War and Civil Conflict - AP European History

The fall of Constantinople occurred in the fifteenth century (1453), when Turkish forces finally overcame the last remnants of the Byzantine Empire and captured the city of Constantinople (now known as Istanbul). The Byzantine Empire was originally the Eastern half of the Roman Empire and the fact that it survived for an additional thousand years is somewhat remarkable. The fall of Constantinople precipitated the spread of Muslim settlements in the Balkans.

The War of the Roses was a civil war fought for control of the English crown between the Houses of York and Lancaster. The war lasted for thirty years and resulted in Henry Tudor, of House Lancaster, defeating his rival from the House of York, Richard III, and establishing the Tudor dynasty, which would rule England for over a century and included such notable monarchs as Henry VIII and Elizabeth I.

The Seven Years’ War (more commonly called the French-Indian War in American parlance) was fought from 1756 until 1763 between the French and British Empires. It was fought all over the world, as at this time the colonial possessions of Britain and France were nearly everywhere. The war ended with British victory and in America resulted in the complete loss of French possessions in Canada and the North of modern-day United States. This would have significant consequences, providing the motivation and circumstance for revolution. It also gave the British control of French holdings on the Indian subcontinent.

Napoleon’s Continental System is an important example of a blockade, or militaristic embargo, during times of war. Napoleon sought to cut off all trade to the British islands and prevent any territory under his control from exchanging goods with the British. The idea was to starve the British into surrender. The system had some effect, but it failed in part because other countries in Europe depended heavily on British imports.

The Battle of Waterloo, one of the most famous battles in history, was the final defeat of Napoleon Bonaparte by a joint British-Prussian force under the command of Generals Arthur Wellesley and Gebhard von Blucher. The campaign began when Napoleon returned from his initial exile on the Island of Elba in 1815. After Waterloo, Napoleon would again be exiled, but this time to the much more distant island of St. Helena and under much tighter security.

After World War I, France was concerned about Germany becoming militarized again and invading France. In an attempt to preempt this, France developed a protective barrier along the German and Swiss borders. The Maginot Line was built between 1929 and 1938 with some of the best military technology of the time and seemed impenetrable. Unfortunately for the French, they decided not to build the Maginot Line at full strength by the Belgian border, as Belgium was a country that remained neutral, and France did not want to do anything that could bring conflict into Belgium. The Germans realized this and invaded France through Belgium, rendering the Maginot Line useless to stop an outside invasion. While the Line initially seemed like a deterrent to invasion, the decision not to fortify it fully was what ultimately lead to France’s downfall in World War II.

During the early years of World War II, the Allies, and in particularly Britain, started to run low on supplies, but unfortunately most of Europe was under Nazi control and could not be counted on to trade. At this same time, the United States was attempting to remain neutral in the war, as many people were in favor of isolationism. Eventually the war became bad enough that it appeared as though the United States would have to pick sides, even without fighting directly. To avoid direct conflict, the Lend-Lease Act was passed in 1941, which allowed the government to give military supplies to foreign nations that were allies of the United States. This act made it so that the debts did not have to be paid back immediately, although typically the United States was given military bases in these countries in exchange for supplies. The act also essentially severed trade ties with members of the Axis Powers, as the U.S. began to help Britain, France, the Soviet Union, and other countries.

The trials of Nazi war criminals were conducted in Nuremberg, Germany due to the fact that the Palace of Justice located there was undamaged and provided enough space needed to detain the prisoners and hold trials. The trials started with the most significant war criminals in 1945, and those trials lasted almost a year. Of the most significant tried, twenty-four people were found guilty by an international tribunal. The rest of the trials were carried out from 1946 to 1949 by the U.S. military.

The War of the Spanish Succession began in 1701 over who would rule over the Spanish Empire after the death of Charles II. The empire that the Habsburgs had built up extended all over Europe and was of great interest to many European leaders. After some attempts to achieve a practical solution, Charles II declared that Philip, Duke of Anjou, a grandson of the King of France, would become the next emperor. This would have given France a tremendous amount of power, and this worried many countries, particularly England, the Netherlands, and Austria, who worked to counteract this expansion of French power. The ensuing conflicts lasted until 1714, when a variety of treaties, collectively called the Peace of Utrecht, were reached that broke down to most of the empire being divided up among the European powers and Philip ruling Spain after agreeing not to seek the French crown.

