Central powers were the good guys

>be in the biggest civilizational struggle the world has yet seen
>you have only a few allies
>one of them behaves like a huge genocidal dick
>if the world hears of this the international and national reaction could destroy everything
>bite the bullet and help cover it up

>be in the biggest civilizational struggle the world has yet seen

I'm sorry, who forced Germany and Austria to invade Belgium, France, Russia, Serbia, and Luxembourg simultaneously?

>he didn't read the Sleepwalkers

>Wanting a short war rather than Plan 1919 with Germany being systematically destroyed by a Franco-Bong Blitzkrieg and never recovering as the new treaty would > > > the entire Central Powers and today we would have fag anons posting from some retarded imperial free cities in bumfuck nowhere
The fucking state of Veeky Forums

The Entente. Anything but a quick reaction would have been suicidal.
>Being that naive and/or condescending

Correct, I haven't read that. I did read "A World Undone" though. Any sensible reading of events would conclude that the war was primarily started by Austria and Germany. France and Russia were simply defending themselves from invasions, and Britain only got involved because Germany invaded France.

What do you say to the fact that Russia went into mobilization first, and that Germany warned them to stop or they would have to respond?

Austria mobilized first.

There is no doubt that Austria-Hungary acted retarded, but they mobilized in the south and to a limited extent. Russia then begining their (slow) mobilization forced the hand of AH to mobilize further and Germany to start.

Point is that it was a massive game of chicken. If you were slow on the draw, you would have a decisive disadvantage. All the powers were eyeing each other, looking for ANY movements from their enemies. Germany had two massively powerful and antagonistic forces on either side of themselves.

Yes, clearly the Anglos are the perfidious ones. What with their getting involved in bloody wars in order to honour their treaties. Those guys who keep launching surprise attacks and ignoring every treaty they sign are the true noble ones.

Just ignore the typical kraut sperg out

Empires certainly only serve mankind. It had nothing to do with getting rid of a competitor and working hard to make that war happen. Find me British cabinet protocols of the 10 years before war broke out. Protip: you can't.

but they were

>Entente were the good guys

>You can't blame the Turks for the Armenian genocide and then just completely ignore the role of the German government
That's retarded. You are only saying this to try to deflect the blame from the group who deserves it. Turks didn't only genocide Armenians btw but Greeks and Assyrians as well.

alright, the context is they're being used as weapons to kill people

>who forced Germany and Austria to invade Belgium, France, Russia, Serbia, and Luxembourg simultaneously?
France, Russia and Serbia were no innocent parties but well willing to go to war. Belgium and Luxembourg were unlucky but ultimately they also knew what they were dealing with - and they picked their side.

Russia and Bulgaria were the only good guys

Why the hell do some of you brainlets blame Austria-Hungary for the conflict even though it was Germany who forced them to attack Serbia, in order to actually PROVOKE a conflict with Russia and France?

Germany wanted them to declare war on Serbia IMMEDIATELY AFTER Ferdinand was assassinated. It would've given Austria-Hungary the moral high ground but they took too long and people lost interest.

Who cares lmao

They weren't the bad guys.

I still believe firmly that the British Empire caused WWI and recently ive been doing research on it through some publications of about 1880-1914 and now i know belief is true.

In 1906 The Russian and French were on the verge of signing an alliance with Germany as to not attack one another if war were to break out and Germany was actually in the process of demilitarized its standing army. Their interests were longing to increase oversees in China and in any event possible war between Japan would have happened with Germany and Russia as allies. Germany had also been helping Turkey modernise its infrastructure and was set to establish an international railroad. While Britain was readily noticing the threat of Germany overtaking its role as the world power long before as early as 1875, there are quotes from a primary source of a political leader, viscount cranborne i believe where he states that Germany has been deliberately attempting to assert itself in the world as a superpower and while it has the capabilities to do so, our Empire will dismantle by means of stopping this."

Ill have to pull out the pdf for tbe exact quote but basically saying they will go to war with Germany if they have to and they dont care that it may cost them their empire. Of course this was just one mad man. Oh wait it wasnt, Britain literally turned the world against Germany. I have yet to pin point the first target of the British to turn against Germany, however I know the last because my thesis was on the American-German Relationships during WWI and WWII.
Whats crazy is you see a lot of anti-German sentiment early on from about 1840-1875/1880. But then by 1880 most germans had been Americanized and Americans recognized them as such fellow americans with the exception of a few nativist and German radical anarachist and socialist groups

But all of the sudden as soon as America enters the war. Boom! Slurs, anti german sentiment, propaganda, Germanophobia, counter german spy militant groups pop up. "BEAT THE HUN, BUY WAR BONDS!" it was almost quite literally like a light switched on and all those years and generations that assimilated were forgotten. Books by German authors and Scientist were burned. German american Journalist were fired.

>Neutral countries
>Picked their side
So this... is the power.... of the Germaboo.

>Turks didn't only genocide Armenians btw but Greeks and Assyrians as well.

Yep, and the Germans helped them cover it up, even after the war was already over and there was literally no reason to keep up the charade. Many of the men responsible for the killings found sanctuary in Berlin after the war; the German government protected them. It speaks volumes that the German government did not even recognize the Armenian Genocide until 2016.

