Causes Worldwar I

What were the causes of World War I?

Before we look at the big causes, we will look at the occasion of WWI.

Occasion: The assassination (murder) of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria-Hungary on the 28th of June in 1914 in Sarajevo, which is the capital of Austria-Hungary.

Causes (MAIN):
Militarism was also a cause. Militarism is that there is a great love for the military and that soldiers got much respect. In the 19th century was a lot of militarism before the first world war, which is why armies got big. The idea of ‘the glory of war’ was very popular all over Europe. This also caused why countries to be very confident about their army and wanted to show how good their army was. The major powers in Europe had a military competition, also called the arms-race. This happened before the first world war, and a lot of European countries tried to get as many weapons as possible.

Alliances were a cause because several alliances were formed before and during the war. When Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia, all the alliances were dragged into the war because they promised each other to help each other in cases of war. After Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia, Germany declared war on Russia and France, making it even easier for this to become a world war.

Imperialism is a system in which a powerful nation conquers smaller nations (mostly colonies). This was a cause of world war I because a lot of countries wanted to expand their empire and because of the militarism, the countries were confident to show their great and big armies. Colonialism means that a country controls another dependent country, there was a race between countries having colonies, and this created tensions in Europe. Great Britain had a lot of colonies and Germany wanted this too. Germany wanted to expand their empire and had a lot of confidence after winning the Franco-Prussian war. Germany made the Von Schlieffen-plan, which was a plan to invade France by going through Belgium after they would defeat France they would go to Russia to fight there, but this did not go as planned….

Nationalism was one of the causes of World war 1. Nationalism is love for your own country and feeling superior to other countries. There was growing nationalism in the 19th century and growing feelings of revenge. This was mainly between France and Germany after Germany defeated France in the Franco-Prussian war in 1871. There were also growing calls for independence from people in countries with multiple states.