Editing Edwardian era (section)

=== Ties with France and Russia against Germany ===
{{Further|France–United Kingdom relations|Germany–United Kingdom relations}}[[File:Punch cartoon 28 April 1909.jpg|thumb|280px|"Wild Fare". Cartoonist [[John Bernard Partridge]] depicts Lloyd George as a giant with a cudgel labelled "Budget" in reference to his [[People's Budget]]; Asquith cowers beneath the table. ''[[Punch (magazine)|Punch]]'' 28 April 1909]]Germany's Chancellor [[Otto von Bismarck]] dominated European diplomacy from 1872 to 1890, with a policy of using the [[European balance of power]] to keep the peace. Bismarck was removed by an aggressive young Kaiser Wilhelm in 1890, effectively decentralizing the Bismarckian Order that had been shrewdly managed, and empowering French efforts to isolate Germany. With the formation of the [[Triple Entente]], Germany began to feel encircled: to the West lay France, with whom rivalry was awakening after a generation of dormancy following the [[Franco-Prussian War]], to the East sat Russia, whose rapid industrialization worried Berlin and Vienna.<ref>Samuel R. Williamson Jr., "German Perceptions of the Triple Entente after 1911: Their Mounting Apprehensions Reconsidered" ''Foreign Policy Analysis'' 7#2 (2011): 205–214 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/24909770 online].</ref>

[[Joseph Chamberlain]], who played a major role in foreign policy in the late 1890s under the Salisbury government, repeatedly tried to open talks with Germany about some sort of alliance. Berlin was not interested.<ref>H.W. Koch, "The Anglo‐German Alliance Negotiations: Missed Opportunity or Myth?." ''History'' 54#182 (1969): 378–392.</ref> Meanwhile, Paris went to great pains to woo Russia and Great Britain. Key markers were the [[Franco-Russian Alliance]] of 1894, the 1904 [[Entente Cordiale]] linking France and Great Britain, and finally the [[Anglo-Russian Entente]] in 1907 which became the [[Triple Entente]]. France thus had a formal alliance with Russia, and an informal alignment with Britain, against Germany and Austria.<ref>G.P. Gooch, ''Before the war: studies in diplomacy'' (1936), pp 87–186.</ref> By 1903 good relations had been established with the United States and Japan.<ref>A.J.P. Taylor, ''The Struggle for Mastery in Europe, 1848–1918'' (1954) pp 345, 403–26</ref>

Britain abandoned the policy of holding aloof from the continental powers, so called "[[Splendid Isolation]]", in the 1900s after being isolated during the [[Boer War]]. Britain concluded agreements, limited to colonial affairs, with her two major colonial rivals: the [[Entente Cordiale]] with France in 1904 and the [[Anglo-Russian Entente]] of 1907. Britain's alignment was a reaction to an assertive German foreign policy and the build-up of its navy from 1898 which led to the [[Anglo-German naval arms race]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Strachan |first=Hew |title=The First World War |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KZHITOPMf4gC&pg=PP1 |year=2005|publisher=Penguin |isbn=9781101153413 }}</ref> British diplomat [[Arthur Nicolson, 1st Baron Carnock|Arthur Nicolson]] argued it was "far more disadvantageous to us to have an unfriendly France and Russia than an unfriendly Germany".<ref>Christopher Clark, ''The Sleepwalkers: How Europe Went to War in 1914'' (2014) p. 324</ref>

The impact of the Triple Entente was to improve British relations with France and its ally Russia and to demote the importance to Britain of good relations with Germany. After 1905, foreign policy was tightly controlled by the Liberal Foreign Secretary [[Edward Grey, 1st Viscount Grey of Fallodon|Edward Grey]] (1862–1933), who seldom consulted with his party leadership. Grey shared the strong Liberal policy against all wars and against military alliances that would force Britain to take a side in war. However, in the case of the Boer War, Grey held that the Boers had committed an aggression that it was necessary to repulse. The Liberal party split on the issue, with a large faction strongly opposed to the war in Africa.<ref>Keith Robbins, "Grey, Edward, Viscount Grey of Fallodon (1862–1933)", ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography,'' (2004; online edition, 2011) [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/33570, accessed 5 Nov 2017]</ref>

The Triple Entente between Britain, France and Russia is often compared to the [[Triple Alliance (1882)|Triple Alliance]] between Germany, Austria–Hungary and Italy, but historians caution against the comparison. The Entente, in contrast to the Triple Alliance or the [[Franco-Russian Alliance]], was not an alliance of mutual defence, and Britain therefore felt free to make her own foreign policy decisions in 1914. The Liberals were highly moralistic, and by 1914 they were increasingly convinced that German aggression violated international norms, and specifically that its invasion of neutral Belgium was completely unacceptable in terms of morality, of Britain and Germany's obligations under the [[Treaty of London (1839)|Treaty of London]], and of British policy against any one power controlling the continent of Europe.<ref>K.A. Hamilton, "Great Britain and France, 1911–1914" in F. H. Hinsley, ed., ''British Foreign Policy Under Sir Edward Grey'' (1977) [https://books.google.com/books?id=VJ08AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA324 online p 324]</ref>

Until the last few weeks before it started in August 1914, almost no one saw a world war coming. The expectation among the generals was that because of industrial advances any future war would produce a quick victory for the side that was better-prepared, better armed, and faster to move. No one saw that the innovations of recent decades—high explosives, long-range artillery and machine guns—were defensive weapons that practically guaranteed defeat of massed infantry attacks with very high casualties.<ref>Gerd Krumeich, "The War Imagined: 1890–1914." in John Horne, ed. ''A Companion to World War I'' (2012) pp 1–18.</ref>