THE CAUSES OFWORLD WAR I

By Trevor Burdzy

MODERN EUROPE 114 56221

PROFESSOR PILANT 8/15/13

At the time World War One was the most devastating war in human history before World War II. It cost millions of lives, and even birthed modern military tactics, thus severing ties to traditional military knowledge and ushering in the modern age. It was the result of various long and short term conflicts between nations, as well as the infamous isms. The isms, being nationalism, imperialism, and militarism, were the social and political factors that ended up making World War I inevitable. The hard-nosed politics, as well as the social philosophies of the time led to things escalating as they did. In general, Europe during the late nineteenth century, and early twentieth century was a powder keg, and it only needed a spark to explode into war. As mentioned, nationalism amongst all European nations, was rampant. In terms of politics, this meant closed doors between nations, and selfish actions were considered desirable policy. Nationalism caused the unification of Italy and Germany inciting other countries to do the same.1 For example, The pressure to belong was so strong that vigorous campaigns were launched against minorities; the Poles in the Russian empire, always rebellious subjects of the tsar, were made to conform to Russian ideals; there was wide spread antiSemitism in central Europe 2. This extreme nationalism essentially stopped nations from finding diplomatic solutions to problems that may arise, because to back down to another nation was seen as weak, both by politicians, and citizens. War and threats were now a legitimate diplomatic strategy, and even an encouraged one. It is no surprise that the First World War was fought with this being the mindset of the leaders of the world.
1

McDonald, Michael J. "World War I the Long and Short Term Causes." World War I the Long and Short Term Causes. Bookoflife.org, 2004. Web. 07 Aug. 2013. 2 Stokesbury, James L. A Short History of World War I. New York: Morrow, 1981. Print. 13.

Many social factors allowed hard-nosed politics, militarism, and nationalism to thrive. New social philosophies and ideals, such as communism, were being created that claimed they could solve the new problems society was facing. Belief in ideas like communism would cause uprisings that rarely achieved what they set out to do, but managed to create considerable social and political tension. One of the more over-arching problems was the increase in population, and production. The increase in numbers was necessarily coupled with an increase in production of goods and services.3 This increase in people and production at first glance would seem beneficial, but for many, it just widened the gap between the classes because of an abundance of workers. This is the time when workers unions started to gain some power and in spite of progressive social legislation, too many people still led lives of drudgery in mines and factories4. This growing disparity between classes was the breeding ground for socialist philosophies such as Marxs communism, which caused much unrest in many European nations. Imperialism in the second ism that is slated for causing World War I. Per the competitive mood at the time nearly every European nation started grabbing up different parts of the world in order to increase their own power. This imperial spirit of Europe though created almost constant conflict between nations. The validation of imperialism was a raciest belief that the civilized nations of Europe had a duty to civilize the rest of the world whether they like or not. It was very clear to political leaders though that they were creating their various empires to increase their own prestige and power by bringing in raw materials cheaply, as well as increasing their amount of land. The major problem in relation to World War I came from land

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4

Stokesbury, James L. A Short History of World War I, 12. Stokesbury, James L. A Short History of World War I, 12.

disputes between nations. Despite the conquered land being far away from home in most cases each country treated the land (although not the people) like it was their own country. Imperialism created additional tensions because it created a rivalry induced by nations unequal development5. Attempting to dominate any place they could, European nations set out on a competitive land grab that only decreased political stability on the continent. A partner to nationalism, necessity of imperialism, as well one of the infamous isms itself, is militarism. Militarism stemmed from nationalism, in the idea that nothing could make a country greater than having a great military. Dominance was the trademark of a successful country, and no major European power was willing to be left out. This trend of militarism in many nations was why there were massive arms build-ups all across Europe, and the interest in warfare gave us the weapons that devastated World War I battlefields. International, which chiefly meant European, policy was indeed, in the opening years of the twentieth century, guided not by the search for a secure means of averting conflict but by the age-old quest for security in military superiority.6 War was highly attractive to the generation before 1914, partly because it had fought so few of them, and those it had fought had not been very bloody.7 Romanticizing war in many countries was not uncommon, in fact many teachers in schools would quote the old Latin tag, It is sweet and fitting to die for ones country 8. This even lasted some time into the war; young men who wanted to go out for an adventure eagerly joined their respective countrys militaries with excited faces as they headed toward the front

