1917

The year in brief

On 1 February 1917 Germany began unrestricted submarine warfare, sinking without warning even ships under a neutral flag. In Russia the February Revolution broke out: on 12 March the Petrograd garrison mutinied, and on 15 March Tsar Nicholas II renounced the throne. On 6 April the United States entered the war against Germany. In France the Canadians took almost the whole of Vimy Ridge on 9 April, but the Nivelle offensive, launched on the Chemin des Dames on 16 April, did not bring the promised breakthrough. In May and June a wave of mutinies swept through several dozen French divisions. On 1 July the Kerensky Offensive began, but after the German counter-blow of 19 July the Russians were driven out of almost all of Eastern Galicia. On 31 July the British opened the Third Battle of Ypres in Flanders, which by 10 November had moved the front forward about 7 km. On 24 October Germany and Austria-Hungary broke through the Italian front at Caporetto and drove the Italians back to the Piave. On 7 November the Bolsheviks seized power in Petrograd. On 20 November the British attacked at Cambrai with several hundred tanks, and on 9 December Jerusalem surrendered to General Allenby's troops. On 15 December Russia concluded an armistice with the Central Powers at Brest-Litovsk and in practice left the war.

For Poland the year began on 14 January, when the Provisional Council of State, a Polish body set up by the occupiers, was inaugurated in Warsaw. On 22 January President Wilson spoke of a united and independent Poland, and on 30 March the Russian Provisional Government recognised the Poles' right to an independent state, joined to Russia, however, by a "free military alliance". On 4 June France agreed to the creation of an autonomous Polish army fighting under the Polish flag. On 9 and 11 July legionaries of the I and III Brigades, at Piłsudski's call, refused to swear an oath of "brotherhood in arms" with Germany and Austria-Hungary, and were interned. On the night of 21–22 July the Germans arrested Piłsudski, who was later imprisoned in Magdeburg. On 15 August the Polish National Committee was founded in Lausanne under Roman Dmowski, and was then recognised by France, Britain, Italy and the United States. The Council of State resigned on 25 August, and the patent of 12 September gave supreme authority in the Kingdom of Poland to a Regency Council, installed in office on 27 October. On 26 November the regents appointed Jan Kucharzewski head of the government.