The extent to which Germany was responsible for world war one

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To what extent was Germany responsible for the worsening relationship with Britain?

Weltpolitik could be responsible for the deterioration of the Anglo-German relationship in the lead up to World War One. This is partly because of the policy of Flottenpolitik and the 'risk theory' focus of the policy. Britain felt their naval supremacy was threatened by the German naval expansion however it was never Germany's intention to have a navy the same size or larger than Britain; they wanted one 2/3rds of the size which shouldn't have threatened Britain or their supremacy. A lot of the threat that Britain saw coming from Flottenpolitik was misconceived and was never really a threat although it is understandable as to why they saw it as a threat because the Navy was Britain's main defence system and they weren't prepared to see it threatened. The decrease in relations caused by Flottenpolitik and the misconceived threat was not fully Germany's fault, nor was it Britain's. However the tension caused by the naval rivalry lead to the deterioration in Anglo-German relations and was one of the biggest factors to effect the relations, without all the navy related tension things may have not got to the level of both sides feeling threatened by each other.
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Another aspect of Weltpolitik that may have caused the deterioration in relations is the triple alliance, which to some caused the British to end their years of 'splendid isolation'. Some believe that Germany creating the triple alliance with Austria-Hungary and Italy, lead to the British feeling threatened and somewhat forced into needing to end its splendid isolation and create alliances. However when Britain ended its isolation first with Japan it wasn't because of the threat they faced from Germany but instead from Russia. In addition to this the second alliance they made with France was in order to ...

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