# Prevent World War I **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 8, 2016, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166 "2016-08-08T18:40:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Deeg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/deeg/32/2955_2.png) [@Deeg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Deeg)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/21 "2016-08-09T03:59:05Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > You could argue that the EU was only possible due to the “never again” mindset about intra-European wars. It’s certainly been much more effective than either the United Nations or the League of Nations in spite of its problems. I think this touches on it. WW I was largely inevitable because nobody knew how terrible war would be. In August of 1914 all the nations expected a quick victory and entered the war willingly. Just about everybody was surprised by the devastation. The democracies learned their lesson so well that they bent over backwards t appease the Fascists in an attempt to avoid war. It took another war for democracies to learn that they should support other democracies. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/22 "2016-08-09T05:12:51Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > I am impressed :dubious: with the OP’s determination that WWI could have been averted if England had been “less aggrandizing” and France less “cocky”. Don’t forget, re: France, less insular and more wise. Also bear in mind that these were suggested not as sufficient but possibly as necessary steps. **Little Nemo’s** comments make me wonder about the possibility of a moderate Germany under Frederick III allied with both Britain and Austria. France wouldn’t want a war on that basis, because Russia wouldn’t be able to contribute troops to defend France against a 2-front war against Germany and Britain. Russia probably wouldn’t have wanted a war either, since it would be fighting both Germany and Austria at the same time. **kunilou** , I don’t think you need to go back to the HRE. You could re-jigger Europe just by going back and preventing Napoleon. You mentioned 1804 and the Hapsburgs. Napoleon also had a horrible influence on the French, leaving them with delusions of grandeur and a lot of bitterness. ---
**Author:** ![drewder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/57b2e6/32.png) [@drewder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewder)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 5:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/23 "2016-08-09T05:43:04Z")
Assassinate Joan of Arc before she can lead the French armies to victory thus leading to France being included in the UK. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 5:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/24 "2016-08-09T05:52:25Z")
> [@Deeg](#): > > I think this touches on it. WW I was largely inevitable because nobody knew how terrible war would be. In August of 1914 all the nations expected a quick victory and entered the war willingly. Just about everybody was surprised by the devastation. One exception was Lord Kitchener. He expected it would be a prolonged war and began making plans for it even in 1914. ---
**Author:** ![ganthet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/9de0a6/32.png) [@ganthet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ganthet)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 7:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/25 "2016-08-09T07:42:52Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > **Little Nemo’s** comments make me wonder about the possibility of a moderate Germany under Frederick III allied with both Britain and Austria. [QUOTE=Little Nemo] It’s bizarre that Britain ended up in an alliance with France and Russia - the two countries which it had traditionally been most hostile against. Britain had always had relatively good relations with Germany, Austria, Italy, and the Ottoman Empire and it would have seemed more natural for Britain to join with the Central Powers. [/QUOTE] **The Stainless Steel Rat** hit the nail on the head. Germany was inherently a disruptive power since it was gaining industrial and military strength and didn’t have many options on where it could expand. Its next item on the agenda was an overseas empire. It acquired slices of territory here and there, but Eurasia was already taken by Russia, and Africa and Asia was dominated by the British, French, and a handful of other European powers. If Britain had teamed up with Germany to fight Russia, Germany would undoubtedly have annexed western Russian into Germany’s own territory, creating an even bigger and daunting superpower. Since Britain has long thought of itself as only European when convenient, its primary goal was to protect its overseas empire and maintain the balance of power in Europe, but not be limited to or by it. Allying with Germany to fight another European power in the early 1900s would likely have tilted things towards Germany for the foreseeable future. While traditionally an enemy, France shared the same goal as Britain - to maintain the status quo in Europe (with the minor