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7 8

Ferro, Marc. The Great War, 1914-1918. London: Routledge & K. Paul, 1973. Print, 19. Keegan, John. The First World War. New York: A. Knopf, 1999. Print, 19. Stokesbury, James L. A Short History of World War I, 13. Stokesbury, James L. A Short History of World War I, 13

lines. Many of Europes political and military leaders were also under an unrelated de lusion, that modern war would be short and quick. In retrospect it is not too hard to understand why this was a popular thought, wars in the past, especially recent past, were short and often decided by one or two decisive battles. Similarly, the idea that money would run out before fighting got bad was not too far-fetched. Huge artillery pieces and new technologies such as the machine gun would be expensive, and if a battle was not decisive then both sides would sue for peace before the war dragged on too long. It is also noteworthy to mention that some people were also persuaded that modern weapons were too good and war would become an impossibility. Ironically they were somewhat right; the stagnant trench warfare of World War I did make traditional fighting impossible. Little did they, and many of Europes political and military leaders realize though, that the devastation would quickly put an end to many of their preconceptions of modern war. When looking back at the history of World War I it is odd to notice that every nation was preparing for war; their aggressive politics used war as a legitimate diplomatic strategy, they built up massive armies, and made plans in case of war. At this point it would seem that the countries of Europe knew war was on the horizon, but thought nothing of it. In the past military strategy and planning was done if war was seriously threatened, or already declared, but in the decades before World War I a new era in military planning had begun; that of the making of war plans in the abstract, plans conceived at leisure, pigeonholed and pulled out when eventuality became reality9. All European armies in 1904 had long-laid military plans, notable

Keegan, John. The First World War. New York: A. Knopf, 1999. Print, 24.

in most cases for their inflexibility.10 This was only one flaw of military plans at the time; another was that some specifically included nationalistic fighting spirit on the part of their soldiers as a genuine part of the plan. The French are infamous for believing this, and they suffered heavily as a result. Another important war plan was the Schlieffen plan that the Germans had prior to the war. The various war plans kept the idea of war constantly in the mind of politicians and would give them greater confidence when toying with war as diplomatic strategy. Finally, after all the buildup, it only took the spark to ignite World War I. On the last days of June 1914 Arch Duke Franz Ferdinand was going to Austria to conduct some ceremonial services and the Serb national terror squads warned Austria not to let him in, sent their assassins to strategic places in the cities he was attending to, and braced for war. 11 When Archduke Ferdinand was assassinated Austria blamed Serbia claiming that they were connected to the attack, and sent them an ultimatum. The Austrian ministers had concocted a series of demands which would have practically destroyed Serbian sovereignty, if Serbia gave in to them.12 Although Serbia did agree to many of the demands, they didnt agree to them all. As a result, Austria set up to attack Serbia which was when the various alliances would kick in and drag all of Europe into war. Russia would back Serbia if it was attacked, and Germany was doing all it could to empower its only real ally, Austria. Then on June 25, 1914 Austria decided to

10 11

Keegan, John. The First World War. New York: A. Knopf, 1999. Print, 27. McDonald, Michael J. World War I the Long and Short Term Causes. Bookoflife.org, 2004. Web. 14 Aug. 2013. 12 Stokesbury, James L. A Short History of World War I, 25.

attack Serbia, the French government assured Russia of its support, and the Serbs replied to the ultimatum13. The next day, the British got involved, and Europe was officially now at war. In conclusion, World War I was a product of many factors relating to the time. The major factor was the aggressive mindset which created numerous problems that led to the war. Nationalism spawned a breed of politics content to use war as legitimate diplomatic strategy. Nationalism and raciest beliefs justified the high amount of imperialistic policies in Europe which only created competition and friction within politics. Finally, in order to satisfy nationalistic beliefs and maintain the empire and a sense of security many countries became militaristic, believing that no brutal war would result because of a belief in military deterrence. Massive arms build-ups as well as ready-made war plans gave each nation the confidence needed to march into war if need be. Aside from these infamous isms though, there were legitimate social issued that caused internal strife within many nations that their respective governments were unable to solve. World War I was likely not an avoidable war, just like many wars. It was the result of complex international (European) political strife, as well as many social factors that allowed the most devastating war in human history at the time to explode.

Bibliography

Keegan, John. The First World War. New York: A. Knopf, 1999. Print.

13

Stokesbury, James L. A Short History of World War I, 27.

Stokesbury, James L. A Short History of World War I. New York: Morrow, 1981. Print.

Ferro, Marc. The Great War, 1914-1918. London: Routledge & K. Paul, 1973. Print.

McDonald, Michael J. "World War I the Long and Short Term Causes." World War I the Long and Short Term Causes. Bookoflife.org, 2004. Web. 27 July 2013.

"C: The First World War, 1914-1918." C: The First World War, 1914-1918. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 July 2013.

Metcalf, Adam. "[Regents Prep Global History] Conflict: World Wars." [Regents Prep Global History] Conflict: World Wars. Regentsprep.org, n.d. Web. 27 July 2013.