Five Great Powers The Europe of 1871 was a continent of five great powers divided into two categories. The first grouping were the three most powerful states—Great Britain, Germany, and France. The second grouping were lesser in rank, but remained significant for the period —Austria-Hungary and Russia. A sixth power was Italy, but this newly unified nation was unpredictable and still suffered from internal problems. (Another growing power in the west was the United States.)
Each of these nations pursued— between 1871 and 1914—its own set of national goals and objectives. Often these goals were in conflict with one another. For example, Austria- Hungary controlled the Balkan States of the Slavs, yet Russia wanted to see Slavic independence from the Austrian Empire. In the bigger picture, much of the diplomacy carried out by these powerful European nations beginning in 1871 led The Iron Chancellor to the outbreak of World War I in 1914. The entire period from 1871 to the beginning of World War I was dominated by German international politics. In earlier years, Germany’s Iron Chancellor, Otto von Bismarck, pursued an aggressive set of policies that helped create a unified Germany. However, after 1871, Bismarck strove for peace and stability across the Continent. One of his main goals was to weaken French power. He did this by forming alliances with both Russia and Austria. The result was the League of the Three Emperors, which included Germany’s William I, Austria’s Francis Joseph, and Russia’s tsar, Alexander II. The first real test for the League came in 1877–1878 when Russia went to war with Turkey over control of the Balkan region. Eventually the war included other powers, such as England (which sided against Russia). An international conference of the major powers was called which met in Berlin in 1878. The Congress of Berlin granted independence to the Balkan states of Montenegro, Serbia, and Rumania, and gave Austria the green light to occupy Bosnia and Herzegovina—two additional Balkan states. The Russo -Turkish War caused strained relations between the Russian and German allies. This caused Bismarck to make a secret alliance with Austria in 1879. (This alliance brought Germany and Austria together as allies in World
War I.) In 1882, Austria, Germany, and Italy negotiated another secret pact (to guarantee their mutual defense) called the Triple Alliance. This agreement brought Italy and Austria together as allies rather than as enemies. Throughout the 1880s, more military alliances were created (some of them secretly). In 1881, Austria and Serbia signed a secret agreement which established Serbia as a protected nation of the Austrians. Austria and Germany formed a secret treaty with Rumania in 1883, which Italy joined five years later. In 1887, Austria, Great Britain, Spain, and Italy made a series of interlocking treaties intended to maintain the integrity of nation-state boundaries in the Mediterranean and Near East.
Such international rivalry and secret treaties caused tremendous tension between the European powers through the 1890s. With the forced retirement of Germany’s Bismarck by Emperor William II, new German diplomats began isolating themselves and dropping out of previous alliances. Britain and France also began to warm to one another, establishing the Anglo-French Entente in 1904. And France and Russia further solidified earlier alliances between themselves. In 1907, Britain and Russia formed the Anglo-Russian Entente. This final move brought France, Great Britain, and Russia together forming the Triple Entente. The other significant alliance—known as the Triple Alliance—already existed between Germany, Austria, and Italy. Thus, the stage was set to bring these two powerful, armed European camps into direct confrontation. Rivalries such as those between Britain and Germany, Russia and Austria, and France and Germany seemed to make an explosive situation inevitable.
Directions: Answer all questions completely. 1) What nations were included in the first grouping?
2) What nations were included in the second grouping? 3) Why did Iron Chancellor, Otto von Bismarck create the League of the Three Emperors? 4) What alliances were created in 1904 and 1907? 5) In your opinion what are the Positives and Negatives to creating an alliance?
The Balkans: Powder Keg of Europe As the nations of Europe allied themselves in a complex web of treaties, secret alliances, and diplomatic connections, the possibility of war early in the twentieth century increased. By 1914, in fact, full-scale war engulfed Europe. How the Great War came about is a combination of tragedy, miscalculation, and political imbalance. The center stage for all this was the Balkans. The Balkans are a group of countries bordering one another, located on a peninsula in southeast Europe. They are named for the Balkan Mountains, which extend across Bulgaria and Yugoslavia (balkan is Turkish for “mountain”). In 1912, the Balkan states included Greece, Mo ntenegro, Serbia, Bulgaria, and portions of territory controlled by the Ottoman Empire of the Turks (including Albania, Macedonia, and Thrace) and by the Austrian-Hungarian Empire in the north, including Bosnia-Herzegovina. By the late 1300s, the people living in the Balkans (many of them of Slavic descent) were under the control of the Ottoman (or Turkish) Empire. For the next five hundred years, the Turks controlled events in the Balkans. But by the early 1800s the Balkan peoples began to rally against the Turks, seeking their independence . One by one, beginning with the Greeks in 1821, the Balkans slipped out from under Turkish control. Such setbacks for the Turks caused Europeans to refer to the Ottoman Empire as “the sick man of Europe.” By 1908, Montenegro, Serbia, Rumania, and Bulgaria had all successfully freed themselves from the Ottoman Empire. But the liberation of these states did not bring unity to the Balkan countries. The Balkan people historically represented several different nationalities, scattered across various Baltic States. As a result, not all the people of a given nationality gained their independence when a Balkan state freed itself from Turkish control. As a result, by
1912, newly independent Balkan states went to war with the Turks to gain control of Macedonia and Albania, which were still under the control of the Ottoman Empire. Serbia and Bulgaria led a coalition of Balkan states called the Balkan League (which included Greece and Montenegro) and in October of 1912 they went to war against Turkey. This First Balkan War lasted until 1913 and resulted in Turkey’s defeat and the loss of nearly all its European territory. Following the war, Serbia and Greece divided Macedonian territory between them. Greece also gained control of the Mediterranean island of Crete. And Bulgaria extended its control over additional Ottoman territory. Albania became an independent Muslim state.
Despite the success of these Balkan states in “liberating” neighboring states from the Turks, the peace treaty led to animosity between former allies Serbia and Bulgaria. When Serbia did not receive all the territory it wanted (and Bulgaria received more), war broke out again, this time with Bulgaria declaring war on Serbia and Greece in June of 1913. This short-lived, yet extremely bloody, conflict became known as the Second Balkan War. When Turkey and Rumania joined the fight against Bulgaria, the Bulgarians were defeated. The Treaty of Bucharest (August 1913) gave Serbia extensive territory, making her the most powerful Balkan state. This new turn of events caused alarm among the leaders of the Austrian-Hungarian Empire. A powerful Serbia could rally the Slavs who were living in territory controlled by Austria-Hungary to gain their independence. By the next year, this tension, and other international anxieties, led to the outbreak of World War I.
Directions: Answer all questions completely. 6) Where is the Balkans? 7) What empire controlled the Balkans and was known as “Sick man of Europe”? 8) What was the result of the first Balkan War? 9) Why were the Serbians angry after the second Balkan War?
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12) List the triple Alliance countries: 13) List the triple Entente countries: