page_title: World War I
section_title: July Crisis
hierarchical_section_title: World War I / Prelude / July Crisis
caption_attribution_description: English: London and Paris On the Day That War Was Declared. ON THE NIGHT OF AUG. 4, 1914, WHEN GREAT BRITAIN DECLARED WAR AGAINST GERMANY, IMMENSE CROWDS SURGED ABOUT BUCKINGHAM PALACE IN LONDON AND CHEERED THE ROYAL FAMILY ON THE BALCONY. THE YOUNGEST CLASS OF FRENCH LADS, ONLY 17 YEARS OF AGE, CALLED TO THE COLORS AND GATHERED AT THE MONTPARNASSE STATION IN PARIS AT THE OUTBREAK OF WAR. ========================================= The war of the nations: portfolio in rotogravure etchings: compiled from the Mid-week pictorial. New York: New York Times, Co, 1919. Book. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, www.loc.gov/item/19013740/. (Accessed November 08, 2016.) Images from "The War of the Nations&#160;: Portfolio in Rotogravure Etchings&#160;: Compiled from the Mid-Week Pictorial" (New York&#160;: New York Times, Co., 1919) Notes: Selected from "The War of the Nations: Portfolio in Rotogravure Etchings," published by the New York Times shortly after the 1919 armistice. This portfolio compiled selected images from their "Mid-Week Pictorial" newspaper supplements of 1914-19. 528 p.&#160;: chiefly ill.&#160;; 42 cm.; hdl.loc.gov/loc.gdc/collgdc.gc000037 Subjects: World War, 1914-1918 --Pictorial works. New York--New York Format: Rotogravures --1910-1920. Rights Info: No known restrictions on reproduction Repository: Library of Congress, Serials and Government Publications Division, Washington, D.C. 20540 Part Of: Newspaper Pictorials: World War I Rotogravures, 1914-1919 (DLC) sgpwar 19191231 General information about the Newspaper Pictorials: World War I Rotogravures, 1914-1919 digital collection is available at hdl.loc.gov/loc.gdc/collgdc.gc000037
context_page_description: World War I, also known as the First World War or the Great War, was a global war that lasted from 28 July 1914 to 11 November 1918. Contemporaneously described as "the war to end all wars", it led to the mobilisation of more than 70 million military personnel, including 60 million Europeans, making it one of the largest wars in history. It is also one of the deadliest conflicts in history, with an estimated nine million combatant deaths and 13 million civilian deaths as a direct result of the war, while resulting genocides and the related 1918 influenza pandemic caused another 17–100 million deaths worldwide.
  On 28 June 1914, Gavrilo Princip, a Bosnian Serb Yugoslav nationalist, assassinated the Austro-Hungarian heir Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo, leading to the July Crisis. In response, Austria-Hungary issued an ultimatum to Serbia on 23 July. Serbia's reply failed to satisfy the Austrians, and the two moved to a war footing.
  A network of interlocking alliances enlarged the crisis from a bilateral issue in the Balkans to one involving most of Europe.
context_section_description: The assassination led to a month of diplomatic manoeuvring between Austria-Hungary, Germany, Russia, France and Britain, called the July Crisis. Austria-Hungary correctly believed that Serbian officials (especially the officers of the Black Hand) were involved in the plot to murder the Archduke, and wanted to finally end Serbian interference in Bosnia. On 23 July, Austria-Hungary delivered to Serbia the July Ultimatum, a series of ten demands that were made intentionally unacceptable, in an effort to provoke a war with Serbia. Serbia decreed general mobilisation on 25 July. Serbia accepted all the terms of the ultimatum except for article six, which demanded that Austrian delegates be allowed in Serbia for the purpose of participation in the investigation into the assassination. Following this, Austria broke off diplomatic relations with Serbia and, the next day, ordered a partial mobilisation. Finally, on 28 July 1914, a month after the assassination, Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia.
  On 25 July, Russia, in support of Serbia, declared partial mobilisation against Austria-Hungary. On 30 July, Russia ordered general mobilisation. German Chancellor Bethmann-Hollweg waited until the 31st for an appropriate response, when Germany declared Erklärung des Kriegszustandes, or "Statement on the war status". Kaiser Wilhelm II asked his cousin, Tsar Nicolas II, to suspend the Russian general mobilisation. When he refused, Germany issued an ultimatum demanding its mobilisation be stopped, and a commitment not to support Serbia. Another was sent to France, asking her not to support Russia if it were to come to the defence of Serbia. On 1 August, after the Russian response, Germany mobilised and declared war on Russia. This also led to the general mobilisation in Austria-Hungary on 4 August.
  The German government issued demands to France that it remain neutral whilst they decided which deployment plan to implement, it being extremely difficult to change the deployment once it was underway. The modified German Schlieffen Plan, Aufmarsch II West, would deploy 80% of the army in the west, while Aufmarsch I Ost and Aufmarsch II Ost would deploy 60% in the west and 40% in the east. The French did not respond, but sent a mixed message by ordering their troops to withdraw 10 km (6 mi) from the border to avoid any incidents, and at the same time ordered the mobilisation of their reserves. Germany responded by mobilising its own reserves and implementing Aufmarsch II West. The British cabinet decided on 29 July that being a signatory to the 1839 treaty about Belgium did not oblige it to oppose a German invasion of Belgium with military force.
  On 1 August, Wilhelm ordered General Helmuth von Moltke the Younger to "march the whole of the ... army to the East" after being informed that Britain would remain neutral if France was not attacked (and, possibly, that her hands might, in any case, be stayed by crisis in Ireland). Moltke told the Kaiser that attempting to redeploy a million men was unthinkable, and that making it possible for the French to attack the Germans "in the rear" would prove disastrous. Yet Wilhelm insisted that the German army should not march into Luxembourg until he received a telegram sent by his cousin George V, who made it clear that there had been a misunderstanding. Eventually the Kaiser told Moltke, "Now you can do what you want."
  For years, the French had been aware of intelligence indicating that Germany planned to attack France through Belgium. General Joseph Joffre, chief of staff of the French military from 1911, inquired about the possibility of moving some French troops into Belgium to preempt such a move by Germany, but France's civilian leadership rejected this idea. Joffre was told that France would not be the first power to violate Belgian neutrality and that any French move into Belgium could come only after the Germans had already invaded. On 2 August, Germany occupied Luxembourg, and on 3 August declared war on France; on the same day, they sent the Belgian government an ultimatum demanding unimpeded
caption: Cheering crowds in London and Paris on the day war was declared.
exif: {"Image ImageWidth": "4115", "Image ImageLength": "6097", "Image BitsPerSample": "[8, 8, 8, 8]", "Image PhotometricInterpretation": "1", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image SamplesPerPixel": "4", "Image XResolution": "400", "Image YResolution": "400", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CC (Windows)", "Image DateTime": "2017:05:29 18:27:01", "Image ExifOffset": "232", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "382", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "8662", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF ColorSpace": "Uncalibrated", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "4000", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "5965"}