World War 1

The Beginnings of World War 1

On June 28 , 1914 , Gavrilo Princip assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand the heir to the Austrian throne , in Sarajevo . In the last week of July and the first week of August of that year , the First World War broke out , with Austria declaring war on Serbia , and Germany declaring war against Russia and France . It was a war that took the lives of 9 million soldiers and many more millions of innocent civilians . France , Russia and the United Kingdom , with Italy and the United States joining them

much later , fought the Austro-Hungarian empire , Germany , Bulgaria and Turkey (then Ottoman Empire , in `a war to end all wars , as the First World War is called sometimes . The assassination in Sarajevo acted as a catalyst that set off the biggest war in the history until that time . In 1966 , Vladimir Dedijer , a leading expert on the Sarajevo assassination claimed that already over 3 ,000 books had been published what studied that fateful day (Hamilton Herwig 2003 . It was a tragic murder because of the consequences it led to . But the war had indeed long been building up , and most probably would have happened anyway even without any such assassination ever happening

Just before the outbreak of World War I , the balance of power in Europe existed in two major political and military groups , the Triple Alliance and the Triple Entente . The Triple Alliance contained Austria-Hungary Germany and Italy (Chant 2002 . The Triple entente consisted of France Russia , and the United Kingdom . There was a strong element of militarism on both sides of the war . All the member countries on both sides had been building large armies and navies in the years before the war itself . They were eagerly preparing for the war , making perfect plans for army mobilization . This military build-up and preparedness existed in a climate of hatred that is based on nationalistic emotions . French were opposed to Germans , and Russians were opposed to the Austrians Mainly in Germany , but elsewhere too , there were many nationalistic speeches and writings which talked about fighting a war in to assert national superiority

For about three weeks after the Sarajevo assassination , nothing much happened . But then Austria-Hungary started reacting (Duffy 2004 . It thought that there was the hand of Serbian government behind the assassination and demanded Serbia the assassins and their groups be given over to it for punishment . Serbia did not like to be issued an ultimatum in that way , and went for the support of its ally Russia Meanwhile , Austria-Hungary asked the support of Germany , in case Russia comes into picture . Germany wanted Austira-Hungary to go out on a war Austria-Hungary then declared war on Serbia . And Russia started sending its huge army to support Serbia . For Germany it was an opportunity that it was waiting for , and it declared war on Russia on Aug 1 . Since France was a close ally of Russia , it was brought in the war too . Germany declared war on France...