Russian trolls

[Smitty-48]

The Russian Czar incited the Second Franco-Prussian War for Serbia in order to try to bind his base around him in the face of a rising revolt against his rule, Winston Churchill turned it into a world war when he threatened to cross the floor to the Tories in the name of a scrap of paper which didn't actually bind the British to go to war, the Germans were the victims of this circumstance, caught between two other Empires bent on irrational murder-suicide.

[Okeefenokee]

Twilight histories, before the show went to shit, did a show in an alternative timeline where Germany won, and they called it the Imperial War.

British Empire
German Empire
French Empire
Russian Empire
Austro-Hungarian Empire
Ottoman Empire
Italian Empire (lol)
Japanese Empire

What percentage of world territory fell under those powers?

I remember asking my eighth grade social studies teacher why it was called a world war when it was mostly just European nations, and she didn't have an answer. I guess the problem was, we were being taught that it was a war between nations, like we're used to today.

[Smitty-48]

It was a world war because the British were a worldwide concern, so once the British engaged, every theater in the world was added to the Continental battle space, from the Falkland Islands to Hong Kong, South Africa to North America, the British were everywhere, and so the Germans fought them there.

The British are taking the port of Jaiozhou in China from the Germans, the Germans are attacking British railway lines in Uganda, it's hard to find any theater which was not engaged somehow, it was a world war by any definition.

[Okeefenokee]

It was a world war because the British were a worldwide concern, so once the British engaged, every theater in the world was added to the Continental battle space, from the Falkland Islands to Hong Kong, South Africa to North America, the British were everywhere, and so the Germans fought them there.

The British are taking the port of Jaiozhou in China from the Germans, the Germans are attacking British railway lines in Uganda, it's hard to find any theater which was not engaged somehow, it was a world war by any definition.

Well of course I get it now, but we weren't taught that at the time.

[Speaker to Animals]

Didn't you watch The African Queen?

[Okeefenokee]

Didn't you watch The African Queen?

Nah, I missed that one.

[Smitty-48]

"First World War" is obviously a post facto revision with hindsight, the Great War didn't become the "First World War" until the 1930's, and then that became ever more prominent as the looming next war started being referred to as "World War Two", most famously on the cover of Time Magazine in 1939, once "World War Two" took hold, the "First World War" started to become "World War One".

[Okeefenokee]

I think we're all up to speed on that point.

I just like the ring of, "The Imperial War."

Anyone else got any examples of so many empires going to war at once?

Maybe Napoleon, maybe.

[Smitty-48]

Veterans of the Great War in my regiment just called it "The War" and they assumed you knew what they meant, one kid asked "World War One or World War Two?" and they just acted like "What do you mean?" like World War II was just an afterthought for them.

[Smitty-48]

It was funny to see guys from the First World War giving the gears to the guys from the Second World War, like the guys from the Second World War were just punk asses "you lot had it easy" and whatnot, and the guys from the Second World War just rolled their eyes "oh here we go again..."

When you got those guys back into the regimental environment, in the Mess, all of a sudden it was like they were all 19 again, the chirping and ball busting was non stop, they'd even start to pick fights but that wasn't allowed to go very far.