A century ago Europe begun its suicide

In 1914 Europe was falling into the hell of the first World War [Italy waited until 1915, as usual, Italians were late!].

From a geopolitical perspective we can say that WW I was the beginning of the end of the European domination of the planet [the British Empire resisted and kept on growing its power, but the first signals of its genetic weakness became visible [the United Kingdom is a relatively little isle with a giant need for supply and in the last period of the Empire, too dependent on the colonies].

French, Italian, German youth had devastated with millions of young boys and men killed on the battlefields.

When the Americans came the mess was near to its end, but also the United States payed their price to this total madness.

The world after that conflict changed, with the end of the Central Empires and the Communist Revolution in Russia [actually allowed also by the tremendous context of the war] Europe was something different, and the continent didn't understand that it was on the path to the end.

What's really surprising about WW I is that after it, the European powers started almost immediately to think to the eventuality of a new wide conflict ...

Germany was an easy prey and its lands were object of interested attention. This was among the reasons for the rebirth of a very strong Teutonic nationalism [and we know how things went].

But also in Italy [theoretically a winning power] the poor condition of a wide section of the population allowed Fascism to raise.

So, WW I was the first step to the end of Europe, the historical European colonial imperialism.

 

Later arrived Portugal, Romania, Greece, USA etc etc

Exactly +1... It was so. The end of European Domination.. in 1914 Europe and World were the same concept... in 1919... USA had shifted to Europe.

No, in fact British Empire had begun its decline in 1901 - 1914... After the War, The British Empire was an empty shell ... never was greater than in 1919 - 1939 .. but its importance had decreased a lot. It was no longer the Victorian Empire. 1914 - 1918 was deadly for the British Empire.

Exactly, in Fact WW1 was most important than WW2... great powers arising from WW2 got their start in WW1: USA is the most powerfull country in the world from 1919 (not military but yes industrial and economic).. the Soviet Union born in 1914 - 1918 war... It is impossible separate it from the Great War...

Regards

 

There is a historian teaching at Harvard called Niall Campbell Douglas Ferguson. He argues that until Great Britain joined WW1 it had only been a continental war, and Britain decided to make it a world war.

I thought I'd pop this idea into people's minds if we're talking about WW1.

 

I've never been much of a fan of Ferguson.
Britain was there from the beginning and if anything it's Germany that had expanded the war.
Even without Anglo-French alliance the invasion of Belgium as well the atrocities committed would have been enough.
Germany was hoping for a quicker repeat of the Franco-Prussian war of 1871.
It's thought that Moltke had a nervous breakdown when he realised that the Schlieffen plan wasn't going to work.
And even if Britain wasn't included in the entente then France and Germany would have gone for one another's colonies which meant that it was a world war irrespective of Britain's inclusion.

 

In fact, WW1 was a Continental War... another wars in XVII or XVIII centuries had a more global extesion. In fact, What we call WW1, it was named Great War... and I think It is a more correct name.

About who was the "guilty" is a very difficult controversy to be solved. For me It was Russia... It was Russia and serbian nationalism who organized, planned and carried out the assassination of the Austrian heir into Austrian land. It was Russia who protected the terrorists, It was Russia who threatened Austria and who mobilized first. France had a wonderful opportunity to stop Russian irresponsability but far from it, encouraged her, gave her all the support and smitulated its attitude. If Russia had been held back by France, all that was over in a small "Strafe" Operation between die Monarchie and Serbia.
So, It was Russia who expanded the war. Germany was guilty of carrying out a disastrous foreign policy, if you want to encourage Austria in the operation against serbian... but I don´think so Germany extended the war.

The Schlieffen (theoretical admirable virtuosity) was ill-conceived plan ... the personal deficiencies of Molket The younger did the execution was done horribly wrong but Schlieffen plan was failed in the base. Not even Napoleon could run the Schlieffen Plan victoriously.

 

Well, the European wars were continental wars involving colonies and spheres of influence. Indians didn't fight on European battlefields as Indians [that is to say as soldiers of India, independent and involved in the war], but as soldiers of the British Empire [it was the British Indian Army, for accuracy].