Following the end of World War I, much of Europe lay in ruins, and most of the European governments did not have the money or the resources to rebuild. The United States realized that it needed to take a lead in rebuilding Europe, not only to help the countries, but also to lower the chances that communism would take hold in Western European countries. Some of the Eastern European countries had already succumbed to communism, and the USSR was in a position to expand its influence. The plan was named after the Secretary of State, George Marshall, and was implemented in 1948 with support from Congress and President Truman. The plan, which spent billions of dollars helping to rebuild Europe and its economy, was quite successful and is credited with helping Europe to recover. It also showed the disadvantages of communism when the USSR refused American aid to help East Germany and other countries within the Soviet Bloc.

The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian Empire, in Sarajevo on June 28, 1914 by Serbian nationalists was the immediate cause of World War I. How this conflict spread throughout the European continent was through a series of longstanding and complex alliances between various powers. When Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia, Russia's alliance with Serbia meant it had to declare war on Austria-Hungary, followed by Germany declaring war on Russia, France declaring war on Germany, and then Britain declaring War on Germany.

The Reign of Terror began in 1793, when Maximillien Robespierre helped form the Committee of Public Safety and its associated Revolutionary Tribunal, which was empowered to try and execute the "enemies of the revolution." These enemies proved to be almost everyone not associated with Robespierre's Jacobin parties, leading to widespread anti-Jacobin sentiment among the masses. From the anger towards the Terror, the public wanted wholesale changes, which helped lead to the rise of Napoleon Bonaparte.

Klemens von Metternich lived over a century after the close of the Thirty Year's War, and is best known as being the Foreign Minister of the Austrian Empire and presiding over the Congress of Vienna. The Peace of Westphalia was the treaty that ended the Thirty Years' War. The Battle of White Mountain was a significant conflict in the early part of the war. Albrecht von Wallenstein was a prominent mercenary leader during the war. Gustavus Adolphus was the king of Sweden who intervened on behalf of the Protestant cause.

The War of the Austrian Succession began in 1740 when Frederick the Great invaded Austria-controlled Silesia under the pretense of Maria Theresa not being a lawful heir to the Austrian throne, which she obtained following the death of her father Charles VI in that same year.

When France ceded Canada to Britain in 1763, the colonists living there became British subjects. The Quebec Act of 1774 was meant to appease them and win over their loyalty to Britain, not deport them from the country. The incredibly sparse colonial population of Canada at the time necessitated measures to keep subjects in Canada, not expel them.

The Thirty Years' War occurred in the 17th century, lasting from 1618 to 1648. The other three conflicts spanned the 18th century: War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1714), War of the Austrian Succession (1740-1748), and Seven Years' War (1754-1763).

The Treaty of Brest-Livotsk was signed between the newly formed Bolshevik government of the Soviet Federated Socialist Republic (the USSR) and the Central Powers, granting the Baltic States to Germany and the Kars Oblast to the Ottomans, while also paying the Germans massive reparations. Germany’s defeat and acceptance of the Treaty of Versailles negated Brest-Livotsk. The first Battle of the Somme was an inconclusive but bloody engagement between Britain, France and Germany in Western Europe in 1916. The Battle of Tannenberg was a decisive defeat of the Russians by the German General von Hindenburg at the beginning of World War I. The Spring Offensive of 1918 was a series of advances by Germany in Western Europe using storm troopers that were ultimately reversed by American reinforcements.

The Italians provided forces in excess of 50,000 land troops, and the Nazi regime tested bombing strategies and technologies during the war, as famously depicted in Picasso’s Guernica. Tens of thousands of foreign volunteers fought in the International Brigades, and Spanish anarchists resisted the fascist and conservative forces. The French Popular Front government of Leon Blum was officially neutral.

The main and proximate cause of the American entrance into World War II in 1941 was the bombing of the American naval base at Pearl Harbor by the Japanese. This event sparked outrage in the U.S and resulted in Roosevelt making the decision to enter the war on the side of its allies. Although inspired by Japanese aggression in the Pacific, the entry of the United States into the war is considered a major turning point in the European theatre of World War II.