Causes for 1st World War - Page 2 - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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The First World War (1914-1918).
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By Thompson_NCL
#13155536
I think Gandalf is not too far off the mark. Everything had built up to such a point that it was impossible to stop once the wheels were set in motion. I watched a documentary about how all the heads of state were eager to avoid war (especially the Royals who were all related) but no one could find a way out of it.
By pugsville
#13156696
But why did this crisis lead to war when others hadnt? The Austrians and Germans took deliberate steps to prevent diplomacy. I am not saying their definitely wanted a war but they thought previous involvement of other powers in conferneces and such hadnt worked out well for them. These actions created the very short timelines making very hard for diplomacy to stops the wheels that were rolling towards war.
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By Siberian Fox
#13206456
Syd wrote:Nationalism.


That's a rather more post WWI thing. While Germany, France and Italy were nation-states, the Austrian, Ottoman and Russian empires were not. As has been mentioned, these states were in crisis. World War One was the culmination of imperialism, not nationalism. Great Britain was not really a nation-state either, but it was far more modern than the others I've mentioned and has soldiered on to this day just about.

Taking Britain as an example, they only joined the war because they thought it didn't suit the long term balance of power for Germany to win, not because they had any direct reason to go to war. It was the politics of empire and a sense of inevitability - fight the central powers now with allies, or risk fighting them later with none.
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By Doomhammer
#13207341
Germany's fears of Russia. If you consider that Russia was also the largest, most populous country in Europe and that it virtually had only one front to fight in, Russia was a serious threat. After 1878, Russia basically got pissed off at the Germans (Congress of Berlin, which was kinda unfavorable to Russia considering that it had made enoromous gains from the Ottoman Empire) and eventually joined forces with the French, who were also pissed off at the Germans (Alsace-Lorraine).

Finally, Russia, contrary to what some people think, was doing very well and its economy and military was growing stronger. Germany wanted to fight and cripple Russia when it still had the power to do so. This is why Germany issued a blank cheque to Austria and why they insisted that Austria punish Serbia; thereby provoke a war with Russia (which would have meant a war France as well).
By Smilin' Dave
#13208660
Finally, Russia, contrary to what some people think, was doing very well and its economy...

Contrary to what people think to the contrary, I have to disagree with that. ;) Russia was still heavily dependent on inputs from other countries for its narrow industrial base, while agricultural reforms had partially stalled prior to WWI, which had a knock on effect in terms of the labour force. The indicators of Russian economic growth in the lead up to WWI are a bit misleading. I would even suggest that the total collapse of the Russian economy during WWI was indicative of how imbalanced the structure was, rather than how destructive the war was (significant though that might have been).
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By Doomhammer
#13211312
The indicators of Russian economic growth in the lead up to WWI are a bit misleading.

Is there a book or article you can recommend?
By pugsville
#13211391
Russia was totally dependant on the agricultural sector to produce a surplus that could be used to fund investment in the economy. The agriculture sector was still in crisis from the terms of the ending of serfdom which loaded up the sector with debt. Only french loads enabled the system to continue. With the closure of the black sea due to war, no exports, no new things for the economy, little for the countryside to get for their surplus from the cities, massive amounts of manpower away from the fields and huge war demands on the economy, Russia was in trouble the moment the war started. Turkey's ecomony also collasped almost totally on entry to the war as the railway system was poor, unfinished , didnt connect many area at all. Turkey was totally dependent on shipping and once at war with Britain, that was simply kaput. One of the major reasons for Italy not siding with the central powers was the vast vunerable coastline, and the threat to domestic shipping still the major cog in the transport system well ahead of the poor railway system.

In Russia, the argucultiral sector collaspes becuase there is no longer an export market due to the closing of the black sea. There was a stripping on manpower into the army. and now the peasants urged to produce more, there was much less on offer in return as all industry was focused on the war and would be barley be able to meet war needs.

The vast expenditures on a fleet that was never finished and too small and trapped in thebaltic to be useful was a serious drain on resources leading up to the war. The investiments in railways were better which was reducing the mobilization times and had some benefits for ecomony.

The russian army pre-WW1 spent almost all of it time growing food, making it's own uniforms rather than training, it was short of everything. In the advent of war just an opposed advance of 100km was a serious stretch of it's abilities. There was much modernzing and building of railways but often at the basics like suppluing and equipment like uniforms. The Russian "steamroller" while having huge manpower resources, most units had no experience or training in working together, and very very little training even on a small unit like regiment basis. The larger formations like divisons and corps were seriously lacky in experince and knowledge of how to operate.


