Eastern Front (World War I)

Battlefront between Russia and Germany/Austria-Hungary during World War I. In 1914 it was effectively the borders of eastern Prussia/Russia, Germany/Poland, Galicia/Poland, and Galicia/Russia. In present-day terms the front ran roughly from Kaliningrad in Russia via Bialystok, southwesterly to Torun in Poland, south to Katowice, east to Lviv, and southeast to the mouth of the River Danube.

In August 1914 the Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, and their allies) were at war in Western Europe with France, Britain, and Belgium, and in Eastern Europe with Russia. Although this had been envisaged in Germany's Schlieffen Plan, the intention had been to defeat France with a rapid strike and then turn all forces towards Russia. The failure of the Schlieffen Plan left Germany fighting a war on two fronts, the Western Front and the Eastern, for the next three years. War in the east only ended after the Bolsheviks took power in the 1917 Russian Revolution and signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk in March 1918.