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Title: Ideology Of World War One
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Date: 2021-12-25
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Tags: WWI, Communism, Democracy, Imperialism, Ethnicity, Podcast
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Category: War
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How did ideology contribute to World War One? It did not.
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None of the extant ideological movements of the time were a factor in
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causing World War One. Even _ethnicity_, which is the opposite of ideology, played only a
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very small role.
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This blog post is a response to the Podcast
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[When Diplomacy Fails](https://www.wdfpodcast.com/){target="_blank"},
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which asserts that ideology was a contributing factor, but I disagree.
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### Communism
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None of the
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[belligerents](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belligerent){target="_blank"}
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were pro-communist. Even if one were to speculate that any of the belligerents,
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might have been capable of being motivated by the desire to prevent the
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spread of communism, there was nothing to prevent.
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While it is true that the outbreak of communism in Russia was tangent, that
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only lead to Russia withdrawing from the war.
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### Democracy
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Democracy is interesting because it had been a huge motivation in the past.
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Because the French Revolution gifted France the capability to raise
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huge armies,
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[The First Coalition](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_the_First_Coalition){target="_blank"}
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rose up against it.
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And Democracy certainly has been a huge factor in other wars. For instance Democracy
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gave Athens the spirit to win at
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[Marathon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Marathon){target="_blank"}.
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And Democracy enabled the allies to execute more effectively and win
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World War Two.
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But despite being the most democratic belligerent in WWI, France did not even have the most
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powerful army at the time, Germany did. And there is no indication that France wanted
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to spread Democracy to Germany. In a vacuum the only motivation France would have had to
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go to war with Germany would have been to recapture
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[Alace-Loraine](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alsace%E2%80%93Lorraine){target="_blank"},
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which it lost in the
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[Franco-Prussion War](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franco-Prussian_War){target="_blank"},
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or to possibly exchange colonial assets.
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### Imperialism
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The only exception here is that Serbia's stance was in opposition to the
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[Austro-Hungarian Empire](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Austria-Hungary){target="_blank"}.
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But in the final analysis, Serbia was merely a pawn.
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Russia, France, Italy, Austria, Britain, Ottomans, and Germany were all empires, and thus
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unopposed to Imperialism as an idea. Even the King of Belgium possessed colonies.
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### Monarchy
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While it is true that Austria wanted to protect the Monarchy as in institution, the fact that
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[Archduke Franz Ferdinand](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archduke_Franz_Ferdinand_of_Austria){target="_blank"}
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was heir to the Austrian Throne was only relevant in the local context of
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the assassination in Sarajevo. Indeed, Serbia also had a King.
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### Ethnicity
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The problem here is that identity is not an ideology. Identity is the opposite
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of ideology. Western Elitists may very well hold the ideology that identity is
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an ideology, but the ideology of identity being an ideology, is not that same
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thing as identity being an ideology. This merely shows how out-of-touch Elitists are.
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But even if we stipulate that identity is an ideology, this only applied to
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Russia coming to Serbia's defense because the Serbs are Slavs. And while it is
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true that the war would not have happened if Russia had not stood up for Serbia,
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in the final analysis Serbia was only a pawn. And furthermore, Russia was equally
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motivated by _sphere-of-influence_ considerations in the Balkans.
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And while it is true that Austria was motivated to contain Serb influence
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in its empire, Serbianism is not an ethnicity. A Serb is no more or less a
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Slav than is a Czech, Bosnian, or Croat, all of whom were already established
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within the empire.
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Were the Ottoman Turks Racist? Either way that is immaterial as they
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were only able to fight effectively in defense.
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Nor did Germany invade France for ethnic reasons. Germany attacked France
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because the strategy of the
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[Schlieffen](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schlieffen_Plan){target="_blank"}
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plan was to defeat France quickly
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on the assumption that Russia would be slow to mobilize, thus avoiding
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having to fight both at the same time. The fact that Germany entered the
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war because of Russian mobilization,
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and because Russia was deceptive and duplicitous about that,
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is a separate issue from the strategy
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of the Schlieffen plan.
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Nor did America enter the war for 'anti-German' reasons. America
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entered the war because she had lent vast amounts of money to the belligerents
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and needed to protect her investment. It would be as disingenuous to
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cast, as racist, alarm about the
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[Zimmerman Telegram](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zimmermann_Telegram){target="_blank"},
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as it is to cast Trump's Border Wall as racist.
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### War as an Ideology
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The Statesmen who pushed over the dominoes, may well have
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embraced the Glory or War, but that was an evolution; an effect but not a cause.
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As of June 28,
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no one thought that the destruction of Europe would be therapeutic.
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### Conclusion
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World War One was caused not by ideology, but by Nationalism and Fear.
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Nationalism and Fear are not ideas, they are feelings.
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The [Donkeys](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lions_led_by_donkeys){target="_blank"}
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were not thinking men anymore than
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[Democrats are](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cesSRfXqS1Q){target="_blank"}.
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Ironically, World War Two **was** caused by Idealism. From
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[Wilson's 14 Points](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourteen_Points){target="_blank"},
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to the
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[Versaille Treaty](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Versailles){target="_blank"}, to the
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[League of Nations](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/League_of_Nations){target="_blank"},
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to the
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[Weimar Republic](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weimar_Republic){target="_blank"}:
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the Elites tried
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to remake Society and the World according to their high-minded ideals, but then in
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typical fashion shielded themselves from the negative consequences of
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their idealism while being unwilling and incapable of enforcing them.
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Until
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[Patton](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_S._Patton){target="_blank"} came along.
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