What Do You Already Know About What Made World War I Such a Unique Event?

World War I, which lasted from 1914 until 1918, introduced the world to the horrors of trench warfare and lethal new technologies such equally toxicant gas and tanks. The result was some of the about horrific carnage the world had ever seen, with more than 16 million armed services personnel and civilians losing their lives.

It also radically altered the map, leading to the collapse of the sprawling Austro-Hungarian, Ottoman and Russian empires that had existed for centuries, and the formation of new nations to take their place. Long after the terminal shot had been fired, the political turmoil and social upheaval connected, and ultimately led to another, fifty-fifty bigger and bloodier global conflict ii decades subsequently.

The event that sparked the conflagration was the assassination of the heir to the Austro-hungarian empire, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, in 1914. But historians say that World War I really was the culmination of a long serial of events, stretching back to the late 1800s. The path to war included enough of miscalculations and actions that turned out to have unforeseen consequences.

"No one tin say precisely why it happened," explains the narration to a film at the National Earth War I Museum and Memorial in Kansas City. "Which may be, in the stop, the all-time explanation for why information technology did."

Here are eight of the events that led to the war.

ane. Franco-Russian Alliance (1894)

Both Russia and French republic, which had been humiliated in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71, feared the ascent ability of Germany, which had already formed alliances with Austro-hungarian empire and Italy. So the two nations decided to join forces for mutual protection equally well. It was the start of what would become the Allied side, the Triple Entente, in Globe War I.

"To my listen, it is the coming together of the Triple Entente in stages—the Franco-Russian Brotherhood in 1894, the British-French Entente Cordiale of 1904, and the Anglo-Russian Entente of 1907—that really solidified the system of diplomatic agreements that formed the main antagonistic blocs that went to war in 1914," Richard Due south. Fogarty, an associate professor of history at University at Albany, explains. "The brotherhood organisation was critical to shaping the state of war, and even in helping bring information technology on: it created a ready of expectations about international rivalry and contest, determining what kind of war Europeans imagined and prepared for."

WATCH: World War I Alliances

2. First High german Naval Law, (1898)

This legislation, advocated past Deutschland's newly-appointed Secretarial assistant of the Imperial Navy, Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz, dramatically expanded the size of Frg's battle fleet. It was the starting time of 5 laws dictating a buildup in which the Germans envisioned building a force that was superior to Great britain's Regal Navy.

"Tirpitz aimed at forcing Britain into an alliance with Germany on German terms," explains Eugene Beiriger, an associate professor of history, peace, justice and disharmonize studies at DePaul University, and author of the 2018 book Globe State of war I: A Historical Exploration of Literature. Instead, the British responded past building even more ships, and by ending their tardily 1880s policy of "first-class isolation" to grade alliances with Nihon, French republic and Russia.

"The German language Naval Laws created unintended consequences," Beiriger says in an email. "They ended upwardly alienating both the authorities and public of Great britain prior to the war."

3. The Russo-Japanese State of war (1904-1905)

Russian federation'due south Arbiter Nicholas II wanted to obtain a port that gave his navy and commercial ships access to the Pacific, and he ready his sites on Korea. The Japanese saw Russia's rising aggressiveness equally a menace, and launched a surprise attack on Nicholas' armada at Port Arthur in China. The resulting war, fought both at sea and on land in Communist china, was won by the Japanese, and as Beiriger notes, it helped shift power the power remainder in Europe.

Russia's allies France and U.k., which were allied with Japan, signed their own agreement in 1904 to avoid existence pulled into the war. France later on convinced the Russians to enter into an brotherhood with the British besides, laying the groundwork for their alliance in World War I. In addition, "Russia'due south expansion in the East had been stopped by Japan," Beiriger says. "This turned Russian ambitions westward, specially in the Balkans, and influenced hardliners within the authorities to not dorsum down in future crises." That Russian combativeness helped trigger Earth State of war I less than a decade afterward.

4. Austria-hungary's Annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (1908)

A railroad train packed with soldiers leaves a railway stationduring the Bosnian annexation crisis in 1908.

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Under an 1878 treaty, Austria-Hungary was governing Bosnia and herzegovina, even though technically they were still function of the Ottoman Empire. But after Austro-Hungarian authorities annexed their territory, the move backfired. The ii provinces' mostly Slavic population wanted to accept their own land, while Slavs in nearby Serbia had the appetite of appropriating the provinces themselves.

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"In multi-ethnic empires, nationalistic fervor fueled resistance to distant rulers," Doran Cart, senior curator of the National World State of war I Museum and Memorial, says. "Tension was powder-keg high in the Balkans, where Slavic people, aided by the Slavs of Russia, resisted the rule of Republic of austria-Hungary." Additionally, the motility drew Russia, which saw itself equally Serbia's protector, toward a gradual showdown with the Austro-Hungarian regime.

5. The Second Moroccan Crisis (1911)

The German language small cruiser SMS Berlin is shown arriving two days after gunboat Panther in order to strengthen the German position off shore Agadir, Morocco, July 1911.

