World War I was like a pan-European revolution in the sense that new nations emerged or preexisting nations changed vehemently. Prior to the initial outbreak of total war or revolution, there were societal changes, economic, and political that was the undercurrent to the pretext of total war. Europe had gone through the second industrial revolution, which had improved upon various techniques of manufacture. The manufacture of a 15-round rifle improved the odds in combat versus indigenous peoples around the world tremendously. Because Europe had carved out Africa and parts of Asia rather easily, though Germany felt left out, economic conditions were better than ever after the agricultural depression that shed prosperity on Europe. The Europeans defended their position as “superior whites” and subdued the African and Asian indigenous people in the name of Christianity and social Darwinism. Little did they know that this was backwards in itself, and this mindset of oppression would carry on to their new political entities shortly after the aftermath of the revolution that was World War I.
Like in France, where the subsequent revolutions after the first were attempted to be suppressed, Europeans in this instance formed their allies and enemies to prevent change. In Europe at the time, politically, the Triple Entente and the Triple Alliance was formed. Thus, the timber for the flames had already been laid out when Austria decided to invade Serbia due to the assassination of their infamous King by Serbian terrorists. The end result of this was that Russia, England, France, Italy, and later the United States and others entered the war against Germany, Austria, and the Ottomans. The total war was not only economically feasible, it was socially acceptable.
So, not only was World War I a massive bloodbath in trench warfare, but it shifted societies in directions they’ve never been before. In other places, besides Russia, there were economic and societal changes that all sort of culminated in a boiling pot. In England, women were working in necessary positions for the “war effort”, subsequently leading to Women’s suffrage there. “Social relations” between classes had begun to relax due to the unanimity of the war effort. In Russia, on the hand, they were lagging behind the rest of their European counterparts. It was much like the revolution that occurred in France in that the people were in the process of removing the Tsarist monarchy, (essentially the Old Regime), and the aristocracy to transform it into a democracy. This failed however, because of soviet Bolshevik party gained control, who tempted the Russian people with an alternative, communist model of how society should operate. The United States, England, and France sent their forces there as the “Whites” versus the Russian “Reds,” but this failed and consequently a new issue arose, the Cold War.
At the aftermath of World War I, Russia had already become a communist nation after seceding territory. New nations were born as a result of this: Czechoslovakia, Iraq (in the Middle East), Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Finland, Yugoslavia, Hungary, Austria (which were divided) and Poland. Germany was stripped of its privileges among the ranks of European colonial powerhouses.
The formation of the League of Nations paved the way for the creation of the United Nations, however, it did not do its job as Woodrow Wilson intended and his 14 points for a national self-determination paradigm went unheeded.
