Ch 21: The Collapse and Recovery of Europe
Margin and Big Picture Responses
Margin Review Questions
1. What aspects of Europe's nineteenth-century history contributed to the First World War?
⢠Aspects of Europe's nineteenth-century history that contributed to the First World War include the emergence of Germany and Italy as unified states, which disrupted the fragile balance of power between Europe's major countries that had been established after the defeat of Napoleon in 1815;
⢠Growing popular nationalism in Europe; industrialization and industrialized militarism; and competition among European powers for colonial empires also played a significant role.
2. In what ways did World War I mark new departures in the history of the twentieth century?
⢠The needs of total war led to the expansion of government authority.
⢠The destruction of life and property wrought by the war led to a widespread disillusionment among European intellectuals with their own civilization.
⢠The political map of Europe was radically altered with the collapse of the German, Russian, and Austrian empires, creating space for new nations in Central Europe, including Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Yugoslavia, all of which were formed around an ideology of national self-determination.
⢠In Russia, the strains of war triggered a vast revolutionary upheaval that launched world communism.
⢠The Treaty of Versailles, which brought the war to a close, also established the conditions that generated the Second World War.
⢠The massacre and deportation of one million Armenians by the Ottoman Empire set a precedent on which Nazi Germany later built.
⢠The collapse of the Ottoman Empire during World War I resulted in the political f ragmentation of the Middle East and the emergence of the states of Turkey, Syria, Iraq, Jordan, and Palestine.
⢠Conflicting promises made by the British to...