To paraphrase Ricky Gervais - it wasn't a
great war, it wasn't even ok. The First World War was a disaster for all nations
concerned, in terms of people, militarily, economically and materially. That
one side emerged as ‘victors’ and the other ‘vanquished’ cannot obscure the fact
that all major combatant nations emerged from the war in a far worse state than
they had entered it (with the possible exception of the USA). The short lived
euphoria at the cessation of combat was followed by years of difficulty until
an even more grotesque global conflict began in 1939 – fulfilling with uncanny
accuracy Foch’s angry denouncement of the 1919 Versailles Peace Treaty: that it
was not peace, but an armistice for 20 years.
The four years of the centenary has given us all opportunities to learn and reflect and perhaps modify our views. The war was a disaster for all concerned, but was it as avoidable,
unnecessary and futile as the prevailing pre-centenary view held it to be?
The cliché is that WW2 was a ‘just’ war
whereas, WW1 was unnecessary – the monarchs of Europe and the Ottomans sending
their peoples to slaughter for preservation of their Empires.
It is entirely possible that different
short term decisions during the July crisis of 1914 would have prevented the
war – and without the first, would there have been a second twenty years later? Of course that is mere speculation, since both undoubtedly did occur, but it’s
speculation that has been continuing for 100 years now. Or would war have occurred at some point even if
the 1914-1918 conflict had been avoided?
1 Was WW1 preventable?
In my unequivocal view, yes – perhaps
(sic). There are short and longer term considerations. The war was
unquestionably born out of the ambitions of imperialism resisting the forces of
revolution and nationalism. The secular trends from the mid 19th
century onwards made it almost inevitable that the balance of power policies of
the empires of Europe – Russia, France, Great Britain, Austria-Hungary and
Germany – would tip over into conflict. The questions were - When? And to what
extent?
Germany was striving to grow and extend
influence. Her industrial economy and military development was outpacing all
the other main players, especially France, and she was frustrated at her lack
of overseas colonies compared to the rivals. Only in German East Africa did she
have great natural resources to draw on. The other empires were seeking, even
struggling, to retain what they had. Britain’s maintenance of sea power was the
only way to keep hold of her global empire, hence the damaging arms race to maintain
superiority in Dreadnoughts over Germany. Austria Hungary was dysfunctional and
being weakened by nationalistic ambitions, particularly in the Balkans. Russia
was at risk of revolution – the Duma (Russian parliament) was a concession made
by the Tsar after the first serious revolt in 1905. The other participant, the
Ottoman Empire, had been in trouble for more than 100 years, with powder kegs
ready to explode in many areas from the Balkans to the Middle East. So if war
had been averted in 1914 – as it had been in the Agadir crisis of 1911, or in the
first Balkan War of 1912 – was it nevertheless inevitable within a few years?(1)
Barbara Tuchman’s superb book, The Proud Tower,
sets out the major social and political changes in the late 19th and
early 20th century, and how they impacted on the major players of
WW1. In Britain, although it had been relatively unaffected by the spirit of
revolution that swept across Europe and the world in 1848, there was a
significant shift in the Edwardian years from imperialism and patrician culture
to reform, represented strongly by Asquith’s liberal reforming government.
France was a divided and unhappy nation, suffering from the after effects of
the loss of Alsace and Lorraine to Germany in 1870 and the divisive effects of
the extraordinary Dreyfus affair. Germany’s rise and rise as a military power
was fuelled by the intensive growth of her industrial base – greater than
Britain, France and Italy combined at the outbreak of war. When the newly
installed Kaiser Wilhelm decided to dispense with the services of Bismarck in
1890, the balance of power policy lost its most skilful and cunning proponent,
and Germany’s foreign policy became more erratic and expansionist. For the
USA, Tuchman describes the ‘end of a dream’ with the need to move from
insulation from world politics (making a comeback today?) to addressing
international issues including Spain, and control of the Panama Canal. Russia,
with no middle class to explore the middle ground, teetered – more than any
country - between the Tsar’s absolutism and revolution. Across the world
movements of socialism, Marxism and anarchy were creating tremendous
instability.
So, when the assassination of Franz
Ferdinand provoked the July crisis of 1914, the risk of regional war was very
high, and of a global conflict the risk was significant(2). Of the diplomatic, political
and popular efforts to avoid (or provoke) war, several could have gone the
other way. Austria was desperate to assert authority over the emerging greater
Serbia. Did the Kaiser’s blank cheque message encourage them more than was
necessary. Did the Kaiser stay out of touch for too long after writing his
cheque? Did the French government play their hand with the Russians as wisely
as they could? Was the misunderstanding of Prince Lichnowsky (German
Ambassador) and his conciliatory offer to Sir Edward Grey (British Foreign
Secretary) simply a result of new technology (a crackly phone line)? Of the
forces working against war, perhaps the strongest across all countries was
emerging socialism. When the leader of France’s socialists, Jean Jaures, was
assassinated in a Paris restaurant on 28th July, almost the last
hope for peace went with him(3). He was perhaps the only man with the stature and
charisma to unite the working classes in all countries in refusal to fight. If
the socialist view had prevailed, maybe world revolution (certainly the
strategy of the Bolsheviks) would have followed rather than world war. Would
that have been any less miserable and damaging?
