1918 - Political Events

Political Events

The Fourteen Points for a just and generous peace outlined by President Wilson January 8 in a message to Congress are intended to counter the Russian Bolsheviks, who have released secret agreements revealing Allied plans to carve up the German Empire. Wilson calls for "open covenants openly arrived at" and for self-determination of government by Europe's peoples; he asks for the creation of a League of Nations to mediate future international disputes and preserve the peace, but he has failed to obtain advance Allied agreement to his proposals, which do receive support from Canada's Prime Minister Borden (Canada has recruited some 500,000 volunteers for overseas service but since last year has used conscripts to keep her forces at full strength, despite opposition from nationalist Henri Bourassa).

Gen. William R. Robertson resigns as chief of the British Imperial General Staff in February and is given a command in England, having failed to make peace with Prime Minister Lloyd George (see 1916).

Nobel jurist-educator Louis Renault dies at Barbizon February 8 at age 74; Renault's fellow 1907 Nobel Peace Prize recipient Ernesto T. Moneta at his native Milan February 10 at age 84, having worked for years in behalf of international peace before becoming an advocate of Italian military expeditions.

The Russo-German peace talks that began in December at Brest-Litovsk break down in February when the Russians balk at signing a treaty. The British have released diplomat Georgy Vasilyevich Chicherin, 45, January 3 in exchange for their ambassador Sir George Buchanan, and he works to make peace with the Germans, but Gen. Max Hoffmann denounces the armistice between the two countries February 16 and launches a massive offensive against the Russians February 18, forcing the Bolshevik government to come to terms March 1. The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk signed March 3 ends Russian participation in the "capitalist-imperialist" war despite opposition from Left Communists (including Inessa Armand) to the capitulation. Armand, now 42, has shared living quarters at Paris and Kraków with V. I. Lenin and his wife, Nadezhda Krupskaya. Commissar for Foreign Affairs Leon Trotsky has negotiated the treaty, which provides for an abandonment of all Russian claims to Poland, Lithuania, Finland, the Baltic provinces, and the Ukraine, turning over much of Armenia to the Ottoman Turks (who come under attack from Armenian forces). Admiral Aleksandr Kolchak mounts a coup d'état in Siberia, makes himself supreme ruler, but will soon antagonize elements in the government and members of the Czechoslovak Legion that controls the Trans-Siberian Railroad (see 1919).

The Lafayette Escadrille of 1916 becomes the U.S. Pursuit Squadron February 18. The 94th Pursuit Squadron founded in March under the command of French-born pilot Raoul Lufbury, 32, includes Ohio-born pilot Edward Vernon "Eddie" Rickenbacker, 27, whose favorite plane is a Nieuport 28.

Turkish troops under the command of Gen. Otto Liman van Sanders hold up the British advance in Syria and Palestine in March, but the British force the 4th, 7th, and 8th Turkish armies to withdraw to Aleppo.

German forces launch a major offensive on the Western Front from March 21 to April 5, gaining ground against French and British armies depleted of able fighting men and almost devoid of reserves. A shell from the German cannon Big Bertha hits the Church of St. Gervais in Paris on Good Friday, leaving 156 dead and injured, but the tide of war has turned with the entry of U.S. troops.

Britain's Royal Air Force (RAF) is created April 1 through an amalgamation of the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air Service under the leadership of men who include primarily Gen. Hugh Montague Trenchard, 45, who has become chief of the Air Council formed in January. Frederick Handley Page has produced the world's first twin-engine bomber at his 8-year-old aircraft works, and it can carry an 1,800-pound bomb load. But the war will end before his new V-1500 four-engine bomber can be used (it is designed to reach Berlin with three tons of bombs).

German air ace Baron Manfred von Richthofen leads the "Flying Circus" that downs dozens of Allied aircraft but he is shot in the heart April 21 over enemy territory near St. Quentin while flying his red Fokker Albatros triplane in pursuit of an inexperienced British pilot, brought down with a bullet fired either by Ottawa-born RAF ace A. (Arthur) Roy Brown, 24, flying a Sopwith Camel or—perhaps more likely—by Australian gunners on the ground. Not quite 26 at his death, the "Red Baron" is credited with 80 confirmed kills (21 of them in the red Fokker triplane), a record that will stand for more than 25 years; the RAF retrieves his body and buries it with full military honors.

