I have some definate views on what was the real cause of WW1.
Before I shared mine though I would be interested in hearing yours. Mine may be too mad to write down and I dont want to make a fool of myself.
I believe it was hitler, but then again i may be wrong.
A corporal in the German Army started WWI?
I know nest to nothing about the First World War. But it would seem that decades, even centuries, of colonial and economic competition between Euro Imperial powers led to a colossal military blunderâŠ
I think the open-ended, secret defense pacts had a lot to do with things spiraling out of controlâŠ
I also know etremely very little about WWI
i think its started when a prince of austria was killed in a very small country. Germany and Austria declared war on that small nation, and russia, england, has to protect its allies, so they have to declare war on Austria and Germany.
I think Japan and Italy is on the allied side too, but did not play an active role.
Too many alliances and to many big heads in the governments of Europe. It was a war just waiting to happen. I dont think anyone could have ever expected the consequences this war would have on the world.
I did a great synopsis of the chain of events which turned the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand (no, not a prince) into a global conflict back in the days of tin walt. If one of the administrators could dig it out, I would be very grateful.
Oh, and by the way, Italy and Japan played very active roles.
Im assuming this is the one you are talking about!?!?
But, essentially the âroot causesâ were a series of miscalculations of epic proportions. The European leaderships were still playing by the rules of 30 or 40 years earlier â they took their mutual defence treaty commitments far too seriously, which escalated what should have been a little spat in Austria-Hungaryâs backyard into a global conflict due to the chain of events in the archived post (itâs also quite easy to find the same information on the Internet â try Wikipedia).
Essentially, once Austria-Hungary invaded Serbia to punish them for the assassination, the juggernaut was unstoppable. If Russia had not honoured her treaty commitment with Serbia and had instead said âyour problem, you sort it outâ, it would not all have gone breasts skyward.
Aye, thatâs the badger, thanks.
GS you was faster than me!
i know very little about ww1 from outher countrys but i know a little on canadas role and and in ww1 aldof hitler was a privet in that war thats why there was no cemical war brought in to ww2 he seen the people that cemical brought and swore if he ran germany he would not use it and a canadaians made the first gas mask
Probably the best/worst case ever of adults not knowing when to back off.
i.e. Archduke Franz Ferdinand assassinated by some unknown Serb (Gavrilo Princip). Do the Austro-Hungarians act as mature adults and quietly ask for justice to be done through the courts? No, that would be too sensible, so they get all macho about it and send an ultimatum to the Serbs and declare war.
This is just the classic bar room scenario where some one accidently spills some oneâs drink. It could end up in a mature solution such as someone buying a fresh drink or at the other extreme some one ending up being knifed. Such stupidity happens every day of the week and always will whilst humans get macho instead of getting sensible.
So stupid human nature started WW1.
All true Gentlemen.
Many donât know this, but the Tsar, Kaiser, Queen of England, etc. were all related through royal marriage. Before war broke out each were begging eachouther not to start, but it was pointless and inevetable.
The man who assassinated Arch Duke Franz Ferdinhand was part of the Black Hand, a Serbian terrorist group. While the war went on, the assassin sat in prison perfectly safe.
Itâs a bit more complicated than that. Gavrilo Princip wasnât just a lone loon. He was a member of Black Hand, a Serbian nationalist organization. Many members of the Serbian government at the time were also members of Black Hand, and some knew about the assassination plot beforehand. Austria-Hungary had the right to declare war on Serbia, but Russia didnât have the right to mobilize against Austria-Hungary, solely because of their alliance with the Serbs. Russia was the initial aggressor.
Compare this to a more modern scenario. Al-Qaeda attacks the United States and kills 3,000 Americans on September 11th, 2001. Technically, the Taliban, nor the Afghan government, perpetrated the attack, but the Taliban had sheltered Al-Qaeda, was sympathetic to its ideas, and obstructed the investigation to bring Osama Bin Laden to proper justice. Just substitute Afghanistan for Serbia, Al-Qaeda for Black Hand, and Bin Laden for Princip.
The Austrians had a right to do what they did.
