What Started World War I
Today I found out what started World War I.
The commonly held notion that it was started out of outrage over the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife Sophie at the hands of Serbian nationalist secret society known as the “Black Hand” isn’t entirely correct. In fact, the Emperor Franz Josef himself expressed relief over the assassination because it rid him of an heir whom he deeply disliked. The Emperor commented that “God will not be mocked. A higher power had put back the order I couldn’t maintain.”
Indeed, it wasn’t just the Emperor who was relieved; it was reported by an Austrian newspaper that the general consensus among the various political circles was that the assassination, though a tragedy, was for the best. As far as the Austrian people were concerned, it was noted “The event almost failed to make any impression whatever. On Sunday and Monday, the crowds in Vienna listened to music and drank wine as if nothing had happened.” Indeed, it took the government itself a full three weeks to react.
As you’ll see shortly, the “treaty alliance system” that was prevalent in Europe with numerous treaties interconnecting the various states was really at the heart of why what would have been a small conflict, not noteworthy in any way in history, escalated into one of the bloodiest wars in human history with over 15 million people dead. Somewhat ironically, the spark that set it all off was the assassination that nobody really cared about.
So why go to war over an assassination, if nobody cared? Because, while nobody seemed to much care about the assassination itself, Austria-Hungary had been looking for an excuse to wage a “preventative war” against Serbia as a state in order to weaken or destroy them so as to take back territory in the Balkans, which had been taken during the Balkan Wars. They had not taken it back up to this point because they lacked Germany’s support; without that support, they feared Russia too much, because of the treaty Russia had with Serbia.
With the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife on June 28th, 1914, Austria-Hungary was able to secure the promise from Germany that it would aid in a war with Serbia and possibly Russia, if Russia chose to enter the fray due to their treaty with Serbia. It should be noted here that Austria-Hungary did not really expect Russia to enter the fray as they expected this to be a very small war that would be over quickly, before Russia would be obligated to respond. Now with Germany’s support if Russia did enter the fray, Austria-Hungary issued an ultimatum to Serbia with remarkably severe terms that Serbia would be sure to reject, thus giving Austria-Hungary an excuse to go launch a limited war on Serbia to reclaim territory in the Balkans.
Surprisingly, Serbia responded relatively well to the ultimatum, but they did dispute a few minor clauses, which gave Austria-Hungary the excuse they needed to go to war. At this point, the following general series of events happened due to a variety of existing treaties between various nations, which escalated this minor clash into the first “Great War”.
Russia bound by their treaty with Serbia decides to come to Serbia’s aid.- Germany, with the recent treaty with Austria-Germany, declares war on Russia.
- France, bound by an existing treaty with Russia, now is at war with Germany by association. Germany then invades Belgium to have easy access to France.
- Britain, allied to France with an existing treaty, declares war against Germany. This was unexpected by Germany as they expected Britain to stay out of the war, due to the fact that the treaty with France was loosely worded and not entirely binding. However, Britain also had a 75 year old treaty with Belgium. So because of both of these treaties, they decided to declare war on Germany.
- With Britain now warring with Germany, Canada, India, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa enter the war as they were colonies of Britain.
- Japan honors an existing treaty with Britain and declares war on Germany.
- Austria-Hungary declare war on Japan for declaring war on Germany.
- The U.S. tries to stay out of the war but in 1917 decides to enter due to Germany’s submarines hindering the United States’ commercial shipping because the U.S. was shipping a lot of supplies to the Allies.
So in the end, a small quick war over a minor land dispute got turned into a lengthy war that was joined by powers all over the globe due to a variety of existing treaties dating back as much as 75 years before the war started.
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Nice post!!
One thing that’s missing here is the reason why the archduke was assassinated by the Black Hand! A lot of it has to do with the animosity of the Orthodox religion against the Catholic Church which was at the heart of the conflict; a tension which still continues to linger in some Orthodox countries.
The Black Hand is a muslim dominated organisation. Apis is an egyptian name. They muslims merely manipulated the serbians into a nationalist mindset and used them to act as fodder for their war machine and also to hide the fact that the muslims along with their ever helpful talmudic pharisees (or are they the masterminds and well paid frontmen?), are at the root cause of this war, as well as many others, then and now. Today they are what we call the mafia. In Syria the Black Hand group have turned into the military wing of Hamas, called the al-qassam.
Do you have sources for this? I’ve not been able to verify this. Have been having discussions around WWI, and am fairly curious as to the formation of The Black Hand in Serbia, but do not see the link to Islam anywhere (other than the Palestinian group which formed in 1930, and was presumably separate).
