Karl Marx' Life and Legacy (China, Germany, Russia, Vietnam)

Karl Marx was born in Trier on the 5th May 1818 as the third of nine children of his parents. His parents were Jews, but converted to the Protestantism, as the father would otherwise have occupational problems. Between 1830 and 1835 he attended a Gymnasium in Trier, before he began his studies in Bonn and Berlin. Although actually studying law, he also often attended historical and philosophical lectures. During his studies he came in contact with the Young Hegelians, who were especially known for their critique of the Prussian political system and who expected more political change as part of a historical process. In 1841 a philosophical doctorate was conferred on Marx by the University of Jena. Actually he hoped to start an academic career, but due to his work with the Young Hegelians the Prussian state prevented this. Instead he began to work as editor for the oppositional Rheinische Zeitung, but had to stop this work as well due to the Prussian censorship.

In 1843 he married Jenny von Westphalen and together they moved to Paris, where Marx again worked as editor for a newspaper. In Paris he also began to proceed to the Communism and his life-long friendship with Friedrich Engels began. Due to Prussian pressure Marx had to leave Paris in 1845 and settled in Brussels. In 1846 Marx and Engels founded the Communist Correspondence Committee, which planned the cooperation of various Communist groups in Europa and which was merged with another organisation to form the Communist League in 1847. In the revolutionary year 1848 Marx and Engels published the famous Communist Manifesto for the league, which summarises Marx and Engels' theories concerning the nature of society and politics. During the revolutions Marx moved from Brussels to Paris, onwards to Cologne, back to Paris and finally to his exile in London, where he worked as journalist and where he stayed until the end of his life. In London he created A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (1859) and Das Kapital (1867-1883) and contributed to the foundation of the First International in 1864. In his last he was often sick, but still was in contact to many leading Communists and Labour Leader in America and Europa also after the First International was dissolved in 1876. On 2nd December 1881 Jenny Marx died and on 14th March 1883 her husband followed her in the grave.

Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels were the most important figures of the Communism and thus they had a tremendous influence on the history of the 20th century especially in China and the Eastern Bloc. He has often been described as one of the most influential figures in human history, although his work has been both lauded and criticised.

Around the World there were and still are many Marx memorial sites. In Eastern Germany for example the city of Chemnitz was known as Karl-Marx-Stadt and there were many memorials for Marx including the famous ones in Berlin and Chemnitz. To commemorate Marx' 200th birthday in 2018 the People's Republic of China sponsored a new Marx memorial for Trier, which was even shown on a Chinese stamp.

Other Marx stamps in 2018 were also issued in Germany, Kyrgyzstan, Russia and Vietnam. Interestingly the German stamp of 2018 is already the second stamp of the Federal Republic after one issued during the heyday of the Cold War in 1968.

Music and Culture in Salzburg (Austria)

The Prince-Archbishopric of Salzburg was an ecclesiastical principality and state of the Holy Roman Empire, which comprised the secular territory ruled by the archbishops of Salzburg. The Diocese of Salzburg was already founded on Bavarian territory in the 8th century, but it needed until the 13th century to gain political autonomy. Around 1600 Salzburg was one of the richest German States. Its autonomy Salzburg was able to maintain until the chaotic times at the beginning of the 19th century. In 1803 Salzburg was secularised and became an electorate under the former Grand Duke of Tuscany. In 1805 it became a part of Austria and in 1809 it became a part of Bavaria, before it ultimately lost its autonomy after the Congress of Vienna. Since then is Salzburg a part of Austria. Today it forms one of the nine states of Austria.

Especially the City of Salzburg, as capital of the Prince-Archbishopric, became an important cultural centre under the archbishops. It was the point where the Italian and German cultures met and which played a crucial role in the exchanges between these two cultures. In 1996 the Historic Centre of the City of Salzburg was one of the first two Austrian sites to be added to the UNESCO World Heritage List.

In 1756 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was born in Salzburg. One of the most famous Austrians was thus not a real Austrian but a Salzburgian. Together with his older sister Maria Anna "Nannerl" Mozart he got music lessons from their father very early and soon he was considered to be a musical child genius, who later went on to become one of the most influential composers of the Classical era. In his childhood he made many voyages in Europa, but used to live in Salzburg. A patron and employer of Mozart was Hieronymus von Colloredo, the Prince-Archbishop of Salzburg. Annoyed with Mozart's frequent absences he later dismissed him and in 1781 Mozart moved from Salzburg to Vienna, where he worked as freelance composer and where he also died impoverished in 1791.

When Salzburg had already lost its autonomy, another exceptional musical history began in the Salzburgian town of Oberndorf. On 24th December 1818 Franz Xaver Gruber and Joseph Mohr performed the Christmas carol Silent Night for the first time in the local Saint Nicholas' Church. Mohr had written its text already in 1816 and Gruber composed the melody shortly before Christmas 1818. Soon after its first performance it began to be spread around the World and until today it was translated into more than 300 languages.

