This article explains the fact that World War I was a global war that took place from the years 1914 to 1918. It began after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria-Hungary in the year of 1914 which eventually ended up causing a chain reaction of the alliance systems in place across Europe. THese alliances divided the country into two different groups, the Allies (Britain, France, Russia) and the Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, the Ottoman Empire). The article talks about the fact that the qar quickly spread beyond Europe, becoming a world war. It talks about the use of new military technology and the dangers that come with them, new military technology including machine guns, artillery, tanks, and otehr chemical weapons. This new technology caused a lot of casualties. A lot of the war was involving trenches, causing long stalemates in the war where soldiers had to live in cruel and dangerous environments for extended periods of time.
This relates to the poem They because it explains a lot of the mechanics behind the psychological aspects of war that Seigfried Sassoon mentioned. The article talks about a lot of the brutal fighting and the trench stalemates during World War I which explains more about why Sassoon was so critical about the war. In the poem, Sassoon talkeda lot about how the soldiers physically and metnally suffured during the way and questioned the people who supported it and saw the value in it.
British 39th Siege Battery RGA Somme 1916 by John Warwick Brooke is licensed under Public Domain.
Sassoon, Seigfried. “They.” Poetry Foundation, Poetry Foundation,
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/siegfried-sassoon
“World War I.” New World Encyclopedia, https://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/World_War_I