place, as well as the gradual increase in the European presence in China.
England and France , the two main colonial powers, clashed in 1898 and 1899 in the so-called Faschoda incident in Sudan, but the rapid rise of the German empire brought the two countries together through the entente cordiale.
Germany, which only had colonies in Cameroon, Namibia, East Africa, some islands in the Pacific ( Solomon Islands ) and commercial enclaves in China, began to claim more as its military and economic power increased after its unification in 1871.
A misguided diplomacy was isolating the Reich, which could only count on the unconditional alliance of Austria- Hungary.
For its part, the United States and, to a lesser extent, the Russian empire controlled vast territories, linked by long rail lines (Atlantic-Pacific and Trans-Siberian railways, respectively).
France wanted revenge for the defeat suffered against Prussia in the Franco-Prussian War from 1870 – 1871. While Paris was under siege, the German princes had proclaimed the empire (the so-called second Reich) in the ” Palace of Versailles “, which meant an offense for the French.
The French Third Republic lost Alsace and Lorraine, which became part of the new Germanic Reich. The French generations of the late 19th century, especially the army, grew up with the idea of avenging the affront by recovering those territories.
In 1914 there were only 1% deserters in the French Army, compared to 30% in 1870.
Meanwhile, the Balkan countries liberated from the Ottoman Empire (the “sick man of Europe”) were the subject of rivalry between the great powers.
Turkey, slowly sinking, had no Europe – by 1914 more than Istanbul, the former Constantinople.
All the young countries born from its decomposition ( Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia, Montenegro, and Albania) sought to expand at the expense of their neighbors, leading to two conflicts between 1910 and 1913 , known as the Balkan Wars.
Driven by this situation, the two enemies of the Ottoman Empire continued their traditional policy of advancing towards Istanbul and the Straits.
The Austro-Hungarian Empire wished to continue its expansion in the “Danube” valley to the “Black” sea, subduing the Slavic peoples.
The Russian empire, which was historically and culturally linked to the Slavs of the Balkans, of Orthodox confession – it had already supported them in the past – counted on them as natural allies in its policy of accessing “hot water ports”.
As a result of these tensions, vast alliance systems were created beginning in 1882 :
The Triple Entente: France, Great Britain and Russia .
The Triple Alliance: Germany , Austria-Hungary and Italy .
This period is known as “Armed Peace”, since Europe was allocating large amounts of resources in armaments and, nevertheless, there was no war, although it was known that it was imminent.
What was the main cause of World War 1?
The triggering event of the conflict was the murder ofArchduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife, Sophie Chotek, in Sarajevo on June 28, 1914 at the hands of the young Serbian nationalist student Gavrilo Princip, a member of the Serbian group “Joven Bosnia”, linked to the Nationalist group “Black Hand”, which supported the unification of Bosnia with Serbia.
Francisco Fernando was the heir to the Austro-Hungarian crown after the death of his cousin, Rodolfo de Habsburgo (in 1889 ) and his father Carlos Luis de Austria (in 1896 ).
His murder precipitated Austria’s declaration of war against Serbia that triggered the First World War.
Who started World War 1?
The Austro-Hungarian Empire demanded, with the support of the German Empire, to investigate crime in Serbian territory, since it considered that the Pan-Slavonic organization “Black Hand” had a connection with the secret services of that country.
The Austro-Hungarian empire issued an ultimatum on July 7 to Serbia, which with Russian support did not accept all the conditions imposed, in particular the participation of Austrian police in investigations on Serbian territory.
Faced with this refusal, on 28 July 1914 , Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia. Then on July 29 Russia ordered the general mobilization.
Based on military alliances, on August 1 , Germany declared war on Russia, considering the mobilization as an act of war against Austria-Hungary.
Given this, and by virtue of the Franco-Russian military alliance of 1894, France declared war on Germany the same day.
Historians also maintain that there were other causes, such as alliances between countries (Triple Entente and Triple Alliance), that a local conflict could take on international dimensions.
In addition, between 1890 and 1914 the countries progressively increased the military budget in an arms race, this period is known as “armed peace”.
