THE CAUSES OF THE FIRST WORLD WAR
What triggered the war?
Sunday 28 June 1914, Archduke Franz Ferdinand from Austria was visiting Sarajevo, Bosnia.
While parading throughout Bosnian streets, a group of 6 Bosnian terrorists wanted to kill Franz.
Effectively, he was murdered that day. What followed:
- 23 July: Austria blamed Serbia for the death of Franz Ferdinand
- 28 July: Austria declared war to Serbia
- 29 July: Russia got ready to help Serbia, despite being warned by Germany not to.
- 1 august: Germany declared war to Russia while sending troops to France and Belgium.
- 3 august: Germany declared war to France and invaded Belgium. Britain ordered
Germany to withdraw from Belgium.
- 4 august: Britain declared war on Germany.
- 6 august: Austria declared war on Russia.
What was it like in 1914?
There were two major alliances in Europe at that time:
1) The Triple Alliance:
a) Germany:
- Germany was specialized in heavy industry, becoming second major industry in
the world.
- Its Kaiser was very ambitious and thought they should have more overseas
colonies (they only had 2 in Africa) such as Britain and France.
- He ordered the building of a strong navy, which become the second largest
worldwide, after Britain.
- Germany was concerned regarding the huge build-up of arms in Russia.
b) Austria-Hungary
- Because of the diversity of people living in the country (Czechs, Slovaks,
Serbs, germans) there was a push to become independent.
- In the north, the Czech wanted to rule themselves, and not obey the central
government.
- The Slav in the southwest, wanted their own state.
- The Serbs wants to be joined to their neighbor: Serbia.
- So, by 1914 it was very difficult to keep this fragmented empire together.
- A-H was threatened by its neighbor Serbia because of the powerful army it was
building. Russia, who supported the Serbs, also did have a strong army.
c) Italy
- Italy was made up from a collection of smaller states, so by 1914 their primary
concern was to stablish a powerful government.
- They also wanted to create overseas colonies, so that’s why they joined the
triple alliance.
2) Triple Entente:
a) Britain
- Britain was concerned not so much on the European issues going on (splendid
isolation), but more on building an overseas empire.
- During the 19th century, France and Russia were seen as its most dangerous
rivals, but that now changed thanks to:
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o An agreement with France in order to divide their colonies in northern
Africa.
o Russia was defeated in the 1904 war by Japan, weakening Russia.
b) France
- France was defeated by Germany in a small war in 1870, which made Germany
build a strong and powerful army and industry.
- Because of this, the French started to build a strong industry and develop a
strong friendship with Russia in order to protect itself against Germany and
take back the rich industrial region of Alsace- Lorraine which Germany took
from them in that war in 1870.
c) Russia.
- It was by far the largest country but was not so powerful because it was mainly
agricultural and not so industrial.
- Along with France, they were concerned by the growing of Germany.
- They were allies to Serbia because of their rivalry with AH and because both
Russian and Serbs were Slavs. Many Slavs lived in AH and Russia wanted to
control them.
The tension builds, 1900-1914
The main cause of tension in Europe was the naval rivalry of the 20 th century. When the german
Kaiser announced that he was building a powerful german navy, Britain felt threatened by this
because although they had the biggest naval in the world, they had it spread throughout their
colonies, while Germany had almost none.
Germanys army was not the biggest but was the better trained. If come the time, they would
have to fight Russia and France simultaneously. So that’s how they came with the “Schlieffen
Plan”, which would quickly attack and defeat France, and then turn their forces on Russia.
AH, allied to Germany, knew they would need their help to hold back Russia if the war came.
They relied on this Schlieffen plan in order to defeat Russia.
Russian army, unlike Germany, was huge but very badly equipped.
France had a large and well-equipped army. Their main plan was “Plan 17”, where French
troops would go across the frontier and attack deep into Germany, forcing their surrender.
Britain’s military planners set up the British Expeditionary Force (BEF), consisting of 150.000
highly trained and well-equipped professional soldiers, which would allow them to go to France
and fight alongside the French.
Because of this great escalade of militarization, many countries felt that war was about to come
sooner or later. All these plans were designed to achieve a quick victory, also because the cost
of a long war would lead to economic collapse.
Morocco, 1905 & 1911.
Two major crises in Morocco raised the temperature in Europe.
- 1905
The german Kaiser visited Morocco while Germany was building its small colonies in southern
Africa. In Morocco, he supported Morocco’s independence, which upset the French who were
looking forward on invading the city. An international conference was held in the city of
Algericas in 1906 in order to cool things down. This was the last thing that happened, as in the
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conference the Kaisers views for Africa were unheard, making him feel like he had no right to
speak on African matters. This made the Kaiser re-think his future strategy for Africa.
In 1907, in the wake of the Moroccan crisis, Britain and France formed an alliance with Russia:
the Triple Entente, ending their old rivalry. This alliance was set as a security alliance against
the possible german aggression.
- 1911
Another crisis arose when the French tried to take over Morocco. Germany´s response was to
send a gunboat to the city in order to get ready to fight. The British feared this was made to set
up a german naval base. Another conference was called which again showed no results. Frane
finally took over Morocco and Germany was given some land in central Africa as
compensation.
