Western Front
Somme: British advance guard now 11 miles from Bapaume. Further gains east and northeast of Gommecourt.
Aisne: Germans repulsed at Hill 185.
Meuse: Fighting near St Mihiel.
“Lively” fighting north-east of Soissons.
Eastern Front
Bulgarians bombard Galatz from the Danube.
Southern Front
Field hospitals at Vertekop (Serbia) bombed: two British nurses and others killed.
British line south-west of Doiran advanced 1,000 yards.
Naval and Overseas Operations
USA: Navy Department authorizes armed merchant ships to take action against U-boats.
France: Parliament
Commission de la marine de guerre urges anti-U-boat directorate and priority to patrol craft.
Norwegian relief ship Lars Fostenes, carrying grain, torpedoed outside blockade zone.
Asiatic and Egyptian Theaters
Russians take Kermanshah (Persia) after two days' fighting.
Another column approaches Bana (140 miles north-west of Kermanshah).
British 30 miles north of Baghdad.
Political, etc
Austria-Hungary: Impending cabinet crisis in Austria-Hungary.
Russia: On 13 March (O.S. 28 February), at five in the morning, the Tsar left Mogilev, (and directed also Nikolay Iudovich Ivanov to go to Tsarskoe Selo) but was unable to reach Petrograd as revolutionaries meanwhile controlled railway stations around the capital. Around midnight the train was stopped at Malaya Vishera, and turned back. In the evening of 14 March Nicholas arrived in Pskov. In the meantime the units guarding the Alexander Palace in Tsarskoe Selo either "declared their neutrality" or left for Petrograd and thus abandoned the imperial family. The Provisional Committee declared itself the governing body of the Russian Empire. [13 March]
http://imgur.com/HMp343H Nicholas II, Tsar of Russia, abdicates. [14 March]. Prince Georgy Lvov appointed Russian Premier. Pavel Milyukov appointed Russian Foreign Minister. General Alexandr Guchkov appointed Russian Minister for War. "Chief among them [the Aims of the Provisional Government] was the desire to bring the war to a successful conclusion in conjunction with the Allies; and the very cause of their opposition was the ever deepening conviction that this was unattainable under the present government and under the present regime. The socialists had formed their rival body, the Petrograd Soviet (or workers' council) on the 27th of February [O. S.; 12 March].
Izvesteya paper first published. Crowd storms military Hotel Astoria but British present save many Russian officers. Revolutionaries execute captain of cruiser
Aurora, refitting in the Baltic, crew elect first ship committee. Mutiny at Kronstadt naval base (just west of Petrograd proper; mutiny lasts until March 14) kills c.40 officers and NCOs, 162 officers arrested. Fleet C-in-C first main one to accept Provisional Government (on March 14).
Emblems of the Russian royal family are torn from shops and thrown into the Fontanka Canal, Petrograd:
http://imgur.com/69vkG5h
France: Political crisis in France grows serious, as the Opposition Party refuses to vote due to disagreements with PM Briand on military decisions.
United Kingdom: In London Haig and Nivelle sign clarifications of command spheres.
Government takes over all quarries and mines (non-coal).
First WAAC (Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps) enrolled, mainly ex-Women’s Legion.
General Smuts sworn of the Privy Council.
Statement on mastery of air in House of Commons.
Government intends to stand by new Indian cotton duties.
Australia: The explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton, while speaking in Sydney, states he seeks war service, as all able-bodied Britons should fight.