WWI 1 Notes 3/3/08

Europe

Uniting a country of states is difficult

1860

Renegade states break apart from Germany

Prussia, most powerful nationstate

Nation State

Specific geographic boundary with common language, religion and unified gov't

Otto Von Bismarck

Conservative Aristocrat of the Junker Party

Rules for King Kaiser Wilhelm I

Want to unify German nation states

Germany's main rival is France

Germany wants to expand, so they expand opposite France, and begin a war with Austria in 1866

Germany wins, but gives Austria a lenient treaty

Bismarck needs a war to unify Germany, but can't look like an aggressor

Looks at France, under Napoleon III

Spanish throne is open, France and Germany want it

EMS Affair

EMS is a Bavarian resort

Germany invites France for talks

French delegation arrives and Germany is not their

Napoleon then goes to Vienna, in Vienna, he is told that the Germans are at EMS

Finally, he meets Germans at EMS, and is told simply what he already knows, that Ge wants Spanish Throne

Napoleon is so infuriated, he declares war

Germans unify in 1871 for the Franco-Prussian War

Lasts for weeks

Germany obliterates the French

Treaty of Frankfurt

One of the worst treaties ever designed

Huge war payments/reparations

Germany will occupy France till full payment is made

French citizens volunteers to increase taxes threefold for three years just to get rid of Germany

Germany nabs Alsace-Lorraine

Germany uses the money to industrialize

Forming of Alliances

Central Powers of the 1800's

Germany: Fears revenge war by Fr

Austria-Hungary

Balkans cause problems

Serbia: Pan-Slavic movement, backed by Russia

Russia needs a warm water port

1912: The Balkan Wars

Balkans rise up against the Ottoman Empire

Wins, Austria Hungary wants to negotiate treaty, gives Albania independence, means that Russia can't get warm water ports

1913: Serbia, Romania, Montenegro wins Bulgaria, and Austria Hungary steps in to take control

Bulgaria

Ottoman Empire

1914: Franz Ferdinand, Archduke of Austria, goes with Sofia to Sarajevo to give speech for peace

Anti-Austrian Black Hand  student movement assassinates Franz Ferdinand

Austria retaliates with troops

Russia supports Serbia, Germany backs A-H, and France enters because they hate Germany