World War I Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

World War I - Essay Example The first allies included the United Kingdom, France and Russia; the central powers included Germany, Italy and Austria-Hungary. During World War I, more than 70 million military officers took part in the war with about 60 million being of European origin. By the end of the conflict, nearly 9 million military officers had been killed. There were various causes of the war, which included both short term and long term. The imperialistic polices imposed by great powers such as German, Russian empire, Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman empires caused conflicts between different powers plunging them into wars. The assassination of Franz Ferdinand in 1914 was also a possible cause of the World War I. After these triggers, different alliances that had been organized before were revived. Austro-Hungarian started the conflict by invading Serbia. This invasion triggered Germany into invading Belgium. Russia and France invaded Germany to counter its advancement into Belgium. The war spread across Eur ope and colonies of the different powers and the world war was on. Causes of World War I At the beginning of the nineteenth century, different powers across Europe started organizing themselves into alliances. These alliances resulted in the formation of complex military and political networks that included European powers. The Holly Alliance was the first alliance to be established and it included Persia, Russia, and Austria. In 1879, the Dual Alliance that included the German empire and Austria-hungry was established to suppress the earlier alliance between Russia and Persia. The formation of these alliances posed a major threat the Great Britain, which entered into an alliance with France and Russia. Although the formation of the dual alliance was intended to counter the Russian advancement into western territories s, the United Kingdom considered it as a major threat to its existence. The dual alliance was formed with the intention of countering Russian influence over the Ottoma n Empire and the Balkan. Each of these alliances was established under treaties that were meant protect the interests of countries in a particular league. The treaties were also aimed at preventing the entry of allied powers. The major treaties signed immediately before World War I included the Reinsurance treaty between the Germans and the Russians, the Franc-Russian alliance and Anglo-Russian alliance (Cross 121). Each of these treaties had the purpose of securing the interests of the concerned parties against the influence or invasion by allied powers. It is also evident that most of these treaties targeted Russia. Treaties were formed either to counter Russian advancement or to incorporate Russia in to a particular alliance. Russia was considered as a major power in Europe and, therefore most countries needed to protect their interest against Russia through formation of alliances. The World War I took place after European industrial and economic revolutions. These advancements m ay have triggered rivalry among different European powers. In the beginning of the nineteenth century, industrial advancement started to concentrate on the production of military equipment. Technology was applied to produce of warships and machine guns that have never been in any battlefield. Germany and Britain were the leading European countries in the production of military equipment. Industrial advancement in Germany and Britain made the two countries to enter into an arm race which later spread to the rest of Europe. By the end of 1910, most European countries had increased their military spending by over 50% of their GDP (Halpern 192). This allocation was used to produce military equipment, military training, and paying allowances to