Although I’m not sure when Australia,NZ, and SA officially gained their independence, Canada most certainly NOT a British Colony at the time of WWI. We had close ties to Britain still and were obligated to enter the fray do to these, but we became a country in 1867.
Canada wasn’t a colony at the time of the Great War, but Britain was still handling our foreign affairs at this time, so when Britain declared war, we declared war automatically.
Good job
Kaiser Wilhelm was the biggest factor for WWI – a spoiled little brat with a gimpy left arm with HUGE inferiority complex ready to take it out on the world – responsible for both World Wars
Hah hah hah. Good to see Allied propaganda ist still alive and well. Heh heh.
wikileaks will trigger the next war?
really?
Rick, there is much more animosity of the Catholic Church against the Orthodox religion in last century. Vatican used to re-baptize Orthodox people during II World War and thus convert them to the Catholic Church. Black Hand was an organization who was against Austro-Hungarian annexation of Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1908 and there were not only Serb nationalists, but Muslims too. Here is a caricature from Austrian newspapers calling for war against Serbia right after assassination as a proof that war was desired by Austria-Hungaria:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/15/Serbien_muss_sterbien.jpg
This is patently false. The Catholic Church never has and never will baptize people that have already been baptized or against their will. It is against the teachings of our faith. Considering Wikepedias extreme bias it is hardly a valid source.
LOL. Wikipedia does not have an “extreme bias.” It’s edited by the PUBLIC, with the best available PUBLIC citations.
Anyone is welcome to be baptized in the Catholic Church if they have been baptized somewhere else. They convert to Catholicism from what they were before. As long as you go through chatacism, commit yourself to Jesus and the Catholic Church, sign a piece of paper and pay the fee, your in.
I don’t need to pay a fee. I can practic my beliefs freely. From what i have seen over the years, The Roman Catholic Church is more interested in creating monetary wealth for the Vatican more than anything else. Just ask the Pope to release the net worth of the RCC, Also what they’re Archbishop’s and so forth get paid, You will be surprised. If they really believed they would not be living like the Money lenders who Jesus threw out.
I really suggest that whoever wrote this article, read Hew Strachans’ “The First World War”. It’s a really great book detailing the causes, duration, and effects of the first world war. If you can not read the book for what ever reason, then I suggest you watch the documentary by the same name. In fact, anyone who reads this and is interested in the First World War, I suggest this to you.
@ Chris:
you did not become a nation in 1867, in 1867 you combined british colonies under confederation into one provence under the word Canada. But up until 1937 you still relyed on Britian for foreign affairs and other things. It wasnt untill 1937 that you got more autonomity from the brits. Then FINALLY in 1982 you severed all ties to the British Parlament (vestige and legal independence). Your relationship was quid pro quo…
and by 1907 the start of the war, considering you were reliant on the british for foreign affairs (which what ww1 was to the canadians) then walla you got British control over Canada to enter the war…
there are other gaps but you get the idea…you cant claim independence when your suckling on the nanny states ‘tata’s for the next century…
“…then walla (sic) you got British control over Canada to enter the war…”
@Anthony: Just FYI, it’s “voila” (not “walla”).
“Voila!” is a contraction of the a French expression “Voi la” meaning literally, “look there!
Actually Anthony, Canada, New Zealand, Australia and S.A. were all self governing members of a very close knit commonwealth of english speaking former colonies. Their going to war when England did was a independent act of their respective parliaments. Because of the various dates of internal self governance being within 50 years of WW1’s start, there remained a very close attachment to England and their shared head of state King George V. However all had independent parliaments and prime ministers as head of gov’t……
Very nice. This helped me with my social studies essay.
We are learning about this now, 8th grade Social Studies evolves alot around WW1.
I bet they are not mentioning the religious-political aspect of the wars, and especially not the influence of the muslim dominated Black Hand organisation which is still a criminal mafia organisation in operation today. In Syria the Black Hands are now the military wing of Hamas call al-qassam.
Notice how the aspect of the moslems and the Ottoman empire gets no attention eh. They avoid the truth.
1. There was tension between the French and the Germans because the Prussians won in a war against the French and gained Alsace and Lorraine.
2. Germany was in a Triple alliance with BOTH Russia and Austria-Hungary, however when Bismarck fell out of power the Russian-German alliance broke and the French created an alliance with Russia.
