Germany Rises - The Wise World Traveler: Becoming a Part of All that You Meet - page 115

dead, and the countries of Europe were bankrupt and exhausted. And the Tsar of Russia as
well as all monarchs of the Central Powers had lost their thrones. [104]
THE SOURCES OF WAR
The assassination in Sarajevo was the spark that began the war, but its combustible ma-
terials had been laid down long before 1914. One likely antecedent is the Franco-Prussi-
an War of 1870-71. For the French, fear and suspicion of Germany was the centerpiece of
its foreign policy. On the German side, victory produced an outpouring of nationalism and
patriotism. Germany's new nationalism was also fed by industrialization. The Industrial
Revolution had begun in Britain in the eighteenth century and moved eastward. Germany
was late in catching up to France, but with unification, German industry moved quickly
forward. Mass production of goods is the great achievement of an industrial society. It re-
quires an expanding urban population to work its factories. Mass production also depends
on both domestic and foreign markets. And expanding markets require raw materials.
In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Africa offered both markets and ma-
terial resources, but Germany was a late entry into the colonization of Africa. The recently
industrialized Germany, now with the most modern armaments, aggressively demanded its
place in the colonial sun. The newly united Germany used its increasing military strength to
search for overseas markets and to acquire colonies. In the Franco-Prussian War, its army
was led by the king and a general staff charged with strategic planning, which is com-
monplace today but was an innovation in its time. Equally important, the chief of staff be-
came the prototype of future chiefs, the brilliant strategist, Helmuth Karl Bernhard Graf
von Moltke.
Kaiser Wilhelm I also insisted that Germany challenge the British Navy, master of the
oceans since the eighteenth century, in both armaments and size. A naval armament race
began, with Germany matching Britain gun for gun and battleship for battleship. The race
was augmented by Germany's Kiel Canal, completed in 1895, which gave German ships
quick and safe passage between the North and Baltic Seas. [105]
As the race for colonies and military domination continued, the countries of Europe
bolstered their military strength by looking for sympathetic allies. Germany joined Austria,
its German-speaking neighbor, while France and England made common cause. And Rus-
sia joined with France, in part remembering an old enemy, the Teutonic knights who were
kept from colonizing Russia by the victory of Alexander Nevsky in 1242.
By the first decade of the twentieth century, European statesmen expected and anticip-
ated war. Plans and timetables for general mobilization were in place. It is not surprising,
therefore, that the assassination at Sarajevo turned expectation into reality.