The reason why Archduke Ferdinand was killed was that he was the successor for the KuK throne. Unlike other Austrian politicians, who wanted to solve the problem with Serbia (actually Serb ultranationalists who were striving for a greater Serbia which should include Bosnia-Hertzegovina and Croatia, at this time part of the KuK empire, even though a large part of the local population (the non-Serbs) did not want to become Serbs) with a hard hand and oppresion, Ferdinand was a realist and had started with a diplomatic initiative to defuse the tensions in the region by peacefull means and a regional autonomy of the two regions within the KuK monarchy, a special status like Hungary had. This, of course, would have torpedoed the Serb ultranationalist terroristâs aims, to get Bosnia and Croatia under Serb control.
There were lots of tensions in Europe starting from the late 19th century on. The French wanted revenge for the humiliation and reparations after the Franco-Prussian war of 1870/71. Bismarck at this time suckered the French into declaring war on Prussia, even though the French were not prepared for it, while Moltke had all the plans for an invasion of France ready in his desk drawer. The result was that France was still mobilising, while the Prussian troops (and their allies from the then other German states) crossed the border.
When the war was over and Germany united under the Prussian king as German Kaiser, Bismarck wisely rejected demands by other German politicians to demand reperations, but found himself overruled. As a result France had to hand over not just the disputed border area Alsace with itâs German-French population, but also the industrial region of Lorraine with itâs steel mills and coal mines. Additionally Germany demanded huge amounts of money from France, money which fueled the industrialisation of Germany.
Then Germany, up to 1871 a patchwork made up out of more than 50 independent kingdoms, duchies, counties and free cities, suddenly became a regional superpower. To be a full superpower at this time meant to have overseas colonies. Now most of the globe was already divided up between the British, French, Belgians and Dutch. The German government did not try to challenge Britain to much, even though they went close to it with Tirpitzâs Risikoflotte (Risk fleet), a navy which should be large enough to blow everybody out of the water except for the British, but not big enough to threaten them seriously.
Then Germany started an adventure in the Middle East in cooperation with the ailing Ottoman empire, the Bagdad railway, which was supposed to connect Istanbul with Bagdad and a branch line down the Arab peninsula. Now this meant that troops could be moved fast into regions of British interest (e.g. the Suez canal). Also Germany sent military advisers and weapons to Turkey, which meant that Turkey could close the Bosporus at any time, which again infuriated the Russians.
Germany also went into a confrontation with France over colonies in Northern Africa.
BTW, the other newcomer on the international scene, Japan, got into similar conflicts with Russia and China in the Far East, leading to the first Sino-Japanese war and the Russian-Japanese war, which were both won by Japan.
In the Balkans there was another crisis brewing after the withdrawal of the Ottoman empire. Since the region is ethnically so mixed, it is difficult to draw clear borders, so there were soon border disputes between the different countries, like Bulgaria, Greece, Serbia, austria-Hungary etc., which led to the Balkan wars. At the same time the big powers, Germany, France,Russia, Turkey, Austria-Hungary and the UK were pursuing their own interests and forging secret alliances with each other.
Very complicated, isnât it?
Jan
Itâs even more complex than that. Under the impact of mass nationalism and economic rivalry (as explained above), relations between the Great Powers of Europe moved away from the balance-of-power politics practised since 1815 to a system based on rival alliance blocs. Rapid rearmament fuelled a growing tension in Europe which fianally exploded in 1914 with the outbreak of WW1.
The alliances were supposed to form a balance of power which would render a no-win (deterrant) situation. Unfortunately, Germany being paranoid for its position between France in the west and Russia in the east, devised a plan which would enable it to win. This was the Shliefen Plan. Germany expected to be able to deliver a quick knock-out blow against France by sweeping through neutral belgium and around Paris, thus encircling the French troops and forcing a surrender before swinging its forces east confront the more slowly mobilizing Russian Army, thus avoiding fighting on two fronts at the same time. By violating Belgian neutrality to attack France, Germany brought Britain into the war.
The distances the German Army was required to cover were too great for the time it had to cover them in, which enabled the Anglo-French armies to recover from the initial onslaught, regroup and hold the German advance.
And this is very simplified.
I donât think Britain cared all too much about Belgian neutrality, contrary to rumor. Belgium was a relatively weak nation compared to the great European powers, and was not a particularly close ally of Britain. More likely, they acted as they did to protect one of their strongest allies, France, because they wanted to contain growing German influence in Europe, and because there were growing rifts between themselves and the German empire, dating back to the Boer War, when Germany denounced what they saw as British imperialism in Africa.