What are the main movements of World War 1?
In 1914, Europeans thought the war would be short. But the generals, who had studied the Napoleonic wars, were wrong in their initial approach to fighting, based on the massive use of infantry.
Responding to the enormous effectiveness of the weapons (rifles, automatic weapons and heavy artillery), the fortifications were reinforced.
Cavalry would be useless as a means of breaking the front. At the beginning of the war the two sides tried to obtain a quick victory by means of fulminating offensives.
The French grouped their troops on the border with Germany , between Nancy and Belfort, divided into five armies.
The French simultaneously launched Plan XVII, but it was a failure due to automatic weapons that stopped any assault and a premature withdrawal of the troops towards their lines.
Weeks later they were already located in the “Marne” river, where they collided with the British corps and the French army, who stopped the German advance.
The Germanic defeat frustrated the original plan and ended expectations of a brief conflagration, marking the final abandonment of the pre-war plans.
At that moment the “race to the sea” began: the two armies marched towards the north sea; Attacks and counter-attacks followed. The contest would take place on French and Belgian territory.
British troops soon intervened in greater numbers, along with the remains of the Belgian army.
Meanwhile, Austria-Hungary failed in its attempt to take Belgrade, which it would later accomplish with German help, in August 1915 .
Russia invaded East Prussia, but the Prussian staff generals Hindenburg and Ludendorff will beat them hard at Tannenberg.
In the course of 1915, two new countries entered the war: Italy on the side of the Allies and Bulgaria on the side of the Central Powers, which with this support defeat and occupy Serbia.
Since the beginning of the war, the Vatican and Switzerland have unsuccessfully attempted probes for peace.
What was the western front like in World War 1?
In August 1914 , the German army opened the western front on August 4, invading Belgium and Luxembourg, with an attack on the city of Liege and then gaining military control of major industrial regions of western France, defeating the French army at the Battle of Lorraine, the Battle of Charleroi ( August 21) and at the Battle of Maubeuge a week later.
The force of the advance was drastically contained with the first battle of the Marne in September 1914, where they confronted the British body made up of 5 experienced divisions and the French reserve troops.
Paris taxis helped move the English troops to the front. The balance of forces and the new weapons facilitated the defense against the attack and imposed the stabilization of the front.
Both contenders barricaded themselves in a sinuous line of fortified positions stretching from the North Sea to the Swiss border with France .
This line remained unchanged for most of the war. An assault presented such a disadvantage against the adversary that the allied attacks were unsuccessful and Germany was able to resist despite fighting on two fronts.
These attacks resorted to massive artillery bombardments and the massive advance of the infantry.
However, the combination of trenches, machine gun nests, barbed wire, and artillery inflicted heavy casualties on attackers and defenders in counterattack.
As a result, no significant progress was made. The sanitary and human conditions for the soldiers were very harsh and the casualties extremely high.
In the autumn of 1915 General Joseph Joffre attempted an offensive, with English support, which ended in gigantic failure.
After this defensive success, at the end of the year, General Von Falkenhayn, chief of staff, proposed to the Kaiser his plan to attack Verdun.
Strong and impenetrable place according to French propaganda, but it was in a delicate position because it did not have a road or railroad for its revival.
In the end, the front was almost unchanged in either Verdun or the Somme, despite the hundreds of thousands of casualties.
In an effort to break this dead end, this front witnessed the introduction of new military technologies, including poison gas and tanks.
But only after the adoption of tactical improvements did a certain degree of mobility recover. Despite the stagnation of this front, this scenario proved decisive.
The inexorable advance of the Allied armies in 1918 convinced the German commanders that defeat was inevitable, and the government was forced to negotiate the terms of an armistice.
What was the Eastern front like in World War 1?
The German war strategy worked against Russia. The Russian armies were huge (8 million men in 1914 ).
But the truth was dire: The Imperial Russian Army was made up mainly of peasants without any military training, poorly armed and equipped; in short, it was not prepared to face the disciplined Germans.
