Why the World Went to War

In August 1914, Europe jumped into catastrophe. Bosnia was the spark, but hostilities had built for decades. Europe’s nations had feared each other’s power, worrying over military mobilisation and, especially, the threat of budding German aggression. But we should not view the Great War as an inevitable atrocity. This historical trope, Niall Ferguson argues, fails to account for the complicated reality of Europe’s situation.

Ferguson focuses on Britain’s decision to intervene. Nothing in history is doomed. As such, Britain’s role in the war was ‘far from being some kind of natural disaster’. Instead, it ‘was the catastrophic result of defective decisions’ by British statesmen (p. 3).

British propaganda c.1914-18. © The British Library. 

Generally speaking, Ferguson explains, the Great War happened because of a breakdown in long-term diplomacy. He relates this point to what he calls ‘the structure of European alliances’ (p. 15). Since the 1870s (when Germany unified), Russia, France, and England ‘had all been able to find issues on which they could agree, but Germany repeatedly failed (or chosen not) to secure comparable “ententes”’ (p. 16).

The nation remained a stranger at the feast of the European table, focusing on its military strength and relationship with Austria. Germany felt a sort of resentment against ‘new armament programmes’ in both France and Russia – thus leading to thoughts about the possibility that they ‘would be at their mercy within a few years’ (p. 17). Certainly, for a long time, Germany thought about the dangers these sort of events posed in terms of the European balance of power.

Britain fought in the war because of German might. When hostilities kicked off, Cabinet debates considered the consequences of France falling to Germany and the implications this would have on British security. The government also felt a responsibility towards protecting Belgian neutrality. Sir Edmund Grey expressed his concerns about the sway of ‘public feeling’ if Germany contravened agreements and marched on Belgian territory. Finally, a moral commitment to France and a greater fear of German domination in Europe pushed the British government to intervene on 4 August 1914.

British neutrality was, as we know, rejected (p. 56). At the last minute, Ferguson concludes, the arguments of Grey and Winston Churchill prevailed over the numerically stronger non-interventionists. Ferguson says that the then Foreign Secretary offered a most misleading assertion before the UK went to war: ‘If we are engaged in war, we shall suffer but little more than we shall suffer if we stand aside’. The human and material cost would go down as one of the most tragic in world history.

Source:

1914: Why the World Went to War. By Niall Ferguson. Penguin: London, 2005. Pp 56. £1.50. 0-141-02220-5.