222 i PERIOD 6 Accelerating Global Change and Realignments (c. 1900 to the present)
Other Outcomes of World War I
Because of World War I:- An entire generation of young European men was almost wiped out.
- Italy and Japan were angered at not receiving additional territory.
- The Ottoman Empire was reduced to the area of present-day Turkey.
- China lost territory to Japan and became a virtual Japanese protectorate.
- The Austro-Hungarian Empire was dissolved.
- The new nations of Yugoslavia, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia were formed from Aus-
tria-Hungary. All three nations contained within their borders a variety of ethnic groups
with their own nationalist aspirations. - Russia lost territory to Romania and Poland. Finland, Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania
gained their independence. - Poland was restored to the European map. A Polish Corridor was created to give Poland
an outlet to the Baltic Sea. - The Ottoman Empire was divided into mandates with Great Britain controlling Iraq
and Pakistan, and France acquiring Syria and Lebanon.
The Great Depression
The cost of war in Europe devastated the economies of European nations on both sides of
the confl ict. When Germany announced it was unable to make its reparations payments
to the former Allies, Great Britain and France were unable to fully honor repayment of
their war debts to the United States. The agricultural sector in Europe and the United
States suffered from overproduction that resulted in a decline in farm prices. Farmers in
Western Europe and the United States borrowed to purchase expensive farm equipment.
Overproduction also resulted in lower prices on plantation-grown crops in Africa and Latin
America.
As the economic situation in Europe worsened, banks began to fail. In 1929, when the
economy and banking systems in the United States also crashed, the United States was unable
to continue its loans to European nations. Global trade diminished, creating massive unem-
ployment not only in Europe and the United States but also in Japan and Latin America.
The economic distress of the Great Depression created various reactions in the politi-
cal arena. In the West, new social welfare programs broadened the role of government.
In Italy and Germany, fascist governments developed. Japan’s search for new markets was
accompanied by increased imperial expansion.World War II
Prelude to War
The fragmented political order that was the legacy of World War I combined with the eco-
nomic distress of the Great Depression created the second global confl ict of the twentieth
century. Fascist governments (nationalist, one-party authoritarian regimes) arose in Ger-
many and Italy. The Nationalist Socialist (Nazi) Party of Adolf Hitler sought to redress the
humiliation Germany had suffered in the Treaty of Versailles and to expand German terri-