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Reasons for the War in 1914 Essay

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Reasons for the War in 1914 World War one, named The Great War erupted in the summer of 1914. It is safe to say that it was the most terrible war in the history of the world; made clear by the record of the many millions whom lost their lives in it. Causes of the war can be counted back to the nineteenth century; most considerably when the Germans defeated France in the Franco-Prussian War, when Germany captured back two French provinces. This came as a major set back to the French as Alsace and Lorraine were high production industrial areas. Obviously such a complex event as world war one cannot have been caused by this single factor alone that happened back in 1871.Many people solely blame The …show more content…

In the lead up to events in 1914 Britain would have been classed as a superpower, controlling almost a quarter of the world's land surface and well over a quarter of its population. British trade stretched to every corner of the globe and its powerful navy ruled the seas. The United States ambassador to Britain once wrote, "I guess they really believe that the earth belongs to them." This shows how powerful Britain appeared in the years before 1914. However in the lead up to summer 1914, other powerful countries began to emerge, most noticeably, Germany. Germany had overtaken Britain's industrial output and had built a large and well equipped army. These are all basic long term causes of the events that erupted in 1914. To gain a proper understanding such long term causes must be explored in greater depth to. Long term causes are triggering events in history that build up and eventually cause something such as a war. The most significant long term cause to world war one was the system of alliances. As many countries were rapidly becoming extremely powerful; more countries became under threat and needed to rally an alliance with other countries so they could support each other. Although Britain was still very powerful, Germany soon became a threat with its growing strength and assets. For years before the threat of war, Britain had not needed alliances so it kept out of European

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