The Russian command was also mediocre. The two armies met at the Battle of Tannenberg (East Prussia) from August 26 to 30, 1914, and then at the Battle of the Masurian Lakes from September 6 to 15, 1914.
The Russians suffered flagrant defeats in both cases and were forced to withdraw. There the legend of the duo formed by Paul von Hindenburg and Erich Ludendorff, the German commanders in this successful defensive campaign, was born.
What was the Other fronts like in World War 1?
Although the main efforts of the belligerent powers were concentrated on the western and eastern fronts, the war was fought with more or less intensity in different parts of the globe.
Throughout this, it was fought in the Balkans, Dardanelles, Middle East, Caucasus, Italian Alps, in Africa , Far East, in the Pacific islands and in the different seas of the world.
Balkan front in World War 1
Being the place where the world conflagration began, on the front of the Balkans, a series of military campaigns were waged between the Central Powers Austria- Hungary, Germany and Bulgaria, on the one hand, and the Allies Serbia, Montenegro, Russia, France , Great Britain and later Romania and Greece.
In this theater of operations the war began with the Austro-Hungarian invasion of Serbia in 1914, which ended with the conquest of Serbia and Montenegro in late 1915.
Serbian forces were attacked from the north and east and were forced to withdraw from the country, however the Serbian army remained operational, although stationed in Greece..
In the fall of 1915, the Allies attempted to go to the Serbs’ aid, through a Franco-British expedition that settled in the port of Salonica in Greece.
The Allied plan was to aid the Serbs from the south, opening a front in Macedonia.
The expedition came too late and in insufficient strength to prevent the fall of Serbia, and was complicated by the internal political crisis in Greece.
However, the Macedonian front was kept stable, from the Albanian coast to the “Estrimón” river in Bulgaria, which remained stable, despite local actions, until 1918.
In 1916 Allied diplomacy succeeded in leading Romania to war against the Central Powers, but this decision proved disastrous for the Romanians.
Shortly after the Romanian declaration of war, a combined offensive between the Germans, Austro-Hungarians, Bulgarians, and Ottoman Turks conquered two-thirds of the country in a swift campaign that ended in December 1916.
However, the Russian and Romanian armies managed to stabilize the front and keep it in Moldova.
In 1917 Greece entered the war on the Allied side, and in September 1918 a major Allied offensive by a multinational force stationed in northern Greece occurred, leading to the capitulation of Bulgaria and the liberation of Serbia.
Middle East Front in World War 1
The Allies counted on Turkey’s weakness to open a direct route and support their troubled Russian allies.
The Dardanelles’ campaign was unleashed by the English, at the suggestion of Winston Churchill, to control the Dardanelles Strait, which would allow France and the British Empire to revitalize Russia, neutralize Turkey and lock up the Central Powers.
The ambitious project began with the deployment of an imposing English fleet and the landing of troops in Gallipoli, but the Turks defended themselves with an unexpected decision.
The Allies failed to penetrate the Ottoman Empire by surpriseand they failed in the successive offensives.
The operation was a bloody disaster, turning into a new trench battle (to top it all off, this time with the sea behind the Allies).
Italian front in World War 1
In 1915 , Italy joins the allies and attacks Austria. However, a long series of offensives on the “Isonzo” river fails.
In 1917 , it is the Austro-Hungarians, reinforced by German troops, who beat the Italians hard at Caporetto. This disaster almost brought Italy out of the war, but the front stabilized on the “Piave” river.
The war in Africa in World War 1
In Africa , the British and French attacked the German colonies on all fronts, surrounded by their possessions.
Germanic forces in Togoland and Cameroon quickly surrendered to Anglo-French troops, while the Southwestern German colony of Africa was invaded by the South African army and fully occupied in 1915.
Only the Tanganyika colony, under the leadership of General Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck, held out under German rule until the end of the war.
The war in the Far East and the Pacific in World War 1
After the outbreak of war, the Japanese Empire sent an ultimatum to Germany , requesting the evacuation of Jiaozhou (northeast China ). Germany refused to comply, so Japan entered the war on the side of the allies on August 23, 1914.
