Causes of WW1

Causes of World War One

There many factors contributing to the start of World War One, one of the bloodiest wars ever fought, both short and long term. The long term causes were Militarism, the Alliance System, Imperialism and Nationalism. The short term events include the First Moroccan Crisis, the Second Moroccan Crisis at Adagir, the annexation of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Germany’s “blank cheque” and finally the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand at Sarajevo.

Militarism was ripe in the European countries during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Militarism means;

“The belief or desire of a government or people that a country should maintain a strong military capability and be prepared to use it aggressively to defend or promote national interests”.

One example of militarism leading up to World War One are the British-German Naval Race. The Naval Race began after Kaiser William II announced the Tirpitz Plan to increase Germany’s naval size. Britain, who went by the “Two-Power Standard” at that point, also increased their naval size. However in 1906 Britain introduced the HMS Dreadnought into service. The Dreadnought was a revolutionary ship, rendering most previous battleships obsolete with its superior speed, thicker armor and bigger guns which had a far larger range. By 1914 Britain had 38 dreadnoughts and dreadnought battle cruisers while Germany only had 24. The naval race increased tension between Britain and Germany. Apart from the Naval Race there were other examples of militarism in the lead up to WW1. France and Germany built up huge conscript armies, which meant that all young men had to go through a period of military training after which they would become part of the country’s military “reserve” of men who, in the case of war, could be called upon to fight. Railways were also extended in most countries to enable troop movements to become faster and more efficient and as weapon technology became more advanced the various governments spent more and more on increasingly expensive weapons making armament manufacturers wealthy.

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Prior to 1905 there were few full-time soldiers in Britain, R.B Haldane, a Scot and also Secretary of State for War reformed the army, now called the British Expeditionary Force (BEF), created the General Staff to help military planning and founded the Territorial Army to backup the BEF.

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The Alliance System was the reason, what should have been a small conflict between two countries, developed into the biggest war the world had ever seen. There were two main groups, the Triple Alliance and the Triple Entente. The Triple Alliance consisted of, Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy while the Triple Entente consisted of Britain, France and Russia. Although Russia and France had an alliance together and had promised to fight with each other, Britain only had an entente with Russia and France which meant she was only promising to talk.

However Kaiser William II was not as clever as his predecessor Bismarck at making alliances with other countries. Bismarck was the old Minister-President of Prussia and had overseen the formation of the Second German Empire and had a policy of politically isolating France and orchestrated the “League of Three Emperors” between Germany, Russia and Austria-Hungary and when that broke down he signed, in secret, the Reinsurance Policy with Russia in 1874. This agreement meant Russian neutrality if France was to attack Germany. When Russia wanted to renew this treaty in 1890 Kaiser William II refused because he wanted to improve the British-German relations and Russia was not Britain’s favourite country at that time. This failure to renew the Reinsurance Policy lead to the Russian-French alliance, ending France’s political isolation and is ultimately seen as Kaiser William II’s greatest political error during his reign.

Another of William II’s great diplomatic errors was during the Moroccan Crisis in 1906 when against his personal wishes but under pressure from the German ruling elite, he made a diplomatic journey to Tangiers, Morocco. During a speech there he made remarks supporting Moroccan independence. This upset France who had intentions to colonize the region. This eventually led to the conference at Algeciras where the result was in France’s favour, furthering the British-French friendship and further isolating Germany.

Imperialism was the main cause of the Moroccan Crisis with Germany, being a relatively new country at the time wanting, as Kaiser William put it “a place in the sun” but at that time most of the most profitable areas had already been colonized by the French and the British. This led to increased tension between the Britain and Germany and between France and Germany although the British-French Entente was strengthened.

Nationalism was another of the main reasons for WW1 and was mainly in the Balkans. The Austro-Hungarian Empire at the time was interested in expanding into the Balkans at the time and Russia did not approve as most of the population in the Balkan area were Slavs, like the Russians. The Austrians however were of the Germanic race but the Austro-Hungarian Empire at time had many different nationalities within its borders. Apart from the Austrian native people there were Serbs, Romanians, Magyars, Germans, Czechs, Poles, Slovaks, Ruthenians, Serb-Croats, Muslims and Croats. As you can see, many nationalities. The big independent state in the Balkans at the time was Serbia and after the Austro-Hungarians annexed Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1908 the Serbs were very angry as they did not want their fellow Slavs under the rule of a Germanic empire. Russia supported this view and started a policy called “Panslavism”. This Policy was intended to unite the Slav people under one banner.

