Triple Entente

• 1. Diplomatic Origins And Alliances

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  In 1870, Prussia and its allies defeated the Second French Empire during the Franco-Prussian War. The Treaty of Frankfurt forced France to cede Alsace-Lorraine to the new German Empire. This loss soured relations between Paris and Berlin for decades. France worried about Germany's escalating military development and began building up its own war industries. Russia had previously been a member of the League of the Three Emperors in 1873 with Austria-Hungary and Germany. German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck designed this alliance to isolate France diplomatically. He feared that France's revanchist aspirations might lead it to attempt to regain its 1871 losses stemming from the Franco-Prussian War. The alliance also served to oppose socialist movements like the First International. Growing tensions between Russia and Austria-Hungary over the Balkans made the League difficult to maintain. Nationalism rose while the Ottoman Empire declined. Many former Ottoman provinces struggled for independence. In October 1879, the Dual Alliance between Germany and Austria-Hungary was concluded. Italy joined this pact in May 1882. The situation in the Balkans prevented the League from being renewed in 1887. Bismarck signed the secret Reinsurance Treaty with Russia in 1887 to stop Russia from allying with France. This treaty assured both parties would remain neutral if war broke out. The growing rapprochement between Russia and France ended the alliance between Germany and Russia when the treaty expired in 1890.

• 2. The Entente Cordiale Breakthrough

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  Britain continued its policy of splendid isolation through the last decade of the nineteenth century. Its primary focus remained defending its massive overseas empire. By the early 1900s, the German threat had increased dramatically. London thought it needed allies to counter this danger. British officials made overtures to Berlin which were not reciprocated. London turned instead to Paris and St. Petersburg. In 1904, Britain and France signed a series of agreements known as the Entente cordiale. These deals mostly aimed toward resolving colonial disputes. France and Britain signed five separate agreements regarding spheres of influence in North Africa that year. The Tangier Crisis later encouraged cooperation between the two countries. Both nations shared fear of apparent German expansionism. This agreement heralded the end of British splendid isolation. It marked a significant shift from isolation towards strategic partnership. Some contemporaries viewed this partnership as an unholy alliance due to its informal nature. Former rivalries between the two empires complicated the new relationship. The move was seen as both necessary and controversial at the time.

• 3. Anglo-Russian Convention Of 1907

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  Russia had recently lost the humiliating Russo-Japanese War. This defeat caused the Russian Revolution of 1905 and transformed Russia into a constitutional monarchy. Although the alliance appeared useless during the war with Japan, it proved valuable in the European theatre. The goal was to counteract the threat of the Triple Alliance. In 1907, the Anglo-Russian Entente was agreed upon. This convention attempted to resolve long-running disputes over Persia, Afghanistan, and Tibet. It ended their rivalry in Central Asia, which historians nicknamed The Great Game. The agreement helped address British fears about the Baghdad Railway. That railway would help German expansion in the Near East. Edward Ingram described Britain's role in this historical period as an introduction to the Great Game. The evolution of the triple entente relationship progressed from shaky understandings to a fully-fledged alliance after World War I broke out. Tomaszewski describes this progression from 1908 to 1914 as a series of crises that were withstood. These events emerged as a complete alliance only when war began.

• 4. Naval Rivalry And Strategic Shifts

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  Britain traditionally held control of the seas until 1909. By that year, the German navy posed a serious threat to its Royal Navy. Germany had fallen behind in Dreadnought technology but responded with a major building program. They built a Royal Navy that Germany could never rival. The British sent war minister Lord Haldane to Berlin in February 1912 to reduce friction. His mission failed because Germans attempted to link a naval holiday with neutrality promises. They wanted Britain to remain neutral if Germany became engaged in a war where Germany was not the aggressor. Zara Steiner noted it would have meant abandoning the whole system of ententes nurtured during the past six years. There was no German concession to counter fear of German aggression. Essentially, the British reserved the right to join whatever country was attacking Germany even if Germany did not start the conflict. This doomed the talks to failure. According to German historian Dirk Bönker, the naval race created an atmosphere of mutual hostility and distrust. It circumscribed space for peaceful diplomacy and public recognition of shared interests. This helped pave the twisted road to war in Europe.

• 5. Informal Nature And Political Tensions

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  The Entente differed from the Triple Alliance and the Franco-Russian Alliance by lacking a mutual defense clause. Britain remained free to make its own foreign policy decisions in 1914. Eyre Crowe minuted that the fundamental fact was that the Entente is not an alliance. He stated it may be found to have no substance at all for ultimate emergencies. The Entente was nothing more than a frame of mind or view of general policy shared by governments. It could become so vague as to lose all content. Many Russian conservatives distrusted the secular French. They recalled British past diplomatic manoeuvres to block Russian influence in the Near East. Prominent French and British journalists, academics, and parliamentarians found the reactionary tsarist regime distasteful. Mistrust persisted even during wartime. British and French politicians expressed relief when Tsar Nicholas II abdicated after the February Revolution in 1917. An offer of political asylum for the Romanovs was withdrawn by the British king due to fear of popular reaction. France never brought up the subject of asylum with the deposed tsar.

• 6. World War I Mobilization

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  At the start of World War I in 1914, all three Triple Entente members entered as Allied Powers. They fought against the Central Powers: Germany, Austria-Hungary, the Ottoman Empire, and Bulgaria. On the 4th of September 1914, the Triple Entente issued a declaration undertaking not to conclude a separate peace. They agreed to demand terms of peace only if agreed among the three parties. Historians continue to debate the importance of the alliance system as one of the causes of World War I. The alignment of the Russian Empire with Europe's two largest power centres remained controversial on both sides. The situation remained flexible despite the coming into being of the entente. It did not necessarily fix a permanent division into two opposing power blocs. The coalition that fought World War I included Japan, Russia, and Britain through informal agreements. France took the lead in creating alliances with these nations. Japan wanted to raise a loan in Paris. France made the loan contingent on a Russo-Japanese agreement and a Japanese guarantee for France's strategically vulnerable possessions in Indochina. Britain encouraged the Russo-Japanese rapprochement to build this coalition.