by Sergei BAZANOV, Dr. Sc. (Hist.), RAS Institute of Russian History, Moscow; Alexei OLEINIKOV, Dr. Sc. (Hist.), Astrakhan State Technical University, Astrakhan, Russia The year 2014 marks the centennial since the outbreak of the First World War, a global blood-letting conflict that went on for as long as four years. Actually it was the first modern war beget as it did new kinds of weaponry and hardware still in the arsenal of armed forces in many countries. At the same time the war meant a breakthrough in many areas (with a great many discoveries and inventions made by Russian scientists and engineers). As good as all industries received great impetus; this is especially true of the aviation, chemical and metallurgical industries, of shipbuilding, automanufacturing, and electrical engineering. The First World War of 1914-1918 became one of the greatest in human history both in the extension of battlefronts and in the number of warring countries (the four powers--Germany, Austria-Hungary, Turkey and Bulgaria pitted against the countries allied in the Entente--France, Great Britain, Russia, the United States and others). It had no precedent either in the number of killed or wounded, and in the scope of resources and wherewithal spent. It was the acid test of strength and minds: since the First engagements revealed shortfalls of weapons (offensive weapons above all!), the governments of the warring countries bent every effort to develop better, upgraded weapons the soonest. The outbreak of World War I, also known in the West as the Great War and in this country, as a Second Patriotic War, sparked an upsurge of patriotic fervor--among our people, too. The scientific community did not straddle the fence either. As Anatoly Ivanov, Doctor of History, wrote in his study on the subject, "like the Russi- стр. 66 an bourgeoisie with its industrial mobilization drive slogan, so our college and university faculty viewed the 'war mobilization o ... Читать далее