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I have my History final tomorrow, and have to write an essay based on said subject.

Would anyone like to add their input into this to help?
Much appreciated

That bloke who was assinated - as far as I can remember he was important. And countries such as England France and Germany all wanted power and to be the best.

Franz Ferdinand m'dear

As I recall, there were a lot of treaties and alliances, so when a few countires decided to go at it, their allies were dragged in. But if this is for a class, don't you have a text book or something you can look this up in?

Thats it! I knew I failed history for a reason! *slaps head*

I do, but we need viewpoints from others, my text book is Canadian.

Weren't the treaties and Alliances after the war?

No, there was a Triple Entente (france, britain and russian) and Triple Alliance (Italy, Germany, Austria-Hungary) before the war.

I believe it involved the Balkans (sp?) and some treaties were broken because of territorial issues with saravejo. There was also the expansion of Ottoman Empire in the east.

That's what I can remenber at the moment.

*checks American history books*

Another reason for failure!!! Well the treaties didn't come in until later.

Canadians have history books?

Lets not forget the Schlieffen Plan, by Keiser Wilhelm

right
almost forgot that

Militarism: each country built up thier armies
Imperialism: each country wanted more resources
Nationalism: each country thought they were the best
Alliance Sytems: If one goes to war, they all do

Aso, be sure to talk about the arm race between the countries at the time they were all builing an army, and thus tention between each other.

No. At the beginning of World War I, only two countries were at war: Serbia and Austria-Hungary. But Russia had an alliance with Serbia to protect them, so they declaired war against Austria-Hungary. Germany was an ally of Austria-Hungary throught the Tripple Alliance. France had already agreed that if Germany attacked Russia, France would declair war on Germany (The Franco-Russian Alliance), and so on.

Oh, Ok. Yet again the word 'failure' seems to linger. *sigh*

that's militarism

....and?

WWI started when the Archduke or Austria was assasinated..the US stayed nuetral until Germany started attacking American ships then sunk an American cruiseliner full of passengers. hope that helps?

and Germany first invented submarines during WWI and they were called U boats

^semi true. The Archduke and his wife was assinated by a Serbia nationalist group. A-H declared war on Serbia. Russia was allied with Serbia can delcared war on A-H. German was allied with A-H and war broke out with Russia. England and France were allied with Russia and delcared war on Germany and A-H. The Ottomen Empire declared war on the Allies as they were allied with Germany and A-H.

Germany didn't attack US ships. They attacked British passenger ships. The US got inviolved because of unrestricted sub warfare. The Lustitania, a passenger ship was sunk and Americans were killed. The Lusitania did contain weapons though. More importantly for US involvment was the Zimmermen telegraph. Germany promised Mexico that if the US entered the war, Germany would help Mexico get back Texas and the SW. Withine months, the US entered ww1

oh, and Germany wasn't the first country to use subs. The South during the US civil war had one, it sunk though.

indeed.

Zimmerman note is important somewhat when considering why we went to war but truly it was the sinking of civilian ships in unrestricted submarin warfare by Germany. Arms race was at its peak on everyones mind when HMS Dreadnout was commissioned, first all big caliber battleship. Everyting with the alliances i concur.

Yeah it was all a huge mixing bowl, Austria-Hungary attacked Serbia after the assasination of the Autrian Hungarian heir in Sarajevo by Serbian nationalists, this attack brought Russia(allied to Serbia) into the war. A-H ally Germany attacked France(Allied to Russia) through the neutral country Belgium, the invasion of Belgium brought Great Brittain into the war.
Turkey joined the A-H German side and Italy joined in on the British/French/Russian side(allies)

Well the thing that never gets metioned is that A-H gave Serbia an ultimatum by which they had to give up the nationalists, to which Serbia did not comply.

(where have we seen that again in recent history)

Imperialism: each country wanted more resources
Well also useful to remember is that the idea in the world at that time was that you needed a lot of lands (which directly increases your amount of resources) to be a wealthy and powerful country, good thing things have changed.

has it really changed?

well the largest countries are not always the most powerful let alone the wealthiest.

mainly because the smaller countries are more clever to make use of the resources they posess

true but that does mean it's not all about having the biggest country anymore

I think it's mostly to do with how resources available are managed. Japan has minimal resources and does very well.

if i were you id refuse to do a project on it! you should just say....oh wait dont worry...ill leave..thats sorta a different thingo!
wat i was tryna say is stuff to do with anzac day an all! i refuse to celebrate it (and all those other days like anzac day) because i refuse to praise the people who fought in wars or wateva b/cause wars shouldnt be allowed! hmph! *folds arms*

yeah dont praise those who offered their lifes so that you can be safe

make me seem like a bad person!
id actually preer if they didnt risk there lives so i can b alive b/cause id prefer to never've been borned!!! and like i said....wars are wrong...they shouldnt b allowed!

yeah and lala land is a cool place

shut up.
nah but seriously i rilly dont c tha point...i mean....well it aint like my point is gon change anything an i cant esplain things witout talkin 2 sum1 ...well actually eva and it makes sence so i just wont botha but wars r so fukin annoyin i hate em....argh..so tyred!

Misha that attitude would get you nowhere in a belgian school

what...bout no war?? y?? i mean...we ave fights at skool an all...an i fully support em! wooh, FIGHT FIGHT FIHGT! but wars are boring! then they like have all this sh*t ova tha news like "asama husan has been catched!" an they have like an hr reporting ova it an ur just like NOONE CARES!