Sure major direct opponet was the Austrians who had been unable to fund their army to keep up (and their major problems in co-ordinating throughthe hungarian parliment which refused to do anything not in their own direct interests, the dual monarhcy system had serious problems)
By Smilin' Dave
#13212509
Is there a book or article you can recommend?

Off the top of my head Alec Nove's "An Economic History of the USSR" discusses economic indicators from the Tsarist era pre-WWI. Although to be precise Nove didn't make a definitive statement about the capacity of the Tsarist economy to continue to develop/grow had their not been a war, his argument was that the focus should be on what happened over hypotheticals.
#14183964
The Kaizer's mentality for one. Even without Great Britain choking
imperial Germany, he would have pursued war in Europe any I'd say.

Treaties is another. The alliance treaties helped lock in state that
otherwise could/would have stayed out. A lesson of WW1 is don't
do alliance treaties.
#14184250
It would be really interesting to see what the UK would be like bad it not entered the war.

Though we tend to like to think of the UK as particularly stable and within an old traditional framework, this is only as true as the idea that the US is the worlds last great hope. It's one of those things the country likes to think about itself and people sometimes give a pass for.

The Parliament Act that really made the Commons even remotely representative was a brand new thing just before WWI. The Lord's veto had just been stripped. Suffragettes were starting to move from protest to bloody action. Ireland was about to collapse into a massive civil war that may have had giant consequences. There were concerns that Redmond's very real international cknnections would bring the world into the Irish issue and that the military would preform a coup in Britain under Carson's direction. These were worst-case scenerio kind of fears, but they were there and not out of the realm of possibility.

A lot was going on as the Edwarian ideals quietly came crashing down. The war allowed Grey to call Ireland, "the one bright spot," as all fears of an apocolypse were put aside to unify the country.
By Rich
#14415685
Its funny that no one mentions the most obvious cause for the war between Britain and Germany: sexism. We have now finally changed the law so that the eldest child inherits the throne. If this had been done in Victoria's reign then war between Britain and Germany would have been most unlikely because Kaiser Wilhelm II would have also been Wilhelm I (or maybe William V) King of Britain..
#14415703
WWI is history. History is constantly being reinterpreted in view of justifying future policies. Thus, the reason why we need to understand the causes of the war is not to repeat them in the future.

Personally, I like Christopher Clark's view that we "sleepwalked" into the war without anybody wanting it. That can happen again, even if the principal actors are not the same. The mistake was obviously to prevent Germany from having an international presence that would have been compatible with its economic potential. Today, this role is played by China, and to a lesser extend by Russia. Will there be attempts to isolate or contain China or Russia like Germany in 1914?

In the case of Russia, the answer is clear, the US clearly wants to isolate or contain Russia, because the Americans think they can do so since Russia doesn't count any longer in their eyes. In the case of China, that will be at lot more difficult.

In short, the lesson of 1914 is that China needs to be integrated into the World community. Any attempts at isolating China, for example by bilateral trade agreements, will send us down a dangerous path.
#14430626
George Friedman's opinion on the subject:
[youtube]QD8xBVRjlVw[/youtube]

Here's my opinion. Sorry it's kind of long.

While I do think that Germany's position is strategically insecure, perhaps more so than any other major country at the time, and that does probably make wars involving Germany more likely - I disagree that this fact in itself it can be considered THE biggest cause for the first world war, I think at best it's only a part of the picture. If the other components of the picture were missing - there probably wouldn't be a war - at least not the same war.

I think the bigger problem boiled down to this: The Germans felt like the existing world order was unfair to them, and they had rather good reasons to feel that way. And war was the only means by which they could hope to alter that order. They knew that, their potential opponents knew that, and that was the real reason behind the mutual fear and suspicion. Everyone in Europe knew that Germany would be looking for an opportunity to reshape the world to its liking, Germany in turn knew that the "established powers" would be looking for an opportunity to crush Germany since it represented a threat to them. Hence, the two sides inched closer and closer to war.

Why did the Germans feel this way? Because Germany rapidly emerged as an economic powerhouse, and it came right in time to see the world firmly divided among the other world powers, with barely any German participation. A handful of nations, mostly of the European origin, had formally or informally divided up the entire world into their colonial empires, not through a conspiracy but through centuries of mutual struggle and often war. Germany was left with little, and for no other reason than because it came late to the game. So by 1913 Germany was Europe's largest economy, and had the second largest population after Russia, yet it was confined within a rather small territory in Central Europe and very few colonies worth anything.

