6 - War and disintegration, 1914–1950

Summary

Introduction

Between 1914 and 1945 Europe's economic development and integration were interrupted and set back by two world wars, and its regional patterns were brutally distorted by combat, exterminations, migrations, and the redrawing of borders. The First World War (the “Great War” of 1914–18) set more than thirty countries into conflict with each other and led to ten million premature deaths. It was dwarfed only by the Second World War (1939–45), in which more than sixty countries waged war and the war prematurely ended the lives of more than fifty-five million people (Broadberry and Harrison 2005b). As for who fought whom, there were limited continuities: in both wars, Germany, Austria, and Hungary fought Britain, France, and Russia for much of the time. Other allegiances changed. For ease of reference, Table 6.1 lists the European countries that were in or out of each war and, if in, on what side.

Although punctuated by an “interwar period,” the two wars can be understood as a single historical process. The process was global but the European dimension was fundamental to it. Thus, Europe was the main theatre of a vast thirty-year conflict of empires and nationalisms. The first War was fought primarily by European powers in Europe; some non-European participants and colonial polities played a minor role while others intervened late in the process.