Militarism

• The arms was competition between countries to build up their military strength
• The arms race can be referred to as 'militarism'
• All the major powers of Europe raced each other to build the biggest and best armed this was the arms race, this included countries like Germany and Great Britian
• Every country, except Great Britain, had a conscript army. This meant that these countries had a large number of trained soldiers they could call up very quickly in the event of war.
• A conscript army is when a person who has been forced to serve in an army or in one of a country's armed forces or has as you could say has been drafted
• In 1914, the German army was the biggest and best in the world - but the Russian army was growing the fastest, and German generals were worried that, in a few years time they would not be able to defeat Russia. At the same time, Britain and Germany had an arms race to see who could build the biggest navy.
• Germany and Great Britain had an arms race to see who could build the biggest navy.
• Military spending snowballed, as one country increased spending

  another would follow suit. Military spending doubled in the period 1900-1914.
• Over 85% of men of military age in France and 50% in Germany had served in the army or navy. France had the highest proportion of its population in the army.
• The rival between the powers led to a building up of powers and an increase in distrust.
• Britain and Germany were rivals at sea. Both countries had big empires and needed a large navy in order to protect their land abroad.
• The German Navy Law of 1898 increased the German battleships from nine cruisers to twelve. In 1900, Germany passed another Navy Law which doubled the German battle fleet.
• In 1880 Germany had 88.000 tonnes of military shipping, Britain 650,000; by 1910 the figures were 964,000 Germany and 2, 174,000 Britain.
• When Britain launched the HMS Dreadnought in 1906 this made matters worse. Dreadnoughts were large, fast and heavily armed battleships with 12 inch guns. They set a new standard in naval armaments and rendered all previous battleships completely out of date. The naval race became intense.
• Because the Dreadnought made all other battle ships completely out of date whoever had the most Dreadnoughts would achieve naval superiority, in 1906 Britain and Germany became involved in a race to build the most Dreadnoughts.
• 1909 and 1911 Germany built nine Dreadnoughts while Britain built 18.
• Britain's navy had always been bigger than the combined navies of her two largest rivals French, Russia (The Two Power Standard ). This position was threatened by the building of the Dreadnought.
• Military spending

  A) 50000000

  B) 15500000

  C) 60000000

  D) 10000000

  E) 40000000

  F) 22000000

  G) 750000

  H) 500000

  I) 250000

  J) 750000

  K) 2500000

  L) 750000

  
• Who are the central powers?

  Germany, Austria-Hungary, Italy
• What are the countries in the triple entente?

  Britain, Russia and France