What part did militarism play in increasing tensions in Europe

Militarism is the build up of military resources such as weapons, military transport and personnel with the aim of using the military to achieve a country's goals.

From 1870, France and Germany were among nations competing with each other to build greater armies. In the process, fear, suspicion and hatred leading to tension was created among the nations.

Great Britain and Germany spent much of the early 20th century racing each other to build larger warships. Britain had one of the greatest navies and emperor Wilhelm II of Germany decided he wanted one like that, so he gave orders to construct several large and powerful boats.

The British responded by building a "Dreadnought", a fast and very dangerous boat. Then the Germans started to build this type of boat, and a race to have the largest navy began.

This led to tensions between the British and The Germans and contributed to the outbreak of world war I.