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Comment by phire | Hacker News Reader

People did actually start calling WW1 "The first world war" long before WW2 started. There is even few instances of that terminology going back to 1914.

They were pessimistic there would be more.

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Couldn't it also have been called "First World War" because it was the first war where fighting happened

- over multiple continents - with huge number of countries participating - at the same time - as part of the same conflict

Arguably, that honor goes to the Seven Years' War, which saw significant fighting both in Europe and in North America.

The French Revolutionary Wars/Napoleonic Wars were equally grand in scale, and conducted at a time when the "world" for all practical purposes included only European powers--all of the major ones got involved in those conflicts at one point or another; even the newly-independent US got peripherally involved (the War of 1812 is partially started due to the effects the Napoleonic Wars had on US shipping).

> when the "world" for all practical purposes included only European powers

Why though? I think even China alone had almost as large a population in 1800 (300M) as the US does right now so I'm confused what this is supposed to mean? Japan also had some 30M, Russia 35M. (I haven't checked other countries.)

We're defining "the world" in 1800 to be "European powers" so that we can claim the first world war was actually before World War I?

Sorry, I should have clarified further. This is "world" in terms of European political discourse--as far as Europe was concerned, if you weren't a European power (and Russia most certainly was a European power), you weren't really a country worth caring about, just fodder for imperialism and colonization.

Okay sure I guess, but what is this meant to imply? Even taking it at face value, this clearly still didn't cause Europe to call that war the first World War, so what conclusion are we drawing from this?

> when the "world" for all practical purposes included only European powers

The United States, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, and Australia all entered the war.

There were significant theaters of the war in Africa and the Middle East.

China was initially neutral in WWI but did eventually declare support for the Entente and sent 140,000 laborers to Europe. [1]

Brazil entered the war after losing ships to German U boats. [2]

Over a million Indian troops participated. [3]

Thailand, New Guinea, and Samoa were involved [4]

And I’m just scratching the surface. The very worst fighting was concentrated in the industrial meat grinders of the front lines in Europe but there was significant participation from all corners of the earth. It earned the name “World War.”

1. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_during_World_War_I

2. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brazil_during_World_War_I

3. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Army_during_World_War...

4. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asian_and_Pacific_theatre_of...

Ferdinand Foch (French WW1 general) called the Versailles treaty a 20 year armistice in 1919. He thought the treaty was too lenient.

I remember seeing more The Great War or The War to End Wars in post-WWI docs and media. Wikipedia says yes, it was WWI soon after the war, but that wasn't common yet.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_I#Names

Interesting. I had to look that up, and apparently a Lt Col called it that in his 1920 memoirs:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_I#Names

In my experience, it was always "The Great War".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_%C3%A0_Court_Repington

Pessimistic, but not wrong.

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