It's not like Germany absolutely had to do something about this in order to survive - no. They could always just "deal with it". But life isn't only about survival, and people don't want to deal with things which they feel they shouldn't have to deal with. Sure, if Germany didn't have enough living space to comfortably sustain its growing population - no big deal, the Germans could always just choose not to reproduce, or to reproduce but emigrate to other countries, where of course they'd be expected to learn other cultures and assimilate to them, and that's after they even get the citizenship, if they can get one. If Germany didn't have nearly enough colonies to match the needs of its growing industrial output - no big deal, it could always just slow down its economic growth, or continue growing but become completely dependent on trade with the established colonial empires - which of course would mean dealing with both their tariffs and their good will in general. If they ever don't like you for any reason whatsoever, they could just put a trade embargo on you and your economy would be ruined immediately. You can't do the same to them, despite having a larger economy, all because, well, you don't have a colonial empire worth shit. If you try to put a trade embargo on them, they'll just laugh at you. This isn't a comfortable position to be in.

So Germany was a revisionist power - it was not quite satisfied with the hand that it was dealt with. It wasn't the only one. Italy and Japan felt roughly similar - Japan particularly, however they ended up on the other side of the war because their interests at the time conflicted more with Germany than anyone else. Other countries had lesser grievances but were also unhappy with the existing state of affairs - for example France wanted back its provinces of Alsace and Lorraine. Again, other than through war, it's highly unlikely that France could get them back by any other means. France could also "deal with it", especially since in the grand scheme of things these provinces themselves aren't really that important, but their loss had important symbolic consequences. If France had agreed to the loss of these provinces, it would mean more or less the same as recognizing the German supremacy in general, and the consequent loss of status by France from being one of Europe's leading great powers to Germany's bitch. Also an uncomfortable prospect. Britain and Russia of course also had expansionist interests they'd like to pursue, though mostly they were just interested in crushing Germany.

But overall basically we had not even one but several great powers which felt that the existing world order didn't suit them, and war was their only means of altering it. It was a situation specific to Europe of the early 20th century. Geography itself was I think a secondary factor, it just added one more dimension to the problem that was already there for other reasons. If Germany was positioned in a really secure and inaccessible position, the war would have certainly looked somewhat different, but I don't think that it could have been avoided entirely. Countries in relatively secure locations also go to war against one another for same reasons as the ones described above.

Anyway, from this standpoint also comes a different conclusion and lesson for today's world. Rather than fearing that the collapse of the EU would immediately result in the emergence of the "third anti-German coalition", as many do, I think there are reasons to be much more positive and less fearful of such doomsday scenarios. Today's world is very different from the world of the early 20th century. None of the European powers really have colonies any more, their economies are barely growing, their populations actually declining more than growing. Nationalism is strong, yet the borders of the nation states practically match the current demographic structure of the continent. The European countries simply don't have any major grievances with each other which could only be resolved by war, and I don't see any emerging in quite some time even if both the EU and NATO collapsed. Eventually, maybe, nothing can guard against the distant future, but it's not like Germany's geographic insecurity will in itself generate major conflict. Here's a simple solution to that question in a post-NATO European order - have an international agreement signed by which Poland promises complete military neutrality and non-deployment of foreign troops on its soil, in exchange for a firm guarantee to Poland's sovereignty and independence from all the leading world powers. How is that not a solution? Germany doesn't have to worry about its eastern border, Poland doesn't have to worry about Germany. Everyone is rather happy, even Russia. It's not an irresolvable issue.
#14430629
pikachu wrote:It's not like Germany absolutely had to do something about this in order to survive - no. They could always just "deal with it". But life isn't only about survival, and people don't want to deal with things which they feel they shouldn't have to deal with. Sure, if Germany didn't have enough living space to comfortably sustain its growing population - no big deal, the Germans could always just choose not to reproduce, or to reproduce but emigrate to other countries, where of course they'd be expected to learn other cultures and assimilate to them, and that's after they even get the citizenship, if they can get one. If Germany didn't have nearly enough colonies to match the needs of its growing industrial output - no big deal, it could always just slow down its economic growth, or continue growing but become completely dependent on trade with the established colonial empires - which of course would mean dealing with both their tariffs and their good will in general. If they ever don't like you for any reason whatsoever, they could just put a trade embargo on you and your economy would be ruined immediately. You can't do the same to them, despite having a larger economy, all because, well, you don't have a colonial empire worth shit. If you try to put a trade embargo on them, they'll just laugh at you. This isn't a comfortable position to be in.


Yet Germany had been growing faster in the period - that was how they caught up from being a broken and devastated country from Gustavus Adolphus and Napoleon to being the most powerful state in continental Europe by 1914.