Raoul Lufbury is killed in action May 7. French pilot René (Paul) Fonck, 24, of "Les Cigones" Groupe de Combat No. 12 shoots down six German fighter planes in 45 seconds May 9.

Russian Army commander in chief Gen. L. G. Kornilov leads a makeshift army in a counter-revolutionary attack on Yekaterinodar but is mortally wounded and dies April 13 at age 47.

A White Army in Finland under the command of soldier-statesman Carl Gustaf (Emil) Mannerheim, 51, and Prime Minister Svinhufvud wins the Battle of Tampere in April. German troops arrive to support Mannerheim and drive the Reds out of Helsinki, and a rebellion that started in January is suppressed by May (see 1917). Finnish Bolsheviks seized Helsinki January 28, forcing the right-wing government of Pehr Evind Svinhufvud to flee to the western part of the country, and assumed control also of the larger industrial towns, although fully 70 percent of Finns are employed in agriculture and forestry. Revolutionist Georgi V. Plekhanov dies in Finland May 30 at age 61, having favored the Mensheviks and opposed Lenin's Bolsheviks. Some 20,000 Finnish revolutionaries are either executed or die in prison camps by fall, and the total death toll exceeds 30,000. Royalists decide to make Finland a monarchy and select the German prince Frederick Charles of Hesse as king in October, with Mannerheim as regent, but Germany's defeat in November will make it clear that Finland will become a republic (see 1919).

An armed gang led by Russian communist Stepan Shaumiyan massacres the Azeri population of Baku March 30 with help from Armenian Dashnak groups, killing as many as 10,000 people by some accounts. Nikolai S. Chkheidze heads an independent Transcaucasian Federal Republic created in April, the republic dissolves in May, and Chkheidze helps to organize an independent republic of Georgia (see 1921). Azerbaijan proclaims herself an independent state May 28—the first democratic republic in the Middle East; Armenia's national council declares Armenian independence the same day as her troops drive back the Turks; Azerbaijan's leaders order their forces to leave the Armenian capital of Erivan May 29, Armenian forces then attack three Azer provinces, and the Azers ask protection from the Ottoman government, whose diplomats sign a peace treaty with Armenia June 4 afer Turkish forces have taken heavy casualties. Combined Ottoman and Azeri forces begin an attack from Ganja and march into Baku September 15, killing as many as 30,000 Armenians; British forces capture Stepan Shaumiyan and 26 of his followers as they try to reach Russian lines and take them to Turkmenistan, where they are executed for crimes against humanity. London recognizes the new Azeri government by December and allows the Azerbaijan Army to remain in Baku (see 1919). Hostilities begin December 13 between Armenia and Georgia but end December 31 with British intervention.

The Central Powers force Romania to return southern Dobruja to Bulgaria under terms of the Treaty of Bucharest. Signed May 7, it also obliges Romania to give Austria-Hungary control of the Carpathian Mountain passes and give Germany a 90-year lease on her oil wells, but the pact will be nullified when the Central Powers collapse in November (see 1919).

Royal Navy ships raid the German U-boat base at Zeebrugge, Belgium, on the night of April 23 in an operation directed by Commodore Roger J. B. Keyes that helps to close the Strait of Dover to enemy submarines. Appointed director of plans at the Admiralty last year, Keyes sent a volunteer crew to Ostend aboard H.M.S. Vindictive, which was sunk at the entrance to the harbor to discourage U-boat operations in the Channel.

British authorities at Dublin rearrest Countess Markievicz May 18, take her to London, and imprison her in Holloway Gaol, where she is soon joined by Mrs. John McBride (actress Maud Gonne, whose late husband, John, was executed for treason in 1916) and Mrs. Thomas J. Clarke (Kathleen Daly, whose husband and brothers have been murdered). All are suspected of involvement in a German plot (see 1917; 1919).

