Lesson video

Hello, and welcome to this lesson six of six.

Our final lesson on the inquiry, did the assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, lead to the outbreak of World War 1? Your title for today is, what really caused the outbreak of World War 1? For today's lesson, you will need a pen and something to write on, and you also need to make sure that wherever you are you're free of any distractions.

I'll give you a moment to write down that title, what really caused the outbreak of World War 1? Then when you're ready, we'll move on.

Hello, it's me again, Mr. Hewitt.

And I'm here for our final lesson on causes of the First World War.

It's fantastic to see you've made it, right the way through this challenging inquiry, I'm so impressed.

If you happen to be joining us for the first time during this lesson, that's great.

But you'll need to go back and complete the other lessons in the inquiry in order to really understand us.

Now today, we're finally going to have a go, trying to answer that very difficult question.

What really caused the outbreak of World War 1? One way of thinking about the causes of the First World War could be to use this metaphor, which we see portrayed in a cartoon, the bonfire of Europe.

At the centre of the cartoon, we can see the dangerous Balkans, which remember was that region with Bosnia and Serbia in it where the Archduke was killed, and the fighting between Austria, Hungary and Russia began.

But that's not the only thing on the bonfire because other logs are being laid also.

For example, the Triple Entente or the Triple Alliance, you'll remember those from our first lesson on alliance systems. The cartoon used to say, "these two could contribute to the outbreak of war, "just like logs on the fire, "they could fuel the flames." And then look at the base of the fire, the matches, insignificant to the burning itself, but essential to start the bonfire.

And they're labelled for example, as Agadir, which is where the Kaiser famously sent the gunboat, the Panther during the second Moroccan Crisis.

Or Algeciras in Spain, the conference that was called after the first Moroccan Crisis.

Where the French and British agreed the Entente cordiale.

And then at the top, breathing the oxygen onto the fire, nationalism and militarism, the subject of our last lesson.

So really we might understand the First World War was caused by many different things.

Some of which perhaps, created the conditions for war, just like the logs in a fire and allowed the war to burn longer.

Others that were essential, however, to the starting of the war, like matches, which set a fire alight, even though they don't do most of the burning themselves.

Let's take a look at the July Crisis again, and the events thereof.

We start with the assassination on the 28th of June, then the blank cheque which Germany offers Austria-Hungary in support.

Then Russia declares war on Austria-Hungary.

Austria-Hungary invades Serbia, and Germany actions the Schlieffen Plan, heading for France via Belgium, dragging Britain into the war, and soon after turning to find the Russians, despite their failure to knock out France.

We have war.

Now, the events of July Crisis, clearly are the causes, short term, of the outbreak of the First World War.

Without the assassination of the Archduke, there could be no direct war between Austria-Hungary and Serbia.

Without this no war between Russia and Austria-Hungary.

And without that, no German blank cheque.

And without the fear of Germany fighting Russia and France on both fronts, why else would the Schlieffen Plan have been put into action? But to look simply at these short term triggers is not enough.

It's fair to say, and many historians would, that the short term triggers, the matches if you will, that lit the bonfire are crucial.

But it's not fair to ignore the underlying factors, which may have weighed more, much more likely or even contributed directly to it.

I'll get my head off the way, so that you can see this strange silhouette of a cyclist a little bit better.

And you might be wondering, what's cycling got to do with all this? And the answer is directly nothing, but I want to make another analogy, to help you better understand the differences between, factors that make something more likely and factors that actually cause an event to happen.

So run with me on this for a moment and just take a look at those questions on the left.

Jot down your thoughts.

Is a cyclist more likely to crash if their front brake doesn't work? Well they'll definitely crash, if their front brake doesn't work.

And if they crash, will they be better protected wearing a helmet, or indeed will the helmet stop them crashing at all? Jot down your thoughts and when you're ready, un-pause the film, comeback, we'll share our ideas.

Fantastic, yeah, you're absolutely right.

There's going to be a higher risk.

It's going to be much more likely that a cyclist will crash if they're not using their front brake.

But that doesn't mean they'll definitely crash.

Any number of other possibilities could still take place.

Perhaps they see the obstacle in time, perhaps their back brake is strong enough to stop the bike.

There's no guarantee that higher risk means an event will happen.

Hewitt, you're quite right, it doesn't make it crash any less likely.

However, if you're doing everything right, a crash might be less bad.

So for example, if as a cyclist you're wearing a helmet, there might be the same likelihood of crashing, but the impact to you might not be as severe.

What's the relevance of all this? Think about the causes of the war.

For example, let's take militarism and the arms race, the competition between Britain and Germany specifically, to produce the most dreadnoughts.

Did this mean that a war would breakout in the Balkans, or that the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, would be assassinated in June, 1914? No, of course not.