3. The Germans wanted a war with the French and had created the “Schlieffen” plan years before it started, which was to capture Paris and knock the French out of the war and return to the east before the Russian army was able to mobilize.
4. The war was caused because of the rise of “Imperialism” and “Nationalism” in the European nations. Which also caused the arms race, which made Europe ready to burst with military power.
5. Contrary to popular belief, it was not the Americans that won the war, the entrance of America in the war just made the German High Command give up faster, the Germans made their last offensive in the summer of 1918, and when they heard that a million more men will be entering the war on the opposite side in 1919, they knew that they had no chance. If America did not enter the war they may have lasted a year longer, a year and a half at best.
So basically, austria or Germany (I got a lil confused there) just got greedy and caused all the pain and tragedy in the world for no real reason, just land!!
1. There was tension between the French and the Germans because the Prussians won in a war against the French and gained Alsace and Lorraine.
2. Germany was in a Triple alliance with BOTH Russia and Austria-Hungary, however when Bismarck fell out of power the Russian-German alliance broke and the French created an alliance with Russia.
3. The Germans wanted a war with the French and had created the “Schlieffen” plan years before it started, which was to capture Paris and knock the French out of the war and return to the east before the Russian army was able to mobilize.
4. The war was caused because of the rise of “Imperialism” and “Nationalism” in the European nations. Which also caused the arms race, which made Europe ready to burst with military power.
5. Contrary to popular belief, it was not the Americans that won the war, the entrance of America in the war just made the German High Command give up faster, the Germans made their last offensive in the summer of 1918, and when they heard that a million more men will be entering the war on the opposite side in 1919, they knew that they had no chance. If America did not enter the war they may have lasted a year longer, a year and a half at best.
one Question I have to ask is this. Did Germany asked the Black hand to kill the duke?
my name is JASEPH and this site doesnt know ANYTHING this all wrong i killed Franz Ferdininad jk lololololololoololololol
caroline@ Nope, they were enemies.
LOL! naive…definetly!
you should look up dodds interview regarding the carnegie investigation.
Norman Dodd, former director of the Committee to Investigate Tax Exempt Foundations of the U.S. House of Representatives, testified that the Committee was invited to study the minutes of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace as part of the Committee’s investigation. The Committee stated: “The trustees of the Foundation brought up a single question. If it is desirable to alter the life of an entire people, is there any means more efficient than war…. They discussed this question… for a year and came up with an answer: There are no known means more efficient than war, assuming the objective is altering the life of an entire people. That leads them to a question: How do we involve the United States in a war. This is in 1909.”
although intervention seems an annual tradition these days, to believe nations do anything that isnt in theiri nterests is just a lack of logic!
also the outcome of ww1 was the sykes-pecko agreement!
ww1 was about a lot more than binding treaties. the small planned war was well organised pretext to involve the other countries!
result= the league of nations…only the americans wanted none of it!
did you copy this from high school history book….the brits were done by 1916…no ammo no rations…..then the balfour declaration was signed and the lusitania sabotaged to bring the americans who were favouring the germans previous…..the american jews were against russia but entered into the war at the behest of their propaganda newspapers……it was a financial takeover by the allies….full stop…the assasination had the calling card of the zionist …the bomb..
@michael, wow, what a bigot you are, and exposing your bigotry for all to see on the intertubes, LOL!
I’m pretty sure the Black Hand, which according to this article (which is wrong) had strong ties to Islam at the time, is the exact OPPOSITE of a “Zionist” organization. Note the capitalization.
Attributing every thing wrong with the world to “Zionists” is pretty much THE hallmark of anti-Semitism. Well, that and denying the Holocaust.
From
http://www.firstworldwar.com/features/balkan_causes.htm
“We can make some generalizations about the plotters. All were Bosnian by birth. Most were Serbian, or one might say Orthodox, but one was a Bosnian Muslim: at their trial, the plotters did not speak of Serbian, Croatian or Muslim identity, only their unhappiness with the Habsburgs.
None of the plotters was older than 27: none of them were old enough to remember the Ottoman regime. Their anger over conditions in Bosnia seems directed simply at the visible authorities. The assassins were not advanced political thinkers: most were high school students. From statements at their trial, the killing seems to have been a symbolic act of protest. Certainly they did not expect it to cause a war between Austria and Serbia. ”
This was a group of mostly young students (ultimately about 25 people were arrested but there were only a few executions because the vast majority of them were minors, teenagers) caught up in the political upheaval common to the times (switching over from rule by inheritance/royalty and strong influence by the Church that sometimes verged on theocracy to a modern secular elected system that mostly eschews strong religious influence). In point of fact most of the original conspirators never fired their guns or tossed their bombs – the royal couple was, in fact, virtually shot BY ACCIDENT as the shooter missed them passing in the original entourage and happened to be passing by when they made a wrong turn later and had to turn around).
