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Heads of states and governments attend ceremonies to mark the 100th anniversary of the signing of the Armistice which brought the First World War to a close. Watch live Sunday, Nov. 11 at 4am ET.

The eleventh, day of the eleventh month is either today or tomorrow depending on where you live.

As they awaken on the morning of November 11 1918, along the 400-mile Western Front from Switzerland in the south to the Belgian coast in the north, nearly 10 million men on both sides know from developments over recent days that an armistice is imminent. They are praying for a swift end to the war. What they are not aware of yet is that at 5.20am in the Compiegne Forest just north of Paris, on the private train of Marshal Foch, commander-in-chief of the Allied armies, the Armistice agreement was signed after three days of negotiation. The war is entering...

More than 60 heads of state and government are converging on France for the commemorations that will crescendo Sunday with ceremonies at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Paris on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, exactly a century after the armistice.

The Great War of 1914-1918 was the defining event of our time: a lost generation of millions dead or maimed; mournful widows and orphans; empires toppled and nations shattered; Western civilization damaged; vast treasures sacrificed. And in war's aftermath, democracies stillborn and totalitarianism and vengeance enthroned. How did it happen? Keegan, despite his vast expertise, confesses that even when one knows what happened, it is difficult to explain why. "The First World War is a mystery. Its origins are mysterious. So is its course. Why did a prosperous continent, at the height of its success as a source and agent...

An atheist group claims the Maryland 'Peace Cross' is unconstitutionalThe Supreme Court has announced that it will hear oral arguments this term to consider if a 40-foot cross in Maryland endorses religion or is simply a secular memorial. The cross in question sits at a busy intersection in the Washington suburb of Bladensburg, Maryland, and memorializes soldiers who died in World War I. Last year, the 4th US Circuit Court of Appeals based in Richmond, Virginia, ruled 2-1 that the 93-year-old monument is unconstitutional and must be removed or destroyed. “(It) has the primary effect of endorsing religion and excessively...

German Chancellor Angela Merkel will mark the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I on French soil, and German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier will be in London at a ceremony in Westminster Abby with Queen Elizabeth II. But while the leaders visit the capitals of Germany's wartime enemies, at home there are no national commemorations planned for the centenary of the Nov. 11 armistice that brought an end to the four-year war that killed more than 2 million of its troops and left 4 million wounded. Next week, German parliament is holding a combined commemoration of the 100th anniversary...

Did the horrors of the Great War cause Canadian soldiers to lose their faith? Or is it true that there were no atheists in the trenches? The war has generally been seen as a powerfully disillusioning experience. Books such as Paul Fussell’s widely influential The Great War and Modern Memory portray the war as the origins of modern skepticism and cynicism. The idea of a “lost generation” of disillusioned Anglo-American vets is a widely accepted one. The situation in Canada, however, is a little more ambiguous. In his study of the war’s impact on Canadian culture, Death So Noble, Jonathan...

Donald Trump is to hold meetings with Vladimir Putin and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Paris as world leaders arrive in western Europe for ceremonies to mark 100 years since the end of the first world war. Emmanuel Macron, the French president and host for the armistice ceremonies in Paris on 11 November, hopes to use the emotion of the occasion to warn that a nationalist resurgence led by authoritarian leaders – an outcome of the flawed ending of the first world war – will threaten liberal democracies and the institutions of multilateralism, the chief outcome of the second world war....

They worked in brothels frequented by troops serving on the front line in northern France, but their role has been virtually erased from the history books. Thanks to a new Roundhouse art project, Cause and Effect, to mark the centenary of the end of the conflict, the wartime sex workers have been immortalised in a film with poet Hollie McNish. McNish worked with historian Clare Makepeace from Birkbeck, University of London, to create War’s Whores, which details the “significant minority” of men paying for sex on the front line.

In the land of religious history, Philip Jenkins towers like a giant. Here, we discuss the religious dimension of World War I and his newest book, “The Great and Holy War: How World War I Became a Religious Crusade.” RNS: You say that World War I was “a religious crusade.” This sounds like a scandalous idea. Can you explain what you mean? PJ: If I myself believed that it was a crusade, that would indeed be scandalous. Actually, I am arguing that a great many people at the time saw it in those terms, which is also scandalous, in a...