exception of getting back Alsace and Lorraine) and preserve their overseas empire. Austria and the Ottomans likely thought they could reserve their decades-old decline by tagging along with Germany’s rising power. The more surprising choice was Italy siding with the Allies and renouncing their previous alliance with the Central Powers, since Italy was a new nation-state like Germany and wanted to create their own, albeit second tier, empire. ---
**Author:** ![I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/i_love_me_vol.i/32/521_2.png) [@I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/I_Love_Me_Vol.I)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 10:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/26 "2016-08-09T10:15:15Z")
> [@Andy\_L](#): > > A simpler way to avoid WWI might be to allow one of the earlier near wars to occur (and there were plenty of near-misses in the two decades before WWI). How about this one? The Dogger Bank incident (when Russian warships sank British civilians (believing them to be Japanese (!) war ships)) leads to Britain declaring war on Russia during the Russo-Japanese war. That might lead to an earlier Russian revolution, and would certainly move Germany and Great Britain closer together (since Russia and GB would be less friendly) which would disrupt the pattern of alliances that was a major factor in causing WWI. Right. So the outbreak of “near war” X means that Nation A and Nation B are closer, but consequently, Nation B and Nation C are much further apart. And Nation A has a mutual-defense pact with Nation C (and Nations D and E have one with Nation B) and… voila! IOW, mightn’t any one of those “near wars” have evolved into a World War? Weren’t we perhaps “due” to have a world war at some point roughly around the time of the actual first world war? Meaning: if it hadn’t been the particular circumstances that led to the actual war, wouldn’t it have been some other set of circumstances around the same time? It could be that a confluence of communication improvements (particularly the maturation of a rapid, worldwide press) as well as weaponry/military improvements set the stage at a certain point in time that any flare-up of hostilities of a certain degree was bound to produce a multi-national/Continental/multi-continental conflagration. And even then, the “War to End All Wars”, didn’t. Maybe after World War 1 1/2 (WWII) we finally realized that sort of worldwide, total-war horror just doesn’t work too well? Or maybe we realized it but even so won’t be able to stop ourselves (humankind) from doing it again… and again. ?? ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 12:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/27 "2016-08-09T12:16:28Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > Don’t forget, re: France, less insular and more wise. Also bear in mind that these were suggested not as sufficient but possibly as necessary steps. I think that you’re forgetting some key bits of history: France did not have aggressive intent against any of its European neighbors by 1914. It had war plans, but those were designed to thwart an expected invasion by Germany and at best in that event to recover Alsace and Lorraine. France had also allied itself with both Russia and England, which hardly counts as foolish or insular. Revisionist history can’t overcome the fact of Germany’s bellicosity and encouragement of Austrian empire expansion, which made Germany the nation overwhelmingly responsible for WWI. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 12:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/28 "2016-08-09T12:47:38Z")
I’d go back to the Siege of Duskendale and convince Tywin Lannister and Barristan Selmy not to rescue King Aerys Targaryen (AKA the Mad King), letting him die in the assault. That way, Rhaegar becomes king (and probably a wise and good king), Brandon and Rickard Stark aren’t executed, Lyanna Stark isn’t kidnapped/seduced, and Robert Baratheon and Ned Stark don’t raise their banners in rebellion. And then there’s no seed planted for the War of the Five Kings. The Greyjoys will probably still rebel (and get crushed), but that’s because they’re idiots. There’s no cure for idiocy. ---
**Author:** ![casdave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c6cbf5/32.png) [@casdave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/casdave)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 1:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/29 "2016-08-09T13:00:56Z")
A change to the German political system would have helped immensely. In fact, had the chartist movement spread across Europe there is every chance that a more representative form of governance would have emerged. Take a look at how close it was, following the French revolution and the fears that engendered among the power holders in Europe, various very repressive measures were taken to crush the rights of populations to gain some sort of representation. In the UK we have the various Combinations acts, in Germany we simply have autocracy and no form of parliament at all. Without the self aggrandising individuals across all of Europe, all of whom were accountable to no-one at all we would have had examination of national actions and decisions. We might even have had no Russian revolution, so if you want to prevent WW1, ensure that the people have effective representation. