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From the view point of the British Empire, was WWI necessary, or was it a mistake?
In the left corner, Max Hastings argued that if Britain hadn’t gone to war, Germany would almost certainly have won in 1915 or 1916. This, he claimed, would have been an unmitigated disaster. He painted Wilhelmine Germany as a place only a few shades less evil than Germany under the Nazis: an undemocratic country run by a bullying dictator, in thrall to the military, and prone to committing the most horrific atrocities. He also pinned the blame for the war squarely on Germany’s shoulders.
Not so, protests Niall Ferguson from the right corner of the ring. Britain was as much to blame for turning the war into a truly global conflict, he says. Furthermore, Germany was not the monster Max Hastings makes it out to be: it was actually far more democratically progressive than Britain, which in 1914 still withheld the vote from 40 per cent of its male population. To imply comparisons between the Kaiser’s Germany and Hitler’s Germany is quite wrong. According to Ferguson, if Germany had won the war in 1916 it would not have been so bad: we would simply have ended up with a Wilhelmine version of today’s EU, and Britain would've kept its empire, or at least parted with it on better economical terms, not to speak of all the lives saved.
Where do you put your money, /his/? The British sitting out the war, enriching themselves from it, and seeing Europe united under the Kaiser, or sacrificing whats necessary to keep the evil authoritarian regime for taking more land and shaping the fates of more European people?
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There is an argument that Britain needed to take down Germany and Russia, or they would inevitably begin to outproduce her industrially; this was the trend before the war. Unlike the USA, they could not be relied on to be friendly.
So in a sense, Britain lucked out, two enemies were set back half a century.
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>>1477021
Max Hastings obviously.
For one thing, Niall is a hack.
For another, Max is right.
>Herrero Namaqua War. Atrocities towards Chinese Civilians.
>The German PUBLIC supported shit like increasing imperialist projects to steer clear from liberalizing reforms.
>Ousted fucking Bismarck who wanted compromise and MINIMAL social reforms.
>German Associations everywhere are fronts of German Imperialism.
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>>1477021
Don't forget the Germans gave the Brits an excuse with the invasion of Belgium, honestly after that the Brits had to get involved or risk losing face on the world scale, they guaranteed the neutrality and independence of Belgium, to fail on that could be disastrous to global power projection.
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>>1477077
>the east india trading company is not a front for british imperialism
>britain complaining about imperialism and occupation
I mean, come on, its 1914.
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>>1477083
>Implying I'm Brit.
What I'm complaining about is adding yet another, more vicious, Imperialist power in the clusterfuck that is Imperialism.
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Max Hastings is obviously biased by his opinions on WW2 Germany.
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>>1477087
The discussion is from the viewpoint of the British Empire, you don't have to be a Brit.
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>>1477021
The most recent scholarly research into the subject carried out by T. G. Otte focuses on the events immediately prior, during, and after July 1914. He says that Edward Grey(the foreign secretary) did everything in his power to avert a global conflict, so in the contemporary respect you can understand that a global conflict at that time was not in Britain's favour.
They participated because they couldn't afford any drastic change to the continental balance of power, and because there was a moral argument for assisting France.
Edward Grey had often stressed the idea of a diplomatic 'free hand' in crises leading up to WW1, which was in theory true. But when you make deals with France so they leave their channel border exposed to Germany, they can then use that as diplomatic leverage.
In my opinion, Niall Ferguson is a moron for taking such a harsh view on Britain's role in WW1, because it was individuals within Britain(and some in Germany, even) that did everything they could to avert war.
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Hastings is the right pic
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>>1477047
>There is an argument that Britain needed to take down Germany and Russia, or they would inevitably begin to outproduce her industrially; this was the trend before the war. Unlike the USA, they could not be relied on to be friendly.
This is just nonsense to be honest.
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>>1477021
>country that was on the forefront of welfare state development, had one of the strongest social democratic movements in Europe and, unlike Britain, had universal male suffrage, was a nazi evil empire
>>1477077
Bismarck wanted to violently clamp down on the social democratic movement while Wilhelm wanted to work with it to improve conditions you fucking retard
Also those responsible for for example Herero were replaced and it wasn't any worse than the British fucking the boers for instance.
The other empires also commited and supported atrocities in crushing the Boxer rebellion.
At the end of the day the German empire was one of the smaller ones and while they did plenty of cruel, exploitative shit pretty much every other empire did that as well. But they also did some good, which is why for instance the German word for school remains in their East African colony.
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The Imperial German navy was expanded to become second only in size to the British navy.
That presented a significant threat to the British navy, its shipping routes and the Empire. Even if Britain had sat out the war, had Germany had won I doubt Europe would have been the Kaiser's last territorial demand.
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>>1477741
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It was absolutely necessary.
The untold story is the way that pacifists and socialists wasted all of the sacrifices made by the military, and allowed Germany to rise again when it was totally preventable.
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2 british historians discuting
>Germany won in 1915-1916
GO EAT SHIT and fucking respect French soldiers
and Belgian, Russian and Serbian btw
>anglo arrogance
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