In 1914 some German military leaders favoured a preventive war.
As a result of the Schlieffen Plan, German mobilisation meant war.
By invading Belgium, Germany brought Britain into the war.
Fearing success of socialism in Germany, the traditional ruling classes pursued a prestige policy on a world scale. Their aim was to distract opinion from domestic tensions and to rally people behind the established order.
However there are also a lot of reasons that support that Germany was not solely resonsilble for the war.
It is believed that WW1 was caused by the assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand. That was a trigger to the conflict, but there are many other reasons that led to this war. The main factors besides the assassination are nationalism, militarism, imperialism and the system of alliance.
Nationalism was a famous movement that had spread itself across Europe. All major powers had strong feelings toward the idea of supporting their own nation. These strong beliefs sometimes became obsessive, as nationalists became so proud of their nation that they strived for it to become richer and more powerful than any other did.
Imperialism was present in Europe for sometime before the war broke out, as each of the great powers aimed to expand theirs boundaries into new areas in order to use the opportunities that the new land held.
Due to each individual nation wanting its armed forces to be stronger than their potential enemy is, the imperial powers followed a policy of militarism. Once one nation began building a specific part of their military, other nation respected their mobilization and started to build up their armed forces as well. For example, the German emperor decided they need to build a fervent navy in order to compete more successfully with the strongest navy in the world; Great Britain. Soon British and German shipyards competed to build the largest battleships and destroyers. Later many countries such as France, Japan and the United States quickly joined the naval arm race.
The European Alliances had also a major part in the beginning of WW1. All these mutual conflicst, jealousies, worries and wishes led the nation of Europe to sign treaties that made them support one another if they faced attack. Germany made a secret alliance with Austria-Hungary back in the late 1800s. A few years later Italy joined two countries to form the Triple Alliance. The rest of the World Powers became more and more concerned about the strength of the Triple Alliance. France and Russia agreed to help each other if any of them were attacked. Britain and France overlooked their earlier conflicts and prepared to go into a union with Russia. Once one country decided to go to war with another country in the other alliance, the additional countries declared war against on the opposing alliances as well.
Out all for of the causes of WWI, nationalism was the strongest reason of the war. Countries had to also consider imperialism in order to fore fill their beliefs of nationalism. To defend their new territory, countries militarized. When other countries recognized a nation building up a military, they also begin militarizing to defend reputation and themselves. Also, due to militarism, many countries formed alliances with other countries.
I believe that Germany was responsible for WW1. As they were the first country to invade another country, hence they started the war.