This Slav Nationalism eventually led to the spark that started the whole war. The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand at Sarajevo, Bosnia in 1914 by the Serbian radical group called the Black Hand. During an official visit to the city to try to quell Anti-Austrian thoughts and to show to the world that they were in control of the Bosnians. During the initial procession to the Town Hall, the Archduke and his wife’s open topped car had a primitive bomb thrown at it. Although the bomb missed the Archduke wanted to visit his staff injured in the attack in the hospital. He told his driver this but the driver got confused and turned the wrong way and by chance stopped the car near a cafe where one of the members of the group of the Black Hand assassins, a man named Gavrilo Princep who was dieing of tuberculosis and had nothing to lose. Princep fired two shots, the first taking the Archduke through the neck, the second hitting his wife Sophie in the stomach. Sophie was later believed to have been pregnant.

Austria-Hungary wanted revenge for this heinous act and after Kaiser William II offered German aid in the war against Serbia and gave Austria-Hungary a “blank cheque” meaning she would support Austria-Hungary in anyway possible, Austria-Hungarya issued Serbia with an ultimatum that had the following demands on it:

1. Suppress publications which incite hatred and contempt of the Monarchy;

2. Dissolve (National Defence) and similar societies, confiscate their means of propaganda, and prevent the societies from reforming under new names;

3. Eliminate from public instruction in Serbia, both as regards the teaching body and the methods of instruction, all that serves or might serve to foment propaganda against Austria-Hungary;

4. Remove from the military service and the administration in general all officers guilty of propaganda against Austria-Hungary, names of which Austria-Hungary reserved the right to provide; (Serbia agreed to remove those officers proven guilty by judicial inquiry. As propaganda was not yet a crime it is unclear how any officers would be removed).

5. Accept the collaboration in Serbia of organs of the Austro-Hungarian government in the suppression of the subversive movement directed against the territorial integrity of the monarchy;

6. Begin a judicial inquiry against the accessories to the plot of June 28th who are on Serbian territory, with organs delegated by the Austro-Hungarian government participating in the investigation;

7. Immediately arrest Major Vojav Tankosić and Milan Ciganović who were implicated by the preliminary investigation undertaken by Austria-Hungary;

8. Prevent by effective measures the cooperation of Serbian authorities in the illicit traffic in arms and explosives across the frontier and to dismiss and severely punish those in the Serbian Frontiers Service who assisted the authors of the Sarajevo outrage;

9. Furnish Austria-Hungary with explanations regarding statements from high Serbian officials both in Serbia and abroad, who have expressed hostility towards Austria-Hungary; and

Notify Austria-Hungary without delay of the execution of these measures.

Serbia however, after recieving the promise that Russia would support them if they were invaded, did not agree to all these demands and so Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia on July 28 1914. Russia started mobilizing its troops a few days after. Germany declared war on Russia on August 1st and on France on August 3rd. Germany then proceeded to launch a pre-emptive strike on France before the Russians had a chance to mobolize all her troops. During this attack the Germans violated Belgium’s neutrality by following the Schiefflen Plan which involved going through Belgium and northern France quickly securing Paris and then moving onto the Russians. This plan failed however as the Belgians and French put up a much tougher resistance than expected. The invasion of Belgium was what brought Britian into the war as Britain thought herself as Belgium’s “protector”.

In conclusion I think they were alot of factors that contributed to the outbreak of World War One but I think that the assassination of Sarajevo had the greatest repurcusions. I think this because if the assassination had not happened then the war would not have begun and at the end the Treaty of Versailles that eventually led to the rise of Nazism in Germany would not have happened. Nor would the Russian Revolution and subsequently the rise of Communist Russia and the Cold War.