It is unsurprising that you become at least suspect to powerful nations at that point, or even more, enemies of them. That in part led to a world war in 1914.

We have such dangers in the 21st century.
#14430633
Yet Germany had been growing faster in the period - that was how they caught up from being a broken and devastated country from Gustavus Adolphus and Napoleon to being the most powerful state in continental Europe by 1914.

It is unsurprising that you become at least suspect to powerful nations at that point, or even more, enemies of them. That in part led to a world war in 1914.

We have such dangers in the 21st century.
Right, but not the same dangers regarding Germany in particular. Stratfor seems to be feeding into that theory that EU and NATO are the only things keeping Europe from devolving into another Germany vs France and Russia confrontation, but I don't think that's really the case. In fact I think it's the opposite - the fact that the EU even exists to this day is a manifestation of the reality that there aren't really significant points of conflict between Germany and others any more. That conflict has, for the most part, resolved itself. There seem to be no significant economic or geostrategic reasons for an intra-European conflict, and that is WHY the EU still exists, not vice versa. I may be wrong of course, but that's the way it seems to me.

And yes, there are rising powers in other parts of the world. China, for instance. And while China does have some grievances with the west particularly over Taiwan, I don't think it's anything of the magnitude that the pre-WW1 Europe had to deal with. China doesn't have much reason to believe that the present day order doesn't suit it, in fact overall it suits it pretty well. China even has a permanent seat at the UN Security Council in recognition of its elite status, one of only five countries that do. Where it does have grievances, with the exception of Taiwan perhaps, it's nothing that absolutely cannot be resolved in any way except by war, though the Chinese are still hoping to solve the Taiwan issue without war as well. That's not even to mention that the idea of China and the US going to war against each other is unthinkable due to their nuclear weapons and huge economic inter-dependence. One way or another they've got to solve their problems by other means, so I don't think we have much to worry about in that regard.
#14430637
pikachu wrote:Right, but not the same dangers regarding Germany in particular. Stratfor seems to be feeding into that theory that EU and NATO are the only things keeping Europe from devolving into another Germany vs France and Russia confrontation, but I don't think that's really the case. In fact I think it's the opposite - the fact that the EU even exists to this day is a manifestation of the reality that there aren't really significant points of conflict between Germany and others any more. That conflict has, for the most part, resolved itself. There seem to be no significant economic or geostrategic reasons for an intra-European conflict, and that is WHY the EU still exists, not vice versa. I may be wrong of course, but that's the way it seems to me.


It would be crazy for Germany and France to go to war (although, this forum...whatever)

The EU exists to be important and influential and powerful. Which is a worthy thing; if it disintegrated into France and Germany and Italy and so on, and subdivided into francs and Deutschemarks and lira and such it would be easily managed piecemeal as it was before /troll, but kind of serious

pikachu wrote:And yes, there are rising powers in other parts of the world. China, for instance. And while China does have some grievances with the west particularly over Taiwan, I don't think it's anything of the magnitude that the pre-WW1 Europe had to deal with. China doesn't have much reason to believe that the present day order doesn't suit it, in fact overall it suits it pretty well. China even has a permanent seat at the UN Security Council in recognition of its elite status, one of only five countries that do. Where it does have grievances, with the exception of Taiwan perhaps, it's nothing that absolutely cannot be resolved in any way except by war, though the Chinese are still hoping to solve the Taiwan issue without war as well. That's not even to mention that the idea of China and the US going to war against each other is unthinkable due to their nuclear weapons and huge economic inter-dependence. One way or another they've got to solve their problems by other means, so I don't think we have much to worry about in that regard.


Well, Germany and the UK were huge trading partners before WWI.

It doesn't really keep me up at night, I have other shit, but...some guy getting killed in Sarajevo caused a world war a century ago. So some shots somewhere in southeast Asia -> Japanese crazies -> Korean crazies => lots of crazies -> US troops involved, it could rapidly escalate into something.

I'm not thinking World War III though, because of two wonderful things: we really do trade more than Germany and the UK did in 1914, which is underappreciated, and 2) we both can kill millions of each other with nukes.
#14430640
The whole question of colonies and living room etc were psychological rather than real. Germany had plenty of access to resources and it's economy was growing, population expanding with increasing urbanisation. There was no real need for colonies or more living room. The economic benefits of colonies was much over stated. (India Aside) Most colonies were actually a drag on the Imperial Nation. However they were real enough in the minds of many.

What if Germany had been unified without Prussia, and a more liberal society was built out of the Rhine Confederation, Saxony and Bavaria. (Like Prussia never had Bismarck)

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