- Effects on People (men/women/families)
8.5 Million men were dead, 17 million were handicapped or wounded for life.Some Women did not get to see their husbands again. A lot of men were never found after the war. About 2 million women in the UK replaced men in their jobs.This was hard for the families and the children, because the women had to work for long hours and leave their children.There was a vast range of new jobs for women. Life was never the same for some of the men as they had constant ‘flashbacks’ and nightmares about the war.The women were forced to financially support their family as well as looking after the kids and at the same time care for their husband or son. This situation made life very difficult. their families were never able to understand the full effects of the War upon their loved ones. They had less time to spend with family members and were expected to grow up faster and help with the war effort.Women also got the rights to vote. It was the first war to use airplanes, tanks, long range artillery, submarines, and poison gas.Four years of war killed a million troops from the British Empire, 1.5 million troops from the Hapsburg Empire, 1.7 million French troops, 1.7 million Russians, and 2 million German troops. The war left a legacy of bitterness that contributed to World War II twenty-one years later.
- Effects on land
Belgium was walked into by germans which destroyed a lot of their land ( even though they were not involved in the war). Verdun was so damaged that it was never rebuilt after the war. Most of Frances land was destroyed and damaged because most of the battles were fought in France. Mostly all of Europe were involved in the war which led to most of Europes land getting damaged. Russia lost a lot of land during the war.the war accelerated the process of change driven by industrialization, and created circumstances in Germany, in the Balkans, and in Russia which people were not prepared for. After Germany signed the Treaty of Versailles it reduced its lands by 14%, and left 12.5% of the German people living outside German borders. Germany had taken the territories of Alsace and Lorraine which had been in French possession for around 200 years. France swore revenge and with the Allied victory in 1918 the Treaty of Versailles gave these territories back to France.
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| The Map Before the war |
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| The Map After the war |
- Economic Effects
Russia Left the war from the economic troubles they had.the war severely disrupted the European economies and allowed the United States to become the world's leading creditor and industrial power. Germany was in a really bad economical situation after the war because based on the Treaty of Versailles, Germany was the one who started the war and had to pay countries back for their damage. Germany had to agree full responsibility for the war. reparations to the Allied Powers, amounted to 6600 million euros in 1920, to make Germany poor for many years. Germany lost land to make new countries like Poland,and Czechoslovakia.The advantages of mass production and the use of machinery to perform former human labor tasks, along with the implementation of the eight hour work day, proved to stimulate the economy, the United States' in particular.
This is a link that sums up most of the effects of world war one : http://www.worldology.com/Europe/world_war_1_effect.htm