In the similar time frame that Germany was expanding its influence into Turkey and the ME, Oil became liquid gold. Simultaneously militant rebel groups within the ottoman empire got better arms and were able to out maneuver Ottoman police forces and supply lines were cut off. Russia had longed to regain Constantinople but was experiencing a time of unrest itself in the first Russian revolution of 1905 due to its decline in influence in the Japanese-Russo war of 04-05. Its attention then remaining on the home front and as tentions between Germany and Britain grew Russia actually anticipated British aggression and stations some hundred thousand soilders on the Afghan-India border. WWI could have happened in 1906 however due to Russia being out of Alliance, there was no protecting it from Turkish advance and since no stoppin Russian advance on India. This is where the history gets iffy but being that Russia was a lone wolf, it would have probably been consumed by eternal revolt once again that much is inevitably true. However when Russian and British treaties were signed in anticipation of Turkish threat attempting to retrieve their Baltic and black sea regional territory, this actually, I believe was the soul event that prolonged WWI from occuring another 8 years.

But then we might not have gotten nukes and jet engines and computers

Once the alliances had been finalized, this sealed the fate of WWI, Germany now had to find a new business partner, one with oil none the less. Turkey joining the war last minute was settled by Italy dropping out of the once famous triple alliance(central powers). Had Italy remained friendly to Germany and Austria (as the 1912 recommencement of the Triple alliance stated it would enter war with the Alliance had war been declare), the Ottoman Empire would have been quite possibly neutral. Further more, Turkey would have joined France prior to 1906 in an Alliance had it not allied with Russia and the British, both of which Empires had been contributing to the rapid decline of the Ottoman influence in MENA.

If anyone is at fault it's Britain. They had no obligation to enter the war at all. That they did made the whole thing a world war in the first place.

>Neutral
>countries
Choose one.

See .

Germany was deathly afraid of a two-fronts war, which the whole Schlieffen plan proves. Bethmann Hollweg in particular was exceedingly doubtful, so your wikipedia source is probably outdated or outright wrong.

Ironically, Germany would have won a conventional two-fronts war against France and Russia. It was their own fear of the Russian paper tiger which gave Britain the pretence to join in on the war.

The British Empires' ability to orchestrate an alliance with Russia, which would have Been an alli of Germany was not only the point at which WWI was inevitable, it was the point at which the war had been won.

Years prior to the french, russian, british alliance in 1906/7, Russia and Germany were fearsome in Europe and the world, noted (by many of those primary sources I was talking about) to be the most likely canidates to go to war. The triple alliance and franco russian alliance were preemptive alliances formed out of this fear. While many believed that these 5 powers, Russia/France vs Germany/Austria/Italy were gearing up for war, as seen in Germany's expansion of 50,000 aditional armed soldiers in the 1870's in response to the Russian militarization of the Balkans after the Turkish-Russian War; it was actually a defensive alliance that formed out of recognition and mutal understanding that if one goes to war, they all go to war and no one will win. In a sense it was actually a Cold War, a successful one that prevented all out War in a European theater for nearly 30 years. But I deviated away from the point I was making, In this mini cold war between the 5, it was said that should Germany go to war with Russia, Germany would lose. This was the belief for some time. In response to this, both Russia and Germany played a game of who has the bigger Dick. As a result there was a large growth of militaryism on both sides. This was great for both because now both sides were becoming big world powers and the contest was on for who could erect the biggest dic-uh standing army. Only problem is, when you make a big army you use your commoners. Which is good because they still get paid. Real problem is how do you pay them when you took all the commoners out of their jobs that fuel your economy? Taxes of course! So taxes got raised but as history loves to tell us, no taxation without representation and pretty much everyone in the world saw it coming.

>germans helped them cover it up
Source or fuck off

At this point it was just a war of attrition. Who ever held out the longest without having a revolution would win. But had these two sides went to war, Russia was predicted to come out on top due to the beliefs that Germany would become victims of a revolution instead of Russia as we know history tells us.

But heres the thing Germany and Russia actually become friends and traded leading Germany to gain momentum again and actually have the ability to keep a large standing army.
This brings us right back to the whole 1905 Russian revolution and British alliance with Russia. I havent the complete understanding of all the motives for Russia signing a military alliance with Britain. I know nearly all of the motives of the British however. Perhaps both sides understood the inevitably of World war, and saw to creating a strong force, or perhaps there were internal motives to rid Germany of its world dominance.

