How Did Germany Cause Ww1

Germany was entirely responsible for expanding World War 1 due to its imperialistic colonialism, knowingly invoking the alliance system and not caring about the repercussions, and supporting impulsive declarations of war which caused tensions internationally and helped grow the nations involved in the war.

Germany's imperialistic ambitions led to an increase of tensions between them and other European powers, leading to the Great War. Imperialism was very prevalent in pre-war Europe. In the centuries previous, the European nations were eager to build an empire building for a variety of reasons. The main material reason was that colonizers were looking for raw materials and markets to sell to while European affairs grew tense (Imperialism in

The alliance system was created by Otto von Bismarck in 1879 in order to protect Germany from their rival, France (Causes of WW1 Handout, Handout). They believed that if they were to ally with another nation or nations, France would think twice about attacking Germany, because they would have a retaliation from both them and any of their allies. After the world saw how effective of a deterrent this alliance was, many other countries followed Germany’s example and formed alliances with others. After the Great War started and Germany declared war on France, the German military strategists thought that it would be a good idea to invade France in order to stop a two front war between them and Russia. However, since the German-French border was heavily fortified, they wanted to invade Belgium, a neutral nation adjacent to Germany and France, in order to get through into France. Germany then issued an ultimatum to neutral Belgium, saying that they would invade Belgium if they didn’t allow German soldiers passage into France via Belgium. Belgium rejects it, and on August 4, 1914, Germany invades Belgium (Causes of WW1, 11/28/16). Belgium then invokes an alliance with superpower Great Britain to declare war on anybody who invades Belgium and violates their neutrality. Germany knew about this alliance before invading, and disregarded it. The aforementioned

Militarism is when a nation glorifies the military, and uses that above all other tactics such as diplomacy to govern international affairs (Causes of WW1, 11/28/16). This means that a nation mightn’t even think about how to resolve conflicts any other than declaring war on them. This could also be shown through a nation’s overeager willingness to declare war on others in order to gain territory or just to show their superiority over others. In 1914, Austria-Hungary wanted to declare war on Serbia because of a perceived connection between them and the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. However, they knew that Serbia had an alliance with Russia, and that if Austria was to declare war on Serbia, Russia would also retaliate against Austria. Because of this, Austria asks for Germany’s support in fighting Serbia, and by extension, Russia. Germany, who believed in throwing their military into a conflict as soon as possible, grants Austria a blank check, meaning that Germany would support Austria in any scale of a conflict that might occur from that point forward (Causes of WW1, 11/28/16). This meant that Germany would side with Austria for the rest of the war, no matter how many nations were against them or if it turned into a world war. Because of Germany’s support, Austria was able to declare war on Serbia, leading to total war. This proves that