To give a global aspect to the war, it was actually the involvement of the Ottoman Empire and the United States, even if Turkey was historically quite interested and connected with European lands.

About the impact of WW I on the British Empire, I cannot say it was so tremendous. At the end France exited the conflict as a winning power, but suffering as well for the long military effort [and the dead of a large part of the young male population, like in Germany, Italy, Austria ...]. So, since the only colonial competitor of a certain weight was in bad conditions, I would say that UK kept its position of domination. And one of the results of WW I was that London obtained the mandate to govern many territories of the defeated powers, so that in 1921 the Empire was at its maximum extension.

 

Ferguson agues against that because the battlefield is merely in Europe before Britain joined. After Britain joined the war was fought in the colonies as well. In Africa German East Africa fought for the German side starting in August of 1914 until November 1918. This colony participated the entire war.

Naval warfare also made it to a world war as German battle ships were fighting British battle ships in the Pacific (battles of Más a Tierra or Papeete)

So British involvement really extended the war globally. And remember that the Ottoman empire joined in October while Britain joined the war effort already in September.

 

Yes, but not the maximum power... UK has lost industrial importance against USA and Germany before 1914 and after 1918, is a heavily indebted country in which British Pound is not the main currency replaced by the dollar.It is not the first naval power and it is not the first t merchant navy .. nor it is the first trader in the world.

 

a joke because Britain entered world August 4, and world begun July 28 when Monarchy declared war Serbia. and August 3, Germany declared war France.. so

It is a joke or maybe Mr Fergusson think there were many battles in Europe in 24 hours to say it was a "continental" war before UK joined.... If Uk had entered in war in 1916 or 1917, we could study if it was a Continental war o not... but in 24 hours (from 3 to 4 august, It is a joke)... an by other side, maybe Mr Fergusson thinks only UK had an Empire in 1914...

I am going to discover a great new... in 1914 also existed other European Empires.... French, German, Portuguese, Italian, belge etc etc... In fact, the same day of the german declaration of War... the Goeben and Breslau bombed Phillippeville and Bone in Algeria... or Mr Fergusson doesn´t know Algeria is in Africa or he doesn´t know the german attack to Algerian Coast... So in the 24 hours between French and British entered in War...There was a military action OUT OF EUROPE!!!
The Great was was mainly a continental war... overseas military operations did not have the importance it had in other wars: War of the Austrian Succession, Seven years War , American Revolutionary War, French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars .. when three, four and five overseas empires fought throughout the world.

 

WW I is called "World "War" because it was a world war, this is evident [!].

What's is less clear is the nature of the conflict in its initial phases. The involvement of UK, from a geopolitical perspective didn't change the nature of continental war [in the sense of European, geologically Great Britain is on the European shelf. It's Europe].

It's anyway clear as well, that from a military / functional perspective the war assumed characteristics of global conflict well soon. Just because, as said, the battles took place substantially all over the planet.

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No power would have challenged the British Empire in the 20's ...

 

I don't fully understand what you mean. Are you saying Ferguson is wrong?
Or are you saying that British Colonies fighting German Colonies were not important?

 

That's a geographical perspective, geopolitically colonies are part of a subject [usually an empire], a subject which stays in Europe.

 

I will say Ferguson is wrong. The question is could Britain have waited for a couple of years to buildup the forces in Britain needed to partake in a full scale campaign against Germany. Plus did the British expect to need those forces at the start of the war. The answer is no. The problem with WW1 is the loses of the French and Russians forcing Britain expend more and more resources to keep them fighting. The British strategy was like it was in before in Europe, have a large allied force with Britain being the only naval power and giving limited but very capable support on land. This strategy worked for two centuries, however it failed in WW1. Basically because the Germans were between the major allied land powers of Russia and France. Napoleon said if you have two great powers fighting you, the only way to defeat them is to get between them and defeat them one after the other. This is what happened they held the Russian and defeated them and would have defeat the French if not for the Commonwealth forces, mainly British being sent over so quickly to hold the French left flank and allow them to regroup. Then you had the British being forced to send a massive conscript army to stop the French from giving up and sending an army into Russia to stop the Communists. The British were played by the French and Russians, who were both spent forces by 1916 and have never recovered. At which point the British should have removed themselves from the war having taken all but one German colony in east Africa. Left the French and Russians to their defeat. Holland and Denmark were still independent and Britain could have reinforced them both to limit Germany and helped France rebuild after its defeat. Russian would have been a lost cause because of its stupid heartland geo-political strategy.

