Daniel Tyler: Events in Europe which lead to War in 1914

 

Daniel Tyler gave an excellent talk on the origins of the Great War.  He argued that although no one power was solely responsible for the war’s outbreak, primary responsibility lay with Germany.  She had pursued an impulsive foreign policy in the decades leading up to the war, which had caused her to become strategically encircled.
 In 1914 she sought to break free by consciously risking a war with Russia and France over the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the throne of her ally, Austria-Hungary.
 However, it was Britain’s intervention that turned a European War into a World War and Daniel argued that in hindsight, Britain’s involvement was a mistake.  Although Germany was an expansionist power, we should not confuse the Second Reich with the Third or see Germany’s ambitions as necessarily incompatible with  Britain’s security.