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Marching to War Chapter 13.1
Setting the Stage: Around 1900, the countries of Europe had been at peace for nearly 30 years, and were tied together economically as much as they are now. Many Europeans believed that progress and the efforts of hundreds of peace organizations had made it impossible for a major war to break out. Events in 1914 would prove how wrong they were.
Rising Tensions in Europe • Despite the peaceful appearance of European politics, there were several darker forces at work during the time period. • Nationalism: As you learned in Chapter 8, nationalism is a form of extreme loyalty or patriotism to one’s nation. • Nationalism can unite a country if its citizens have something in common • It can also divide a country or empire if nationalism makes smaller groups within the country want to fight for their own independence.
Nationalism: • It can also lead to competition between countries as they seek to become better than their rivals. By 1900, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Great Britain, Russia, Italy, and France all desired to be richer and more powerful than their neighbors. • For example, France was deeply angry at losing the Franco-Prussian War and two territories to the Germans and sought revenge. • Serbia, which had gained its independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1835 after a 30 year struggle, sought to gain power and prestige in the region and often angered the large empires that controlled the rest of the Balkan Peninsula area of southern Europe. • The Balkans were full of small territories with Serbs, Slavs, and other ethnic groups that each wanted independence, or to be ruled by a local power such as Serbia.
Rising Tensions in Europe Brittania: The traditional symbol Great Britain personified as a living goddess. Now that’s team spirit! • Imperialism: In chapter 11 and 12, you learned that imperialism is the conquering of other lands by a powerful country to get access to new markets and raw materials. Imperialism lead the countries of Europe to the brink of war as they competed in Africa and Asia, and many countries coveted the territories of their rivals.
Rising Tensions in Europe Now those are helmets… • Militarism: A policy of glorifying military power was extremely common throughout Europe leading up to WWI. • Because most European countries believed that the greatness of their country was tied to the greatness of their military, large standing armies were kept. • Military leaders held great power in these countries and could often do as they pleased regardless of what elected officials said. • Highly detailed war plans were also designed for any circumstance. If any event happened, it seemed as if a plan existed to resolve the conflict with war.
Militarism: • Worse yet, an arms race existed in Europe between several nations, but especially Britain and Germany. • Because Britain had threatened to blockade Germany if they helped the Dutch Boers during the Boer War in 1897, Germany’s Kaiser Wilhelm II was determined to create a navy powerful enough to counter Britain. • The result was a rush to create Dreadnoughts, basically the first truly modern armored battleships, by the most powerful countries in Europe. • By 1914, Britain had 29 such ships, while Germany had 17.
Rising Tensions in Europe Tangled Alliances: Perhaps the greatest immediate cause of World War I was the presence of powerful alliances that ensured a small war would quickly involve all of Europe.
Tangled Alliances: • German chancellor Otto von Bismarck lead the way to a divided Europe after using war to unite Germany. Realizing the French were angry at losing the Franco-Prussian War and the territories of Alsace and Lorraine, he tried to isolate France because “as long as it is without allies, France poses no danger to (Germany).” • The Triple Alliance resulted, in which Germany, Austria, and Italy pledged to support each other, and Bismarck even drew up an alliance with Russia for a time. • When Kaiser Wilhelm II took power, he forced Bismarck to resign and began a more aggressive policy to show the world how powerful Germany had become. He let the treaty with Russia lapse in 1890.
Tangled Alliances: • France and Russia then entered into their own alliance between 1892 and 1894. This now meant that Germany would have to fight a two-front war if fighting ever broke out. • The Kaiser’s shipbuilding program in the above-mentioned arms race pushed Britain toward an alliance with France and Russia. In 1907, Britain, France, and Russia formed the Triple Entente. • Although Britain did not promise to fight automatically if France or Russia was attacked, it was a promise not to fight AGAINST them. • By 1914, any significant power in Europe had essentially chosen sides. All it took was a spark to ignite the fuse and a world war would explode.
Rising Tensions in Europe Crisis in the Balkans: The Balkans had long been viewed as a troublesome region because it had a long history of nationalist uprisings, ethnic clashes, and was known as the “powder keg” of Europe.
Crisis in the Balkans: • The Ottoman Empire Declines: As the Turkish Ottoman Empire lost power, many of its territories had broken away and won independence. Serbia, Greece, Montenegro, Romania, and Bulgaria all won independence from Turkey. • Nationalism was strong in all of these countries, and each wanted to expand their borders. For example, Serbia, which was made up of Serbian Slavs, wanted to unite all Slavs under their leadership and essentially control southern Europe. • Russia, which was mostly Slavic, supported this Slavic unity and supported Serbia. Austria-Hungary, Serbia’s neighbor to the North, opposed Serbian power because its own empire included Slavic people that might rebel.
Crisis in the Balkans: • In 1907, Austria annexed, or took over, the territory of Bosnia-Herzegovina from the Ottoman Empire. This territory was full of Slavs, and in particular, Serbian Slavs. • Serbia was angry because they felt that they should be the rightful rulers of this land, while Austria threatened to crush any attempt by Serbia to undermine their rule. • Essentially, they both had something to fight over.
The Spark that Ignited Europe • Serbia officially did very little to anger Austria, but a variety of secret organizations did form to resist Austrian rule and help other Slavs resist. This lead to the formation of the Black Hand, a terrorist organization responsible for violence and assassinations in southern Europe. • The Black Hand was composed of many Serbian military and political leaders and had great power. GavriloPrincip was a 19 year old member of the Black Hand that slipped into Bosnia-Herzegovina with several others to assassinate Austria’s crown-prince, the Archduke Franz Ferdinand.
The Spark that Ignited Europe • On June 28, 1914, Franz Ferdinand and his wife visited Sarajevo. • Though the Black Hand failed at first when bombs thrown by assassins missed their mark, Franz Ferdinand insisted on visiting a wounded member of his group at the hospital. Their driver made a wrong turn and attempted to turn around right outside of a café in which Princip and the other assassins happened to be. • Princip fired two shots, striking the Austrian prince and his wife once each. They would die shortly after.
The Spark that Ignited Europe • Austria finally had a reason to punish Serbia, and delivered an ultimatum with several demands. One of these was to grant Austria police power within Serbia to find and prosecute the Black Hand for the assassination. • Serbia could not accept this demand, as it would basically give up being a country to be ruled by Austria, and Serbia offered to allow other countries help settle the argument peacefully. Austria refused, because Germany had granted unlimited support. • Russia was forced to back Serbia, and when Austria declared war, moved troops to its border with Austria AND its border with Germany, because Germany was allied with Austria. • This angered Germany, who declared war on Russia, and set the wheels rolling for the Alliance system to draw all of Europe into war.
