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ck. In 1866, Bismarck contrived to provoke Austria into war, the Seven Weeks' War. Prus-
sian soldiers were better trained, and its weapons were modern and effective. In a short sev-
en weeks, Austria sued for peace, agreeing to Prussia's plans for a North German Confed-
eration. Under Prussia's leadership, the states of south Germany (excluding Austria) joined
the nearly two dozen states of the former Confederation of the Rhine.
THE FRANCO-PRUSSIAN WAR
Four years later, Prussia turned on France. And the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71 inflic-
ted a stunning defeat on the French. In defeat, the French monarch, Emperor Louis Napo-
leon, abdicated, and civil war followed. Radical groups seized Paris and withstood a four-
month Prussian siege. Outside Paris, a newly formed republican government acceded to
Prussia's terms for peace, but the government in Paris (the Commune, or workers' gov-
ernment) refused to lay down arms. Troops of the new Republic bombarded Paris. In the
fighting, the Communards set fire to large parts of the city. As soldiers of the Republic took
the city, more than 20,000 Communards were killed.
As a reward for victorious leadership, William I, King of Prussia, was declared emper-
or, or Kaiser, of the newly united German Empire, called The Second Reich. The Kaiser's
(and Bismarck's) peace terms were severe: France was forced to surrender two of its his-
toric provinces on its northeast frontier, Alsace and Lorraine. And the seeds of enmity
between France and Germany would bear fruit in World War I.
The German Empire would be defeated in the First World War. The same fate would
befall its successor in the Second World War, the infamous Third Reich (Third Empire).
Out of the carnage of World War II, present-day Europe emerged. And out of war's ashes,
the German phoenix rose once again.
WORLD WAR I
The lamps are going out all over Europe; we shall not see them lit again in our lifetime.
— Viscount Grey, British Foreign Secretary, On the eve of war, August 3, 1914
The First World War ushered in what many call history's most violent century. The violence
began on June 28, 1914, in Sarajevo, Bosnia (part of the Austro-Hungarian empire) when
a Serb nationalist assassinated the heir to the Austrian throne. Austria then declared war
on Russia, the protector and patron of Serbian nationalist aspirations. Step by step, the war
expanded, pulling in thirty-two countries, arrayed in two grand coalitions. One was known
as the Allies and included Great Britain, France, Russia, Italy, and the United States. Its
antagonist was called the Central Powers and included Germany, Austria, Bulgaria, and
the Ottoman Empire. When it ended on November 11, 1918, more than forty million were
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