A History of Europe Key Battles

As background to the Turkish National Struggle, this episode describes the events in the Caucasus Mountains in World War One, - conflict between Russia, the Ottoman Empire, the Germans, and nationalist groups of Georgians, Armenians and Azerbaijanis.

Separately I talk about Greece's involvement in World War One.

Picture: Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany and Enver Pasha, Minister of War for the Ottoman Empire

In 1920 the Polish and Soviet Russian armies clashed in a series of battles across a wide area of eastern Europe including Ukraine and Lithuania.

The Soviets advanced deep into Poland and reached the gates of Warsaw, with the aims of capturing the city and., more widely, exporting their revolution across Europe.

Picture: Polish soldiers in the Battle of Warsaw 1920

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The Polish Army make a pre-emptive strike against Soviet Russia. They invade the eastern borderlands, and take large amounts of territory, especially in Ukraine, but they fail to break the Russian army. Meanwhile, the Ukrainians attempt to form an administration in Kyiv

Picture: Vladimir Lenin rallying his people to the war

Intro Music: The Charlston

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While Western Europe's borders were settled post World War One, fighting still raged elsewhere on the continent. The most significant was the Polish Soviet War, which raised issues such as the clash of ideologies, the Soviets’ attempt to export their revolution, the future of Europe itself.

It was a conflict that spanned a large area, from Lithuania and Ukraine in the east to Warsaw in the west.

Picture: Josef Pilsudksi with soldiers

The Bolsheviks face numerous opponents across Russia, and struggle to gain control of all lands of the old Tsarist Empire.

The White anti-Bolsheviks make a plan to move on Moscow 

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Picture: By Hoodinski - Own work, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=16761719

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The Battle of Lake Peipus or 'The Battle on the Ice' was fought on 5th April 1242 between a coalition of western crusaders led by the Teutonic Knights against an army from Novgorod, Russia, led by Alexander Nevsky. The conflict was made famous by a Soviet film of 1938 directed by Sergei Eisenstein.

This is the fifth and final part of a set of episodes on the Medieval Baltic and the Northern Crusades

Livonia in the 12th century was threatened by invasion from all sides; Danes, Swedes, Germans, Poles and Russians. Key events in the episode;

1201 - Founding of Riga (capital of modern day Latvia) by Bishop Albert

1219 - Capture of Tallinn (capital of modern day Estonia) by Denmark in the legendary battle of Lyndaniss

1236 - Defeat of a military order, the Sword Brothers, by a band of Lithuanians at the Battle of Saule

A special episode where I interview Stuart E Eizenstat - an American diplomat and attorney.

Mr Einzenstat worked on Jimmy Carter's 1976 presidential campaign. After winning said campaign he became President Jimmy Carter’s Chief Domestic Policy Adviser.

Later he went on to become President Bill Clinton's Deputy Secretary of the Treasury. And he served as the United States Ambassador to the European Union from 1993 to 1996

Mr Eizenstat...

The Paris Peace consisted of a group of distinct treaties, but the main concern of the delegates was the settlement with Germany, embodied in the Treaty of Versailles signed in June 1919.

Germany’s eastern frontiers presented far greater problems. 

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Music composed by Edward Elgar, Enigma variations, Variation IX (Adagio) Nimrod

Picture - Treaty of Versailles, Big Four

Theme ...

In Spring 1918 a massive German offensive made significant territorial gains, but ultimately not the intended breakthrough, and the Allied forces stood firm. Exhausted and demoralised at the scale of casualties, the Germans were pushed back in a major counter-attack in the late Summer and Autumn. And on 26 September, the Allies launched a general offensive along the entire Western Front.

Meanwhile, the Habsburg empire was fast falli...

After the Russian withdrawal from the frontlines following the October revolution, the treaty of Brest-Litovsk is negotiated between Germany and Russia.

The Germans sought to conclude war on the Eastern Front as quickly as possible, while at the same time trying to establish an informal empire in east-central Europe, one composed of newly independent nation states on Russia’s western periphery. However, back on the German home fron...