Causes of the First World War Canadian History 30F

Crash Courses How World War I Started Part 1 9 minutes Who Started WWI Part 2 11 minutes

militarism In the early 20th century there was a massive build up of military arsenals in Europe The competitive arms race between countries like Great Britain, Germany and Russia led to a dangerous stockpile of weapons Advances in technology also led to deadlier weapons ex. machine guns, subs

Imperialism Refers to the British Empire, which stretched ¼ of the globe Other countries, like Germany, were in competition with Great Britain Animosity grew as competition increased for global territory

Nationalism The growing desire for nationhood was popular in Europe The Austrian-Hungary empire was home to 50 million ethnic minorities such as Ukrainians, Serbs, and Bosnians and many desired independence Events in Bosnia and Herzegovina would play a huge role in the outbreak of the war

Military alliances There were two key alliances that had evolved in Europe The Triple Entente (Allies) was made up of France, Russia, and Great Britain The Triple Alliance (Axis) included Austria- Hungary, Germany and Italy This network of alliances allowed a small conflict to quickly spread into something much larger

Assassination On June 28th, 1914 Archduke of Austria- Hungary Franz Ferdinand was shot by a Serbian nationalist When Aus-Hung declared war on Serbia, Russia came to its defence When Russia began to mobilize its army Germany immediately declared war on Russia and then on France When the German army invaded Belgium Britain declared war on Germany (Aug 4), which meant Canada was automatically at war as well

Canada in 1914 Canada PM for the duration of the war was a Conservative imperialist named Robert Borden Borden pledged there would be no conscription in Canada Canada’s initial wave of volunteers was 30,000 (within one month of war declaration) Between unemployment and adventure many were eager to fight

The Western Front

Trench Warfare After the initial German advance was halted in late 1914, a long period of trench warfare emerged Soldiers would live in the trenches for two week periods at a time moving from front-line to support-line and to the reserve line Attempts to advance from trench lines to advance on the enemy would result in thousands of deaths at a time for both sides