Japanese troops occupied German possessions on the Carolinas and Marianas islands. In 1915, Japan filed the twenty-one lawsuits with China, forcing China not to rent or cede any territory off Taiwan to any country except Japan.
In 1919, China ceded the commercial rights of Inner Mongolia and Manchuria to Japan..
Meanwhile, in the Pacific there were also movements, although not significant battles. Australian troops stationed in Papua seamlessly occupied German New Guinea, while Japan and New Zealand led attacks on German bases in the Mariana Islands.
The Chinese port of Qingdao, the main German base in the Far East, was occupied by the Japanese. As a result of the world war peace agreement, Japan received the islands of the Pacific it had occupied.
Naval warfare in World War 1
The naval warfare in World War I was characterized by the efforts of the Allied powers, especially Great Britain, to impose a sea blockade on the Central empires, utilizing their large naval fleets; and by the efforts of the Central Powers to break the blockade or establish an effective blockade of the United Kingdom and France.
The Germans, who had a large fleet of submarines, tried to impose a complete blockade on the United Kingdom and France, intercept the support of their colonies and break the supply routes between America (meat of Argentina, American weaponry) and Europe .
The North Sea and the English Channel were the main theater of operations for war at sea. In it they were, the great British fleet and the German High Seas fleet, starring in 3 great battles.
In August 1914 they met at the Battle of Heligoland, in January 1915 at the Battle of the Dogger Bank, both in favor of Great Britain.
In the middle of 1916 both fleets were in full front of the Jutland peninsula. The Germans aimed to prevent British supply from Norway.
The battle began on May 31, it lasted 80 minutes and was the largest naval combat recorded during the war. There was no total winner, as the Royal Navy lost more men and ships, but the Germans were unable to break the blockade and had more damaged ships.
In addition, the war at sea was fought in other settings. German activity in the Atlantic was characterized by submarine warfare.
In the Mediterranean, the allied fleets (British, French and Italian) faced the Austro-Hungarian navy in the Adriatic, with the largest battle being the Battle of the Otranto Canal in 1917; and to the Ottoman Navy during the Dardanelles campaign.
In the Pacific Ocean the German Far East Squadron, commanded by Admiral Graf von Spee, clashed with the 4th Squadron of the British Royal Navy, the Royal Australian Navy and some units of the Russian Imperial Navy and the French Navy.
The main battles of this theater of operations were the battle of colonel and the battle of the Falklands.
Turn of the war
In 1917, the German general staff made the decision to put up with the allies in the west and sink the discouraged Tsarist troops at once.
After the British tactical victory at Arras. The French, after the total failure of their Chemin des Dames offensive, are unable to launch any other offensive, merely resisting.
On June 7 the British launch an offensive in Flanders, however, it fails to break the front. Conflict stagnates and discouragement reigns in the rear. The civilian population suffers from restrictions, especially in Germany , blocked by the allies.
In April 1917 the United StatesThey declared war on the central empires, which gave the war its global character. However, its effects would not be felt until 1918.
The fact that motivated the United States’ entry into the war was the sinking of the Lusitania, where 123 Americans were traveling, by a German submarine.
This fact provoked a lively reaction in the United States, which prepared to officially go to war alongside the allies.
In February 1917 , the Russian Revolution broke out in Russia , which forced Emperor Nicholas II to abdicate, leaving the country under the command of Alexander Kerensky, who continued at war with Germany.
However in October the Bolshevik revolution would break out, which deposed the Kerensky government. This climate of instability allowed the Germans to advance considerably in Russia.
The Bolsheviks took full control and signed the armistice with the Central Empires in December, after the Brest-Litovsk peace (negotiated by Leon Trotsky ) in March 1918.
To obtain this peace, they consented to enormous economic and territorial sacrifices. Furthermore, Germany occupied Poland , Ukraine, Finland, the Baltic States and a part of Belarus.
The Reich took advantage of this victory to send almost all of its eastern army to the western front and try to obtain a quick victory before the massive arrival of the Americans.
It was their ultimate asset, as Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria and Turkey were showing signs of discouragement in the face of the increased financial and human reserves of the Allies.