The European powers could have gone through an arms race and not ended up a war.

There have been many arms races in history, which didn't result in direct conflict.

So this factor made events more likely, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it was the cause of those events directly.

Just as cycling without a front brake might make it more likely that you'll crash, but it doesn't guarantee it.

Equally, think about the helmet.

Imagine the European countries have been doing everything right, not pairing off into alliance systems or secretly planning to destroy each other, not fighting for countries and land in Africa, to exploit and govern unfairly.

Imagine instead, that the European powers had been taking precautions and securing themselves safely, against an outcome such as war.

Won't this have meant, that Princip didn't assassinate the Duke? Or that Austria-Hungary and Serbia, couldn't have gone to war? No, not at all.

You might have made the outcomes of war, slightly less hazardous or bad just as a helmet does for a cyclist in a crash.

But, it's not to say that it could have prevented the war.

There are factors that caused the war which go beyond simply the underlying causes that make it more likely.

Let's have a reminder of these factors then.

The alliance systems. The fact that European powers were locked into the Triple Alliance and Triple Entente respectively, meant that a war with one power was very likely to lead to a war with others.

Again, that's very likely.

Britain, France, Russia, they weren't required by any super power to stick to these alliances.

The Germans equally could have said, no, to the Austria-Hungarian request for a blank cheque.

Ultimately they still had that decision during the July Crisis.

The Schlieffen Plan.

It had been around for years, but it was still being debated by the German generals.

And actually, as we'll see later in the lesson, some historians such as A.

J.

P Taylor, have argued that the plan itself, was not really the issue, so much as other factors.

Which meant the Germans feared, not actioning the plan.

We'll come back to exactly what these were in a moment, 'cause it's a very interesting notion.

Ultimately though, the Germans didn't have to act on Schlieffen Plan.

Yes, it made a war more likely, but it didn't guarantee it.

Also the Schlieffen Plan was only acted on in the context of the July Crisis.

So actually had the Archduke not been murdered, the question of whether to action the plan may never have arisen.

Then we have Germany and the Kaiser himself.

We know the Kaiser was hot tempered, an imperialist desperate for respect among the European powers.

We know that Germany was going through a period of intense nationalism and militarism, that nations have experienced these phenomena before.

And it didn't lead them directly into war without the nations.

Notice having a leader with a hot temper, mean that a huge European conflict, is uncertainty.

Many leaders throughout history have behaved erratically and dangerously and it hasn't led to a world war.

The nature of the Kaiser in Germany, might've made war more likely.

But did they actually guarantee that the events of the July Crisis would lead to war? And more importantly, did they actually lead to the July Crisis itself? What relationship does the Kaiser's hot temper or German nationalism actually bear, to whether Princip shot the Archduke that day? Ultimately not a great deal.

Imperial rivalries.

The imperial rivalries taking place between the European powers, the desire to take over and unfairly exploit a particular territories in Africa.

This of course made war more likely because it increased resentment and tension between the powers, but it didn't guarantee a war.

There is nothing to say that a conflict over Morocco, would lead to Pricip assassinating the Duke, or the other European powers, deciding to throw themselves into a bloody, brutal and destructive conflict on the continent of Europe.

This factor again, might have made war more likely, but it didn't directly lead to the July Crisis.

And it wasn't the only thing which motivated people during the July Crisis.

Nationalism and militarism.

Another of these underlying factors or causes, which made the war more likely, may have contributed in many ways to its outcome.

But actually, weren't necessarily responsible for directly causing the conflict.

Yes, nationalism made people like Princip and the Serbian state more likely to want to attack the Archduke.

Yes, it made the Kaiser more interested in conflict and desirous to expand Germany's power.

Yes, the arms race made a conflict seem more possible, more plausible, maybe even more desirable to the powers of Europe.

But it did not necessitate war.

The production of dreadnoughts, the marching troops around parade grounds didn't mean that Princip definitely would kill the Duke.

Or that the events of the July Crisis would unfold as they did.

Of course these factors are linked, but they are not necessarily the only, or even the most significant cause of the war.

So much as features which underlie the July Crisis and make its outcomes much more likely to result in war.

Now being a historian is all about using evidence that you've collected from sources, and learning to form an argument, a position within a historical debate.

Historians could use the same evidence.

They come to very different conclusions.

They might also find a new piece of evidence during their research, which draw them to different conclusions.

That even without research beyond these lessons, we might have different arguments for why these factors individually were more or less important, when understanding why the First World War broke out.

And I want you to have a go at this little exercise, ranking from one to five, one being the most important, five, the least.

These different factors in terms of how directly they contributed to the outbreak of war, in 1914.

So think about the knowledge we've just reviewed.