The Sedition Act adopted by Congress May 16 amends last year's Espionage Act and makes it illegal willfully to "utter, print, write, or publish any disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive language about the form of government of the United States, or the Constitution of the United States, or the military or naval forces of the United States . . . or advocate, teach, defend, or suggest the doing of any of the acts or things in this section enumerated."

Four-time Socialist candidate for president Eugene V. Debs delivers an academic speech at Canton, Ohio, June 16 analyzing the economic consequences of war; now 62, he is arrested and tried in a federal court at Cleveland, acts as his own lawyer, is convicted, makes an eloquent statement to the jury, but is sentenced to 10 years' imprisonment and disenfranchised for life, losing his citizenship.

The U.S. 2nd and 3rd Divisions stop a German offensive in early June with support from some disorganized French units under the command of Gen. Denis Duchene. Newly arrived U.S. Marines capture Belleau Wood north of Château-Thierry June 6 and hold a small scrub forest, less than one square mile in size, through 19 days of repeated German attempts to dislodge them. Machine gunners of the U.S. 3rd Division under the command of Gen. J. T. Dickman stop Gen. Max von Bohn, whose forces are then driven back across the Marne after 1,600 of them have been taken prisoner. The engagement 50 miles east of Paris has left 1,811 Allied dead, but the success of the aggressive Americans reinvigorates Allied spirits.

Gen. Hugh Trenchard organizes intensive strategic bombing attacks in June on German airfields, industrial centers, and railways, using two Royal Air Force (RAF) squadrons as part of the Independent Air Force based near Nancy, France.

British, French, and U.S. troops land at Murmansk with Bolshevik permission June 23 to begin Allied intervention in northern Russia. The Allied Supreme War Council voices support for intervention in Siberia July 2.

The Second Battle of the Marne begins July 15 on a line extending between Chalons in the east to Soissons in the west. Four German armies attack the Allied lines in what Gen. Ludendorff calls a Friedensturm, suggesting that it will produce a decisive victory and bring peace. Ludendorff's object is to isolate Reims, but the French throw five armies into a strategic counter-offensive, receive strong support from U.S., British, and Italian units, and have 746 tanks, whereas the Germans have only a small number of tanks, including some captured British vehicles.

A German gunner shoots down Winnipeg-born Royal Air Force fighter pilot William S. (Samuel) Stephenson, 22, July 18, and capture him after he has shot down 12 enemy planes. Formerly a sergeant in the Canadian engineers, he was badly wounded in a gas attack 2 years ago and last year transferred to the Royal Flying Corps (see 1940). René Fonck repeats his May 9 feat September 26 and by war's end will claim to have shot down 127 enemy planes (he will be credited with 71). Richthofen's "Flying Circus" scores 644 victories by war's end, having lost only 52 of its own planes, and 81 German airmen will have been awarded the Blue Max.

France's Senate tries former minister of the interior Louis-Jean Malvy on charges of laxity and high treason (see 1917). The trial has been held at Malvy's request, the Senate sits as a high court, and although it acquits him of high treason August 6, it finds Malvy guilty of forfaiture (culpable negligence) and sentences him to 5 years' banishment (he moves to Spain, will be pardoned, and will return to the Chamber of Deputies in 1924).

Russia's royal Romanov family is shot to death July 16 at Yekaterinburg by order of the Bolsheviks, 4 days after other members of the Russian nobility have been assassinated elsewhere. Nicholas II, the czarina Aleksandra, their daughters Olga, Tatiana, Marie, and Anastasia, their son Alexis, Prince Dolgorolkoff, their physician, a nurse, and a lady in waiting are all put to death July 16 or within a few weeks of that date, but rumors will persist that one or more of the daughters has somehow been spared.