A nineteenth century cannon sits at the entrance of a Pakistani village, the huge monument casts a striking silhouette against the dust and cobble alleyways of the small agricultural village. Nestled in the rocky hills of Punjab's salt ranges, blasted by heat in the summer, the village of Dulmial is a far cry from the freezing mud of the Flanders trenches. Locally, Dulmial is now known simply as the 'village with the gun' but when the man who uncovered the horrors, and heroics that the cannon symbolized, first saw it, it meant nothing to him, The Telegraph reports.

World War I was one of the major events that shook mankind. Originated in Europe, the war lasted from July, 1914 to November, 1918. Filmmakers across the globe have tried to capture the essence of the events that changed the world forever. As First World War marks a century, here are 5 films that delved deep into what happened among the warring nations and how it affected the humanity at large. Paths of Glory The film starring Kirk Douglas as Colonel Dax is a narration of a soldier’s dilemma while motivating others for a bloody war. Douglas plays the commanding...

In the end, the guns fell silent at the appointed hour: 11 a.m. on the 11th of November, the 11th month of the year 1918. For four brutal years Europe -- and much of the rest of the world -- had been first drawn into and then fully involved in the most ferocious conflict in history up to that time. A war that began almost accidentally, with the assassination of the Austro-Hungarian Archduke Franz Ferdinand in the Balkan backwater of Sarajevo, soon morphed into a domino-toppling series of alliances and ententes, from which no nation or empire emerged unscathed. Nineteenth-century...

President Trump is spending Monday at the White House and had no plans to visit Arlington National Cemetery in northern Virginia as America observes the Veterans Day holiday. The White House announced a so-called travel lid at 10 a.m. ET, meaning that the president is not expected to hold any public events or leave the executive mansion. Trump returned to Washington on Sunday evening after a weekend in France, where he attended events commemorating the 100th anniversary of the armistice that ended World War I. The president paid tribute earlier in the day to U.S. and allied soldiers killed in...

I stumbled on a Fox news round table discussion hosted by Pete Hegseth that included, (Lone survivor) Marcus Lutrell, (Decorated Ranger Cpt.) Sean Parnell, (Medal of Honor recipient)Dakota Meyer and (Navy SEAL who fired the Bin Laden head shot) Robert O'Neill. Patterned after the highly enjoyable "Wise Guys" show hosted by Bill Bennett this open discussion of heroes talking about serving their country and the disruptive force liberals in congress have become to protecting freedom was very refreshing TV in my opinion.

After more than a year of discussion, the U.S. Army announced Sunday that it has adopted a version of the World War II pinks and greens uniform as the service's new everyday dress uniform. By 2028, the "Army Greens" will become the "everyday business-wear uniform for all soldiers," according to a Veterans Day Army news release. "This is the uniform worn by America's 'Greatest Generation' in World War II," the release states. Sergeant Major of the Army Daniel Dailey unveiled the first prototypes of the two-tone uniform in October 2017 at the Association of the United States Army's annual meeting....

In northern California 29 are dead and hundred are reported missing because of the "Camp Fire" that started last Thursday and consumed the town of Paradise on Friday, burning over 6,700 structures in the town of 26,000. 228 people are reported missing according to the Butte County Sheriff...... President Trump was in France yesterday at an American cemetery..... The President was in attendance earlier at a ceremony in Paris along with the leaders of more than 60 nations.... Polling data for the European Parliament elections next May shows Marine Le Pen's National Rally Party, formerly the National Front..... Two-hundred thousand...

The standard view of World War I is that it is a testament to the futility of war. Yet maybe the better way to think of the war, which lasted from 1914 to 1918—including American participation in 1917-1918—is that if war comes, it’s better to win than to lose. [...] Most of the chronicling of that war is heavy on mournfulness, along with the implication that war solves nothing. Hence we see headlines such as “The Tragic Futility of World War I” and “The Most Unnecessary War in History.” Still, we are left to wonder: If the war was “futile”...

The day that Allied Forces made history on the beaches of Normandy in World War II was already the anniversary of a critical World War I battle. What would befall the United States Marine Corps at Belleau Wood beginning June 6, 1918, would change the Corps forever. In the spring of 1918, German forces launched a massive attack on France. The German Spring Offensive was a focused attempt to take France and win the war. By June, the Germans had already made significant gains. The Marines’ orders were to counterattack the Germans who were stopped at Belleau Wood, about 50...