X-Nico

7 unusual facts about Central Powers


Aleppo Railway Station

The Turks, who sided with Germany and the Central Powers, decided to recover the infrastructure south of Aleppo to the Lebanon in 1917.

Andrija Radović

In early 1916 the Kingdom of Montenegro was being occupied by the Central Powers, so Andrija fled together with Nikola to friendly free Italy.

Frederick Wall

Notably, Wall refused on behalf of the FA to offer wartime financial compensation to famed Anglo-Irish coach Jimmy Hogan, on the basis of the latter's perceived co-operation with the Central Powers during the First World War (Hogan had coached Hungarian side MTK Budapest whilst interned as an enemy alien during the conflict).

José Pessoa Cavalcanti de Albuquerque

He was one of the officers sent on a preparatory mission to Europe by Brazilian Army during the World War I against the Central Powers.

Military strategy

More so than in previous wars, military strategy in World War I was directed by the grand strategy of a coalition of nations; the Entente on one side and the Central Powers on the other.

Prime Minister of Montenegro

After the capitulation of Montenegro to the Central Powers on January 15, 1916 during the World War I, the Government went into exile and remained abroad for the rest of its continuation.

Robert Lansing

These agents were initially used to observe the activities of the Central Powers in America, and later to watch over interned German diplomats.


Aleksander Kakowski

After the outbreak of the Great War he remained in Warsaw and in 1917 Kakowski was appointed to be a member of the Regency Council, a semi-independent and temporary highest authority of the Kingdom of Poland, recreated by the Central Powers as part of their Mitteleuropa plan.

Closed bolt

The Maxim style arms used by both the Allies, as the Vickers machine gun and Central Powers, as both the LMG 08 and LMG 08/15 Spandau gun, and Parabellum LMG 14 gun, all fired with a cycle starting with a closed bolt, and since the bullet firing from the gun started the firing cycle, it was much easier to set the synchronizer to only trigger the gun when the propeller's blade was not in front of the gun.

Count Manfred von Clary-Aldringen

After the fall of the Austro-Hungarian Empire following the defeat of the Central Powers during the automn of 1918, Count Manfred resigned from all his official offices and spend his remaining years between his estates in Austria and his family's Czech estates (Teplice).

Flămânda Offensive

The plan was to attack the Central Powers forces from the rear by crossing the Danube at Flămânda, while the front-line Romanian and Russian forces were supposed to launch an offensive southwards towards Cobadin and Kurtbunar (today Tervel, Dobrich Province).

Fort Montecchio-Lusardi

The main function of the fort was to control the roads of Spluga, Maloja and Stelvio, in case the Central Powers decided to invade northern Italy, violating the neutrality of Switzerland.

German invasion of Belgium

This started a chain reaction of political events: Serbia's ally Russia joined the war on Austria, Austria's ally Germany joined the war on Russia and Serbia and Russia's ally France declared war on both of the Central Powers.

Irish National War Memorial Gardens

The Memorial Gardens also commemorate all other Irish men and women who at that time served, fought and died in Irish regiments of the Allied armies, the British, Canadian, Australian, New Zealand, South African and United States armies in support of the Triple Entente's war effort against the Central Powers.

National Bank of Romania

In 1916, in the wake of the Central Powers' invasion, the valuables of the National Bank of Romania, together with many other valuables (the Romanian Treasure) were sent to Moscow for safekeeping, but were never returned (except for the Pietroasele treasure - now on display at the National Museum of Romanian History, the numismatic collection of the National Bank, some paintings and archives).

Transitional Bulgarian dialects

They also cross the border to include the dialects or subdialects of the Bulgarian minority in the Western Outlands (the regions of Tsaribrod and Bosilegrad), Bulgarian territories transferred to Serbia by the Treaty of Neuilly as punishment for Bulgarian participation in World War I on the side of the Central Powers.

Transylvanian Memorandum

However, activism for union per se was largely held off until after World War I and the Treaty of Trianon, with Romania itself oscillating between alliances with the Central Powers and the Entente, and with the parallel offer made by Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria (the heir apparent) to negotiate for a compromise (see United States of Greater Austria).

Young Turks

The unity among the Young Turks that originated from the Young Turk Revolution began to splinter in face of the realities of the ongoing dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, especially with the onset of World War I in 1914, with the Ottoman Empire joining the Central Powers against the Allies.


see also

Adriatic Campaign

Adriatic Campaign of World War I, a naval campaign fought during World War I between the Central Powers and the Mediterranean squadrons of the Allies

Henri Mathias Berthelot

The results of the reorganisation and resupply of the Romanian troops were seen in the summer of 1917, when the Alexandru Averescu's army broke the front at Mărăşti and the major counter-offensive of the Central Powers with the aim of occupying the rest of the Romanian territory (Moldavia) and the port of Odessa was stopped at Mărăşeşti and Oituz.

History of Poland during World War I

The defection of Russia from the Allied coalition gave free rein to the calls of Woodrow Wilson, the American president, to transform the war into a crusade to spread democracy and liberate the Poles and other peoples from the suzerainty of the Central Powers.

Ion I. C. Brătianu

This situation was ended by the October Revolution in Russia and the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk between the Bolshevik government and the Central Powers: Romania saw itself without reinforcements, agreed to an armistice, and then signed the Treaty of Bucharest in May 1918.

While Moldavia remained the only region under Romanian administration and the country increased its reliance on Imperial Russia - and then on the Russian Provisional Government, the Romanian Army was able to block further Central Powers' offensives in the battles of Mărăşeşti, Mărăşti, and Oituz.

Kingdom of Romania

The Romanian military campaign ended in disaster when the Central Powers quickly crushed the country's armed forces (despite fierce Romanian resistance, especially at Mărăşeşti) and occupied most of the country, including Bucharest and the strategically important oil fields.