The Balkans: the spark that lit the war.
The Balkans (actual Turkey, Bulgaria and Greece) was a very unstable area because:
- Different nationalities were mixed together
- The area had been ruled by turkey for many centuries, but Turkish power was now in
decline.
- The new governments which had been set up in place of Turkish rule were regularly in
dispute with each other
- Two great powers, Russia and AH, bordered the countries in this region and both
wanted control of the sea areas which would give them access to the Mediterranean.
The first crisis came in 1908 when AH took over Bosnia and Herzegovina, which made Serbia
and Russia protest but backed down when they saw that Germany supported AH. AH now
thought Germany would always back them in future disputes.
During 1912 and 1913 some local wars took place and resulted in Serbia becoming the most
powerful country in the Balkans. This scared AH and thought it was time to confront them in
order to reinstate their order. Their opportunity came with the murder of the archduke Ferdinand
in Bosnia. Although there was no evidence that the murderer was acting under orders of the
Serbian government, AH blamed them for the murder and commenced war.
The war on the western front reaches stalemate
As soon as the war was declared, Germany put into operation the Schlieffen Plan in order to
send troops through Belgium and defeat France. Then, because of the long distance, Russia
would take a long time to get its troops ready for war and would allow the german troops to
recover and fight against Russia. Unfortunately for Germany, that did not happen:
- The germans were slowed down by the Belgian army and did not reach Paris quickly.
- The Russians moved quicklier than expected, so Germany had to divide its troops to go
fight against them, weakening their both fronts.
Once in France, the german troops had to deal with the support of the British troops, which were
beaten. Also, France experienced some problems as they followed their “Plan 17” but got
surprised by german troops which used heavy artillery and machine gun fire. This made the
French to loose over 200.000 men in 12 days. They abandoned plan 17 and regrouped in order
to defend Paris from the germans.
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As the French were on the defensive, trying to save paris, the Germans were experiencing some
issues. First, the german commander had to pull 100.000 troops from that fight because Russia
had movilized quickly (despite being planed the opposite in the Schlieffen plan). Second,
german army was lacking food and ammunition supplies. Because of this, the german
commander ordered not to take Paris and instead, pass over it in order to reach the next goal.
When they reached the River Marne, they were met by British and French forces which stopped
the german advance and pull them back to the river Aisne. However, they couldn´t expulse them
from France entirely. Neither of both sides were making any progress do they started digging
trenches to protect themselves. This was known as the Battle of the Marne.
This battle was a turning point. The Schlieffen plan had failed, and Germany was caught
fighting a two-front war. Because of this, the germans began “the race to the sea” in order to
escape those fronts, but the British and French troops moved to block them from wherever the
germans were trying to escape.
Soon, the Battle of Ypres took place in Belgium. In this battle, the BEF lost 50.000 men but the
germans lost 100.000 and lost the control of the English ports, which meant they could not
receive supplies. It was November 1914 and war was a deadlock. The French had suffered more
than 1 million dead and were exhausted. So, millions of troops were dug into a line of trenches
that went from the sea in the west, to the alps in the east. This was known as The Western
Front.
How was the fighting like on the Western Front?
It was the first time something like this happened, the main changes in the technique of warfare
on the First World War were:
1) Trench warfare: Instead of a war of movement, this war was static. Trenches were a
kind of shelter that became complex defensive systems.
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2) More powerful artillery: new artillery bombardments caused more casualties than any
other weapon. At the beginning of the war, guns were not very accurate. By the end of
the war, artillery was much bigger and accurate.
3) Cavalry (men riding horses) became less important: before 1914 all sides thought of
the speed and mobility of horses would be decisive. However, once trenches were dug,
cavalry became too vulnerable as they could be seen easier from the trenches and so,
could easily be defeated. The cavalry discovered a new role: transporting supplies and
equipment.
4) Infantry became more important: the standard equipment for an infantry soldier
were:
The infantry´s job was to follow the cavalry and take charge of the captured positions.
Then, they should defend the position against any counterattack that might occur.
Because of trenches, the cavalry charge was replaced by the infantry charge.
The machine gun was really effective against the infantry charge, and each trench
would have many of them.
5) Poison gas: the main aim of these attacks was to disable enemy troops so that your own
infantry charge would be successful. Later, scientists developed new poison gases such
as mustard gas which would burn, blind or slowly kill the victims. Because of the
poison gas, gas masks were also created for the soldiers in the trenches if there was any
gas attack.
6) Tanks: there were a British invention. Its first use was in the Battle of the Somme.
They caused alarm over the germans because of the power they had. It was more of a
moral boost for the British than a war boost (es decir, se creian mejores por tener esto).
What was life like in the trenches?
Soldiers were either extremely bored down there or extremely stressed when a bombardment or
attack occurred. Soldiers spent more time on guard, repairing trenches rather than fighting on
the top. It depended on the commander in chief how much they spent in there, sometimes it
could be 3 days in, 3 days out, etc. If a strong battle occurred, they should leave them and fight
in the front line. On their free time, they would even write notes to their loved ones.