Finally, on July 17, 1918, Tsar Nicholas II was assassinated with his entire family in Yekaterinburg, fearing that the advance of the Czechoslovak legion towards the city might liberate the Tsar.
The Russian revolution, in particular after the Brest-Litovsk Treaty, gave way to a civil war, which lasted until 1923, caused by the rise of anti-Bolshevik groups inside and outside Russia , which organized to act against the new regime.
How did the World War 1 end?
Reinforced by the troops coming from the eastern front, the Germans put all their forces in their last offensive, named by the infantry general Erich Ludendorff as Kaiserschlacht (code name Michael), from March 1918 , on the river “Somme”, in Flanders and Champagne.
This began on March 21 and lasted until April 5 , although with the end of this the Germans continued with a series of four offensives until June 17..
But, poorly fed and tired, the German troops were unable to resist Foch’s counteroffensive and failed in the face of the final objective: Paris, remaining 120 km from the French capital.
General Foch commands his French and American troops to victory, in the second battle of the Marne; the first British tanks enter combat and Allied air superiority is evident.
It is the beginning of the end for the Central Powers. In the Balkans, French troops attack the Bulgarian lines in Macedonia. After a few days of fighting, Bulgaria understands that it cannot face them and asks for an armistice.
Turkey, it is at the limit of its forces and cannot contain the British who have already taken Jerusalem and Baghdad and are advancing towards Anatolia; in addition the Bulgarian defeat compromises Constantinople.
French and British occupy the Middle East and Iraq, and the Ottoman Empire also surrenders.
The duel between Italians and Austrians is also to be resolved. General Diaz obeys the insistence of his government that he needs a victory on the Alpine front to be able to negotiate.
The Italians defeat Austria- Hungary at Vittorio Veneto. This fact marked the collapse of the imperial army, and the Habsburg monarchy collapses, unable to oppose anything to the allied advance by the Balkans ( November 3 ).
The Reich is in a desperate situation: it has run out of allies, its civilian population suffers from draconian restrictions, its army is on the edge, without reservation and demoralized.
Ludendorff and Hindenburg are supporters of immediate capitulation, believing that the front will collapse at any moment.
Indeed, spare US troops do not stop landing, and even Italy is preparing to send a contingent to France.
On August 8 an allied attack near Amiens succeeds and breaks the German front: the allies penetrate Belgium. The high command calls on the political arm to immediately start peace negotiations.
There is widespread belief that the war is lost. Wilson proclaims that The United States will only negotiate with a democratic German government.
The Hohenzollerns have their days numbered. After a workers’ revolution in Berlin , the Kaiser fled to the Netherlands; the government of the new German Republic signs the Rethondes armistice on November 11, 1918. The war ends with the victory of the allies.
What were the peace treaties after World War 1?
After the conflict, several separate peace treaties were signed between each of the vanquished and all of the victors, with the exception of Russia, which had abandoned the war in 1917. All these treaties are known as “The Peace of Paris” ( 1919 – 1920 ).
Versailles Treaty : Signed on June 28 , 1919 between the Allies and Germany. The empire was cut in two by the Polish corridor, demilitarized, its colonies confiscated, supervised, sentenced to pay huge compensation and treated as responsible for the conflict.
This treaty produced great bitterness among the Germans and was the initial seed for the next world conflict.
Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye : Signed on September 10 , 1919 between the Allies and Austria. This treaty established the dismemberment of the former Habsburg monarchy, the Austro-Hungarian empire, and Austria was limited to some areas where only German was spoken.
Sèvres: Signed on August 10, 1920 between the Ottoman Empire and the Allies (except Russia and United States ). The Treaty left the Ottomans without most of their former possessions, limiting it to Constantinople and part of Asia Minor.
Trianon: Agreement imposed on Hungary on June 4, 1920 by the allies, in which the delivery of territories to Czechoslovakia , Romania and Yugoslavia was ruled .
Treaty of Neuilly-sur-Seine : The Treaty of Neuilly-sur-Seine was signed on November 27, 1919 in Neuilly-sur-Seine (France) between Bulgaria and the victorious powers.
