Many factors led to the second bloodiest war in history, World War One. Alliances, militarism, nationalism and imperialism were the main causes of WW1.Imperialism is the idea that land equals to power and also describes the need for powerful countries to dominate and control undeveloped, third world countries. The need of powerfull countries to control more land, was an important contributor to the First World War because it created tensions inside and outside of Europe. While Imperialism might have been the most important cause of WW1, alliances, militarism and nationalism also helped shape imperialism.
Alliances were being made constantly towards the beginning of WW1 by all countries so they could protect themselves. This many alliances caused mistrust between members because of overlapping alliances. . The 3 emperor’s league was formed in 1872 after the Franco-Japanese war. Bismarck wanted to keep his land and even gain some more so he joined with Russia and Austro-Hungary. The Ducu alliance of 1879 was a defensive alliance with Austria-Hungary and Germany. This was the only alliance that had stayed through to WW1. The Triple Alliance in 1882 was signed by Germany, Austria and Italy and it stated that if one of the three countries went into war (on the defensive) the others would help. Germany and Austria went into war but Italy didn’t support them because they were on the offensive, they were the attackers. Italy ended up joining later with the enemy.
Countries focused all of their resources in the development of armies and new weapons. Industrialization was one of the main reasons that WW1 was so bloody. There were many weapons developed (artillery, machine guns), as well as the naval race which was, mainly, Germany and Britain having a battle for control over the sea. The Dreadnought was the most heavily armed ship in Europe. When it was created, it renewed the naval arms race between Britain and Germany. Admiral Tirpitz was the one that created such a powerful German navy that could compete with Britain’s already established navy. Britain was furious because this new power, Germany, was catching up to their powerful navy even though they had just begun the development of their own navy.
The definition of nationalism is extreme pride in your nation. This was a big issue in Europe because many countries had nationalistic leaders which had nationalistic followers, and therefore caused conflicts between countries in Europe. The Young Turk revolution was the birth of the modern Ottoman Empire. The Young Turks were a coalition of various groups that rebelled and reformed the Ottoman Empire to their liking. Alsace/Loraine was French territory with German speaking people. Germany was trying to unite all German speaking people together but when the Germans tried to take Alsace and Loraine the French didn’t let them, which led to even more issues between the two countries. Slavic nationalism is accounted as the starting point of WW1. With Russia’s support, the Serbian people were thinking nationalistic and they assassinated Franz Ferdinand which led to Austria’s ultimatum.
Imperialism is the idea that land equals to power and it also represents the need of big countries to conquer and rule underdeveloped countries to shape them as part of their empire and also use them to have more overall control over the world. The Austro-Hungarian Ultimatum to Serbia raised conflicts in between alliances because Russia was in an alliance with both sides. The ultimatum was sent, after the king was assassinated, to Serbia with a list of demands. The two meetings in Morocco were also factors to the shape of alliances in WW1. France wanted to claim the land of Morocco but so did Germany and there were 2 meetings that Germany tried to sabotage by sending high members (such as the Kaiser himself) to impress England so the land could be given to them but to no avail since France signed with the British an alliance that granted them the area . Industrialization also created conflicts in Europe in terms of Imperialism and could be accounted as one of the main sub-causes of WW1. Industrialization was the revolution in fields such as agriculture, mining, transporting and even military technology. The industrial revolution also gave way to the creation of rail ways, and one of the most famous railways created at the time was connecting Berlin to Baghdad which was a British colony, and a railway connecting them with their enemy infuriated them.
Imperialism was the main cause of WW1 because it developed the base for everything to occur. The need for countries to expand can be accounted towards nationalist leaders having nationalist followers (nationalism), or the industrial revolution which led to the naval race as well as the development of new, deadlier weapons (militarism) and untrustworthy and overlapping alliances (alliances), all led to the Imperialism, which is the need for countries to expand and become more powerful at the expenses of others.
