Written Test on WW1 (pre arbete)

Written Test on WW1

There were many factors that played an important roll in enabling WW1. The largest factors which I am going to bring up are economic rivalries, militarism, colonial issues, the alliance systems and finally the spark that led to WW1, the assassination in Sarajevo.

The economic rivalries and the militarism are connected to each other as economics and the technology of weapons are connected. If one country has more money it can buy better weapons and threaten another country. This is what grew the tension in Europe as Germany past Britain in economics. It is hard to link this directly to the war but as the pride and economic rivalries grew up between the countries of Europe the tension between countries and alliances also became a trigger point, leading to militarism and finally war.

One great difference from today was the common way people saw a war as in that time. To really understand the militarism we have to understand that people who wanted a war in that time thought of it as short and victorious and propaganda promised pride and showed heroic pictures of soldiers fighting for there country. In general people were excited and proud to go to war and many were eager to see changes in there lifetime, this is the militarism which was one of the major reasons for WW1.

The colonial issues between European countries were also a part of this rivalry game which was played. The colonies brought in a lot of recourses and money to there owners and Britain had the most colonies of all. This brought dispute between Germany and Britain again as Germany also wanted more colonies and thought of Britain as “selfish” keeping all the colonies to them selves and giving Germany no chance to participate in other parts of the world.

The alliance systems are what made it possible for to small countries in Europe to set of a world war. When many countries ally themselves to each other they want to protect themselves and in return they give there protection to the other country, so when Austria declared war on Serbia it led to Russia mobilizing there troops. When this threatens Austria, there ally Germany is suddenly involved to, declaring war on Russia. As Russia is allied to France, they are now also involved. These are perfect examples of how alliance systems and a small conflict between two small countries together can turn into a world war.

As the tension and rivalry grew stronger between alliances and nations, all that was needed was a small trigger that could set of WW1. This trigger was a murder of Archduke Francias Ferdinand who was visiting Serbia. Austria wanted to start an investigation but the Serbian government did not fulfil there terms and on July 28 1914 Austria declared war on Serbia. The spark that was needed to set of WW1 had now come and the war had begun.

Before WW1, war had been fought with single-shot firing guns and with two armies meeting at a battle field to directly clash together to determine who had the upper hand. The battles that were fought were therefore over within a couple of hours if not less, but with the new technology that was developed before WW1 the way of war completely changed. During WW1 the machineguns and barbed wire made a charge or offence against the enemy almost impossible as you were shot down before reaching any targets. To compensate for this, a well-known strategy during WW1 was to use your artillery to bomb the enemy trenches for several days before trying to break through with soldiers, this strategy may have worked but it also gave the enemy a large opportunity as you let him know many days before you attacked that an offence was going to take place, so the enemy could easily get in different positions and answer you with strong machinegun fire as you charged. This led to trench warfare which means that both sides dug themselves down below barriers along the whole border facing the enemy.

The trench warfare led to a long war where the defender had the upper hand in almost every battle, the conditions in these trenches where soldiers had to live were awful and many died during charges and in attempts to push through the enemy lines. Although the conditions were awful I think the reason that the trench warfare could continue during the war like it did was because of the lack of media on the fronts. Leaders could send soldiers to wherever they pleased and if many lives were lost leaders could still continue sending in men as they were not as criticised as leaders today.

The trench warfare led to a deadlock on the western front as none of the fighting sides could get an upper hand and push back enemy lines. This made WW1 a long and muddy war, where many lives where lost without making much progress against the enemy.

By 1917 the war was causing serious trouble for Russia. The Tsar Nicholas II had led Russia into a war which the country could not afford and which they were loosing, this led to entire cities being without resources, (no food!). The living-condition for people in cities and those of the soldiers were catastrophic, yet the Tsar would not withdraw from war.

Ideas of socialism had also started growing during 19^th century in Russia, since it was going through industrialization and modern ideas of individualism and human rights were common in Europe. The socialistic organisations in Russia had by 1917 grown strong enough to reach a majority of workers and there major demands were peace and land reforms. With the country now collapsing under the Tsar who refused to withdraw from war and who was neglecting the land reforms, on February 23, starving and angry groups of workers set of in protests against the Tsar monarchy. The police had no chance of stopping them as they were such a large number of people and when soldiers were sent against the mobs, they joined the protest instead of trying to bring it to an end. On February 28 the last of the Tsars loyal soldiers gave up and the country was released from the Tsars monarchy.

After WW1 the “alliance” came out victorious as the Germans withdrew and offered peace. All countries involved in the war had suffered greatly from it, but of course it is the winning side who in the end decides what the terms of the peace treaty will be. The blame was set mainly on Germany and resulted in great military restrictions and it was also decided that Germany should have to pay a great sum of money to involved countries for starting the war. Many more decisions were also made that gave Germany a great disadvantage in many ways in the future and today you can argue that this was one of the factors which led to WWII.

There are many factors which led to WW1, (I have them discussed above), and Germany is not one of them. Germany was given a high punishment and guilt after the war simply because it was the major enemy of the victorious alliance, the fact that Germany declared war on Russia is what gave Germany such a high burden to carry afterwards. But to analyze the situation we also have to look at the factor that Russia were mobilizing there troops and threatening an ally of Germany if not Germany itself. A dispute between two countries cannot be judged upon who hit the other country first, it must be seen all the way from the beginning and why things led to what happened, and even if that is done, the factor still stands that disputes and militarism created a lot of tension around countries in Europe before the war and in my sense that is what led to the war. Who made the first move and who declared war first is of least significance.