Following the assassination of Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand by a Bosnian Serb separatist, Austria declared war on Serbia in July 1914. A complex web of both alliances and mounting tensions between the "great powers" of Europe essentially forced the other nations of the continent to take sides. Germany supported Austria, joined slightly later by the Ottoman (Turkish) Empire; these countries became the primary members of the "Central Powers" bloc. France, Great Britain, and Russia— supporting Serbia and wary of German ambitions—became the "Entente" or "Allies."
Germany attacked France first, according to the "Von Schlieffen Plan"; the aim was to rapidly sweep through Northern France via Belgium, outflanking the French and capturing Paris before turning most of their forces to face slowly-mobilizing Russia. However, despite initial German success, the French staved off defeat at the Battle of the Marne, assisted by the British Expeditionary Force. The Western Front then became a stalemate marked by widespread trench warfare. The significant defensive advantages of trenches, machine guns, and modern artillery (among other weapons and tactics) meant that offensives were generally futile and marked by massive casualties. The armies' positions in France and Belgium thus changed little for the next three years, despite their unprecedented size and mortality rates at battles such as Verdun (1915), the Somme (1916), and Third Ypres (1917).
The United States under President Wilson originally kept a position of official neutrality. However, the German policy of "unrestricted submarine warfare"—sinking civilian and neutral ships in the Atlantic in an attempt to starve out Britain—galvanized support for the Allies, especially after 128 Americans died aboard the British ocean liner Lusitania in May 1915. Tensions had almost reached a tipping point in early 1917, and when the British intercepted the "Zimmermann Telegram" proposing an alliance between Germany and Mexico, the U.S. entered the war on the side of the Allies.
That proved fortunate for the Allies, as the Russian Revolution of 1917 had forced that country to sue for peace and freed up the German forces on the Eastern Front to bolster the Western. Early 1918 saw a renewed, tactically-innovative German offensive against the exhausted Allies, breaking the deadlock and bringing them close to Paris. However, with the help of American forces and equipment, the Allies held strong and then launched a devastating counterattack with these reinforcements (including newly-developed tanks). Germany, faced with these military setbacks and widespread shortages and disaffection on the home front, entered negotiations with the Allies, having been by far the main player of the Central Powers. The war ended with an armistice on November 11, 1918. It's worth noting that American men and materiel certainly played a significant role in resisting and then pushing back the German forces in 1918, and may well have been the decisive factor leading to the Allied victory, but the number of American casualties and troops engaged was very small in the overall picture of the war.
Even before the conclusion of the war, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson was looking towards securing a lasting peace in its aftermath, particularly as a broader justification for the American entry. His "Fourteen Points" of January 1918 were intended as a set of guiding principles for international affairs to ensure such a devastating conflict would never occur again. Such principles included diplomatic transparency and openness, the promotion of free trade, armaments reduction, and the right to autonomy and self-determination for the nations and ethnic groups of Europe. The Points offered specific solutions to several of the many territorial and sovereignty crises of Europe. The fourteenth point notably called for the establishment of an international association of nations to safeguard national and political integrity and rights, which would lead to the League of Nations.
However, the Treaty of Versailles, which officially ended the war in 1919, did not hew nearly as close to the Fourteen Points as Wilson would have liked. The Treaty was particularly punitive of Germany, for example; rather than attempting to foster a lasting peace as the Fourteen Points intended, it stoked resentment in Germany that contributed to the rise of fascism. Additionally, the well-intentioned League of Nations proved too weak to live up to Wilson's mandate—which was not helped by the fact the United States, experiencing a new birth of isolationism, did not join it!
After the German army's initial attempt to capture Paris was thwarted by French and British forces, the war on the Western Front became a bloody stalemate characterized by trench warfare. Despite massive, bloody offensives, neither side was able to move the front more than a few miles. The casualties were shocking, and by the time the United States entered the war in 1917, both sides were exhausted. The United States entered the war, it was argued, to protect its right to trade on the open seas, which was threatened by German submarines that attacked and sank American merchant ships; it also entered the war because Germany had made overtures toward Mexico to conclude a military alliance. The entry of the United States into the war tipped the balance in favor of the Allies. After stopping a German offensive in the spring and summer of 1918, American troops helped drive German forces out of France, and the German army was demoralized and a spent force by the time of the cease-fire and armistice in November of 1918. Woodrow Wilson sought to use the outcome of the war to establish a plan for lasting peace based on the Fourteen Points, a series of principles that emphasized territorial integrity of nations, self-determination for ethnic groups in Europe, and (above all) the League of Nations, an international organization that would promote cooperation and peaceful conflict resolution. Ultimately, only some of Wilson's principles were included in the Treaty of Versailles, which formally ended the war, and isolationists in the US Senate kept the nation out of the League of Nations, a development that severely limited the League's ability to perform its mandate.
https://www.history.com/topics/world-war-i/world-war-i-history
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