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HMS Dreadnought.The 1902, 1904 and 1907 agreements with Japan, France and Russia allowed Britain to refocus resources during the Anglo-German naval arms race. In explaining why Britain went to war with Germany, British historian Paul Kennedy (1980) argued that a critical factor was the British realisation that Germany was rapidly becoming economically more powerful than Britain.
The highly controversial introduction, in January 1916, of conscription for the first time in British history followed the raising of one of the largest all-volunteer armies in history, known as Kitchener's Army, of more than 2,000,000 men. [1]: 504 The outbreak of war was a socially unifying event. [2]
An outline of British military history, 1660–1936 (1936). online; Dupuy, R. Ernest and Trevor N. Dupuy. The Harper Encyclopedia of Military History: From 3500 B.C. to the Present (1993). Fortescue, John William. History of the British Army from the Norman Conquest to the First World War (1899–1930), in 13 volumes with six separate map volumes.
A 1917 poster designed by Robert Baden-Powell encouraging civilian participation in the war effort. This is a timeline of the British home front during the First World War from 1914 to 1918. This conflict was the first modern example of total war in the United Kingdom ; innovations included the mobilisation of the workforce, including many ...
The cavalry brigade had one British and two Indian regiments while the infantry brigades consisted of one British and three Indian battalions. [14] Indian Army battalions were smaller than the British battalions, consisting of 30 officers and 723 other ranks [10] as compared to the British 29 officers and 977 other ranks. [15]
By the First World War, the British military forces (i.e., those raised in British territory, whether in the British Isles or colonies, and also those raised in the Channel Islands, but not the British Indian Army, the military forces of the Dominions, or those of British protectorates) was still a complex of organisations, and not strictly a single force under a single administration.
Canada's military and civilian participation in the First World War strengthened a sense of British-Canadian nationhood among the Anglophones (English speakers). The Francophones (French speakers) supported the war at first, but pulled back and stood aloof after 1915 because of language disputes at home.
For a century British governmental policy and public opinion were against conscription for foreign wars. At the start of World War I the British Army consisted of six infantry divisions , [ 3 ] one cavalry division in the United Kingdom formed shortly after the outbreak of the war, [ 4 ] and four divisions located overseas.