German and Austrian expeditionary forces move into the Ukraine to clear out the Bolsheviks, French troops land at Russian Black Sea ports, Britain announces support July 31 of a Central Caspian Dictatorship to thwart any Turkish or Azeri advances, British and French forces seize Archangel August 2 to support a puppet government in northern Russia, and 7,000 U.S. troops occupy the Russian Pacific port of Vladivostok August 3, partly to prevent Japanese expansion in Siberia. Some 3,000 Canadian troops are also sent to Vladivostok in hopes of obtaining eventual trade concessions, but public opinion at home forces their recall. British forces enter Baku August 4.

The Second Battle of the Marne ends August 7 after more than 3 weeks of heavy combat. Having achieved numerical superiority on the Western Front by reassigning men from the Eastern Front, the Germans now lose that superiority and are forced to retreat after both sides have sustained staggeringly heavy casualties. Ludendorff's failure plunges the Germans into despair.

The British attack with 450 tanks at the Battle of Amiens from August 8 to 11. Gen. Sir Henry Rawlinson's 4th Army includes the Australian and Canadian Corps with a total of 13 divisions, the Cavalry Corps with three divisions, and the Tank Corps with 324 Mk V tanks, 96 Whippet tanks, 42 tanks in reserve, and 22 supply tanks. Two French divisions under the command of Gen. M. Eugene Debeney mount a diversionary operation on Rawlinson's right flank, German forces under the command of Gen. Georg von der Marwitz and Gen. Oskar von Hutier are taken by surprise, the Allies penetrate to a depth of seven and a half miles, and although German gunfire knocks out 109 tanks the first day, the Germans have lost more than 75,000 men (including nearly 30,000 prisoners) by August 11. British losses total 22,000 killed, wounded, and missing, French losses 24,232 (up to August 15). The Germans are forced to fall back to the Hindenburg Line after British and French offensives in September.

Russian terrorist Fanya Kaplan (née Feiga Efimovna Roidman), 28, shoots at the Bolshevik leader V. I. Lenin August 30 and says she did it because he betrayed the Revolution in making peace with Germany; she is executed soon thereafter despite Lenin's opposition. "A revolutionist executed in a revolutionary country! Never," Lenin's wife, Nadezhda Krupskaya, has said.

Australian statesman-explorer Sir John Forrest is raised to the peerage as Baron Forrest of Bunbury (the first Australian-born peer) but dies at sea September 3 at age 71, leaving no male survivor.

U.S. forces land at Archangel September 4, but Azerbaijani and Turkish troops drive the British out of Baku September 15.

Six Sopworth Camels take off from the Royal Navy's aircraft carrier H.M.S. Furious in July and attack Zeppelin sheds in the world's first carrier strike (see 1917). Furious has been modified to give her a full-length flight deck (see U.S., 1921).

The Royal Navy's H.M.S. Argus completed in September is the world's first aircraft carrier; begun in 1914 as the Italian ocean liner Conte Rosso, she was purchased by the Royal Navy in 1916, has an unobstructed, 560-foot flight deck that can accommodate 20 planes, can reach a speed of 20.2 knots, and is armed with six four-inch guns.

The U.S. Navy commissions its first aircraft carrier (see 1912; Langley, 1921).

Gen. Pershing launches his first major offensive in mid-September at Saint-Mihiel and forces the Germans to give up salients they have held since 1914. German casualties total 5,000 dead or wounded, Pershing's 1st Army (seven U.S. and four French divisions) loses 7,000 men, the Americans take 15,000 prisoners, and the Allies push north and east in the battles of the Argonne Forest and Ypres from late September to mid-October.

Eddie Rickenbacker engages seven German planes in a dogfight September 25; he will win the Congressional Medal of Honor for his performance in the encounter, and by war's end his combined balloon and aircraft kills will total 26.

Britain's 3rd Army under Gen. Sir Julian Byng breaks the Hindenburg Line September 27.

Phoenix, Ariz.-born U.S. Air Service second lieutenant Frank Luke, Jr., 21, takes off in his Spad September 29 in defiance of his commanding officer, who has grounded him. Luke has shot down 16 enemy balloons and planes, 10 German Fokkers have gone up expressly to seek him out, he downs two of the Fokkers before a ground-fired antiaircraft shell fragment hits him in the shoulder, he goes down behind enemy lines near Murvaux, empties his pistol at approaching soldiers, and is mortally wounded 17 days after he first went into combat. Canadian ace William Avery "Billy" Bishop, 24, continues an outstanding career and will be credited by November with having shot down 72 enemy planes.

