When did World War I actually start?

[Eccentric]

WWI tourism, mostly from Brits, is an indispensable source of income for the whole of western Flanders. Best thing that ever happened.

[Electerrific]

y'all need to get together and build a time machine, maybe then you can stop living in the past and instead go and live in the past.

 

yes, it's important to know where you have come from, but more important to look where you're going.

If it wasn't for those people that fought and died in our past, we wouldn't have a place to move forward to!

[JFKvsNixon]

World war One was the greatetst crime perpetuated against the people by a bunch of strutting and posturing little dukes, kings and emperors.

 

The Crimean war just over half a century earlier should have been a lesson learned by British statesmen who were all gung ho to go to war so willingly in 1914

 

Without Britain supporting the French there was a distinct possibility that they would not have held out against the Germans. What would have happened to the the UK if the continent was dominated by the Germans?

[shanes teeth]

I read the figures a few years ago about British casualties in WW1 and WW2. In WW1 it was over a million (civilian as well as military, over 2% of the population) and including a few tens of thousands of colonial recruits. The high figure was largely due to the massacres caused by troops being sent straight into machine gun fire.

 

In WW2 the total numbers of British and colonials killed, military and civilian, was less than half a million, or less than 1% of the population, despite aerial bombings of British cities. This lower figure was due to most deaths being on the Eastern Front where about 70% of the fighting was done, and the UK only being involved in fighting on the continent from 1944.

 

It's still a surprise though that there were more British casualties in WW1 than in WW2.

 

---------- Post added 27-08-2013 at 19:19 ----------

 

 

I'd go for 28th July when the first declaration of war was made. Subsequent declarations occurred because of existing treaties where nation states promised to fight to defend other allied countries under attack. The UK entered the war to defend France from German invasion.

 

 

Britains treaty was with Belgium and we declared war on Germany when they invaded neutral Belgium.

It was a fact that all of Europe had been looking for an excuse for a war and when Austria/Hungary declared war on Serbia it set off a "domino effect" around Europe where countries moved quickly to honour,sometimes centuries,old treaties.Everybody had to mobilise quickly to avoid being left behind and to hesitate meant almost certain defeat.There was no time for negotiation which may have prevented all out war.

[Harleyman]

Without Britain supporting the French there was a distinct possibility that they would not have held out against the Germans. What would have happened to the the UK if the continent was dominated by the Germans?

 

The British government were more than willing to go to war against Germany because Kaiser Wilhelm was constructing a navy along with big battleships to rival the power of the Royal Navy.

The Kaiser was also making a lot of noise about wanting colonies for Germany.

 

The British government saw all this as a threat to their interests. Helping defend France may have been a part of the reason for going to war but it was by no means the core reason

[JFKvsNixon]

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Britains treaty was with Belgium and we declared war on Germany when they invaded neutral Belgium.

It was a fact that all of Europe had been looking for an excuse for a war and when Austria/Hungary declared war on Serbia it set off a "domino effect" around Europe where countries moved quickly to honour,sometimes centuries,old treaties.Everybody had to mobilise quickly to avoid being left behind and to hesitate meant almost certain defeat.There was no time for negotiation which may have prevented all out war.

 

Lets not beat around the bush. We went to war to protect our interests, it wasn't in our interest for France to fall to the Germans, so we fought on the French's side. The treaty with Belgium may have been the pretext for the declaration, but it was not the reason why we went to war.

[shanes teeth]

Lets not beat around the bush. We went to war to protect our interests, it wasn't in our interest for France to fall to the Germans, so we fought on the French's side. The treaty with Belgium may have been the pretext for the declaration, but it was not the reason why we went to war.

 

I agree completely.It was better to fight on French soil than to wait for France to fall.I was pointing out in my post that we had no obligation to support France and used the invasion of Belgian nutrality as the excuse.And it wasn't that we were worried about a Europe dominated by Germany,rather a loss of our possesions (and source of the countries power and wealth) overseas.

[JFKvsNixon]

I agree completely.It was better to fight on French soil than to wait for France to fall.I was pointing out in my post that we had no obligation to support France and used the invasion of Belgian nutrality as the excuse.And it wasn't that we were worried about a Europe dominated by Germany,rather a loss of our possesions (and source of the countries power and wealth) overseas.

 

I disagree, partially. I don't think that it was Europe being dominated by the Germans that frightened us so much, I believe that it was Europe dominated by a single country. If the French looked like they were going to take control, we'd have gone to war against them and allied with the Germans, much like we did against Napoleon's France.

[LeMaquis]

Britains treaty was with Belgium and we declared war on Germany when they invaded neutral Belgium.

 

Belgium was neutral as you say, meaning we didn't have a treaty with Belgium other than to recognise its neutrality. Germany invaded Belgium as part of its invasion of France under the Schlieffen Plan under which Germany hoped to fight a war against France in the west and Russia in the east. Germany asked Belgium to allow German troops to pass through on their way to France. Belgium refused so Germany invaded.

 

Franco-German hostilities had been key to Germany being formed as a state under Bismarck just 40 years earlier and France was Germany's main perceived enemy in western Europe. Anglo-German tensions were to do with Germany overtaking the UK economically and Germany's potential to build an empire to rival Britain's. Something similar happened in 1939.

[shanes teeth]

I disagree, partially. I don't think that it was Europe being dominated by the Germans that frightened us so much, I believe that it was Europe dominated by a single country. If the French looked like they were going to take control, we'd have gone to war against them and allied with the Germans, much like we did against Napoleon's France.

 

Again,I agree,but I thought we were talking about the threat,at that particular time,of Germany.