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The End of Hostilities
After four grueling years of stagnant trench warfare, characterized by many technological innovations that contributed to the brutal nature of the battlefield, an armistice ended hostilities on November 11, 1918. The peace settlement negotiated in Versailles, France, imposed harsh terms on the Central Powers, dismantling their empires into many newly created nations, and requiring them to pay crippling reparations to the Allies. German humiliation and bitterness over the terms of the Treaty of Versailles in part contributed to the rise of Nazism and World War II twenty years later.
World War I dramatically refashioned the map of Europe and the Middle East, laying the foundation for later conflicts, including World War II, the Cold War, and recent clashes in the Middle East. The First World War spawned numerous revolutions, the most significant in Russia in 1917, leading to the creation of the Soviet Union. |