Pause the video, rank them, and then in a moment, come back and we'll think about why you might have said, some of the things that you did.

Very interesting.

Now I'm not saying you would have this, but you might have chosen the assassination of the Duke and the July Crisis.

And that could be, because this event, most directly catalysed, sped up, caused in the exact way and at the exact time, the events that led to the First World War.

And this is a reasonably sensible answer in many ways, but it's not the only answer.

It's not necessarily a correct answer, because of course there is no correct answer.

It's really a matter of having a compelling argument, a convincing one.

For example, you might have said, that was important but actually alliance systems were more important, because we know these, the events of the July Crisis, wouldn't have sucked all of the different European powers into what might just have been a war between Austria-Hungary and Serbia.

In fact, you could have rated any of these as number one.

You might find that some historians would disagree with you, but as long as you had a compelling argument, for why imperial rivalries or nationalism and militarism were the most significant causes, you could still be a fantastic historian and give a very interesting and balanced answer to this complicated question of why the First World War actually happened.

One way of helping yourself to come to this judgement might be to think about a hierarchy and order, in which these causes could sit.

Just like this pyramid here.

We have certain causes that are at the base.

They form a foundation that make things more likely.

They aren't necessarily the most obvious part of that structure.

And they could be causes such as nationalism and militarism, or imperial rivalry.

Because ultimately without these rivalries, would Europe genuinely have been geared for conflict? Or certainly not to the same extent.

We might go a layer up in the pyramid, less crucial to its foundations, but slightly more obvious.

Factors such as alliance systems, the Schlieffen Plan or the Kaiser himself.

Again, they're not necessarily the most obvious causes of the war, nor the deepest line, but they're pretty important.

We can't deny that the leaders of these countries and the alliance systems they created, certainly made the conditions to war much more likely, and maybe even, were the most significant or important reasons why the war took place.

Let me go to perhaps the most obvious events, but not necessarily the events that are most important as underlying causes, rather the triggers, such as the July Crisis.

Because once the July Crisis, in a vacuum, without any of these other factors, would not have led to the same kind of conflict.

It must be acknowledged that the July Crisis and the assassination of the Duke, still was the spark, the match, if you will, which lit the bonfire of Europe.

A.

J.

P Taylor is a historian.

Now, one of his arguments about the cause of the First World War, was actually to use the idea of railway timetables, which today and certainly in that time, are very, very complex and very carefully mapped out to ensure the trains are travelling in the right directions, at the right times and not blocking each other off, or crashing into each other or getting stuck in a station at one moment in time or another.

A.

J.

P Taylor argued that, because the mobilisation of different European armies depended, especially in the German case, on the perfect following of railway timetables, in order to get it done exactly in the right manner and fashion, the Germans felt forced during the July Crisis to proceed with the Schlieffen Plan.

Because if they didn't action the Schlieffen Plan exactly as they had worked out, in accordance with the railway timetables, it might be too linked to action Schlieffen Plan.

And actually they could easily be defeated by France and Russia.

Now you could watch Taylor's lectures on YouTube or even read extracts from his work, it's not necessary, but it might be of interest to you.

The reason I'm sharing you this idea, it's not because I want you to start thinking that, perhaps railway timetables were the cause of the war, and we can ignore the other features, but because I want you to understand that historians can study complex events like this, and get something entirely new altogether out of them.

I suppose, really what Taylor is saying is that mobilisation, the fear of other European powers, as through the railway timetables was the primary cause.

And in this way perhaps, is leaning towards the idea of the Schlieffen Plan, for example, maybe even militarism.

But actually what Taylor is saying in the short term is that, the realities of these time tables actually forced the hand of the German generals.

Now, history can be a very interesting subject.

Not only does it allow us to become better citizens of the world, because we learn about our origins, the bad and good things that people who've come before us have done, but also because it allows us to think about future risks.

And what might happen in the future, if factors like nationalism, for example, are not addressed and recognised and combated.

So it's not just because we have an interest in why the First World War happens, but also because we have an interest in becoming developed human beings and possibly helping to prevent things like the First World War in the future.

That we make an effort to come to a conclusion about these things.

Now that's what I'd like us to do, in the final phase of this lesson.

And so I want you to review your learning, look at those comprehension questions and write a sentence for each factor.

How did each of these factors make a war in Europe, more likely? Pause the video, write down a sentence for each of those factors and when you're happy, comeback and we'll share some of our answers.

Wow, I'm so impressed, you completed that final set of questions.

Let's take a look at some of the answers that you might have got.

So, if your sentence on nationalism and militarism, you wrote something similar to the idea that nationalism and militarism meant European powers had large armies, and therefore we're more likely to think that settling disputes with conflict was a possible reason, good idea.