German chancellor Georg von Hertling, now 75, resigns September 29 as British forces advance on the Western Front.

Bulgaria signs an armistice September 29 following defeat of her forces at Dobropole in Macedonia. Ferdinand I abdicates under pressure October 4 at age 57 after a 32-year reign and leaves Sofia; he is succeeded by his 11-year-old son, who will reign until 1943 as Boris I. Politician Aleksandr Stamboliski, 40, opposed Bulgaria's entry into the war and was imprisoned from 1915 to 1918, but he now becomes premier (see Treaty of Neuilly, 1920).

Kaiser Wilhelm appoints Prince Maximilian of Baden, 51, chancellor October 3 in hopes that someone with a humanitarian reputation can bring hostilities to an end. The prince demands a few days' wait before making peace overtures lest it appear that Germany is admitting to imminent collapse. He is overruled by military authorities, and a note is sent to President Wilson the night of October 3 requesting an armistice and negotiations based on Wilson's 14 Points. Washington responds October 8 that Germany must first agree to negotiate on the sole question of ways to put Wilson's principles into practice and withdraw her forces from Allied soil. Berlin accepts these requirements in a note sent October 12 and suggests a mixed commission to arrange the evacuation. Washington responds October 14 with a note alluding to Germany's "illegal and inhuman" methods of warfare and demanding that the conditions of the armistice and the evacuation be determined unilaterally, that the "arbitrary power" of the German regime be removed, and that negotiations be conducted by a government that represents the German people.

Allied troops rescue the "Lost Battalion" in the Argonne Forest October 7. Commanded by Wisconsin-born New York lawyer Maj. Charles W. (White) Whittlesey, 34, and made up mostly of volunteers and enlistees from the streets of New York, the 308th Battalion of the U.S. 77th Division crashed through the German line with about 800 men October 1 but was soon isolated and surrounded. By October 2 it numbered only 463 men, well-supplied German troops have kept it under almost constant machine-gun and mortar fire, its only means of communication has been homing pigeons, its position has come under "friendly fire" from Allied artillery, rations and water have been reduced almost to nothing, ammunition is low, but Whittlesey has refused a German demand that he surrender. Only 194 survivors of the battalion are able to walk, Maj. Whittlesey is promoted to lieutenant colonel and awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, but he will commit suicide in November 1921, jumping overboard from a United Fruit Co. ship bound for Havana.

The Ottoman grand vizier Mahmed Talat resigns October 14, Constantinople signs an armistice at Mudros October 30 and withdraws from the war, Gen. Sir William Marshall accepts the surrender of the Turkish army at Mosul that day, and British authorities banish the former Ottoman grand vizier Said Halim to Malta. Russia returns Kars to the Turks after 63 years of efforts to make the Turkish city Russian, but British forces have occupied Baghdad and Basra throughout the war and beginning in November occupy Mosul and the Kurdish cities of Kirkum and Suleymaniya, violating the Mudros Treaty with the Ottoman Turks (see 1920).

Mutiny breaks out in the German fleet at the Kiel naval base October 28 and spreads quickly to Hamburg, Bremen, Lübeck, and all of northwestern Germany. The imperial government commissions Reichstag member Gustav Noske, 50, to restore order.

The Czechoslovak National Council at Paris issues a declaration of independence October 28, having organized a provisional government October 14 with Thomas Garrigue Masaryk, 68, as president and Eduard Benes, 34, as foreign minister.

An independent Austrian state is proclaimed October 30 with a State Council (Staatsrat) made up of leaders of the three chief parties and other elected members. More than 200 German members of Austria's imperial parliament (Reichsrat) have formed themselves into a national assembly for German-Austria (Deutschösterreich) October 21, and radical uprisings at Vienna impel the State Council toward making Austria a republic.

