world war 1 causes

World War 1 Causes WW1 left roughly 10 million soldiers dead, 21 million soldiers wounded and 8 million soldiers missing. It was a conflict between the Allied Powers, and the Central Powers. The three main causes of the war were the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, widespread militarism and economic imperialism. I will explain why these where the three reasons in the following paragraphs. The first cause of WW1 took place on June 28, 1914. Gavrilo Princip killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, and his wife. Princip belonged to a group called the Black Hand. Austria Hungary demanded Serbia to punish those responsible for the assassination. When Serbia didn’t want to cooperate, Austria Hungary declared war on Serbia. Since Serbia was an ally of the Allied Powers, the Allied Powers declared war on Austria Hungary. This meant a declaration of war against the Central Powers. Ferdinand’s assassination led to both powers declaring war on each other. Widespread militarism was the second cause of World War One. Aristocrats, dictators and military elites had too much control over Russia, Germany and Austria. The war was one consequence of their desire for military power. Britain’s Royal Navy was stronger in the amount of personnel, ships and carrying capacity than both Germany and Austria Hungary’s navies combined. Since aristocrats in Germany and Austria Hungary knew they were losing the arms race, they decided the best way to catch up was to declare war. The third cause of WW1 was economic imperialism. Great Britain and France maintained their domestic economies through their control and trade with foreign colonies. Germany and Austria Hungary had few foreign colonies, and their domestic resources were running out pretty fast. In order to maintain their domestic economy, they had to look for more resources by expanding their territories. Germany could not easily find other colonies because there weren’t that