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/30 "2016-08-09T16:25:35Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > I think that you’re forgetting some key bits of history: France did not have aggressive intent against any of its European neighbors by 1914. It had war plans, but those were designed to thwart an expected invasion by Germany and at best in that event to recover Alsace and Lorraine. France had also allied itself with both Russia and England, which hardly counts as foolish or insular. > > Revisionist history can’t overcome the fact of Germany’s bellicosity and encouragement of Austrian empire expansion, which made Germany the nation overwhelmingly responsible for WWI. There were no innocent victim countries among the major powers in that war. ---
**Author:** ![WillFarnaby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/willfarnaby/32/514_2.png) [@WillFarnaby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WillFarnaby)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/31 "2016-08-09T16:37:16Z")
Did democracy alert the British people to the fact their leaders were committing them to war on the continent in the event of a German/French conflict? Did democracy prevent the US from entering the war on suspect grounds after Wilson had promised neutrality in order to get elected? Did democracy warn the French people of disastrous commitments to Russia? Nope. ---
**Author:** ![casdave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c6cbf5/32.png) [@casdave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/casdave)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/32 "2016-08-09T17:45:00Z")
Was Britain democratic? well given that half the adult population could not vote, I would say not. The reality was that the Royals and Lords had far too much influence on the route that Britain took, they really was no accountability, those at the top did pretty much as they wanted, the Labour party was not developed, and the Liberals were the closest thing to a voice that the ordinary person had. As for Germany, well they didn’t even have that, and Russia was a monarchy that was completely at the whim of the Tsar. You can add Austro-Hungary to that too, there simply was no way that individual leaders could be held accountable for their actions, there were no brakes on any of the main participants, they just did pretty much what they wanted, and their national interest was whatever they said it was. Now lets get fully functioning democracies a generation earlier - as I say, we might not have had a Russian revolution, the German military leaders ran their nation over the edge of a cliff without ever having to answer to anyone else - had there been some democratic government then surrender might have been possible much earlier. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/33 "2016-08-09T18:08:47Z")
> [@ganthet](#): > > **The Stainless Steel Rat** hit the nail on the head. Germany was inherently a disruptive power since it was gaining industrial and military strength and didn’t have many options on where it could expand. Its next item on the agenda was an overseas empire. It acquired slices of territory here and there, but Eurasia was already taken by Russia, and Africa and Asia was dominated by the British, French, and a handful of other European powers. If Britain had teamed up with Germany to fight Russia, Germany would undoubtedly have annexed western Russian into Germany’s own territory, creating an even bigger and daunting superpower. Since Britain has long thought of itself as only European when convenient, its primary goal was to protect its overseas empire and maintain the balance of power in Europe, but not be limited to or by it. Allying with Germany to fight another European power in the early 1900s would likely have tilted things towards Germany for the foreseeable future. The thing was the necessity of expansion was a myth. Countries didn’t need to grow or die. They could do quite well by just staying inside their original borders and developing internally. One of the big factors in Germany’s growth was that it hadn’t spend its resources in building an empire. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/34 "2016-08-09T18:36:36Z")
