VIII: The Origins of the First World War Flashcards
What are the causes/origins of WWI?
- Domestic Political Factors
- Technical Military Factors
- Imperialism
Causes of WWI: Domestic Political Factors
One argument that can be made about the lead-up to WWI was that the domestic political situation within the key powers had pushed each of the states towards a more hostile foreign policy and increased their willingness to go to war.
In Austria-Hungary, politics in the decades before the war were increasingly dominated by the struggle for national rights among the empire’s eleven official nationalities: Germans, Hungarians, Czechs, Slovaks, Slovenes, Croats, Serbs, Romanians, Ukrainians, Poles, and Italians. Externally, Austria-Hungary was battling to maintain their international relevance as well as their legitimacy as an Empire. Internally, Austria-Hungary had to maintain control over their Empire. They knew that in order to maintain their Empire, they had to deal with Serbia and the Pan-Slavic movement supported by Russia. The Balkan wars had already demonstrated the will of the Balkan nations for self-determination and the Bosnian annexation crisis was the precursor to WW1, a “dress rehearsal” so to speak.
In Germany, left-wing parties, especially the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD), had made large gains in the 1912 German election. The German government was still dominated by the Prussian Junkers, members of the landed nobility such as Paul von Hindenburg, who feared the rise of left-wing parties seeking social and economic changes. German historian Fritz Fischer has famously argued that they deliberately sought an external war to siphon support for the left-wing revisionist parties and incite patriotic support for the government.
In Russia, there is a very close connection between domestic and foreign policy. Russia was strongly conditioned by their defeat in the Russo-Japanese war. Historically, periods of expansion had also been accompanied by periods of economic growth and social change. Between 1905 and 1915, there had been remarkable growth in Russia that promised social stability and opportunities for movements of change. The question can also be reversed in this case: Had it not been for WW1 and its domestic consequences, would there have been the same level of major social change?
Britain was inhibited in its role as keeper of the Balance of Power due to its domestic political conflicts. There was social and political conflict over the budget, the rise of the labour party, as well as the women’s movement internally. Irelands proved to be another big problem for Britain, as the Island was on the verge of civil war. This was a much more immediate problem for Britain that the conflict in Europe. Ireland would eventually rebel in the Easter Rising in 1916.
All these domestic factors contributed to the hostile international relations in the early 20th century. The question was not whether war would break out, but when and under what conditions. Thus, the assassination of Francis Ferdinand was the event that triggered the states’ responses that had been inevitable at this point, not the overall cause of it.
Causes of WWI: Technical and Military Factors
Argument 1: The Role of Military in Society
Militarism is ever-present in Europe at this time. Everything is militarized, everyone was wearing military uniforms. Military service was an opportunity for upwards mobility and people were easier convinced that waging war was a good thing.
- In Austria-Hungary – the army, along with Bureaucracy, was a major connector of the monarchy. It held the empire together.
- In Prussia, the army was very much a social elite. This is why the Navy was popular with the middle-class people
- Britain always had a professional army and navy was most important
- In Italy, the army had a strong domestic role and served as a kind of police force, keeping the people under control
- In France, the army had a very mixed role. On the one hand it was the defender of the nation but on the other, it was the defender of its own interests
- In Russia, the army is the backbone of the state. Without the army, the autocracy/the state dissolves (which would happen shortly after).
Argument 2: The Arms Race
One argument historians make is that the industry that created armaments was to blame for the outbreak of WW1. These industries created the conditions for the decision to go to war. An example of this is the great naval arms race between Germany and Britain that started well before the war began. Anglo-German anxieties and animosities were fuelled by the arms race.
Argument 3: Military Strategy and its Involvement
The alliance system dictated strategy, that is, who your friends and foes are.
Mobilization dictated timing. Quick mobilisation was key to prevent being surprised and overrun in case of war. “If we do not mobilize, we will not be able to fight”.
The military leadership determined strategy and mobilization, not diplomacy. Thus, it was the military leadership that ultimately decided the who and when of WW1.
Causes of WWI:
Germany had long desired a dominant world position and was ready to challenge the continental countries, as well as Britain, for it. Britain, on the other hand, feared the potential growth and hegemony of a German Empire. France was once again in a position in which it needed a foreign empire in order to secure its situation within Europe. On the other side of the coin, Russia’s failed imperial excursion to Japan re-directed its interests back to Europe and expansion to the west, instead of the east. Many scholars and world leaders at the time argued that economic and imperial interests were part of the main causes of WW1.
There is, however, a question of proximity. Imperialism had been going on for quite some time and the situation was not a unique one. In the immediate sense, it is hard to find evidence that this war was the direct result of economic pressures.
