Global Conflict beyond 1900 Flashcards
Who dominated the global political order at the start of the 20th century?
“The West”
The West is referred to as the countries in Western Europe, Canada, and the United States.
Which empires were in major decline by 1900?
The land-based empires of Russia, China, and Turkey were all in major decline.
What happened to the land-based empire in Russia?
In 1917, Russia was exhausted from years of war and faced food shortages at home. When workers rioted in St. Petersburg, Tsar Nicholas II sent troops to put down the unrest.
Instead of firing on the crowds, the soldiers mutinied. The mutiny spread, leading the Tsar to abdicate and to the establishment of the Provisional Government under Alexander Kerensky and prominent members of the Duma.
Who led Russia after the dissolution of the Romanov Dynasty?
While Kerensky’s government did establish some far-reaching reforms, including imposing an eight-hour working day and freedom of religion, it continued the war against the Central Powers, making it very unpopular.
People like Vladimir Lenin used the unpopularity of the Kerensky government to build popular support for Bolshevik Communist rule, which eventually happened, ending Russia’s involvement in World War I.
Who took over the USSR after Vladimir Lenin died?
Josef Stalin.
Stalin had close to a million of Russia’s own citizens killed by 1930 for holding different beliefs or for being part of a different social class, such as the Kulaks, who were high-income farmers.
By the time Stalin died in the 1950s, he had either directly (executions) or indirectly (through famine) killed close to 10 million people.
Define:
communism
Communism refers to a system of government in which the government owns the means of production. Under a pure communist system, the government owns all land and factories, as opposed to a pure capitalist system, in which individuals own the means of production.
How did Russia’s transition to communism impact its relations with countries in the West?
Countries in the West felt threatened by Russia’s move to Communism. Not just that, but Russia had left while World War I was still happening, and Russia’s former allies felt ill will towards the Bolsheviks for making peace with Germany once they took over Russia.
The United States felt so threatened that Russia became Communist that US President Wilson sent 13,000 US troops into Russia while World War I was still happening.
Who controlled China since 1644?
The Qing Dynasty (Q =CH)
The Qing were not of Han Chinese ancestry, but of Manchu Chinese ancestry, making them the only dynasty ever controlled by the Manchu.
What were two major internal economic problems faced by the Qing Dynasty during the 1900s?
Famine: Food production in China had not kept up with population growth, so natural disasters such as a drought would kill hundreds of thousands of people.
Taxes: The Qing Dynasty was not collecting enough taxes, and its ability to build infrastructure was significantly decreased as a result.
What was the Qing Dynasty’s relationship with western powers?
They were being dominated by most of the European powers, but especially England, who had forced China to allow the sale of drugs (in the form of opium) to Chinese people, in order to make money off of China.
Countries like the United States issued declarations like the Open Door Policy, to further humiliate China, to the economic benefit of the United States and its western peers.
Who was Sun Yat-Sen?
He led a revolution against Qing Dynasty rule in China, overthrowing China’s 2300-year tradition of dynastic rule.
Who was Mao Zedong?
He represented the Communist side of China during the Chinese Civil War and would go on to be the first dictator of Communist China after the end of World War 2.
What did the Committee of Union and Progress do?
A nationalist Turkish movement, the committee brought about an end to the Ottoman monarchy and helped the creation of a secular Turkish Republic after World War I was over.
However, during World War I, leaders of the CUP ruled the Ottoman Empire via a one-party state and used their tremendous political power within their empire to commit genocide against Armenians and Assyrians.
Why did the Ottoman Empire side with Germany during World War I?
They felt that France and England had taken advantage of them in the Crimean War, as well as a shared Turkish and German animosity toward England and France.
Who was Ataturk? (AKA Mustafa Kemal)
He is seen as the founder of the modern-day secular Turkish Republic from the ashes of the Ottoman Empire.
Who had been the dictator of Mexico for 31 years in 1910?
Porfirio Diaz
His reign as dictator in Mexico is referred to as the “Porfiriato”. During his reign, political power was concentrated in the hands of very few people, and political expression was greatly suppressed.
Who opposed Porfirio Diaz in the 1910 General Election for the Presidency of Mexico?
Francisco Madero
Francisco and other young reformers created the “anti-reeleccionista” party, in order to stop Diaz from becoming President.
How successful were Madero and others in trying to oust Diaz from the Presidency of Mexico?