Because if a teacher gives you an assignement you have to do it, wether you like to or not.

yeah i know.....same wit us but if they make me do sometin on praisin em ima gon get mum 2 right me a note!

that won't help here

I reckon that this is a good starting page with elements you have to mention:

http://www.pvhs.chico.k12.ca.us/~bsilva/projects/great_war/causes.htm

this site expands on it some more:

http://www.firstworldwar.com/origins/causes.htm

and here you can find some dates:

http://www.kimcox.org/causesww1.htm

ok, firstly, fights at school are silly and totally un-needed
but, what do you MEAN, no-one cares if terrorists and important (dangerous) leaders have been captured? you'll find out there are people who do care, cause this would affect their whole life... Some people should really start watching politics

and wars are boring? I'd call them many things, but certainly not boring!

*checks*
oh look, you still have to be 13 to be here *takes out broomstick*

Errr, not really. Germany was building a mass army like mad but the UK was doing no such thing- we were very ill-prepared for a 20th century war. The UK WAS building ships but that was only an obscure cause of the war, that was really more down to Germany, who were fleet building with the specific intent of overthrowing our balance of power in a way we were specifically not doing with land forces in the same manner.

The Germans actually did attack US boats in European waters, that was the point of unrestricted sub warfare. But as said, it is the Zimmerman telegraph that brought them into the war, as intercepted and decoded by the UK.

Most people seem to ignore the role of the Balkans in causing the war, as if the Archduke being shot in an obscure country was all there was to it. Not so- the Balkans, then as now, were Europe's greatest trouble spot, and 10 years before the war German strategists were saying that the next big war would start because of Serbia and something should be done about it- sadly, nothing was. "We should crush this viper Serbia," was a famed quote of the time.

Austria's unstoppable decline as an Empire was another major cause.

To be honest, it is very difficult to hammer down such an amazingly complicated subject as this in a few posts.

good point ush

Second time I have seen confusion over submarine invention around here lately- last time it was with Jules Verne...

As already mentioned again, the first military use of a submarine was in the American Civil War.

Did anyone mention fear as a cause? Fear of domination, fear of the future, fear of social change? All major factors.

hey ush!!!
ok...evy o: u said that terrorists effect ppls lifes or wateva...thats y they care...yeah i agree, but if there were no wars thered b no need for terrorists would there???
yerss: wtf??

Erm Ush...the arm race was one of the causes of WWI, and just because UK wasnt involved in the arm race, doesnt make it insagnificant.

Lil I think ush just ment to make clear that the arms race was not a global phenomenon not all countries did it

WW1: 1900's weapons, 1700's tactics. Not a good combo. What idiot came up with the idea to charge into a machine gun line?

Dunno but in a trench war, when there is no (or almost no) airforce, almost no tanks there is very little other choice. I agree it is a weird way of fighting, but at the time I think it was almost the only way. they could have used horses but horses and trenches dont mix I reckon.

To be exact, I said that these "news that interest nobody" actually affect people's lifes.
Well, see, this is no perfect world we're living in, wars are never gonna stop (or at least not any time soon), so, I think your point about this doesn't really stand.

However, I fail to see the link between your last post and this one

Lil, you clearly said 'they were ALL building an army'. In fact, very few of the belligerants involved were expanding their land forces at any rate before the war- really only France and Germany... and mostly only Germany. 'All' was therefore inaccurate, the UK being the main example. In fact, of the major players of WWI, the one who most directly started it- Austria-Hungary- had an army that was, if anything, falling to pieces. It couldn't have raced under any circumstances.

In fact, arms race is only a cause of WWI in some specific circumstances, and even then only as a subset of other matters. The main race was in fact industrial power, the main place this spilled into tension was the UK being worried about the growth of a German fleet.

Incidentally, nothing approaching 18th century tactics were used in WWI.

WWI was fought almost entirely over....










































...CHEESE!

well, they did charge at forified positions. It's not exactly like what happened in the 1700's, but it's clear tactics changed too slowly with the new weapons

That's somewhat of a cliche. Never did Generals actually deliberately try and slowly advance their men into enemy fields of fire.

thank you yerss

When you have to take a position and you only have infantry, what do you think you do? send your men in slowly or send them in running like hell, so atleast some make it

Kind of both actually.

If you have them run the whole way. then the faster soldiers would get seperated from the slower soldiers. Sending them like this makes it easier for marksmen to shoot the closer threat and work their way back.

If they walk, they'll just keep getting mowed down until they are all gone.

Troops need to be able to run, but still stay in some sort of formation in order to be quick enough to be effective, but not so quick that you break formation.

Careful though, the tone and conclusion of the third site is all wrong. No-one (of importance) ever thought that the accumulation of power was going to prevent wars- on the contrary, countries like Germany were preparing for a war they saw as unavoidable. People WANTED that fight.

It is a very common error for peope to say the build up for WWI was comparable to the Cold War arms race. This is a gross distortion of attitudes at the time.

The second link is much better- making no mention of such a myth but highlighting the naval build up of Germany specifically as the only place where the building of arms was a serious issue (and that was most certainly not done as deterrent- it was deliberately aggressive!)

Meanwhile again... there was no such thing as attacking with infantry alone, even in Napoleonic times. WWI was more complex than a set situation like that.