The first world war essay

T
he First World War has been one of the most controversial events in history. It began at the end of July 1914 in consequence of different issues arisen between several European countries, in which the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand (the heir to the Austrian-Hungarian throne) by Gavrilo Princip, a Serbian Nationalist, on 28th June 1914 in Sarajevo was last straw to spark a great war.Furthermore, the power of the German Empire became big, and this created conflicting ambitions and mutual fears amongst the European powers. More British, French and Italian soldiers died more than in the First World War than died in the Second. It was the first genuinely global conflict for not just on the fields of France and Flanders, but at mountains, at sea and in the air. Four years lateron 11th November 1918, eight million people dead, and new problems arose again amongst the European countries in consequence of the Great War. The end of the war was prolonged by the individual aims of every nation involved.

After to declare war on Serbia, Russia began to mobilize against the Austrian-Hungarian Empire, and so Germany threaded Russia to declare her on war. Thus, Austria-Hungaryoffered Russia to modify the ultimatum that had been sent to the Serbians. Nevertheless, Germany insisted Russia on withdrawing her troops immediately. Russia refused to do it however, and Germany decided to declare her on war on 1st August 1914. Two days later, she declared war on Russia’s ally, France, and on 4th August Britain declared war against Germany. Therefore, the war officiallycommenced. Most belligerents had been waiting for this moment in order to fitful their own purposes. These are some of the main remote causes, probably the most important ones, which provoked countries to participate in a great war in a global scale and also to make it much longer than it had been thought at the beginning:

* The loss of Alsace and Lorraine by France: in 1871, Prussia defeatedFrance in the Franco-Prussian war and annexed her provinces of Alsace and Lorraine to the newly created German Empire. Since that moment, France had been keeping up a revenge sentiment against Germany, which trusted too much in her last victory and so declared war against France. Thus for France, naturally enough, there could be no peace so long as the German army occupied a fifth of her mostproductive territory. France was willing to fight to recover her lost territories no matter how long this could take.

* Fleet competence between Germany and Britain: Germany was increasing her fleet in order to be capable to bring the British navy face to face successfully. Furthermore, Germany was waiting for this moment during the First World War, and she could not accept to end to World upwithout beating the British navy.

* Germany’s insecurity-security, fears, ambitious and ‘Weltpolitik’:
-Insecurity-Security and fears: the German Empire could have been feeling threatened by other European countries, as she was the most powerful country in Europe in those days. So Germany needed to be victorious in this war in order to maintain her power and also to avoid other Europeannations from obtaining power. However, at the same time Germany owned herself a big security due to her past victories against France, for example.
-Ambitious: Bismarck himself had been content simply to preserve the newly created German Empire. However, the successor generation was not easily satisfied with simply preserving the German Empire as it was. The following successors were eager to increasethe power of Germany no matter what. Furthermore, Germany’s expansionist policy was poor compared to other nations such as France, Britain or Spain. This fact created an empty feeling in Germany’s pride, since it was a powerful empire without expansion, which was what characterized a powerful empire. Therefore, Germany was willing to fight as long as it was required to gain some of those...