Alliances and the Causes of WWI
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What students do
- Explain how the alliance system divided Europe into two competing blocs by 1914
- Analyze the 1882 Triple Alliance treaty text as primary-source evidence of its mutual-defense terms
- Argue how militarism and nationalism raised tension among the great powers before 1914
- Trace the July Crisis from Franz Ferdinand's assassination to the outbreak of general war
What it covers
- The mutual-defense terms of the Triple Alliance and the Triple Entente
- How the alliance system turned a regional crisis into a continental war
- Key vocabulary including alliance system, militarism, mobilization, and the July Crisis
Learning targets
- Explain how the alliance system divided Europe into two competing blocs by 1914.
- Describe the mutual-defense terms of the Triple Alliance and the Triple Entente.
- Analyze how militarism and nationalism raised tension among the great powers.
- Explain how Franz Ferdinand's assassination triggered the July Crisis.
- Evaluate how alliances turned a regional crisis into a continental war.
From one teacher to another
Twenty-eight days sat between Franz Ferdinand's assassination on June 28, 1914, and a war that had swallowed five great powers by early August. I put the Triple Alliance treaty of 1882 itself in front of students, in its own words, so the mutual-defense promises they weigh aren't my paraphrase of them. The lesson opens the WWI unit on purpose, teaching the alliance system before the fighting starts so the July Crisis makes sense once it hits.
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