Still, Woodrow Wilson and Lenin focus on these questions.
o Wilson argued that democratic and free-trade countries are more harmonious and that authoritarians and trading cartels a recipe for war (liberal basis of Wilson’s worldview).
o Lenin has the same analytical view but with an opposite conclusion – arguing that capitalism is what leads to war.
What happened in Sarajevo and what were its immediate causes?
By 1914, there had emerged a comparable movement for national unification of all Slav peoples south of the Danube - that is, within Austria, Hungary, and Bosnia, and within Serbia, Montenegro, and Turkey – as there had been previously with Piedmont. In 1908 Austria’s annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina had caused a six months’ crisis, and had started a continuous drift towards war, because it made clear Austria’s intention to check the movement even by annexations.
On June 28, 1914, Franz Ferdinand was in the Austro-Hungarian province of Bosnia and Herzegovina accompanied by his wife, Sophie. He was there as inspector general of the imperial army. Moreover, the date chosen for this imperial visit and Hapsburg show of force was June 28, a black date in Serbian history: it was the anniversary of the Turkish victory over Serbia at the Battle of Kosovo in 1389. This fanned the flames of dissent among Serbian nationalists even further. Shortly after 10 am, one of the attackers, Nedjelko Cabrinovic, threw a grenade at the royal couple’s car. The bomb bounced off the back of the vehicle and exploded behind them, injuring members of the entourage who were in the next car and peppering bystanders with shrapnel. After completing the planned reception at City Hall, the shaken royal couple insisted on changing their schedule and visiting the hospital to check on one of the officers injured in the morning attack. When the royal motorcade entered a side street and stopped to turn around, a compatriot of Cabrinovic, 19-year-old Gavrilo Princip, seized his opportunity. Approaching the royal couple’s open car, he shot both Franz Ferdinand and Sophie with a Browning pistol. Sophie died en route to the hospital and Franz Ferdinand died shortly after. Princip tried to shoot himself but was apprehended by bystanders. All of the conspirators were eventually found and arrested. Exempted from the death penalty because of his young age, Princip was sentenced to 20 years in prison, where he died from tuberculosis in 1918. Until his death, Princip insisted that he did not “cause” World War One, but that his actions only sped up the process to an inevitable war.
There was no reason intrinsically why such an incident should necessitate war between Austria and Serbia. That it did so was due to the policy followed by Vienna. Serbia, at the time, was the focal point of a triple conflict: that between dynastic imperialism and insurgent nationalism; that between Pan-Germanism and Pan-Slavism; and that between Triple Alliance and Triple Entente. This threefold importance explains why assassinations at Sarajevo could precipitate a world war.
The Archduke Franz Ferdinand had liberal-minded plans for a federal reorganization of the Dual Monarchy, which involved appealing for the support of the southern Slavs against the ruling Magyar minority. Since the aim of fervent Serbian patriots was a southern Slav state completely outside the Dual Monarchy, they regarded with great animosity any plan for prolonging German rule over Slavs. After the Balkan Wars of 1912-13 the Austrian government was confronted with even more positive nationalist agitation for a ‘greater Serbia’, to include all Slavs south of the Danube and so involving disruption of the Habsburg Empire. That Russian Pan-Slav ambitions lay behind this agitation they had no doubts. They resolved to tolerate no further Serbian gains. When the Archduke and his wife, visiting the Bosnian capital of Sarajevo on 28 June, on a mission intended to win its good will, were fired at and killed by the Austrian Serb, Gavrilo Princip, Vienna regarded the murders as Serbian provocation of war.
What were the war aims of the powers? Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary was desperate to protect the integrity of its crumbling Empire, especially in the Balkans, where a power vacuum created by the decline of the Ottoman Empire had allowed nationalist movements to agitate and fight. Austria was particularly concerned with Russian and Serbian Pan-Slavic nationalism. Austria feared that this would lead to either Russian domination in the Balkans, or the total ousting of Austro-Hungarian power. The destruction of Serbia was deemed vital in keeping Austria-Hungary together, as there were near twice as many Serbs within the empire as were in Serbia (over seven million, versus over three million). It was, in this sense, regarded as a war of defence, an ordeal necessary for the survival of a dynastic state. Revenging the death of Franz Ferdinand was low on the list of causes.
What were the war aims of the powers? Serbia
For Serbia, it was also a war of national defence. Behind it, however, were the same demand which the nineteenth century had made popular and respectable: for the national unification and self-determination of all southern Slavs. The paradox of this struggle against the dynastic Austrian Empire was that that the cause of Serbian nationalism was supported primarily by the illiberal dynastic government of Russia, whose aim was to preserve independent Slav states as an obstruction to Austro-German influence in the Balkans. This paradox prevented, from the start, any clear ideological alignment of the powers.
