Militarism Was The Main Cause Of World War 1 Dbq Analysis

Militarism is the most important cause of World War I because it increased tension and countries felt threatened. Militarism is a desire and policy to have a strong military in order to use aggressively once needed. World War I started in the early 1900’s, it was a war that lasted from August 1914-November 1918. The war was centered in Europe and it included many countries like France, United Kingdom, Russia, Germany, Austria-Hungary and Serbia. One example, of how militarism was the main cause can be found in the notes, it explains that militarism increased tension between countries as they all wanted to have more military power. This cause competition between those countries as they call wanted to have supreme military power. This means

that while countries were growing big armies and getting armaments it caused countries to be anxious which led to them to built up their armies in case of an attack from superior militaries. One other example, can be found in Document #4 written by Richard Overy, an editor of The London Times, written for the people of London to inform them of the growth of armaments in different countries in Europe through the years.

The image shows that countries started spending more money in 1914 which is when the war started. Also, countries like Germany spend the most money as they felt the most threatened by the surrounding countries and they felt the need to built a big army in order to fight against the surrounding countries. This graph shows that the most important cause is militarism because the military bases were gaining more firearms as the years approached to the war, this comes to show that competition that was led on by militarism caused countries to invest more on their militaries so they could have enough resources to go against other countries. As countries grew their armies, other countries felt worried or threatened as they saw countries like Germany spending and growing this big army. Another example, can be found in Document #5 written by an unknown author in London on March 9, 1913. The unknown author was a cartoonist for Reynold’s Newspaper, he drew this cartoon for the citizens of London to inform them of Germany’s growth in

armaments. The cartoon shows a German soldier heading into the direction that says “War and Barbarism” instead of the path that says “Civilization and Peace”. This document also explains that Germany’s military was expanded by 50 million pounds. This shows the most important cause of World War I was militarism because countries were like Germany were spending huge amounts of money on expanding their armies to become more powerful during wars which caused countries to worry and cause tension.

This also shows that Germany wanted to start a war and was just waiting for the right reason to start one. For example, when an archduke and his wife were shot in Serbia, Germany was the one to advice Austria-Hungary to go after Serbia and Germany would provide unconditional support. This allowed an opportunity for Germany to put it’s enormous army to use. Another example, was when Germany felt threatened by countries of France and Russia as they felt they would be attacked by them at the same time. Then, they created the Schlieffen Plan. This plan put Germany’s army to the test as they planned to invade France through Belgium to defeat them quickly before Russia was able to mobilize their armed forces. Some people may argue that alliances were the most important cause of World War I. Alliances are groups of countries that provide unconditional support to each other. There were two big alliances at the time the Triple Alliance and the Triple Entente. An example of how alliances were the cause can be found in Document #3 written by John T. McCutcheon, a cartoonist, in Chicago on August 5th,

1914. He created the cartoon for the people of Chicago to express the different alliances in Europe at the time. In the cartoon, each man represents a country in Europe, the picture basically represents that countries in Europe blame each other for the war. For example, France, England and Belgium blame Germany. Serbia and Austria blame each other. Russia blames Austria and Germany blames Russia while, Italy stays out. The cartoon also expresses that due to this the peace in Europe has completely died out. This comes to show that people may think that Alliances were the cause of World War I, but militarism is the main cause of World War I because everyone was blaming Germany because they had a very large army and this intimidated other countries which made them build up on armaments. Also, Germany only invested so much money in their army to use it somehow but all they needed was a reason.