re: Which country’s military do you consider to have won WWI?

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There was no winner, it was a cease fire. The Treaty of Versailles was a "sign here and take blame" document rather than a "peace treaty". Obviously, this helped lead into WWII.

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Idk if you read the terms of the Versailles Treaty but that definitely wasn’t a cease fire, that was as complete of a victory as you could want in war. Toppled the enemy’s government, made their military completely disband, take away any land titles they have. That was a total victory and they were harder on the German people after WWI than after WWII.

You take away either France or Russia and central powers win.

Russia before they bowed out kept Germans in the east. France not crumbling never allowed Germany to run back western forces to the east. And by the time they were able to move troops east to west it was too late.

Well, France should at least get points for hosting.

There was no one single military who can lay claim to having “won” the war. The truth of the matter is it was very much a group effort that no one Allied power could have done alone.

France would have collapsed in 1914 without Great Britain’s aid and Russia tying down German armies in the East. And even with British help in 1917 France came within a whisker of complete collapse when huge portions of its army broke down in full Munity. So while the French suffered terribly, they never could have even survived, much less won, the war alone.

Great Britain didn’t even have a proper field army until almost a year into the war. And even then they never had the strength break the Germans all on their own, even with their naval blockade of German ports. So while Great Britian played arguably the most pivotal role in the war as whole, they could have never won it alone.

Russia suffered huge losses, although scoring some notible sucessss, especially against Austria-Hungary. But the fact still remains the Russian Empire was destroyed by WWI and fell in revolution, forcing Russia to sue for peace as it was plunged into its own internal civil war. So seeing how Russia was destroyed before the war even ended, they can’t say they won, or even survived, the war.

Italy played the important role of tying down German and Austrian forces along the Isonzo Front. But just as France needed help to keep from total collapse, so too Italy also had to have help from both France and Great Britian to keep her in the war. So really Italy, even more than France required help just to survive the war.

The United States came in late and helped deliver the death blow. But this was only after the Germans had already been bled white for three long years. And let’s not forget that almost all the artillery, tanks, and aircraft used by American Forces, not to mention a lot of training, came from the British and French Forces. So while the US all but financed the allied effort throughout the war and her armies helped deliver the killing blow. The US can’t take credit as having won the war on its own due it the fact that without French or British heavy weapons, the American Army in France would have been little more than a mob armed with little more than their bolt action rifles and a few shotguns.

So, if you put all the facts of WWI together, the only logical conclusion is to say is that no one allied power can say their army (or navy) alone “won” the war. They all both assisted and required assistance from the other allied powers. None could have done it alone.

Whats funny is Prussia went much easier on France after the Napoleonic Wars. France was still mad over 1870.