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Description:
Leading up to WWI, Europe got a little complicated. Looks like imperialism will come back to bite you.
Transcript
- 00:00
while Europe's leaders were stitching a false piece together by
- 00:06
making alliances left and right, other forces were at work driving the [heads of state pictured]
- 00:11
continent slowly but inexorably toward war. those forces were, nationalism
- 00:18
imperialism, and militarism. and those are three of the big isms.
- 00:24
fortunately botulism is notably absent from this list. okay so let's start with
Full Transcript
- 00:29
nationalism. way back in unit 2 we talked about how in the early 1800s various
- 00:36
people's across Europe wanted to join together to form their own countries. at
- 00:40
last the Nationalists thought, everyone who spoke the same language sang the
- 00:45
same songs and ate the same food would be able to do all of those things
- 00:49
together just in a little nation state of their very own. [men waving bread smile]
- 00:53
while nationalism got squashed after Napoleon's defeat it displayed cockroach
- 00:58
like tendencies and rose from the dead again and again throughout the 19th
- 01:03
century. by the 1870s several areas of Europe were ripe for a nationalistic
- 01:08
resurgence . you had the Austrian and Ottoman empires which covered a lot of
- 01:12
territory in which featured a whole bunch of different ethnic and cultural
- 01:16
groups. and on the other hand you had Germany in Italy. as we mentioned in unit
- 01:21
2. many of the aristocrats ruling Europe were not wild about nationalism. like at [members of ruling class pictured]
- 01:26
all .if they could have killed it with fire they would have. instead they pulled
- 01:30
that every trick in the book to try and contain nationalist sentiment. the
- 01:34
Austrian Empire for example gave itself a new name by sticking the word
- 01:38
Hungarian in between Austria and Empire the ruling Habsburg family hoped like
- 01:44
heck people of Hungary would simmer down and not stage a revolt. again.
- 01:50
austria-hungary also reconfigured itself so that while the Austrian and Hungarian
- 01:54
states controlled their own domestic affairs a single ruler oversaw all [compromise of 1867 pictured]
- 01:59
foreign and economic ones. just like every other man in Europe at the time,
- 02:03
well dude had a huge mustache .well father East Tsar Alexander ii
- 02:09
implemented a program of Russification - that he hoped would
- 02:13
magically turn all of his empires minority citizens from rebels into
- 02:18
russet potato into Russians. other European nations were less terrified of
- 02:24
nationalism. in fact they did their best to make national pride via in thing. well
- 02:30
the British expanded voting rights and started paying their elected
- 02:33
representatives. the French created a new constitution that called for a republic
- 02:39
with a president and a bicameral legislature . all right well the Germans [legislative document pictured]
- 02:44
started providing financial aid to the sick and disabled, while retired workers
- 02:48
gained access to a pension system. after finishing up all those reforms at home
- 02:53
Europe's leaders began to ask themselves what else they could do to make their
- 02:57
citizens feel, you know proud. well the answer was to subjugate as many non
- 03:02
Europeans as possible. yay. for example Italy who really should
- 03:08
have known better after the whole Tunisia thing and we talked about in the
- 03:11
last lesson , tried to take over Ethiopia in 1890s and well promptly failed,
- 03:16
national pride was dented but not to worry third time's the charm! [painting of battle pictured]
- 03:20
in 1911 Italy snatched Tripoli from the Ottomans, and renamed it Libya. and so
- 03:25
Africa and Asia were made into Christmas dinner for the countries of Europe. at
- 03:29
last there was peace at home and you know kind of peace abroad. it was at this
- 03:34
point that Europe's leaders decided to build up their militaries because well
- 03:38
you never know when some Archduke is gonna go off and get himself
- 03:42
assassinated. well between 1890 and 1914 Europe's [picture of assignation shown]
- 03:46
military forces doubled in size and every country except Great Britain
- 03:50
instituted mandatory military service for its male citizens. of course this
- 03:55
increased militarism- meant that military leaders began to have more and more
- 03:59
power within national governments/ well if you've ever wondered why civilians
- 04:04
and not soldiers have ultimate authority over the military in many countries
- 04:07
today this this right here the lead-up to World War one is your answer/ because
- 04:14
what the German military did was designed these really complex plans for [map of France featuring invasion plans pictured]
- 04:19
invading France very quickly .once they had those plans and an opportunity well
- 04:24
went looking for a fight .by 1914 in spite of the alliances Europe's leaders
- 04:29
thought would keep everybody safe, while the continent was a toxic brew of
- 04:33
nationalism imperialism and militarism. all the situation needed now was a match-
- 04:39
or a bullet- you know -whatever works. [flaming cauldron pictured]
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