In accordance with the provisions of the treaty, Bulgaria recognized the new Kingdom of Yugoslavia, paid $ 400 million in compensation and reduced its army to 20,000 troops.
In addition, it lost a strip of western land in favor of Yugoslavia and yielded western Thrace to Greece , leaving it without access to the Aegean Sea.
What were the consequences of World War 1?
65.8 million soldiers fought, of whom more than 1 in 8 died, an average of 6,046 men killed every day of the four years it lasted.
As a result of this war four empires fell – the German, the Austro-Hungarian, Russian and Ottoman- and three great dynasties, the Hohenzollern, the Habsburgs and the Romanovs.
The war is estimated to have produced approximately eight million deaths and six million invalids. France was the country most affected proportionally: 1.4 million dead and disappeared, equivalent to 10% of the male active population, accompanied by a birth deficit.
65.8 million soldiers fought, of whom more than 1 in 8 died, an average of 6,046 men killed every day of the four years it lasted.
As a result of this war four empires fell – the German, the Austro-Hungarian, Russian and Ottoman- and three great dynasties, the Hohenzollern, the Habsburgs and the Romanovs.
The war is estimated to have produced approximately eight million deaths and six million invalids. France was the country most affected proportionally: 1.4 million dead and disappeared, equivalent to 10% of the male active population, accompanied by a birth deficit.
The French demographic stagnation continued, with an aging population that only managed to grow with immigration. The French north was in ruins: houses, bridges, railways, factories, etc.
On the political plane, four empires collapsed, profoundly transforming the map of Europe, redesigned by the 1919 peace treaty:
The Tsar’s empire was transformed into communist Russia (later the USSR), the Ottoman empire was reduced Turkey (Anatolian peninsula and Constantinople), the Austro-Hungarian empire was dismantled and tiny Austria were born, Hungary, Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia as new independent countries, the German empire came to an end and was replaced by the Weimar Republic, territorially and economically reduced by the payment of war reparations.
New world political balance. The colonies supplied food, raw materials and soldiers. After the war, the colonial peoples no longer believed in what had been instilled in them about the natural superiority of the metropolis and demanded an improvement in their situation.
To this first decline in the influence of Europe in the colonies, was added the expansion of the United States, the greatest beneficiary of the war along with Japan, and whose capitals were placed next to Paris and Londonon the international scene.
Social transformation: Social differences were accentuated with the enrichment of arms merchants and the impoverishment of small savers, retirees and salaried workers affected by inflation.
Women acquired a new place in society and became indispensable throughout the war, in the fields, factories, offices, schools (to compensate for the departure of many teachers).
Feminism was progressing, the right to vote was agreed in Great Britain, Germany, the United States, Turkey and Russia, but not in France.
Technological consequences: The war generated an intense development of the instruments and techniques of war: repetition rifles, machine guns, poisonous gases giving rise to biological and chemical warfare, there were tanks, airships and planes, and bombardments of cities were also carried out.
Artillery multiplied calibers, increased range, and improved correction methods. Motorized transport became widespread.
Political consequences in Germany. The five post-war treaties, mainly the one signed at Versailles, created an atmosphere of oppression towards the vanquished.
The new republican Germany suffered the consequences of the German empire and its economy was exploited by the victors. This is how both left and right theses emerged to end this situation.
The coups against the system began when, in 1921, communist militias rose in Munich. The revolt was put down. Adolf Hitler blamed the German Marxists for the German surrender, citing as evidence the progressive Weimar constitution and the armistice that followed.
When Hitler was still in the trenches, the German military convinced the civilian population that the war could be won, while they confessed to the politicians that surrender was inescapable.
But Hitler maintained this thesis in the National Socialist German workers and with it, led the so – called Putsch in Munich in 1923 against the headquarters of the government.
The military coup was crushed and Hitler held in prison for eight months. However, in January 1933, Hitler was appointed chancellor by President Paul von Hindenburg, and on October 14, 1933, he triumphed in the elections, leading to the German parliament.
