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Paragraph 5
Importantly, Germany had imperial ambitions as
well, seeking to rival Britain in Africa especially.
What Germany wanted from expanded colonial
territories was similar to British expectations of its
colonies: natural resources such as oil and gas, vital
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HISTORY

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materials such as rubber and cotton, new markets
for its own domestic goods and areas of the world
where German capitalism could flourish in general.
The Great War could be perceived as basically a war
between two major competing imperial powers
battling out in the trenches for the right to colonise
and exploit. By the outbreak of the war, the
Austrian-Hungarian Empire was already a
crumbling edifice beset by strife caused by the
aspirations of the subject peoples to self-
determination. It had to ally itself with Germany in
an attempt to prolong its existence. France, on the
other hand, although a major imperial power, was
relatively militarily weak in comparison with
Britain and Germany. The war was essentially a
contest for dominance between the two major
imperial players, Britain and Germany.
Paragraph 6
Thus, when the Archduke Ferdinand was
assassinated, Germany immediately backed Austria
against the Serbs. With Russia allying itself with the
Serbs, this brought Britain and France into play
through the Entente. When Germany invaded
neutral Belgium in order to attack France, Britain
appeared to have no choice but to declare war
against Germany. Not only was France an ally,
Britain felt menaced by the Belgian ports being in
German hands. War became inevitable and Europe
became engulfed in a war that would devastate
huge areas and result in the deaths of millions of
people, end the rule of the German Kaisers, break up
the Austrian-Hungarian Empire and redraw the
map of Europe after the treaty of Versailles in 1919.
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