Assassins kill Hungary's premier Count Stephen Tisza at his house in Buda October 31 at age 57 for having supported Germany as revolution breaks out in his country; the Hapsburg emperor Karl I appoints Count Mihály Károlyi, 43, premier and recognizes Hungary as a separate country with a separate army. The emperor is forced to renounce participation in the government of Austria November 11 and of Hungary November 13 (he ascended the throne in 1916 at the death of Franz Josef); Austria's national assembly resolves unanimously November 12 that "German-Austria is a democratic republic." A Hungarian republic is proclaimed November 16 with its premier Count Mihály Károlyi to take office as president in January. The Austrian national assembly defines the republic's territory November 22, claiming all the Hapsburg lands in which Germans comprised a majority (see 1919).

The 10-day Battle of Vittorio Veneto ends November 3 with a victory for Italian forces under the command of Gen. Armando Diaz over Austrian forces, whose Gen. Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf is stripped of his command and recalled to Vienna (now nearly 66, he soon retires). Diaz stabilized the army after last year's devastating defeat at Caporetto and has repelled a strong Austrian offensive in June, but the Italians have accomplished little in the war despite the loss of 250,000 troops on a 60-mile front along the Isonzo River.

A Polish republic is proclaimed November 3 at Warsaw. Poland regains independence November 11, having been partitioned for 120 years between Austria, Prussia, and Russia; she quickly comes under the control of Gen. Josef Pilsudski, who was imprisoned by the Germans in 1916 when his troops refused to join the Central Powers against the Allies but who has been released after the collapse of the Central Powers.

Revolution breaks out November 7 at Munich. Independent Social Democratic Party leader Kurt Eisner, 52, dethrones Bavaria's last Wittelsbach duke Ludwig III and declares Bavaria a republic November 8; Eisner was convicted of treason earlier in the year for inciting munition workers to strike but has been released from prison (see 1919). Prince Maximilian von Baden resigns November 9 in favor of Heidelberg-born Social Democratic Party leader Friedrich Ebert, 47, who accepts the imperial chancellorship, Baden announces the abdication of Kaiser Wilhelm, and Social Democrat Philipp Scheidemann proclaims all of Germany to be a republic November 9. U.S. strength in France has risen to 42 divisions, the British prepare to bomb Berlin from the air, Germany is exhausted, and hostilities on the Western Front cease at 11 o'clock in the morning of November 11 under terms of an armistice signed by a German deputation (headed by Reichstag leader Matthias Erzberger, 43) with Allied representatives 6 hours earlier in the railway car of Marshal Foch at Compiègne outside Paris. Germany is required to evacuate Belgium, France, Alsace-Lorraine, and all the rest of the west bank of the Rhine, neutralize the east bank between the Netherlands and Switzerland, withdraw to the prewar frontier in the East, annul the treaties of Brest-Litovsk and Bucharest, repatriate all prisoners of war, order her troops in East Africa to surrender, turn over 5,000 artillery pieces, 25,000 machine guns, 1,700 aircraft, 5,000 locomotives, and 150,000 railroad cars, but the Germans obtain some easing of these terms by citing the danger of Bolshevism as private paramilitary groups (Freikorps) enlist ex-soldiers, unemployed youths, and other malcontents under the leadership of former officers and noncoms.

Berlin-born National Liberal Party leader Gustav Stresemann, 40, founds the German People's Party (Deutsche Volkspartei, or DVP) November 18. A patriot who 2 years ago supported unrestricted submarine warfare against Allied shipping, he has by some accounts become disillusioned with an imperial government dedicated to military force and recognized that the only sensible course is to cultivate political and commercial relationships with the other world powers; by other accounts he remains opposed to a republican form of government and accepts the theory that Germany would have won the war had she not been "stabbed in the back" by cowardly civilian politicians. The entire German High Fleet steams in single file into Scotland's Scapa Flow November 21 and surrenders to Admiral Beatty, turning over 90 ships plus 87 U-boats (see Washington Naval Conference, 1921). A new German republican government takes power in December under a six-member ruling council; it commissions political theorist-legal expert Hugo Preuss, now 58, to draft a national constitution (see 1919).

