Causes of WW1
Is Germany to blame for WW1 and to what extent? –Marya Atassi
By the end of World War 1, during the Peace negotiation, everyone looked for someone to blame for the damage. Therefore fingers were pointed at Germany since it was the easiest to blame after it being defeated. In the treaty of Versailles, victorious countries agreed that Germany is to take responsibilty of all the "loss and damage" as Article 231 states. That is not fair though, because Germany was not the only country to attack and be part of the war and it causes. There are many things that involved the other European powers, such as the alliance system, colonial rivalries, arms race, the balkans, and others too. It is true that Germany is to blame, but so are the other countries, such as britain.
The alliance system was a major cause to World War 1 and led to the division of Europe that rose conflict and was an outbreak to war. After the defeat of France by Germany in the Franco-Prussian war, France made sure not to fight Germany again without allies. Therefore it chose to ally with Russia, and Great Britain later joined to form the Triple Entent. Germany felt concerned about being encircled by France and Russia, it allied with Austria. Later, after losing Tunis to France, Itlay turned to ally with Germany and Austria to form the Central Powers. Italy was not a permanant ally to the Central Powers as it aspired to be on the winning side of the war. Alliance system caused secrecy which then led to suspicion between the nations and this suspicion created conflict between them. The fear of suspecting led to testing the commitement in their alliances and arragements. In 1904, the Entente Cordiale was signed between Britian and France which triggered fear in Kaiser Wilhelm II created conflict with France by attempting to conquer Morroco in aim to challenge France's imperialism. This is for Germany to blame for triggering conflict. Local disputes were able to transform into a European
By the end of World War 1, during the Peace negotiation, everyone looked for someone to blame for the damage. Therefore fingers were pointed at Germany since it was the easiest to blame after it being defeated. In the treaty of Versailles, victorious countries agreed that Germany is to take responsibilty of all the "loss and damage" as Article 231 states. That is not fair though, because Germany was not the only country to attack and be part of the war and it causes. There are many things that involved the other European powers, such as the alliance system, colonial rivalries, arms race, the balkans, and others too. It is true that Germany is to blame, but so are the other countries, such as britain.
The alliance system was a major cause to World War 1 and led to the division of Europe that rose conflict and was an outbreak to war. After the defeat of France by Germany in the Franco-Prussian war, France made sure not to fight Germany again without allies. Therefore it chose to ally with Russia, and Great Britain later joined to form the Triple Entent. Germany felt concerned about being encircled by France and Russia, it allied with Austria. Later, after losing Tunis to France, Itlay turned to ally with Germany and Austria to form the Central Powers. Italy was not a permanant ally to the Central Powers as it aspired to be on the winning side of the war. Alliance system caused secrecy which then led to suspicion between the nations and this suspicion created conflict between them. The fear of suspecting led to testing the commitement in their alliances and arragements. In 1904, the Entente Cordiale was signed between Britian and France which triggered fear in Kaiser Wilhelm II created conflict with France by attempting to conquer Morroco in aim to challenge France's imperialism. This is for Germany to blame for triggering conflict. Local disputes were able to transform into a European