wwi: background and causes. belle epoch – beaux arts
TRANSCRIPT
WWI: Background and Causes
Belle Epoch – Beaux Arts
Nationalism: What is it? How does it make war more likely?
Nationalism:
Nationalism: Austria-Hungry
Nationalism• Nationalism: devotion to national
interests, identity, and/or independence• One of the most powerful forces
animating European politics in the 19th/c.
• Prussia under Bismarck would unify Germany in 1872 through the conquest of France in the Franco-Prussian war.
• Kaiser is named ruler of all Germany in the “Hall of Mirrors” to rub France’s face in her humiliation
• Germany became at once the most powerful nation in Europe and aggressive War was a big part of her story
• Austria-Hungry: the other nationalism!• Is nationalism a good or bad thing? Do
we foster too little or too much?
Imperialism
Imperialism• How could the 19th/C. scramble for
African and Asian colonies contribute to war?
• Fosters an international climate of rivalry• Fosters political conceptions informed by
social Darwinism, exaggerated nationalism, and easy military victory
• Wilhelm II would pursue a “World Policy” so his Germany could rival Britain-oddly in an attempt to win closer alliance with Britain
• Cartoon depicts the “2nd Algerian Crises where Kaiser Wilhelm II sends German warship into a French colony and stirs up trouble? What are German intentions? Can she be trusted? What are her capabilities and can we live with them?
Militarism
General Brunhardi: Germany & the Next War
• APPARTS
• For S, discuss what militarism is and how it makes war very likely when societies embrace militarism
Militarism
• Glorifying the military and military power and focusing societies energies for the purpose of war fighting
• Gen. Bernhardi: ecstatic belief in social Darwinism and progress through war
• All European states were militarized with universal conscription
• Wilhelm particularly was animated by marshal values and experiences
• Germany began a policy of naval construction in the 1890’s that forced Britain to seek alliance with France & Russia in the early 20/c. and a massive arms race
• Do more weapons and military power always make us safer?
Alliances
Alliances
• Bismarck had always carefully maintained his “rule of three”
• “World Policy” and Battleship building pushed Britain to alliance with France and Russia – Called the Triple Entente – in the first decade of the 20th/c.
• The collapse of the Ottoman Empire put Austria and Russia into conflict and Germany in the middle
• How do Alliances make war more likely – how less likely?
• Shade the two alliance systems on your map
Kaiser Wilhelmfrom: “The Great War, Vol. #1”
• What kinds of issues did Kaiser Wilhelm have?
• How could these traits and experiences have destabilized Europe in the era before WWI?
– Militarism as a fetish
– Navel Envy
– Rule of 3
Assassination
Assassination of Archduke Ferdinand
• People of the Balkans are largely Slavic (like Russia) ethnically but had been ruled by the Muslim Ottoman Turks for centuries
• Austria had snatched Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1878 from Turks and played the Russians
• By 1913 the Balkans were newly independent countries with Serbia being the largest and dominant
• Slavic Bosnians wish to join (nationalism) Serbia to form an all Slavic greater Serbia
• Toward that end a 19 year old terrorist/patriot shot Archduke Ferdinand on 28 June 1914 (an interesting story)
• Label the concatenation of ensuing events on your map