In 2011 Silent Night became an Intangible Heritage of the Austrian UNESCO and it was also proposed for the European Heritage Label.
A special memorial for the carol is the Silent Night Chapel in Oberndorf. It was built at the site of the former Saint Nicholas' Church, which had to be demolished after it was damaged during the floodings of the Salzach in the late 19th century. The Silent Night Chapel was built between 1924 and 1936 and is today a popular tourist destination.
Of the original autographs of Gruber and Mohr only a few survived until today, but one of them is kept in Salzburg.

1918: 第一次世界大戦 and Primul Război Mondial (Australia, Belgium, Canada, Germany, Ireland, Montenegro, New Zealand, Portugal, Turkey, United Kingdom, USA)

8th January - Woodrow Wilson outlines his Fourteen Points in a speech to the United States Congress.

The Fourteen Points of Woodrow Wilson were a statement of principles for peace that Wilson regarded as the only possible basis of an enduring peace. They included the self-determination of the nations, the liberation of occupied territories and the formation of a general association of nations. The Central Powers soon refused the Fourteen Points and the Entente countries were anyway skeptical of the applicability of the Wilsonian idealism, but Woodrow Wilson was still awarded the 1919 Nobel Peace Prize for his peace-making efforts.

25th January - The Ukrainian People's Republic declares its independence from Russia.

1st February - Beginning of the Cattaro Mutiny

The SMS Sankt Georg was an armoured cruiser of the Austro-Hungarian Navy. On 1st February 1918 the Cattaro Mutiny began on this ship, that was later joined by sailors from around 40 other Austro-Hungarian ships in the Cattaro naval base. The sailors had grown weary of the war and the long periods of inactivity and demanded a better treatment, political change and an imminent peace, but already on 3rd February the mutiny was suppressed. The SMS Sankt Georg was decommissioned after the mutiny and awarded to Britain as a war prize after the war. In 1920 it was scrapped.

9th February - The Ukrainian People's Republic and the Central Powers sign the "Brotfrieden" (peace for bread), which secured food-supply support for the Austro-Hungarian and the German Empire in return for providing military protection for the Ukrainian People's Republic.

10th February - Leon Trotsky stops the peace negotiations in Brest-Litovsk. The Central Powers answer with a quite successful offensive against Russia, which forces Trotsky to continue the negotiations on the 26th February.

3rd March - Russia and the Central Powers sign the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, which ended Russia's participation in World War I. The treaty, which was extraordinarily harsh, also renounced all Russian territorial claims in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bessarabia (which became a part of Romania), Estonia, Finland, Georgia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Ukraine. Doing so Russia hoped to get some relief from further invasion to protect the "success" of the revolution.

21st March - Beginning of Operation Michael, the first major German military offensive as part of the Spring Offensive of 1918 on the Western Front

30th March - Around 12000 Azerbaijanis are killed by Armenian and Bolshevik forces during the March Events until the 2nd April.

1st April - Formation of the Royal Air Force

Although the air plane was both quite young when World War I broke out, it played an important role during the war. The main tasks of the aircrafts were recce flights, air combats and sometimes also the bombing of enemy positions or cities. On 1st April 1918 the United Kingdom became the first country in the World with an independent air force, when the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air Service were merged to create the Royal Air Force. Earlier the Royal Flying Corps was under army and the Royal Naval Air Service under navy control. At that time it was also the World's largest air force.

6th April - The city of Van comes again under Ottoman rule.

In 1915 the city of Van was one of the few places where Armenians with the support of the Imperial Russian Army fought against the Ottoman Empire's armed forces during the Armenian Genocide. The city was afterwards under Armenian control, but the Russian Revolution of 1917 changed the situation in the region. In April 1918 the Ottoman Army started to attack again and on 6th April Van was again under Ottoman control.

9th April - Beginning of the Battle of the Lys

The Battle of the Lys, which is also known as Operation Georgette or Fourth Battle of Flanders, was the second part of the German Spring Offensive. It was fought between the 9th and 29th April. In the battle the German Empire tried to capture Ypres, but that failed and the battle ended with an Entente victory.

7th May - Romania and the Central Powers sign the Peace Treaty of Bucharest.

22nd May - Beginning of the Battle of Sardarabad, which stopped the Ottoman advance into Armenia and which is also considered to have prevented the complete destruction of the Armenian nation

27th May - Beginning of the Third Battle of the Aisne, the again unsuccessful third part of the German Spring Offensive

4th June - The Ottoman Empire and the newly independent countries Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia sign the Treaty of Batum, which grants big territorial gains to the Ottoman Empire.

10th June - The SMS Szent István, the most modern Austro-Hungarian battleship, is sunk during an attempt to break through Otranto Barrage, which prohibited the Austro-Hungarian Navy from leaving the Adriatic Sea.