What were the war aims of the powers? Germany
Many members of the German military and government were convinced that a war with Russia was inevitable given their competing interests in the land between them and the Balkans. But they had also concluded that Russia was militarily much weaker now than it would be should it continue to industrialize and modernize its army. France was also increasing its military capacity – a law making conscription last three years was passed against opposition – and Germany had managed to get stuck in a naval race with Britain. To many influential Germans, their nation was surrounded and stuck in an arms race it would lose if allowed to continue. The conclusion was that this inevitable war must be fought sooner, when it could be won, than later. Although this is a highly controversial conclusion.
War would also enable Germany to dominate more of Europe and expand the core of the German Empire east and west. But Germany also wanted a key element it lacked, which the other major empires – Britain, France, Russia – had: colonial land. Germany coveted the extra resources and power. The German government thought that a victory would allow them to gain some of their rivals’ land. Germany was also determined to keep Austria-Hungary alive as a viable ally to their south and support them in a war if necessary.
What were the war aims of the powers? Russia
The Russians fought to keep Austria out of the Balkans and to preserve free passage of the Straits upon which Russia’s economic life was felt to depend. Russia believed that the Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian Empires were collapsing and that there would be a reckoning over who would occupy their territory. To many Russia, this reckoning would be largely in the Balkans between a pan-Slavic alliance, ideally dominated by (if not entirely controlled by) Russia, against a pan-German Empire. Many in the Russian court, in the ranks of the military officer class, in the central government, in the press and even among the educated, felt Russia should enter and win this clash. Indeed, Russia was afraid that if they didn’t act in decisive support of the Slavs, as they had failed to do in the Balkan Wars, that Serbia would take the Slavic initiative and destabilize Russia. In addition, Russia had lusted over Constantinople and the Dardanelles for centuries, as half of Russia’s foreign trade traveled through this narrow region controlled by the Ottomans. War and victory would bring greater trade security. Russia’s position was further hardened by their recent humiliation after fighting the Japanese. They could not back down again.
What were the war aims of the powers? France
France felt it had been humiliated in the Franco-Prussian war of 1870 – 71, in which Paris had been besieged and the French Emperor had been forced to personally surrender with his army. France was burning to restore its reputation and, crucially, gain back the rich industrial land of Alsace and Lorraine which Germany had won off her. Indeed, the French plan for war with Germany, Plan XVII, focused on gaining this land above everything else.
What were the war aims of the powers? Britain
Of all the European powers, Britain was arguably the least tied into the treaties which divided Europe into two sides. Indeed, for several years in the late nineteenth century, Britain had consciously kept out of European affairs, preferring to focus on its global empire while keeping one eye on the balance of power on the continent. But Germany had challenged this because it too wanted a global empire, and it too wanted a dominant navy. In the beginning, it was very clear why Britain was fighting against Austria. Although Britain was obligated by the Treaty of London to defend Belgium, it was mostly the fear that Germany and its allies would also defeat France, failing British intervention. This idea of Germany as a continental hegemon was absolutely unacceptable. Thus, to reach a satisfactory balance of powers had to involve the restoration of a status quo in such a way that the Austrian Empire was properly chastened.
What were the war aims of the powers? Turkey
Turkey entered into secret negotiations with Germany and declared war on the Entente in October 1914. They wanted to regain land which had been lost in both the Caucuses and Balkans and dreamed of gaining Egypt and Cyprus from Britain. They claimed to be fighting a holy war to justify this.
What was the first battle of the Marne and what are its lessons and consequences?
Significance: The First Battle of the Marne succeeded in pushing the Germans back and thus saved the capital city of Paris from capture. It was a great Franco-British strategic victory and marked the failure of the Schlieffen Plan. It was also the beginning of the trench warfare.
Lessons:
The Schlieffen Plan ultimately failed because it was fundamentally flawed from the get-go. It was a mental exercise which ignored factors outside of the initial proposer’s plan.
There were several reasons for the German defeat at the Marne. Chief among them was the utter exhaustion of the German soldiery of the right wing, some of whom had marched more than 150 miles under conditions of frequent battle. Their fatigue was ultimately a by-product of the Schlieffen Plan itself, for while the retreating French had been able to move troops by rail to various points within the circle formed by the front, the German troops had found their advance hampered by demolished bridges and destroyed rail lines. Their food and ammunition supply were consequently restricted, and the troops also had to make their advance by foot.
The Schlieffen Plan as we know it was a masterpiece of German rail timetables, concentrating on speed of mobilization, but it made wildly optimistic assumptions about the speed of movement in hostile territory and the ease of resupply. Corps in training at the time could advance 25-32 km a day in perfect conditions, without fighting, over pristine roads. Schlieffen’s Plan basically used these numbers as the speed of advance by the marching German Army, leaving little to no time in his schedule for actual fighting.