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The French and Germans butted heads for several years over Morocco, where Frg'southward Kaiser Wilhelm 2 meddled in an endeavour to force per unit area the French-British alliance. In the First Moroccan Crunch in 1905, he actually sailed to Tangiers to express his back up for the sultan of Morocco against French interests. Simply instead of backing abroad from the conflict, the British rose in support of France.

In the 2d Moroccan Crisis in 1911, the German foreign secretary, Alfred von Kiderlen- Wächter, sent a naval cruiser to anchor in a harbor on the Moroccan coast, in reaction to a tribal revolt that the Germans thought was existence backed by France as a pretext for seizing the state. Again, the British backed the French, and eventually, Frg was forced to concord to recognize a French protectorate in Morocco. The two crises pushed the British and French closer together, and but hastened an eventual confrontation with the Germans.

6. Italy Invades Libya (1911)

The Italian government alleged war on Turkey in 1911 considering it had refused to permit the military occupation of Tripoli by Italia. Italian troops are seen here landing later the bombardment of Benghazi.

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The modern Italian state, which didn't begin until 1861, had been "largely left out of the scramble that built Britain, France, and other powers into worldwide empires," Fogarty explains. The Italian government gear up its sights on Libya, a Due north African country that hadn't been claimed by some other western European power, and decided to accept it from the Ottoman Empire. The Italo-Turkish War ended with a peace treaty, simply the Ottoman armed forces left Libya and permit the Italians colonize it. It was the offset military conflict that featured aeriform bombing, but every bit Fogarty notes, the real significance was that it exposed the shakiness of the Ottoman Empire and its slipping control over peripheral territories. That, in turn, was one of the factors that ultimately led to World War I, which Fogarty describes as "a war of empires, some expanding or seeking to expand, some groovy to agree on to what they had, others trying badly not to lose what they had left,"

vii. The Balkan Wars (1912-thirteen)

Soldiers resting with their weapons off a battleground during the Balkan Wars.

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Serbia, Republic of bulgaria, Montenegro and Greece, which had broken away from the Ottoman Empire during the 1800s, formed an alliance called the Balkan League. The Russian-backed alliance aimed to have away even more than of the Turks' remaining territory in the Balkans.

In the Starting time Balkan War in 1912, Serbia, Greece and Montenegro defeated Ottoman forces, and forced them to concur to an armistice. Merely the Balkan League before long disintegrated, and in the Second Balkan War, the Bulgarians fought the Greeks and Serbs over Macedonia, and the Ottoman Empire and Romania jumped into the fray against the Bulgarians besides.

Bulgaria ultimately was defeated. The Balkan Wars made the region even more than unstable. In the power void left by the Ottomans, tensions grew between Serbia and Austria-Hungary. That, in plow, led Austro-hungarian empire and its ally, Federal republic of germany, to make up one's mind that a war with the Serbs would be needed at some point to strengthen Republic of austria-Hungary'due south position. "Many historians consider the Balkan Wars as the true beginning of the First Earth War," Fogarty says.

8. Bump-off of Archduke Franz Ferdinand (1914)

WATCH: How a Wrong Plough Started World War I

The archduke, who was heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, went to Sarajevo to audit the imperial troops stationed in Republic of bosnia and herzegovina. He and his wife Sophie were shot to death in their car past a 19-twelvemonth-erstwhile Serbian revolutionary, Gavrilo Princip.

"The bump-off highlighted the nationalism that was pulling the Austro-Hungarian Empire apart at the seams," Fogarty explains, noting that Serbian extremists really wanted Franz Ferdinand expressionless considering they feared he was too moderate and would promote a power-sharing arrangement that would proceed Slavic peoples in the empire.

"His assassination killed the idea, whether or not it was e'er realistic to begin with, and radicalized Serbian disobedience and Austrian determination to solve the nationalism problem for good, at least with respect to Serbia," Fogarty says.

Instead, the tension between European powers increased, as they took different sides in the crunch. Every bit the U.K.'s Royal War Museum notes, the killing put both Austria-Hungary and Russia, which saw itself equally the Serbians' protector, in a bind. Neither one of them wanted to dorsum downward and appear weak. Fearing a fight that would draw in Russia, Austria-Hungary turned for help to Germany, which promised backing if the Austro-Hungarians used force against the Serbians. German support emboldened Austro-hungarian empire to declare war on Serbia on July 28.

Two days later, Russia's war machine mobilized, and the Germans saw that they too were in a bind. They didn't want to fight both Russian federation and its ally France on two fronts simultaneously, so information technology became imperative to knock the French military out of the war before Russia was gear up to fight. Germany declared war on Russia on August 1, and two days later declared war against France. German forces gathered on the border of neutral Belgium, which they planned to cantankerous in social club to invade French republic. Belgium called for help, and on August 4, Cracking Britain alleged war on Germany.

World War I had begun.

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Source: https://www.history.com/news/world-war-i-causes#:~:text=World%20War%20I%2C%20which%20lasted,and%20civilians%20losing%20their%20lives.

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