The Main Causes of Wars Are Long Term, Discuss

How can you define long-term effects, what are long term effects? In the case of the Wars I am studying the use of long-term effects. To me long-term effects are a cause from which a problem has arisen several years before and therefore have knock on affects from one problem that amounts to another before something finally acts as the catalyst and sets off the war. In the case of World War One the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand was the event that started World War One officially.

World War One has been written to have been caused by long-term affects, it has been written that even as far back as 1871 that tensions grew to lead off this war. It is said that a complex web of alliances and counterbalances that developed between the various European powers after the defeat of France and the formation of Germany under the leadership of Otto von Bismarck helped towards it. Most theorists however say that it was caused by the act of Gavrilo Princip of the Black Hand Gang. Gavrilo Princip famously assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, and his wife Countess Sophie in Sarajevo on June 28th 1914. This event ultimately led to an attack by Austria against Serbia triggering World War One. Nevertheless reasons behind the cause of the war are very complicated, many factors intertwine; fervent and uncompromising nationalism, unresolved previous disputes, the intricate system of alliances, convoluted and fragmented governance, delays and misunderstandings in diplomatic communications, the arms races of the previous decades and rigidity in military planning.

AustriaÐ'-Hungary was created in the "Ausgleich of 1867" after Austria was defeated by Prussia. As agreed in 1867, the Habsburgs were the Emperors of the Austrian Empire. With the formation of the Dual Monarchy, Franz Josef became leader of a nation with sixteen ethnic groups and five major religions speaking no fewer than nine languages. In large measure because of the vast disparities that existed within the Empire, Austrians and Hungarians always viewed growing Slavic nationalism with deep suspicion and concern. Thus the Austro-Hungarian government grew worried with the near-doubling in size of neighbouring Serbia's territory as a result of the Balkan Wars of 1912Ð'-1913. Serbia, for its part, made no queries about the fact that it viewed all of Southern AustriaÐ'-Hungary as part of a future Great South Slavic Union.

This is classed as a long-term effect for starting World War one. Primary sources of the time show that the 5 major European powers were struggling to keep the Balkan areas under control and that trouble was inventible. The countries in the area at the time formed the Balkan league and became increasingly influential and powerful, stripping the Ottoman Turks of every one of their European states.

After the assassination of Franz Ferdinand by Gavrilo Princip and nearly a month of debate the government of AustriaÐ'-Hungary sent a ten-point ultimatum to Serbia, the so called July Ultimatum to be unconditionally accepted within 48 hours. The ultimatum was the first of a series of diplomatic events known as the July Crisis which set off a chain reaction and a general war in Europe. The Serbian government agreed to all but one of the demands in the ultimatum, noting that participation in its judicial proceedings by a foreign power would violate its constitution. AustriaÐ'-Hungary nonetheless broke off diplomatic relations and declared war through a telegram sent to the Serbian government. The Russian government, which had pledged in 1909 to uphold Serbian independence in return for Serbia's acceptance of the Bosnia annexation, mobilised its military reserves on 30th July following a breakdown in crucial telegram communications between Kaiser Wilhelm and Tsar Nicholas II, who was under pressure by his military staff to prepare for war. Germany demanded that Russia stand down its forces, but the Russian government persisted, as demobilisation would have made it impossible to re-activate its military schedule in the short term. Germany declared war against Russia on August 1st and two days later, against the Russia's ally France. The effect of this is seen as short-term effects.

The outbreak of the conflict is often attributed to the alliances established over the previous decades, Germany-Austria-Italy vs. France-Russia; Britain. In fact, none of the alliances were activated in the initial outbreak, though Russian general mobilisation and Germany's declaration of war against France were motivated by fear of the opposing alliance being brought into play. Britain declared war against Germany on August 4th. This was substantially provoked by Germany's invasion of Belgium on August 4th 1914, whose independence Britain had guaranteed to uphold in the Treaty of London of 1839 and which stood astride the planned German route for invasion of Russia's ally France. Unofficially, it was already generally accepted in government that Britain could not remain neutral, since without the co-operation of France and Russia its colonies in Africa and India would be under threat, while German occupation of the French Atlantic ports would be an even larger threat to British trade as a whole.

World War I proved to be the decisive break with world order, marking the final demise of absolutist monarchy in Europe. Four empires were shattered: the German, the Austro-Hungarian, the Ottoman and the Russian. Their four dynasties, the Hohenzollerns, the Habsburgs, the Ottoman and the Romanovs, who had roots of power back to the days of the Crusades, all fell during or after the war.

Bulgaria was the first of the Central Powers to sign an armistice on 29th September 1918. Germany requested a cease-fire on 3rd October 1918. When Wilhelm II ordered the German High Seas Fleet to sortie against the Entente's navies, they mutinied in Wilhelmshaven starting 29th October 1918. On 30th October the Ottoman Empire capitulated. The Armistice with Austria was granted to take effect at three o'clock on the afternoon of November 4th. Austria and Hungary had signed separate armistices following the overthrow of the Habsburg monarchy. Following the outbreak of the German Revolution, the Weimar Republic was proclaimed on 9th November, marking the end of the German Empire. The Kaiser fled the next day to the Netherlands, which granted him political asylum. On 11 November, an armistice was signed in a railroad carriage at CompiÐ"Ёgne in France. At 1100 hours that day, a ceasefire came into effect and the opposing armies began to withdraw from their positions. The state of war between the two sides persisted for another seven months until it was finally ended by the signing of the Treaty of Versailles on June 28th 1919. Many