World War I, " the Great War," involved all of the great powers of Europe and killed more than eight million soldiers. Discuss the reasons which led to the rising international tensions that sparked World War I.
World War I was one of the largest and deadly wars ever to grace this planet. It involved all of the European superpower, in an all out battle being fought for, in retrospect, such a small cause. The first two nations involved in this war were Austria-Hungary and Serbia, who were going to war over the death of Franz Ferdinand by the hand of a Serbian revolutionary. This war between two nations grew, encompassing many others, and even changing the focal point away from the assassination, and more towards economics. The Pressing factor for this war was not only the assassination of Franz Ferdinand, but rather it was the numerous treaties and pacts among European states that forced many nations to join in on the war.
As World War I began with the Serbian-Austria-Hungary conflict, these nations began to call other nations to join them in their fight. Serbia brought in their Slavic native, Russia, who was also allied with France. This led to the treaty between Austria-Hungary and Germany being put into play, due to the Russian involvement (Doc. 1). This grossly increased the magnitude of this war, from two nations fighting to world powers now fighting. These nations had created these treaties from past history together that linked them. Germany has been linked together with the Austro-Hungarians from the time of Bismarck, which kept the two contractually obligated to aid one another in war. Russia came into to join Serbia because of their linked Slavic heritage that they shared. The tie between Russia and France came from the days of Peter the Great being influenced by the French monarchy. Ever since Peter the Great modeled Russia after France they have been tied, with French goods being sold in Russia, the upper class speaking French, and their government system. England was also brought into the war, fighting on the Serbian side, because they vowed to protect Belgium, which was attacked by Germany, and also wished to protect their economic growth in the Middle East that Germany had infringed upon. Another nation involved, that was not a major player, was Italy which was brought in but did not play a significant factor in the war (Doc. 2).
This entire war that engulfed all of Europe can be traced back to one craze that the Europeans thought would go well, treaties. If these nations had not created such complex partnerships it would still have been strictly a conflict between Serbia and Austria-Hungary. In reality, these alliances did more harm than good to the general European collect. Treaties were created to protect Europe, and to save lives, but when put into place created a much larger problem than what was in place originally. The original assassination of Franz Ferdinand was not even linked to the Serbian government, and was more of a misunderstanding that started the war, not a disagreement. The Black Hand was a Serbian radical group that fought against any enemy they thought quelled Serbian nationalism (Doc 6). This secret organization was not involved with the government, and did not fall under their jurisdiction. They performed this assassination unbeknownst to the Serbian government, but the blame was still placed on the Serbian state. The Austro-Hungarians were really fighting a war against a people who, for the most part, was not involved in the assassination at all. The Austro-Hungarians were expecting war when they sent their demands to the Serbians, sending irrational claims to them, and when they accepted the majority of them, the Austro-Hungarians still when to war (Doc 7).
These treaties that had been created, in hindsight, did not seem to have worked to plan for Europe. They put European nations into shambles, crippled economies, and created an even greater hatred for others. Treaties and partnerships are meant to be thought of as a benefit and good thing to have, but really pulled nations into war when they really had to reason to get involved. Germany is perhaps the biggest victim of these treaties, a nation that was contractually bound to aid Austria-Hungary in war, and tried to peacefully negotiate out of the war with Russia, but was unable to (Doc. 8). Germany was not on bad terms with Russia prior to this, but seeing that other Russia was assembling their troops for an invasion, they had no other choice but to attack first, and begin this war (Doc 9). Germany was then surrounded; all because they were obligated to join Austria-Hungary, a treaty that can defiantly be seen to have hurt the Germans much, much more than they had thought it would help.
This massive European war could have been entirely avoided, if these treaties had not been created. Yes, there still would have been a war between Austria-Hungary and Serbia, but this would have been much smaller and not have done such damage to Europe. These treaties that had been created forced the European nations to join into this war, whether they wanted to or not, showing how the downside of treaties far outweigh the upsides and benefits.