15th June - Beginning of the Second Battle of the Piave River, the last Austro-Hungarian attempt to defeat Italy, but which instead resulted in a decisive Italian victory

3rd July - The Ottoman Sultan Mehmed V dies.

15th July - Beginning of the Second Battle of the Marne, the last part of the German Spring Offensive

16th July - The Russian Imperial Romanov family is executed on the night of the 16th July.

8th August - Beginning of the Battle of Amiens and the Hundred Days Offensive

The Battle of Amiens was fought by the British Empire, France and the USA against the German Empire between the 8th and the 12th August 1918. The battle ended with a decisive Allied victory. It is notable for its effects on both sides' morale and the war's tempo. After the Battle of Amiens the Entente saw a rapid series of victories against the German Empire, which are now known as Hundred Days Offensive. This became the beginning of the end of the Western Front. Erich Ludendorff later described the 8th August as "the black day of the German Army".

John Monash was an Australian civil engineer and military
commander of World War I. He was a meticulous planner and
brilliant tactician and among others planned the Battle of Amiens.

26th August - Beginning of the Battle of Baku, which ended with an Ottoman-Azerbaijani victory and thus concluded the Caucasus Campaign

15th September - As part of the Vardar Offensive French, Greek and Serbian forces begin their Breakthrough at Dobro Pole leading to a collapse of the Macedonian Front.

19th September - Beginning of the Battle of Megiddo, the last battle of the war in the Middle East that would later lead to a complete collapse of the Ottoman front

29th September - Bulgaria and the Allied Powers sign the Armistice of Salonica.

1st October - The British capture Damascus.

10th October - RMS Leinster is sunk by a German submarine.

RMS Leinster was an Irish ship that was used for Royal Mail service. On 10th October 1918, when she was on her way between Ireland and Wales, she was torpedoed and sunk by a German submarine. Over 500 people lost their lives. Still today this is the greatest single loss of life in the Irish Sea.

24th October - Beginning of the Battle of Vittorio Veneto

The Battle of Vittorio Veneto was fought between the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Italy between the 24th October and the 3rd November 1918. It ended with a disastrous Austro-Hungarian defeat and thus marked the end of the war on the Italian Front, secured the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and sealed the end of the Italian unification.

29th October - Beginning of the Mutinies in Wilhelmshaven and Kiel

The German Fleet was nearly not used during World War I and when the war was actually already lost, the imperial naval command planned a final battle against the Royal Navy in the English Channel. The preparations triggered a mutiny among the affected sailors in Wilhemshaven, which was actually suppressed shortly after, but when the commander believed that he was again master of his crews, another mutiny broke out in Kiel. The Kiel Mutiny turned into a revolution and soon spred across Germany.

30th October - The Ottoman Empire and the Allied Powers sign the Armistice of Mudros.

1st November - As a main event of the Allied Liberation of Albania, Montenegro and Albania Belgrade comes again under Serbian control.

3rd November - The Austro-Hungarian Empire and the Allied Powers sign the Armistice of Villa Giusti.

9th November - Philipp Scheidemann proclaims the German Republic.

The German Revolution that began in Kiel soon swept away the monarchy in Germany. On 9th November the abdication of the Emperor was declared and Philipp Scheidemann proclaimed the German Republic from one of the balconies of the Reichstag building. Scheidemann proclaimed the republic just a few hours before a planned proclamation of a Soviet Republic by Karl Liebknecht, which would later lead to some leftist uprisings. One day later an interim government was formed, which planned the elections for a constituent National Assembly. In 1919 the Weimar Republic arose from this event, which was the first modern democratic republic in Germany.

10th November - Romania re-enters the war.

11th November - The German Empire and the Allied Powers sign the Armistice of Compiègne.

At least since the Battle of Amiens everyone in the higher ranks of the German military knew that there was no chance left for a German victory. Erich Ludendorff, although he later changed his mind, demanded a request to be given to the Entente for an immediate ceasefire already on the 29th September, but still it needed the German Revolution to bring an end to the war. A German delegation headed by Matthias Erzberger finally signed an armistice at Compiègne on the 11th November 1918. Although they formally protested at the harshness of Allied terms, they were in no position to refuse to sign. Among others the Allies demanded the termination of hostilities on the Western Front, the immediate evacuation of the occupied territories, the surrender of military materiel, the release of Allied prisoners of war and the renunciation of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. The fact that the republicans signed the armistice later created the stab-in-the-back myth (Dolchstoßlegende), a notion that the German Army did not lose World War I on the battlefield but was instead betrayed by the civilians on the home front and the republicans who overthrew the monarchy in the German Revolution.

After over four years of fighting the war was finally over. More than 15million people lost their lives, big parts of Europe were destroyed and new countries arose. To find a new order for the continent the Allied powers came together in Paris in 1919, but the peace was short-lived and just twenty years later an even more horrible war began.