The Great War has killed 1.8 million Germans, nearly 2 million Russians (the Russians will lose more than three times that many in their civil war over the next few years), 1.4 million French, 1.2 million Austrians and Hungarians, between 750,000 and 950,000 British, 460,000 Italians, 325,000 Turks, and 115,000 Americans. Some 20 million have been blinded, maimed, mutilated, crippled, permanently shell-shocked, or otherwise disabled. More than 1 million Indian troops have gone overseas to fight or serve as noncombatants behind Allied lines on every major front, and they have sustained over 100,000 casualties, including 36,000 dead.

Nearly all of the war has been fought on French soil, and it has left one in every 28 French citizens dead; gassed and dismembered corpses swing from barbed wire that stretches along thousands of miles of trenches, 1,039 villages have been completely destroyed, and only half the buildings remain standing at Reims, Soissons, Verdun, Ypres, and more than 1,200 other cities that have suffered persistent shelling.

The Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes is proclaimed December 4 under the regency of Serbia's Prince Aleksandr Garageorgevic, 30, who will become Yugoslavia's Aleksandr I in 1921. A Congress of Oppressed Nationalities, most of them ruled by the Hapsburgs, has been held at Rome in April, and Italy has recognized the unity and independence of a new Yugoslav nation organized in 1917 (see 1919).

French forces occupy Odessa December 18 and will remain until April of next year. British forces land at Batumi on the eastern shore of the Black Sea near the Turkish border.

A pamphlet entitled "The League of Nations: A Practical Suggestion" by South African statesman Jan Christiaan Smuts appears in December with recommendations for a lenient peace. Now 48, Smuts accepted a commission as lieutenant general in the British Army in 1916 and will play a significant role at the Versailles Peace Conference (see 1919).

Egyptian nationalist Sa'd Zaghlul leads a three-man delegation to meet with the British high commissioner Sir Reginald Wingate November 13 (see 1914; Zaghlul, 1913). Zaghlul has spent the war years forming activist groups to agitate for eventual independence; he and his colleagues advise Wingate that they regard themselves as the true representatives of the people and demand a treaty of alliance in place of the protectorate that has existed since late in 1914. Wingate refuses their demand that they be allowed to proceed to London to negotiate such a treaty, and disorder break out across the country (see 1919).

Chinese soldier Chang Tso-lin, 45, is appointed inspector general of Manchuria's three provinces. He will control Manchuria as a virtually autonomous state within the Chinese republic and in 2 years will begin trying to expand his power southward into North China, making himself a warlord who threatens the unity of the republic (see 1924).

Former Japanese home minister Takashi Hara, 62, becomes prime minister September 29, having built his Friends of Constitutional Government Party (Rikken Seiyukai) into an American-style political party, gaining popular support by dispensing patronage and promoting regional economic development. Hara will try to reduce the power of the military and enlarge the electorate by lowering property qualifications to include small landowners, and although he will balk at extending universal male suffrage, his Seiyukai machine will hold power for nearly 20 years (but see 1921).

Hailed as a U.S. war hero is Tennessee doughboy Alvin C. (Cullum) York, 30, whose draft board denied his petition for exemption as a conscientious objector. In the battle of the Argonne Forest October 8, Private York of the 82nd Infantry Division led an attack on a German machine gun nest that killed 25 of the enemy and he then almost singlehandedly captured 132 prisoners and 35 machine guns. Promoted to sergeant November 1, York will be awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor and French Croix de Guerre.

Haiti gets a constitution that permits foreigners to own land (see 1915); an election is held under U.S. Marine Corps supervision, and the Marines revive an old law dating to the reign of Henri Christophe permitting them to use forced labor on the roads. The Marines will occupy the Caribbean nation until 1934.

Former U.S. vice president and Republican stalwart Charles W. Fairbanks dies at Indianapolis June 4 at age 66; former ambassador to Britain Walter Hines Page at his native Cary, N.C., December 21 at age 63.