And you've understood that really well, so fantastic work.

If your sentence on Germany and the Kaiser, you touched on the Kaiser's characteristics, his hot temper, his militaristic tendencies, or Germany's desire for an empire, then you're going exactly in the right direction.

These two could have made the war more likely.

If for your sentence on imperial rivalry, you discussed incidences like the Moroccan Crisis, and you explained how these created more tension and rivalry and even feeding to the Entente Cordiale on the other alliances in Europe, then you've really well understood the work and I'm seriously impressed.

And if on the matter of the Schlieffen Plan and alliance systems, you explained how war between, for example, Austria-Hungary and Serbia could be drawn into a much bigger conflict simply because of these alliance systems. And again, you've done a fantastic job.

Really, really good work.

And you're clearly understanding the topic, so well done.

This is an incredibly impressive and important moment, because we're coming to the end of our inquiry.

And we need to go back and look at the big question.

What exactly is that? Did the assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, lead to the outbreak of World War 1? There's of course, no right answer to this.

A.

J.

P Taylor isn't necessarily right when he talks about railway timetables and other historians, myself, wouldn't be able to give you the answer.

That's not because they haven't studied the past, it's because they have studied the past and come up with different conclusions or arguments.

And that's what being a young historian is all about.

Deciding where your position is within that argument.

Now you might have to write an essay about a topic like this, which is fantastic, because it will give you the opportunity to share your knowledge and the stroke of your argument with your peers and teachers.

If that's the case, your essay will want to have a structure.

For example, it will want to have a paragraph on each of the factors we've studied, which explains why that factor, or how that factor contributed to the outbreak of World War 1.

It will also want a conclusion that sets the scene and sorry.

That's fantastic work.

Let's take a look at those answers.

If for nationalism and militarism, you wrote something similar to the idea that nationalism and militarism meant European nations had big and powerful armies and were willing to use them, then you clearly understand how this factor made the war more likely.

if on the matter of Germany and the Kaiser, you've explained the nature of the Kaiser's temperament and of Germany's desire for an empire and how these may have contributed to war being more likely, again, you've clearly understood this and I'm supremely impressed.

If for this imperial rivalry you discussed, for example, the Moroccan Crisis and how this fed into the paranoia, and the disputes, and even the alliance systems of Europe, pre-1914.

And again, what a stellar job.

You're really doing so well.

And if for the Schlieffen and alliance systems, you've explained the idea that without the Schlieffen Plan, without the Triple Entente and Triple Alliance, it simply wouldn't have been possible for a conflict in Austria-Hungary and Serbia, to grow into a major European war, again, well done.

This is quite right, and your thinking is becoming just like that of a real historian.

Now we need to return to our inquiry and consider, before we finish, that big question.

And what is that big question? What it is of course? Did the assassination of the Archduke, Franz Ferdinand actually lead to the outbreak of World War 1? Now I can't give you an answer to this question, any more than A.

J.

P Taylor can.

He might be able to suggest the railway timetables were the cause, however, I might be able to explain some of the factors to you.

But ultimately, a historian such as yourself has to make their own minds up.

They have to look at the evidence and decide for themselves which position they are most in agreement with.

And that's the fantastic thing about history, it involves argument, it involves debate.

We can't say categorically, yes we know, to such a complicated question as this.

It might be that you're asked to write an essay about a question such as this.

And that's fantastic because it gives you the chance to prove that you're a true historian to those around you.

And to make a strong case for what you really believe in or interested in.

If that should happen, your essay will need a structure.

It will need to have paragraphs on the different factors, like imperialism, where it is explained how these contributed to the outbreak of war.

And it will need an introduction and conclusion.

Introduction will set the scene, while the conclusion will explain what is your position? What is your argument? So for example, your introduction could, as I said, set the scene, what actually happened 28th of June, 1914 in Sarajevo.

Your first paragraph could touch on the July Crisis.

What was the significance, for example, of Germany giving a blank cheque to Austria, or invading France? How did these contribute to the war? You could then go back in your second, third or fourth paragraph, and look at, for example, imperial rivalries.

Remember that sentence you wrote about the Moroccan Crisis, this could form a basis of one of those paragraphs, explaining how imperial rivalries contributed to the outbreak of the war.

And finally, in your conclusion, you could say, actually, this was the most important factor, and this is why.

And that's what an essay looks like.

Well, I'm seriously impressed.

You've done a fantastic job.

And you've got to the end of this inquiry, which means you're becoming a real young historian.

I hope I can see your work.

If it's possible that you have a parent or guardian on Twitter, I'd love you to share your fantastic work with the Oak Academy.

I'd like to thank you one more time as well, for completing this inquiry.

A really great job and well done.

See you later.