 

Britain was screwed over by the Russians and French refusing to pay their debt to Britain. Then the Americans were asking the British for money when the debt wasn't even due. Then you have the 1916 easter rising and the over reach in the Middle East. The British lost from WW1 and everybody else but the Ottomans and Austrians gained. With the Americans gaining the most. This is why I say the Lloyd George government is the worst in British history, followed by the Clement Attlee government. Terrible anti-British progressive socialists with no geo-political understand or thought. I hate them. Churchill was a Strategic genius and removed by both of them, bastards.

 

I can only recommend you read Ferguson's books and the evidence he presents. Feels like you didn't read a line that historian had written

 

That's a new one to me

Actually it was written off during the depression

To be honest the Irish have always been troublesome and it's unfortunate that they chose violence over negotiation.
And Palestine really wasn't managed properly but then again we have hindsight.

Not really. We acquired more territory.
I would say that Britain and the Empire took a beating but we still walked out unbroken.
Both the Ottoman and Austrian empires were dismantled so I think that they lost.

I don't know. I don't think that they gained much.

Conflict with Germany was inevitable.

Atlee implemented important social reforms which were and are still needed.

I don't think Churchill was that brilliant at strategy but still brilliant for keeping the nation going during WWII.

 

Well it is true.

Public debt was, private debt wasn't and the great depression happened over a decade after WW1.

They were support by Germany so they were a proxy. Same as their rebellion in the Napoleonic wars. What about the rebellion in Iraq and the war in Arabia? When sucked up our resources in the inter-war period.

Russia is the largest country in the world. Territory doesn't mean anything other than stopping someone else having it. We took pointless territory in Africa and much of the middle east territory we took was pointless. These places were a drain on our resources. As well as the pacific territory we took from Germany. It caused us to redirect our forces further to a colonial war, rather than a European one. Which directly caused our defeat in WW2. We about 5% of the male population of the country, we were broken by WW1. Trust in the establishment was gone.

The American gained technology transfer from Britain, aswell as money. They gained at our expense. The also became the major pacific power and reinforced their domination over the Caribbean and upgraded the Panama canal. We didn't do the same at Suez or the Mediterranean. We did make major improvements at Sinapore though.

We were already at war Lloyd George took over in 1916. His government took us further into the war.

Attlee took over the entire economy and destroyed British dynamism and cut R&D spending. Cutted the military in favour of jobs programs. I hate Attlee we could have recovered after WW2 and remained a world power, but no chance we what happened after WW2.

Churchill was without doubt a strategic genius. The attack on the Ottoman was a great strategic move, even though it failed. He create the borders of modern day Iraq. I mean a total genius.

 

I have watch a number of his interviews and have used numbers from his research to win arguments about WW1 and it being a British victory. However he is just wrong that Britain shouldn't have entered the war.

 

Why so? Britain entering the war did have negative consequences for Britain and the UK.
The UK lost their position in the world and over 700.000 soldiers - pretty much a generation. The entire Empire lost over 1 million!

The crappy peace designed in Versailles didn't create any long term peace. Not one country came out of this peace treaty really happy...

 

Well that is a tall order to simply erase everyone's debt. Even today that would be beyond catastrophic.

Ireland? Yes it's true that they did ship rifles and ammunition over but the Easter rising was already set in motion before Germany agreed to aid the Irish and they didn't receive them because the shipment was intercepted by the RN.
.

There's no evidence to suggest that the Iraq rebellion of 1920 was aided by German suppliers and considering the beating that Germany took I doubt that they would have risked or afforded to supply arms to the Iraqi's.
And I'm not aware of any inter-war conflict in Arabia.

Well not really. Russia's vast resources are spread out.