2. Why the years of attrition and unacceptable loss?
Right up until the declarations of war, there
had been strong protests against war in Germany Britain and France,
predominantly led by the socialists. However, after the event there was a rapid
change to full commitment with all nations believing they had God on their
side. True, the enthusiastic rush to volunteer in Britain was based on a false
assumption that victory would be a formality – and over in 4 months rather than
the 4+ years it took. France was galvanised by being invaded. In Germany the
people were hoodwinked into believing theirs was a defensive war for the honour
for the Fatherland, after Russian mobilisation. In Russia the ill informed
people rallied to the call of the Tsar. So, once in, there was a conviction in
the justice of their cause and determination to stick it out. Censorship and
propaganda on all sides were able to conceal from the public for a long time
the scale of casualties and the horrific costs of continuing.
To be fair to the much-maligned British
Minister of War Lord Kitchener, he saw from the start that the war would be
long and arduous(4). He saw Britain's small army dragged into a war in conditions not of her
choosing, and that it would take three years to produce an army that could
match the French and German counterparts. Like most military opinions he was of
the view that the decisive theatre would be the Western Front, and once trench
warfare had become established there would be little option but to stick it out
to the end in attritional fashion. It was the politicians who were more likely
to be supporters of alternative strategies such as Gallipoli, Mesopotamia and
Palestine. Eventually everyone became sick of the war, but things had gone so
far, extricating one’s country was difficult. Peace overtures were made from
various sources – Germany, the Vatican, Woodrow Wilson – for nearly two years
leading up to the Armistice.
Mostly, nations concluded they had
stronger reasons to stay in the war than pull out. Bulgaria, Rumania and Italy
had been the most opportunist entrants, and were perhaps the flakiest in their
resolve to stay in. Turkey had thrown her lot in with Germany early on, and was staying in with increasing reluctance. When Russia
eventually pulled out the result was a punitive peace treaty followed rapidly
by revolution, anarchy and civil war(5). Hard to say which was worse.
3. What about the peace?
Cessation of hostilities was achieved (at
least on the Western Front) by the Armistice of 11th November 1918.
This was a military document requiring withdrawals and handing over of weapons
in order to ensure Germany would be unable to resume hostilities any time soon(6).
It was severe, particularly in its continuation of the naval blockade
(condemning the German people to continuing famine), but one look at the
Brest-Litovsk treaty showed people what would have been applied by Germany if
the boot were on the other foot.
The Armistice with Germany was a clear
victory for the Allies - it was effectively unconditional surrender. But
armistice victory was a very different matter to winning the peace.
Interestingly, the USA did not become formally a member of the Allied Powers
but an ally in the conflict. The distinction may be small, but the Agenda for
the Versailles Peace Conference was for Wilson more about his fourteen points,
and for the Allied Powers it was more about restitution and reparations.
Germany had tried to seek an Armistice based on Wilson’s Fourteen Points, and
the Allied Powers had insisted on the Military solution described.
The upshot was that no-one won the peace.
Hitler was able to use the grievances contained within the Versailles Treaty to
stoke the fires of national socialism. Successively, he overturned the German
grievances over demilitarised Rhineland; union with Austria; Czech Sudetenland,
and finally Poland to provoke the horrors of 1939-45.
4. Conclusions
No matter how hard we try, we cannot avoid
looking at the outcomes of WW1 with 100 years hindsight. What seems
incomprehensible to us now, must have felt necessary and unavoidable then.
Wilson 14 points were not aimed at the
dismemberment of Germany, but at a safer, fairer, democratic world. Even
knowing what happened, they still look decent and reasonable proposals. Most of
them were implemented by the Versailles Treaty:
· Adequate guarantees for the reduction of
national armaments
· An absolutely impartial adjustment of
colonial claims, the interests of those peoples concerned having equal weight
· All Russian territory to be evacuated, and
Russia given full opportunity for self-development, the Powers aiding
· Complete restoration of Belgium, in full
and free sovereignty
· All French territory freed and the wrong
done by Prussian in 1871 in the matter of Alsace Lorraine righted
· Re-adjustment of Italian frontiers on lines
of nationality
· Peoples of Austria-Hungary accorded an
opportunity of autonomous development
· Rumania, Serbia and Montenegro evacuated, Serbia
being given access to the sea, and relations of Balkan states settled on lines
of allegiance and nationality
· Non-Turkish nationalities in the Ottoman
empire assured of autonomous development, and the Dardanelles to be permanently
free to all ships
· An independent Polish state
· A general association of nations must be
formed under specific covenants for the purpose of affording mutual guarantees
of political independence and territorial integrity to great and small states
alike.
All of these happened, the only exceptions being:
· Removal as far as possible of all economic barriers
. Open covenants of peace and no secret
diplomacy in future
· Absolute freedom of navigation in peace and
war outside territorial waters
In the light of these, there is an
argument that WW1 was not entirely a waste of effort. The price paid was far
too high, but the end of four imperial hegemonies and the liberation of nations
to enable Yugoslavia; Czechoslovakia; Poland, Finland and the Baltic states to emerge
were world changing. Undoubted wrongs, such as Belgium and the rape of NE France
were put right. The League of Nations was a flawed organisation but surely
benefited the planning of the next version, the UN.
In those senses it was a Great War, but
what a pity that it happened.
