Was Germany solely responsible for the outbreak of World War One Essay Example

the Schlieffen plan and the fact that Germany had planned for an attack on two fronts, shows that Germany were prepared for war and were not drawn into it.

Furthermore, with Tirpitz preferring to postpone the “great fight for one and a half years” in the War Council meeting of December 1912, one can only look at the timing of Germany’s declaration of war on both Russia and France (just over one and a half years later) with strong suspicion. This isn’t to say they wanted a war, but they were certainly prepared for one and a ‘great’ one at that. It is also not surprising that it is of popular opinion that Germany were aggressive and up for war.

This aggressiveness is exemplified by the Pan-German League, an ultra-nationalist pressure movement which promoted the idea of an “inevitable conflict of nations. ” And that Germany should “expand from being a mere continental power to a world power, if necessary by means of war. ” Although an influential movement, and not too different from the Kaiser’s own ambitions, its popularity is not as widespread as many think and there were many Germans that did not want a war.

They even suspected the government would “steal their money to finance it. ” The people in power however believed that German expansion was for the good of the people and that as well as boosting their prestige in Europe they would create trade and make Germany much wealthier as a nation. Fisher highlights this ambition to be a world power claiming that Germany “embarked on a course aiming at nothing less than parity with

the British world empire, if not more.”

Here Fischer highlights Germany’s competitiveness as a main factor in expansionism and Joll expands on this by stating that “a powerful navy was the one means available of readjusting the balance of World power in Germany’s interest. ” Layton however, in contrast with Fischer, argues that Weltpolitik and German expansionism was not a major factor in the build-up to World War One, instead claiming that Kaiser’s policy secured the entente’s alliance and merely led to further anti-German feelings around Europe. Therefore having a more indirect influence.

Layton argues against German aggression as being a main factor and looks at their actions from a more defensive line. Bond on the other hand, while disagreeing that Germany’s actions were defensive, suggests it wasn’t just Germany promoting military might, the British too were culpable for engaging in a naval race with Germany and promoting military values through youth groups such as Boy Scouts. Bond does however go on to say the naval race was not a cause for the outbreak of war but merely “played a significant part in preparing for an explosive situation.”

This was seen by Bethmann-Hollweg who tried to “bring about a detente” between the British and Germans but his attempts were futile as the implementation of the 2nd Naval Law meant Britain didn’t trust Germany so it was probable that, should they be involved in the war, they would be against Germany. Although one could blame German expansionism as a root cause for World War One because it equipped them for war and in-turn made other countries strengthen their defences it is unfair to

blame Germany for doing so as Robbins argues, “rivalries characterised the European state system.”

Germany was merely trying to fit in. From another standpoint one could view the British actions and involvement in the war as hugely significant because, as Robbins argues, British involvement “expanded the war and prolonged it. ” Germany didn’t believe the British would get involved in the war because Britain had refused to sign any documents obliging them to defend any members of the entente and because of the Anglo-German settlement in Africa. “Britain would be neutral.”

One could also blame the British for sheer size of the war as British involvement took the war front to Africa as well as India. Although it is a valid argument that British involvement turned a European conflict into a world war it is also fair to assume the war would have taken place with or without British involvement and they should therefore bare little blame for the outbreak of war in 1914 as Germany didn’t even think Britain would be involved. Indeed neither did Britain as Grey suggested an international conference, indicating that they didn’t want to intervene.

Instead of blaming Germany or Britain one could be more specific and blame the mere existence of the Schlieffen plan as a root cause for a world war. This is because the rigidness of the plan meant Germany had to break the neutrality of Belgium despite British objections which in turn involved Britain in the war. Another failure of the plan was that all countries knew of the Schlieffen plan which enabled them, especially Russia, to keep two steps ahead of it

which they did by mobilising early.

In light of this one could blame Russian mobilization for the outbreak of war as Martel does by pointing to the fact that the Russians were the first to mobilise. In addition to this, Martel argues that Russian mobilisation was a main factor in the Germans involvement highlighting the fact that they wanted the Austrian/ Serbian conflict to remain local. One support for the argument that Germany’s actions in the build-up to World War One were defensive is the diary of Riezler, Bethmann’s secretary.

Here it is clear that Germany were indeed concerned about encirclement as Austria were their only ally and should they not defend them, they may be faced with isolation as well as encirclement. One can also look at Robbins in the defence of the Germans as he suggests that the Kaiser tried to keep the conflict minimal between Austria and Serbia and telegraphed the Tsar for help in smoothing things over which was denied. Davies also agrees with Robbins that Russian mobilization was a major influence in the outbreak of war.

This is partly due to the fact that neither Britain, nor France were consulted about the Russian’s involvement or mobilization and the Russians themselves had no obligation to help Serbia. One could argue from this that Russia were a main cause because they dragged the entente as well as Germany into fighting what could have been a local war between Serbia and Austria. Germany’s seeming innocence in this matter is somewhat one-sided however. Looking at Davies and other historians we learn that Germany promoted the idea for war and encouraged Austria.