NONE of them were members of the Black Hand. Any involvement of the Black Hand itself was very minor, basically they gave them some weapons and sneaked them back over the border. In fact these kids came up with the plot on their own and eventually implemented it (as little of the original plan as they actually managed to accomplish) themselves.
So yeah, look elsewhere for the actual facts, but neither Zionists nor Islamic extremists (a modern bugaboo that some people are trying to paste on to a historical period where it did not exist at the time) were involved in any important way.
“So yeah, look elsewhere for the actual facts, but neither Zionists nor Islamic extremists (a modern bugaboo that some people are trying to paste on to a historical period where it did not exist at the time) were involved in any important way.”
An ignorant statement at best. The Crusades predated WWI by *centuries*, and they were a result of Islam taking over several countries (mainly Christians) and the fight to get them back. This, in fact is what Obama tried to use to discredit Christians, claiming *they* were the aggressors. But you Demorrhoids just won;t accept the truth.
He probly did you never know
yeah.right…a finance takeover by the ally powers…..the first chairperson of the league of nations was a mysterious man called aimon de valera……new york born to irish mum and so called cuban dad……no one can find record of his dads birth marriage cert death cert…..at two he went to ireland to be bought up by grandmum….rose up arrested for easter riot with 15 others…all but him were shot….later arrested by brits escapes….becomes national hero….and first president of irish union…..later heads league of nations……psuedo zionist if ever there was one
Simply an Awesome clear concise and highly readable and understandable breakdown of the causes of the Great War, very well done,
this helped me get a 100 on my social studies test although i like this wesite i still think they could have provided more information thank you tso much to the creaters
Have a read of this excerpt, written by AJP Taylor who is largely to be considered one of the best informed WWI historians, and tell me that all the preamble (assassinations and treaties) to The Great War wasn’t all pretext to something that had already been long planned out.
http://www.ae.metu.edu.tr/~evren/history/texts/taylor1.htm
AJP Taylor was a fiercely Germanophobic piece of work, so his writings should be used with great caution, if at all.
Thanks for the attention! Too bad that here in the USA the indoctrination centres known as *public schools* try to push it on kids that it’s all religious reasons.
I actually have read it and it’s the teachers that emphasize the religious aspects but most kids just read what they are required at the minimum not giving a rip.
As usual thru history even today most wars are over resources and land grabs.
The Salem Witch Trials religion actually had very little to do with it. The problem was again land grabs from widows who had large plots of unused land judges wanted.
The religious excuses were only enough to start it as the church only read select passages from the bible not seeing the *big* picture so go right along with the majority but in the end it was all about power and land rights.
When will people be happy with the land they have and use their own resources more wisely instead of ignoring it and trying to take it from others?
Also thank you for not having a lot of military lingo that goes on and on making the scroll bar really tiny.
A couple of points:
1) The Archduke and his wife Sophia weren’t actually assassinated by the nationalist Black hand of Serbia. They were assassinated by “Mlada Bosnia”, a Bosnian independence and pan-yugoslav group.
The Mlada Bosnia assassins had however gone to Belgrade to receive assistance from the black hand. This was because a black hand operative and Mlada Bosnia’s leader Danilo Ilic had made contact in Sarejevo, where the operative promised Assistance from the black hand in any assassination attempts.
So some members of “Mlada Bosnia” (including the eventually successful Gravilo Princip) made their own way to Belgrade to make an unannounced contact. The Black hand did not expect this and didn’t take the group of misfits from Sarajevo very seriously. So the black hand only gave the members of Mlada Bosnia some accommodation, some basic training and some old pistols, explosives and some expired cyanide and sent them on their way.
Apparently Serbian PM Nikola Pasic learned of the plot via an informant and attempted to get the group apprehended, but it appears that black hand members had infiltrated the Serbian Gendarmerie preventing that.
2) Austria was not involved in the Balkan wars and thus had no territory to regain. Their bugbear against Serbia was for the even more ignoble reason of wanting expansion into territories it had no previous historical control over.
But you are in fact very correct that nobody liked Franz Ferdinand much in Vienna and not many people were too upset when he and his wife died. And that it was the ultimatum and not the assassination that caused the war. The Assassination only really set-off the chain of events.
