Russia. Nine million men were mobilized for the war effort, but the slow and corrupt bureaucratic apparatus was unable to manage them.

Winston Churchill returned to the army after the defeat blamed on him at Gallipoli during the First World War. He served in Belgium and Northern France in various battalions.

Colorado, United States. Molybdenum was highly coveted by the war industry, especially in Germany, since cannons like Big Bertha suffered from warping at high temperatures, a defect that disappeared when the steel was molybdenum-based (which melts at 2600°C, compared to 1500°C for iron). The only known source of molybdenum at the time was Bartlett Mountain, Colorado. The mining rights were sold to a certain Otis King, when extraction cost much more than the eventual revenue. With an entrepreneurial spirit, King adopted a new technique, which nearly cost him financial ruin, but led him to extract 2.6 tons of molybdenum in a short time, an amount that exceeded global demand by 50%! Among the few interested parties was Metallgesellschaft, a German company with a branch in New York, which instructed its representative, Max Schott, to acquire the mine. Schott began to harass and then threaten King, who hired a bodyguard, a crippled prison sergeant nicknamed “Two-Gun” Adams. The Germans managed to get their hands on King, pushing him down a slope. He was saved only by the providential soft snow. In 1916, the British managed to get their hands on a German cannon and discover the metal of Molly-be-damned (as King’s miners called it). In 1917, the United States entered the war, but it was only in 1918 that the American government began to pry into the affairs of Max Schott and his associates at American Metal (the American subsidiary of Metallgesellschaft), by which time King had already given in to pressure and sold the mine to the Germans. The US government quickly seized the assets of Metallgesellschaft and nationalized Bartlett Mountain. But it was too late to silence the Big Bertha made of molybdenum steel. Schott’s company went bankrupt in 1919. King became a millionaire after convincing Ford to use special steels in his car engines. And molybdenum in the war industry was soon replaced by tungsten (the element below it in Mendeleev’s Table), which was supplied to the Germans by Portugal during the following World War…

The Germans occupy Warsaw

Second Battle of the Isonzo

Troops in German South-West Africa surrender to British forces

The flamethrower was used for the first time by the Germans against the French, not far from Ypres. Shortly thereafter, they also used it against the British. The success was partial but significant.

First Battle of the Isonzo

The Germans used poison gas for the first time during the Battle of Ypres.

Guglielmo Marconi, in a letter to Minister of War Vittorio Zupelli, offered his services. He would join the Army Engineers as a reserve lieutenant, tasked with inspecting the Italian Army’s radio and telegraph equipment at the front.

Kaiser Wilhelm II authorized strategic bombing raids in southern England, but banned them from London, for fear that his relatives in the British royal family would be affected.

Italian Garibaldi volunteers fight in the Argonne alongside the Entente

Winter Offensive in Champagne

Japan submits the 21 Demands to China, which would effectively convert China into a vassal state of Japan.

Cocos (Keeling) Islands, Eastern Indian Ocean. The Germans seize control of the British submarine telegraph station on Cocos Island, operated by the Eastern Telegraph Company. The German landing party is part of the SMS Emden, under the command of German officer Hellmuth von Mucke.

Turkey, already at war with Russia, declares war on Great Britain and France

Battle of the Marne: German troops arrive at the gates of Paris; from this moment until 1918; the Germans will remain on the defensive with the only notable exception of Verdun; the French have only 300 heavy guns, the Germans have 3,500 including the fearsome Krupp Big Bertha, 420mm (144km range); in the battle the French will lose 300,000 men including 4,778 officers

Benedict XV (Giacomo Della Chiesa) is Pope

J. Langmuir invents gas tube control: thyratrons

The trenches, the barbed wire fences, the German machine guns halt the French advance, the Germans literally mow down the French infantry and then launch a counterattack; the French retreat to the Grand Couronne.

The Panama Canal is open to navigation

German Zeppelin airships carry out the first strategic bombing raid in history. The target is Liège, Belgium. Many other bombing raids will follow, especially over southern England, first targeting military targets, then civilians, with the aim of weakening British morale. Paris will also be bombed, and Notre Dame Cathedral will suffer minor damage.

The first strategic bombing raid was carried out by aircraft. It involved German Zeppelins bombing Liège, Belgium. Many other bombing raids followed, especially over southern England, first targeting military targets, then civilians, with the aim of weakening British morale.

The French attack from the Ardennes to Lorraine: in the Battle of the Frontiers, which lasts 11 days, they lose 300,000 men.

On the first day of the war, the British ship Telconia, under the benefit of darkness, approached the German coast, dropped anchor where it knew it would find German submarine communications cables, pulled up the cables, and cut them. In this way, the British forced the Germans to use radio transmission, which was much more easily intercepted, or to use submarine cables owned by other nations, such as Sweden or the United States, which in both cases passed through England. This was the case, for example, with the famous Zimmermann Telegram addressed to the Mexican government, intended to induce the Mexicans to attack the United States. This telegram was intercepted by the British, which instead convinced the reticent Americans of German hostility. From a cryptographic standpoint, the information that the British intercepted and decoded the German message was kept secret by the British, and the Germans were led to believe that the “leak” was actually due to a leak from the Mexican side. This false assumption persisted until the Second World War, when the Germans, confident that their codes were still “unbreakable”, created a more ingenious, but not entirely innovative, version: the Enigma machine.

Only hours after the declaration of war, the British cut German submarine cables to the United States. From now on, and throughout the war, German telegrams to the American continent must pass through England. This will be crucial when the Kaiser courts Mexico to enter the war against the United States: the British will intercept the message, decrypt it, and warn the American president in advance.

Britain enters the war: the war becomes global

Sarajevo. Seven conspirators hatch a plot to assassinate Austrian Prince Franz Ferdinand. Within days, the assassination will trigger World War I, which would later lead to World War II. The successful assassin, Gavrilo Princip, is captured and sentenced to 20 years, dying in prison of tuberculosis. However, the bomb thrown by Nedeljko Cabrinovic misses its target. Cabrinovic is also captured and, sentenced to 20 years, dies in prison. Other captured accomplices included Trifko Grabez (sentenced to 20 years in prison, dies of tuberculosis), Cvjetko Popovic (sentenced to 13 years, released in 1918, becomes a professor and curator of a museum in Sarajevo), Vaso Cubrilovic (sentenced to 16 years, released in 1918, becomes a minister in communist Yugoslavia), and Danilo Ilic (sentenced to death because he was the only adult, hanged). The only conspirator who escaped capture was Muhamed Mehmedbasic, who fled to Serbia and was killed during World War II.

Germany. The process invented by a bald, mustachioed man wearing pince-nez glasses, Fritz Haber, has already saved millions of people from starvation. It’s a process for capturing nitrogen and producing highly efficient fertilizers. This alternative to manure and organic compounds (such as bird droppings) makes agriculture much more productive.

American philosopher Peirce dies

Explorer Ernest Shackleton embarks on the Trans-Antarctic Expedition. The ship becomes entangled in the ice and subsequently sinks. The crew manages to escape and, after months, first reaches the deserted Elephant Island at latitude 61S, then South Georgia Island, approaching from the uninhabited side. Finally, they complete the first crossing of the island on foot and finally return to civilization (which had by then left them for dead).