> [@WillFarnaby](#): > > Did democracy alert the British people to the fact their leaders were committing them to war on the continent in the event of a German/French conflict? Actually their leaders did no such thing. There was considerable doubt in France when war threatened, whether British leaders would follow through on previously proposed (but never set in stone) joint military operations. > [@](#): > > Did democracy prevent the US from entering the war on suspect grounds after Wilson had promised neutrality in order to get elected? Do “suspect grounds” include Germany’s secret proposal for alliance with Mexico, on the basis that if America entered the war against Germany, Mexico could get back the territory it had lost in the Southwest? > [@](#): > > Did democracy warn the French people of disastrous commitments to Russia? How exactly was this alliance “disastrous” for France? > [@Roderick Femm](#): > > There were no innocent victim countries among the major powers in that war. Nor did I say there were. It remains true that Germany and Austria were overwhelmingly guilty of having precipitated WWI (and Germany was responsible for the lion’s share of its atrocities). ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/35 "2016-08-09T18:42:21Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > WWI started with Adam and Eve bickering over dinner. > > Honestly, the more I learn about that horrid mess the more I am convinced it was unavoidable. You’d have to unravel 200 years of complicated, largely unavoidable interactions to prevent at least some multinational war by about 1930. Even if such a war never happened, WWI would have been started by the little Austrian with the funny mustache. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/36 "2016-08-09T19:05:01Z")
I suppose we could simply give each of the major powers before the war a handful of ICBM’s with MIRV equipped nukes in the 10-20 MT range and the ability to program them and launch them as they like…after we give each of the heads of state a demo of what they can do. I’m sure, being Europeans they will do the civilized thing… :eek: (I actually think that this would work and that they would do the MAD thing, and it would prevent large-scale war in Europe if they had weapons that could cause mass destruction AND understood the implications of them. Unlike the weapons they did have that could do the same things, if a bit slower, and didn’t understand the implications of them and so thought war on those terms was a good thing…or at least a winnable thing). ---
**Author:** ![Uniqueorn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/uniqueorn/32/2807_2.png) [@Uniqueorn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uniqueorn)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/37 "2016-08-09T19:05:46Z")
Have a German assassinate Archduke Ferdinand. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/38 "2016-08-09T19:17:19Z")
> [@I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](#): > > Right. So the outbreak of “near war” X means that Nation A and Nation B are closer, but consequently, Nation B and Nation C are much further apart. And Nation A has a mutual-defense pact with Nation C (and Nations D and E have one with Nation B) and… voila! > > IOW, mightn’t any one of those “near wars” have evolved into a World War? Weren’t we perhaps “due” to have a world war at some point roughly around the time of the actual first world war? Meaning: if it hadn’t been the particular circumstances that led to the actual war, wouldn’t it have been some other set of circumstances around the same time? > > It could be that a confluence of communication improvements (particularly the maturation of a rapid, worldwide press) as well as weaponry/military improvements set the stage at a certain point in time that any flare-up of hostilities of a certain degree was bound to produce a multi-national/Continental/multi-continental conflagration. It certainly could be, but I think the particular set of alliances just before WWI was especially prone to a disastrous war resulting. If Germany were aligned with Russia or GB, the sense that Gemwny had that their survival relied on preemptive attacks on their neighbors might have been defused. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/39 "2016-08-09T20:04:22Z")
Start with getting rid of the Kaiser. or Tirpitz. Their idea of having Germany compete with the English in naval supremacy drove the English into the French side. This would be a much shorter war, with France falling much as it did in the Franco-Prussian war. Russia falls soon after. It’s possible that the Schlieffen Plan and the invasion of Belgium could bring Britain in. But _if_ they stuck to the original Schlieffen Plan, the French would have fallen quickly. OTOH, if Germany had decided to fight a holding action vs the French, and hit the Russians hard, the Russians would have folded very quickly. France would have accepted a peace then. Now, once you have gotten rid of the Kaiser, ther’d be no _Blank Cheque_ (Kaiser Wilhelm [William] II assured Austria of Germany’s support in _whatever_ measures she took against Serbia). Sure Germany would support AH, but hardly in such aggressive demands. Thus, the demands would have been ameliorated and accepted in full, thus no war… at that time. (War was brewing anyway as many have pointed out) ---
**Author:** ![drewder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/57b2e6/32.png) [@drewder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewder)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2016, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166/40 "2016-08-09T22:29:32Z")
> [@Skywatcher](#): > > Even if such a war never happened, WWI would have been started by the little Austrian with the funny mustache. 😉 I doubt he could have. WWII was caused by the terms in the treaty of Versailles. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prevent-world-war-i/762166.md?page=3)