Kudos to the comments from the “big one”. For 2000 years, this rock we call Planet Earth, has been besieged with secular “land grabs”. There is plenty of room for everybody. Why all the killing? What ever your beliefs, what ever you call your God…if you even believe in one, stop killing, simply in the name of Humanity. This is a beautiful world we live in. It tilts on its axis, so everybody gets their share of warm and cold, day and night, blue sky’s and cloudy , air to breath, fish to catch, water to drink. Killing in the name of Religeous beliefs does not make sense, nor does Anarchtic Communism. We all need to stop, stay where we are, and improve on what we have….. NO MORE WARS….we’re too old for this childish way Nations conduct themselves. World Peace is all that matters now….or the apocolipse may not be far off. Mankind needs to put it’s resources into making life better for all. NOT WAR. To kill in the name of religion is not what He ( or Her) you pray to wants, for sure. Let’s all grow up and live in harmony for the first time in 2000 years. World Peace…what a concept!
I don’t think there is enough land for everyone. People starve and die from exposure by the millions already every year because there isn’t enough.
On top of that, we are using way more of earths annual resources (caloric and material production, etc.) to produce what we do, which isn’t enough. If we lived within our means, even more would do without.
Reducing the population to about 2 billion would help, but that’s not possible.
My solution: I think that the reason we have these problems is because we live in fear. All religions are punishment-based, most culture is punitive in order to control behaviour, and fear is self-fulfilling by causing the strong to dominate the weak so that the strong can live (they wish) fear-free. I’m working on myself to try to be motivated by, and set goals of, confidence and respect. But as animals, with animal bodies and needs, it almost seems impossible. So I dunno.
I’d love to hear what you think.
Apply to All
There is enough land and resources and we could have more resources but we are not using our resources wisely and poorly her on earth.
Seems to me that it always involves having more land, power and wealth than anyone. Well greed destroy. When you leave this world you will leave with none. The higher power in heaven will be the judge on how you live on this earth. Share to others and you will prosper.
War is not the answer. We all lose.
If you want to be taken seriously you need to cite your sources and footnote the piece. It’s true because you say so?
@missy: All sources are cited at the bottom.
This is very helpful for school
I think you’ve done a good job at pointing these events out and putting them in context. Thanks for the references.
It might be worth adding that it’s just your interpretation of the material in the references, and that others might have other ways of putting the facts together. The Internet is full of stuff people think is true, but more information often gives different analyses. To put it another way, you could say, “Don’t take my word for it – check the references and see what you think?”
The cause of WWI has become so convoluted that nobody seems to understand what really caused the devastating world war.
We focus on the assassination and cobweb of alliances as some sort of clumsy, unintentional cause of WWI, when that’s just not accurate. To better understand it, we must go back to what started the one-year Franco-Prussian War (between basically Germany and France) between 1870 and 1871 and the result of that war. That was another war that began with dubious reasons. When you look at that, you begin to see the motivation that Germany had for starting a Franco-Prussian War part II.
The bottom line is that what would have been a smaller regional conflict centering around Austria-Hungary and Serbia, became a full scale world war simply because Germany wanted to attack France and used the loose alliances between Serbia-Russia and Russia-France as a pretense to justify doing so.
To get there, Germany needed to be at war with Serbia and then Russia – so that they had an excuse to attack France. They joined their friend Austria-Hungary against Serbia, which then put the focus on Russia. But Russia did not immediately declare war on Germany. They only began to mobilize their troops, then reversed the order and stopped mobilizing, and then started mobilizing again. They were clearly wavering. In a day with poor communications between countries – mostly telegram (when it was working). Germany gave Russia a 12 hour ultimatum to de-mobilize their troops and move away from the border. They then promptly declared war on Russia and then declared war on France (which they attacked first).
France literally moved their troops away from the border to show they were not interested in war with Germany. German news media, however, printed made-up propaganda stories of french troop infiltration and incursion into Germany to further their plans for attack.
Examining the facts demonstrates that there is clearly a single country responsible for taking advantage of a regional conflict and turning it into a full scale world war – and that country is Germany.
I am a German-American, I am not looking to bash Germany, but it is important to dig a little deeper to get to the truth.
This doesn’t mention Ottoman Empire or some smaller nations like Bulgaria.
Ottomans jumped in more or less because Britain, France and Russia had been poaching off pieces of their empire.
They could have stayed out but obviously thought they could help Germany win.
Bulgaria – I forget why. I think they were hoping to get some territory from some of their Balkan neighbors.