{"id":712,"date":"2017-09-02T18:20:10","date_gmt":"2017-09-02T18:20:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/?p=712"},"modified":"2026-04-24T07:46:26","modified_gmt":"2026-04-24T07:46:26","slug":"militarism-as-a-cause-of-world-war-i","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/militarism-as-a-cause-of-world-war-i\/","title":{"rendered":"Militarism as a Cause of World War I: A Detailed Summary"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Militarism was one of the\u00a0main causes of World War I<\/a>, which began in July of 1914, following the\u00a0assassination of Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand<\/a>.\u00a0 In fact, historians consider it to be one of four main long-term causes of the war, along with:\u00a0alliance systems<\/a>,\u00a0imperialism<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0nationalism<\/a>.\u00a0 Militarism was a particularly important cause of\u00a0World War I<\/a>\u00a0due to several key factors.\u00a0 For instance, it caused nations to build up their armies and led to increased tensions between the European powers.\u00a0 This was especially prevalent in the arms race and naval race<\/a> that occurred between the European nations before the start of World War I.\u200b<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

WHAT IS MILITARISM?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Militarism can best be understood as the buildup or expansion of the ability of a country\u2019s military to wage war.\u00a0 This could be carried out by recruiting more soldiers for service or by building more weapons and vehicle for use in the army.\u00a0 In the decades before World War I<\/a> many European countries began to practice militarism and worked to expand and strengthen their military forces.\u00a0 For example, there was an intense arms race and naval race between several European nations in the buildup to World War I. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Specifically,\u00a0France<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Germany<\/a>\u00a0were heavily involved in an arms race in which each country doubled their armies between 1870 and 1914.\u00a0 As well, there was a competitive naval race between Britain<\/a> and Germany that centered around the construction of new naval ships.\u200b<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Battle
German soldiers at the First Battle of the Marne in 1914. (Colorized by historycrunch.com)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n

ARMS RACE BEFORE WORLD WAR I<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

An arms race is when two or more countries compete to establish the larger and more capable armies.\u00a0 France and Germany were heavily involved in an arms race in which each country doubled their armies between 1870 and 1914.\u00a0 Both nations had a history of war against each other and their rivalry caused them to expand their military forces.\u00a0 For example, the Franco-Prussian War<\/a> had occurred just decades earlier from 1870 until 1871.\u00a0 More specifically, Prussia (the largest Germanic Kingdom before the unification of Germany<\/a>) defeated France in the Franco-Prussian War. \u00a0As part of its defeat, France gave up a section of its land called Alsace-Lorraine, which bordered with Germany.\u00a0 Germany\u2019s control over Alsace-Lorraine was a major source of frustration for France and led to heightened tensions between Germany and France.\u00a0 In fact, France had a deep mistrust of Germany in the years before World War I.\u200b<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This eventually led to Europe being carved up between two alliance systems \u2013\u00a0Triple Entente<\/a>\u00a0and the\u00a0Triple Alliance<\/a>.\u00a0 Britain, France and Russia<\/a> were the member nations of the Triple Entente, while Germany, Austria-Hungary<\/a> and Italy<\/a> were the member nations of the Triple Alliance.\u00a0 The alliance systems alongside, France and Germany\u2019s tensions caused each country to begin to build up their armies.\u200b<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the outbreak of fighting in 1914, France had approximately 4 million soldiers while Germany had over 4.5 million.  This was significant because most other European countries did not have nearly as many soldiers at the ready to fight.  The arms race showed the distrust between the nations of Europe and when war did break out in 1914 it allowed the countries to go to war more easily.\u200b<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"France
French soldiers on their way to the Battle of Verdun. (Colorized by historycrunch.com)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n

NAVAL RACE BEFORE WORLD WAR I<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The\u00a0naval race<\/a> of World War I\u00a0was an important competition between\u00a0Britain\u00a0and\u00a0Germany\u00a0for naval supremacy.\u00a0 Each nation raced to build more ships and capabilities, which led to an extreme increase in tensions between them.\u00a0 As such, historians consider the naval race between these two major European nations to be a main cause of World War I.\u200b<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the time, Britain had the largest navy in the world. Britain\u2019s naval power was threatening to other European nations and caused many to build up their own naval forces.  Germany viewed the British navy as a threat and sought to develop its own navy to match.  Mostly Germany needed a strong navy to challenge British ships in the North Sea, which was located to the north of Germany and to the east of Britain.  The North Sea was Germany’s only coastal access but was difficult for Germany since the North Sea was connected to Britain and the British navy dominated the area.\u200b<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the key areas that this naval race between Britain and Germany can best be seen is in the construction of new battleships referred to as \u2018dreadnoughts<\/a>\u2019.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The dreadnought was a class of battleship that existed in the timeframe of World War I.  However, the first dreadnought was the HMS Dreadnought from the British Royal Navy.  The name is meant to refer to a sense of \u2018fearlessness\u2019.  It was first launched in 1906, and completely changed the history of naval warfare at the time.\u200b<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Dreadnought\"
HMS Dreadnought (Colorized by historycrunch.com)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n

HOW DID MILITARISM CAUSE WORLD WAR I?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Militarism in Europe had a major impact on the start of World War I.\u00a0 Historians have identified several ways in which militarism led to the start of the war.\u00a0 First, militarism showed the rivalry that existed between the nation of Europe in the years for the outbreak of World War I.\u00a0 When the nations of Europe competed in the arms race and naval race it led to increased tensions.\u00a0 These tensions ultimately led to the start of World War I because it created an underlying feeling of distrust.\u00a0 Also, militarism created the large forces that easily allowed the European nations to go to war in 1914.\u00a0 If they had not built such large armies then the war may not have been so easy to begin and so devastating.\u00a0 For instance, following the assassination of the Austrian Archduke\u00a0Franz Ferdinand<\/a>, which was the event that sparked World War I, the nations of Europe were able to go to war more easily due to their large armies.\u200b<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Assassination
The assassination of Franz Ferdinand artwork by Achille Beltrame from an Italian newspaper. It shows Gavrilo Princip killing Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria in Sarajevo. (1914)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Militarism was one of the main causes of World War I. In fact, the buildup of weapons, soldiers and ships before World War I was a major cause of the conflict.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1406,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":36,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[15,20],"class_list":["post-712","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world-war-i","tag-history","tag-world-war-i"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/712","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=712"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/712\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10372,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/712\/revisions\/10372"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1406"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=712"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=712"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=712"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}