Furthermore, there simply were not enough roads from Belgium to France to move the men that were deployed to the plan, let alone Schlieffen’s grandiose numbers. Even with wildly optimistic advances, Schlieffen’s plan predicated an entire corps would basically appear in front of Paris, unable to explain how it was supposed to get there. Even if Germany had won the Battle of the Marne, they had lost half their vehicles and horses and the men were exhausted; this was the bigger reason for retreat rather than insufficient troops.
The plan also did not take into account that the French and Russians had also learned some of the lessons of the Franco-Prussian War and stepped up building their railways and creating mobilization schedules. They were able to mobilize faster than Schlieffen thought they would, and since the French especially were able to fight on home ground, they could rush troop formations to the frontline as soon as they were created. The taxis ferrying troops to the Marne from Paris is a great and dramatic story, but it also illustrates that France was able to draw on the best logistics and railway hub in the land to supply their men.
Consequences:
At the start of the war, both sides had plans that they counted on to deliver a short war. The Battle of the Marne was the second great battle on the Western Front, after the Battle of the Frontiers, and one of the most important events of the war. While the German invasion failed decisively to defeat the Entente in France, the German army occupied a good portion of northern France as well as most of Belgium and it was the failure of the French Plan 17 that caused that situation. It is generally agreed among historians that the battle was an Allied victory that saved Paris and kept France in the war but there is considerable disagreement as to the extent of the victory.
What was the economic cost of the First World War?
All of the powers in 1914 expected a short war; none had made any economic preparations for a long war, such as stockpiling food or critical raw materials. The longer the war went on, the more the advantages went to the Allies, with their larger, deeper, more versatile economies and better access to global supplies. The International Monetary system had collapse during the war and the period after the Great War was characterized by changes to the International Monetary System, as well as the respective domestic economies.
Production distortion: Needs shift all production from “butter to guns
Total war demanded total mobilization of all the nation’s resources for a common goal. Manpower had to be channelled into the front lines. Behind the lines labour power had to be redirected away from less necessary activities that were luxuries during total war. In particular, vast munitions industries had to be built up to provide shells, guns, warships, uniforms, airplanes, and a hundred other weapons both old and new. Agriculture had to provide food for both civilians and for soldiers and for horses to move supplies. Transportation, in general, was a challenge, especially when Britain and Germany each tried to intercept merchant ships headed for the enemy.
Domestic war costs
For most countries, especially those involved in heavy fighting such as Germany, France, and the UK – a majority of their GNP was sucked into financing the war.
In order to pay for a war, states had four choices:
1. They could tax the population (if there was anything left to tax)
2. They could print money (which causes inflation)
3. They could borrow from foreigners or from your own people (war bonds)
Germany financed the Central Powers. Britain financed the Allies until 1916 when it ran out of money and had to borrow from the United States. The U.S. took over the financing of the Allies in 1917 with loans that it insisted be repaid after the war. The victorious Allies looked to defeated Germany in 1919 to pay reparations that would cover some of their costs.
WWI marked the end of European economic hegemony
Europe had become debtor nations, and the US had become a creditor. Both Central Powers and Allies had to pay back their war loans / reparations to the US. This resulted in a shift of the financial centre of the world from London to New York. Furthermore, the European foreign investments have been withdrawn to pay for the war. Japan and the US took over the foreign financial positions and further cemented the shift from Europe to the US in terms of global financial power.
What was the human cost of the First World War?
The Great War had also been accompanied with enormous human costs. In Western Europe, the casualties were even larger in WWI than in WWII. Estimates vary considerably but at least 10 million people were killed and another 23 million wounded. Germany, France and Russia lost by far the most personnel. Italy, which only entered the war in mid-1915 and was not significantly involved with the Western Front still lost an enormous number of men, particularly in 1917. These losses increased even further due to the multiplier effect, i.e. the consequences down the line of a soldier’s death. One soldier killed meant one potential father missing, decreasing the future population growth. France especially was “bled white” (= coined by General Falkenhayn as the stated aim of Verdun), and they would remember this long into the post-war period.
Furthermore, mental and physical injuries persisted long after the end of the Great War. Those who returned alive confronted their own challenges. Artillery, shrapnel, mines and mortars also left a generation permanently maimed and disfigured. The most common casualties were limbs as arms and legs shattered or mangled by explosive weapons could not be restored on the battlefield. In most cases, they were swiftly amputated in field hospitals. In Britain, a wave of 240,000 amputee soldiers forced new developments in the science of prosthetic limb-making.
