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Chapter 21: In the 20th century the world entered a new era of its history. It started with World War I 1914-1918. Europe had gained tremendous power through population growth, Industrial revolution and imperialism but the many nations of Europe were not unified. The Germans and French fought in the Franco-Prussian war of 1870 leaving bad blood between these countries. By the early 20th century there were two rival groups the Triple Alliance of Germany, Austria and Italy and the Triple Entente of Russia, France and Britain. When a Serbian nationalists assassinated the Heir to the Austrian thrown Austria and its ally Germany went to war against Serbia and its ally Russia. The conflicts soon spread to all the European nations and finally the United States which joined on the British side when Germans threatened American shipping. World War I was a brutal war that dragged down into trench warfare. Battles lasted months with deaths of a million or more. The war became a "total war" effort with each countries entire population involved supporting their nation in war. The war was considered irrational and tragic. After it was over there were new independent countries such as Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania, Finland, Turkey and Palestine. The Germans had to pay reparations that were so crushing it led to much hatred. World War I was followed by the great depression that was so severe that it seemed like the whole European-US economic system was failing. The instability of industrial capitalism and its huge social class divisions became dominant in the great depression. In the United States and elsewhere people were unemployed, hungry and bitter. In countries that supplied the industrialized nations such as Chile and Brazil the demand for their crops and the prices of the crops fell apart. With capitalism under attack many people turned to the idea of communism and socialism with more government regulation of the economy. In the United States under President Franklin Roosevelt he put in the New Deal. This was a series of projects and reforms to encourage economic growth. People were put to work building highways, bridges and parks and even paintings murals like the one in Coit Tower. There was also reforms to create an economic safety net such as social security. The Great Depression did not end though until the massive government spending required by World War II started. In Germany as a response to the depression and reparations fascism became powerful. It was an ideology that set out to "purify the nation" (page 988) and to encourage violence against enemies and stamp out individualism and democracy.  It took hold in Germany and Italy most strongly. And Italy the fascist movement was led by Benito Mussolini. He was supported by big business because they were afraid of communism. He consolidated power in the central government there was no more democracy. In Germany, Adolf Hitler and the Nazi party led to the victory of fascism there. As people suffered under the reparations and defeat of World War I and the depression that followed fascism helped them find a message of German racial superiority and hatred and blame for Jews. Once Hitler gained power in 1933 all other political parties were outlawed.