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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. How did Clausewitz claim one could win public opinion?

2. Why did German deputies not know that the Belgians had rejected their ultimatum?

3. What were Schlieffen’s last words about the right wing?

4. Who was the Home Secretary of Britain when the war began?

5. Were the French unaware of the possibility of an attack from the German right wing?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is Grey’s speech before the House in Chapter 9 about and how was it received?

2. What was unique about the thoughts of the American Minister in Brussels about what the Belgian king’s 12-year-old son was thinking as he watched his father reject the German ultimatum?

3. Why, right up until the invasion actually happened, did many still believe that the German armies would not actually invade Belgium?

4. Contrast the differences between the Elder von Moltke’s view of the next war being a long war and the general opinion of the younger generation who thought the next war would not feasibly last very long at all.

5. What was Plan 17?

6. While the Germans had defeated the French in the Franco-Prussian war that ended in 1870, what condition was France in when World War I began just over 40 years later?

7. What other country besides Germany planned to use the open frontier of Belgium as a route of invasion, however this time only after the Germans had violated Belgian neutrality? How did they plan to do this?

8. In the beginning of Chapter 2 it is revealed that the alliances and counter-alliances of the various powers of Europe had created a “heap of swords piled as delicately as jackstraws” (18). How does this complex web of alliances help lead to the outbreak of war in 1914?

9. Why did Britain and France create joint military plans in 1905 after Russia was defeated by the Japanese on the other side of the world?

10. What were the two parts of Britain’s ultimatum to Germany, of which only the second part was truly an ultimatum?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Break down the idea of Clausewitz’s warning that “military plans which leave no room for the unexpected can lead to disaster” (26) in regards to the German obsession with planning every moment of their invasion down to the minutest detail.

Essay Topic 2

Compare and contrast the views of President Woodrow Wilson and the overall attitude of the United States towards the war and how the United States should be involved.

Essay Topic 3

Explain the meaning and false optimism of the statement “You will be home before the leaves have fallen from the trees” (119) from Chapter 9.

(see the answer keys)

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