We had a number of commercial enterprises in German East Africa and fought disease which could have very easily spread.
I'm not saying that that's why we fought there but we did make it productive when the war was over.

Would Britain have wanted a resurgent Ottoman empire to form?

I don't think so. If you recall they was a naval arms race between Britain and Germany which if matched or exceeded the RN could have caused our downfall.
Dismantling Germany's overseas empire would have deprived them revenue and negated the need for a large and powerful navy.

If you're talking about the early stages of WWII then I would say that our defeat in the orient was at Singapore but that was a very close run thing.
In Europe it was the lack of investment in preparing for the next generation of warfare.

As I said it was high price but we still came out of it unbroken. But you have your view as have I.

Like what?

Well the eastern pacific wasn't really our bit anyway.

I don't think that Suez could have been enlarged. and in any case there was and still is more than enough space.
The difference between Suez and Panama is that one requires locks in order to traverse while the other is simply a gap.

I don't think that we could have been steeped in it than we already were.

Which were sorely needed. We were broke after the war and of course as the war was over there was no need to have such a large army.

Not really. Independence had to be granted to our overseas possessions. If we had the time to turn them into dominions then we could have maintain our position.

Ok well I don't think that the assault on Suvla bay was a particularly bright move.

 

Because in the first year of the war Britain held the French left flank and defeated a German force 3 times its number. Meanwhile it was removing the Germany navy from outside the North and Baltic sea's, and taking over all but one German colony in East Africa. So the first year of the war went very well for Britain. We had achived all our pre-war goals apart from destroying the German high seas fleet in a battle against the British grand fleet. Plus the German submarine campaign was only a minor thing at this point and Britain was basically trading freely with the rest of the world. If we had made peace with Germany then and pulled out Britain would have been in a great position. However we couldn't pull out until the threat from the German high seas fleet was removed. So we did the right thing to enter the war and the wrong thing to stay in so long. This is why I think Ferguson is wrong and why I hate Lloyd George.

 

The difference in opinion I feel here is that Britain joining the war had negative effects for the British Empire and for Europe as it extended the war, and the crappy peace created really unsuitability and negative consequences to this day. I'm saying that it might had been better for the Empire to not get involved as they wouldn't have lost their position in the world, and by what I read a German victory would have forced a weird early version of the EU upon the loosing French and Russian sides. Whether that would have really happened of course will always remain speculation. Judging but what I read though, it seemed that a German victory, which probably would have been quick as well without British aid, might have had fewer negative side effects for continental Europe and the Empire of the decades to come...

It seems your argument is that Britain had to enter to aid a French victory, in my opinion. And I don't see any arguments of why a German victory would have had as many negative effects I guess, and that preventing that victory caused the downfall of continental Europe and the Empire.

 

The Germans would have forced a breakup of France and Russia, then taken partial control of the French Empire with fleet basing rights and land basing rights. This would have been a great threat to British naval domination. The British had to destroy the Germany Highseas fleet. The Germans would have kept their Empire outside of Europe and increased it inside Europe. Threatening Holland and Denmark. The war with Germany would have been later for the British Empire, but Britain would have been in a worse position.

If Britain had destroy the German fleet at Jutland they could have left the war then. However the simply couldn't allow German domination of Europe and basing in the French Empire.

 

So the potential threat of the Empire not running the world but Germany doing so was worth destroying the Empire and Continental Europe in your mind.

I think it's inevitable for Germany to run Europe anyhow, because there are more Germans. There's 63 million Brits, 65 million Frenchmen and 82 million Germans. Not only that but the countries who depend on Germany are financially more important than the ones the other two countries run all over the world. Our Austrian government doesn't do anything without Germany (that adds 8 million), and I think the most important might be Poland (49 million) which is also is German friendly.

I don't think the French and the English will ever agree on much, and meanwhile more and more people become dependent on what's going on in Berlin and what the German Chancellor says. I think the other solution of WW1 got only moved for 100 years or 120. You must realize that Merkel has a bigger word in the EU than Holland or Brown...

 

I agree that World War I was the beginning of the end for the West. Even the victors enjoyed only a Pyrrhic victory. Everyone lost.