Diaz was forced to dissolve his government after Madero led a group of people to remove him from power. Madero’s call to arms to defeat Diaz is known as the “Plan of San Luis Potosi”.
After Madero takes the Presidency in Mexico in 1911, who rises to oppose Madero?
Emiliano Zapata.
Zapata leads a revolt against Madero and announces a program he calls the Plan de Ayala.
In order to put his plan into effect, Zapata makes himself the ruler of a state within Mexico called Morelos. In the state of Morelos, he begins to seize the land of hacienda owners, who he claims have exploited the people.
How does President Madero of Mexico die during the Mexican Revolution?
Victoriano Huerta led a coup to force him out of power. Once removed from power, Huerta ordered Madero to be shot.
Huerta established a short-lived, right-wing, military dictatorship and was removed from power after a little over a year in power.
When did political stability return to Mexico, following the Mexican Revolution?
It returned when Plutarco Elias Calles established the Institutional Revolutionary Party (also known as the PRI), which had continuous control over Mexico’s presidency from 1929 to 1997.
Plutarco Elias Calles was able to gain power in Mexico by promising equal justice, advocating for the rights of workers, as well as land redistribution.
Although early Presidents of Mexico like Lorenzo Cardenas honored their PRI political promises by leading bold reform, after World War II, the PRI will be plagued with political corruption, making Mexico a one-party state.
What were the driving forces behind World War I?
Major causes include the desire for imperialist expansion, secret diplomacy, commitments to alliances, and intense nationalism.
How did the desire for imperialist expansion contribute to World War I?
European rivals wanted each other’s colonies.
For example, if Germany could take France’s colonies in Africa, it was believed to give Germany a more competitive edge economically since those newly acquired lands would contain people who could purchase German-made manufactured products.
New markets were not the only reason for imperialist expansion. European economies desired resources like rubber and oil to help run their industrial economies.
How did intense nationalism cause World War I?
European countries, and the citizens that lived in them, were fed government propaganda that established the superiority of their nation over the other nations of Europe.
For example, the French believed, at the outset of World War 1, that the war would be brief and that they would emerge triumphant after crushing the Germans.
German, British, and Russian, doesn’t matter who, they all believed that the war would be short for their nation since they were superior to others.
How did conflicts over territory, or regional conflicts, combined with a flawed alliance system, contribute to the start of World War I?
A regional conflict could escalate to include other nations due to secret alliances and secret diplomacy.
World War I has often been viewed as a war that could have been prevented had more dialogue about areas of conflict among nations. This is the main reason why the League of Nations will be created after the war is over, so as to prevent a regional conflict from escalating into a global one.
What is total war?
When a country devotes all of the nation’s resources and attention to fighting a war.
What is propaganda?
Propaganda is art, usually sponsored by a government, encouraging people to act in ways that are supportive of that government.
Throughout all of the 1900s and in all of the World Wars, governments across the political spectrum, democracies and fascist regimes alike, will use art to persuade billions of people to obey government laws, even those that limit freedoms, to help the government achieve its goals.
Why did World War I last much longer than people had anticipated?
Because wartime technology, such as machine guns, had forced the creation of new strategies, such as trench warfare, to avoid machine-gun fire.
The technological advancement of new weapons, such as the machine gun, capable of shooting 500 bullets every minute, was used in the global conflict after 1900.
What chemical weapons have been used throughout the global conflicts of the 1900s?
Gas was weaponized in a variety of formats. Gas was first used in World War I on the battlefield, and despite the Geneva convention in the 1920s making it illegal, it was used again through Zyklon B during the Holocaust of World War II.
It has been used many times since World War II, and its usage is typically the hallmark of governments, trying to intimidate their citizens into submission. Democracies use tear gas, and dictatorships, such as that Bashar al Assad of Syria, use Chlorine gas.
What are two societal effects that are similar between World War I and World War II?
In both global conflicts, factories that produced consumer goods were converted into war factories, increasing employment, especially among women, altering society’s view of a woman’s “traditional role”.
In both global conflicts, media was censored in the name of national security during wartime, and food was rationed during wartime among the population, so as to save food for the troops on the frontline.
Overwhelming naval superiority enabled the British navy to conduct what form of naval warfare during World War 1?
Britain’s naval supremacy enabled the country to blockade Germany, cutting Germany off from shipments of food and medical supplies from neutral countries, such as the United States.
Britain kept up the blockade even after the Germans surrendered, only lifting it after the Treaty of Versailles was signed.