>Be Germany
>Ally is a fucking decrepit husk of an Empire bound to erupt any day now
>Ally wants to invade Serbia and add more minorities to their overdiverse empire
>Tell them that you'll back them up no matter what, keep egging them on and telling them you got their back
>Fuck they actually did it, now we're at war with Russia and France because we're shit at choosing alliances
>Ask Belgium for military access
>They want to be neutral, say no
>Invade anyway
>wtf they ripped up all the railways
>wtf they ripped up all the telephone lines
>Kill civilians for not being okay with foreign invaders
>Few years later
>Directly responsible for Lenin returning to Russia, therefore also indirectly responsible for all the bullshit that happens afterwards
>Sunk neutral American boat
>Tried to convince Mexico to invade the USA
>America learns about this
>America declares war
>Get shitstomped
>Become a republic
>Has to pay heavy war reparations for being the definitive leader of the Central Powers
>Lose lands whose populations were mostly belonging to another ethnicity
>Fuck this
>We're too good to pay war reparations
>Just print a shit ton of money to screw the French out of actually paying the debt
>inflation.jpg
>Hitler shows up
>Franz von Papen convinces President Hindenburg to make him Chancellor to #unitetheright
>Old Fuck Hindenburg dies
>Hitler merges the Presidency and Chancellory, becomes a dictator
>ww2
>But it was all worth it because edgy Kaiserboos and Wehraboos on Veeky Forums will blame the Entente and the Treaty of Versailles for Germany being a fucking retarded nation

This board is fucking retarded. Just accept that Anglos are objectively the good guys

Oh, forgot to mention how the Germans kept acting totally fucking retarded diplomatically. Google the Morocco Crisis. What the fuck was the point of all that?

Good guys: Belgium, Greece
Bad guys: France, Britain, Russia, Germany, Italy, Bulgaria, Romania, Ottomans, AUSTRIA-HUNGARY, Serbia
Call me what you want, thats just how it was.

instead communists would've had a foothold in the middle of Europe (France)

Why Greece?

>italy
>central power
I think refusing to join them in the war and then fighting with allies kind of discredits any claims to them being aligned with Germany and Austria.

Schlieffen plan wanted to knock out France quickly so Germany could focus on Russia.

>Schlieffen plan wanted to knock out France quickly so Germany could focus on Russia.
Yes, because France was considered the weaker of the two opponents.

Schlieffen plan was autism from the beggining

>Prepare to go to war against Russa
>French build up troops to your west.
If the French and Belgium really didn't want the war to happen why didn't they sign a Non-Aggression Pact with the Germans and not build up troops to their west?

Poincaré told the Russians that he would be willing to support their cause even if it came to war. Also, it was THE opportunity to strike against Germany.

italy is the tragic protagonist of WWI

Right, it's not like Serbia supported the assassins of Austria's heir to the throne, it's not like Russia intervened in the Balkan conflict purely out of wanting more power. It's not like Russia mobilized its army against both Germany and Austria before Germany declared war to anyone. It's not like France had a military alliance with Russia and would have attacked Germany anyway, it's not like attacking France through Alsace-Lorraine would have been a suicide mission.

Also you're implying Britain gave any fuck about human rights or international treaties with their declaration of war while they gladly starved several million Indians to death repeatedly.

Also you're implying the Lusitania was a neutral boat when it carried tons of war material. The Americans and Brits didn't tell that to the passengers, the Germans did and warned them - but of course their the evil guys, so that doesn't matter.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinking_of_the_RMS_Lusitania#International_reaction

Also the talks with Mexico were about an alliance only in case the Americans attacked Germany, not as attack on America. You can look that up yourself.

I'm a Germanophile but even I think German diplomacy was fucking retarded

>If Germany won in 1914, Soviet Russia and Nazi Germany never would have happened.
Instead we would have Mitteleuropa, where whole central Europe is enslaved to Germans and ethnic cleansing of millions.
There is no doubt second war would happen, and oppressed natuons would turn against Germs.

If Germany won, they would still have a crippling debt to be paid and eventually a revolution would still happen due to the damaged economy of Europe post war. Work would be far from anything long lasting for men returning home, and would resort to bars and drinking, thus talking, and finally a political overhaul on the upper class. However there would be a split over moderate beliefs and full on radical communism. Small rebellions at first, possible a civil war. France would adopt a Empire again and invade Spain. Russia... pretty much the same probably. Russian communist revolution was inevitable by 1910's, regardless of the victor in WWI. Putting down the first one in 1905 only insured a new one to happen with more force.

>if the world hears of this the international and national reaction could destroy everything
Really? How bad was the stigma against genocide back then m I'd think it would be fairly accepted, just another part of life

The "war helps progress" meme is something I truly hate. The only thing it does is redistribute budget to military-related technology. It doesn't improve scientific education (indeed, that stagnates, because the budget is redistributed to production and military technology). It doesn't birth better scientists or help develop civilian technology (that is purely incidental, in cases where military tech can be used for civilian purposes). It doesn't do anything that a redistribution of budget couldn't do in peacetime.
>but evolutionary pressure
Evolutionary pressure is exerted whenever a position depends on deeds and merits. And that's how the scientific community works, in peace or war.
>but they fight to survive
Scientists get a good deal at the end of any war. Just like operation Paperclip.

Italy was the mentally-challenged henchman of WWI.

wtf is this stupid meme that Italy had some sort of secret role in WWI?

They literally just had an indecisive diplomatic stance and were caught up in the mess with the rest of the 5 powers. Italy was arguably the weakest of the 6 European superpowers in 1912 and by the time war was finally declared they were bumped down another peg by Turkey in relevance.

>

It's almost like France had to defend Russia in a defensive war. Who would've thought?