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Lecture # 16: World War I: Causes & Consequences

Presented byAbul Kalam Azad

Senior Lecturer, GED, NUBE-mail: kalamadd@gmail.com

Causes of World War IMilitarism – policy of building up strong military forces to prepare for war

Alliances - agreements between nations to aid and protect one another

Nationalism – pride in or devotion to one’s country

Emperialism – when one country takes over another country economically and politically

Assassination – murder of Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand

Imperialism: European conquest

of Africa

1910-1914 Increase in Defense Expenditures

France 10%

Britain 13%

Russia 39%

Germany 73%

1870 1880 1890 1900 1910 1914

94 130 154 268 289 398

Causes of World War I - MilitarismTotal Defense Expenditures for the Great Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Italy,

France, Britain, Russia) in millions of £s£s (British pounds)

Triple Entente:Triple Entente: Triple Alliance:Triple Alliance:

Germany

Austria-Hungary

Italy

Great Britain

France

Russia

Causes of World War I - Alliances

Tension

Pan-Germanism  - movement to unify the people of all German speaking countries

Austria *

Belgium

Denmark

Iceland

Germany *

Liechtenstein *

Luxembourg

Netherlands

Norway

Sweden

Switzerland *

United Kingdom

* = German speaking country

Germanic Countries

Causes of World War I - Nationalism

Pan-Slavism  - movement to unify all of the Slavic people

Causes of World War I - Nationalism

Causes of World War I - Imperialism

Causes of World War I - Imperialism

Archduke Franz Ferdinand and Duchess Sophie Sarajevo, Bosnia - June 28th, 1914.

Causes of World War I - Assassination

Causes of World War I - Assassination

Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand was killed in Bosnia by a Serbian nationalist who believed that Bosnia should belong to Serbia.

Causes of World War I - Assassination

Gavrilo Princip after his assassination of Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand.

Causes of World War I - Assassination

The Point of No Return:

The Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand

Austria blamed Serbia for Ferdinand’s death and declared war on Serbia.

Germany pledged their support for Austria -Hungary.· example of Pan-German nationalism

Russia pledged their support for Serbia.· example of Pan-Slavic nationalism

The Point of No Return:

The Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand

Germany declares war on Russia.

France pledges their support for Russia.

Germany declares war on France.

Germany invades Belgium on the way to France.

Great Britain supports Belgium and declares war on Germany.

World War IWorld War IWorld War IWorld War I

Allied Powers:Allied Powers: Central Powers:Central Powers:

Great Britain

France

Russia

Italy

Germany

Austria-Hungary

Ottoman Empire

League of Nations• The League of Nations was an International

Organization founded as a result of the Treaty of Versaillesin 1919–1920. The League's goals included Disarmament, preventing war through collective security, settling disputes between countries through negotiations, diplomacy and improving global welfare. The diplomatic philosophy behind the League represented a fundamental shift in thought from the preceding hundred years. The League lacked its own armed force and so depended on the Great Powers to enforce its resolutions, keep to economic sanctions which the League ordered, or provide an army, when needed, for the League to use. However, they were often reluctant to do so. Benito Musilini stated that "The League is very well when sparrows shout, but no good at all when eagles fall out."

• After a number of notable successes and some early failures in the 1920s, the League ultimately proved incapable of preventing aggression by the Axis Powers in the 1930s. The onset of the Second World War suggested that the League had failed in its primary purpose, that was to avoid any future world war. The United Nations replaced it after the end of the war and inherited a number of agencies and organizations founded by the League.

• Symbols• The League of Nations had neither an official

flag nor logo. Proposals for adopting an official symbol were made during the League's beginning in 1921, but the member states never reached agreement. However, League of Nations organization used varying logos and flags (or none at all) in their own operations. An international contest was held in 1929 to find a design, which again failed to produce a symbol. One of the reasons for this failure may have been the fear by the member states that the power of the supranational organization might supersede them.

• Finally, in 1939, a semi-official emblem emerged: two five-pointed stars within a blue pentagon. The pentagon and the five-pointed stars were supposed to symbolize the five contenents and the five races of mankind. In a bow on top and at the bottom, the flag had the names in English (League of Nations) and French (Société des Nations). This flag was used on the building of the New York World’s Fair in 1939 and 1940.

• Languages:• The official languages of the League of Nations

were Frech, English And Spanish (from 1920). In 1921, there was a proposal by the Under-Secretary General of the League of Nations, Dr. Nitobe Inazo, for the League to accept Esperanto as their working language. Ten delegates accepted the proposal with only one voice against, the French delegate, Gabriel Hanotaux. Hanotaux did not like how the French Language was losing its position as the international language of diplomacy and saw Esperanto as a threat. Two years later the League recommended that its member states include Esperanto in their educational curricula.

• Principal organs:The League had three principal organs:

1. Secretariat (headed by the General Secretary and based in Geneva),

2. Council, and 3. an Assembly.

The League also had numerous Agencies and Commissions. Authorization for any action required both a unanimous vote by the Council and a majority vote in the Assembly. Sir James Eric Drammond was the first secretary general of the secreteriat(1920-1933).

• General weaknesses• The League did not, in the long term, succeed.

The outbreak of World War II was the immediate cause of the League's demise, but there was also a variety of other, more fundamental, flaws.

• The League, like the modern United Nations, lacked an armed force of its own and depended on the Great Powers to enforce its resolutions, which they were very reluctant to do. Economic sanctions, which were the most severe measure the League could implement short of military action, were difficult to enforce and had no great impact on the target country, because they could simply trade with those outside the League. The problem is exemplified in the following passage, taken from The Essential Facts About the League of Nations, a handbook published in Geneva in 1939:

• Demise and legacy• The final meeting of the League of

Nations was held in Geneva on April 18, 1946. Delegates from 34 nations attended, and a motion was made to close the session, with the resolution that "The League of Nations shall cease to exist except for the purpose of the liquidation of its assets." The vote was 33-0 in favor, with Egypt abstaining. At 5:43 pm Geneva time, Secretary Carl J. Hambro of Norway stated, "I declare the twenty-first and last session of the General Assembly of the League of Nations closed."

• With the onset of World War II, it had been clear that the League had failed in its purpose – to avoid any future world war. During the war, neither the League's Assembly nor Council had been able or willing to meet, and its secretariat in Geneva had been reduced to a skeleton staff, with many offices moving to North America. At the 1943 Tehran Conference the Allied Powers agreed to create a new body to replace the League. This body was to be the United Nations. Many League bodies, such as the Internatinal Labour Organization, continued to function and eventually became affiliated with the UN. The League's assets of $22,000,000 were then assigned to the U.N