Most Powerful Military in Janurary 1914?

Most Powerful Military in Jan 1914? (On Paper)

  • United Kingdom

    Votes: 32 25.8%
  • France

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Imperial Germany

    Votes: 81 65.3%
  • Austro-Hungarian Empire

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • United States of America

    Votes: 2 1.6%
  • Republic of China

    Votes: 3 2.4%
  • Imperial Russia

    Votes: 6 4.8%
  • Imperial Japan

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Ottoman Empire

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Other

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    124

Redbeard

Banned
Voted for Germany because the German Army was second to none in 1914 and its navy second to only one. Although the Royal Navy undisputedly ruled the waves the British Army by 1914 simply was too puny to independently make a creditable power projection where it mattered in 1914 - Europe. By 1917-18, when the RN was even bigger and the British army had become huge, and the Germans rather worn out, you might argue for the British Empire, but not by 1914.

If voting for potential and not actual military power I will vote for Andorra, they might anytime invent a machine that shits out Orcs of the Pyrenean rocks!

Serious, just looking at manpower or industrial resources like in the case of USA and China says very little about military power - it takes more. Even if having the industrial and manpower resources you still need to transform it into useful military power, that takes loong time, and you still need the will to use it. For most of its history USA hasn't had that will, only from 1917-18 and from 1941 and until Obama. For all its huge potential China has never had the ability or perhaps even the will to project power beyond its neighbour states - and they are still far from.

Another example is Russia in mid 19th century. On paper it had the most powerful army and a creditable navy too, but still it was beaten on own territory in the Crimean war by a relatively small international expeditionary force. In spite of all its countless and brave regiments Russia couldn't focus its power outside the Russian heartland. Same lesson in 1904-5 vs. Japan.
 
Russian Empire had the most potential. If they could have industrialised in the early 19thC, freed the Serfs, introduced compulsory schooling and liberalised the government then there was the potential by 1914 to be a proper superpower.
 

Redbeard

Banned
Russian Empire had the most potential. If they could have industrialised in the early 19thC, freed the Serfs, introduced compulsory schooling and liberalised the government then there was the potential by 1914 to be a proper superpower.
Just prior to WWI Russia indeed, and closely followed by A-H, had the fastest growth in industrialisation. If that growth could have continued of course is a good question, the regime after all wasn't particularly fit for modern life, but just looking at the naval expansion programmes in 1914 would indicate some potential confrontations with the old seapowers. First target would I guess however be the Japanese - a 2nd Russo-Japanese War in first half of 20th century? But they'll probably wait until the Transsiberian Railway is finished.

Being a modern and emancipated nation before 1914 is IMHO however highly unlikely, Russia hardly isn't today!
 

Wallet

Banned
At that moment, Germany had the largest strongest army, with the 2nd best navy.

At that moment, Great Britain had the largest strongest navy, and the smallest army in Europe. Maybe 4th or 5th.

The US had jack shit. Nothing. They had the greatest potential, but the question is clearly asking who had the best military at the moment of January 1914.

I give it to Germany. Naval warfare didn't win WWI. Land armies did, and before the US joined in 1917 Germany was able to gain land and hold off Britain, France, and Russia. While also supporting their allies Austria-Hungry and the Ottomans
 
At that moment, Germany had the largest strongest army, with the 2nd best navy.

At that moment, Great Britain had the largest strongest navy, and the smallest army in Europe. Maybe 4th or 5th.

The US had jack shit. Nothing. They had the greatest potential, but the question is clearly asking who had the best military at the moment of January 1914.

I give it to Germany. Naval warfare didn't win WWI. Land armies did, and before the US joined in 1917 Germany was able to gain land and hold off Britain, France, and Russia. While also supporting their allies Austria-Hungry and the Ottomans

The problem with your argument was that America was finally tipped into intervention by unlimited submarine warfare, the Germans embarked on unlimited submarine warfare as the British blockade at sea was defeating Germany's economy faster than its armies were 'winning' on land. So the Germans needed to gamble on the quick defeat of Britain before the Germans could no longer fight on land even at the risk of shortening the war not in their favour as America would come in if it did not work. The only means to do that was some form of naval warfare.

Naval warfare clearly did a lot to win World War 1 and might arguably be the factor that actually decided the war's outcome.

Oh and I would not say the US had nothing in 1914 either.
 

iddt3

Donor
You could also gauge it on who would be hardest to defeat, and think that one goes to the UK; An Alliance of France, Germany and Russia would be hard pressed to actually invade the UK, let alone any other single state. Germany had the best army, but not the best power projection or abilityto defend oneself.
 
Beiyang Army under Shikai and his lieutenants was actually pretty freaking strong (enough to give any European power a run for its money). Though I'm having trouble tracking down stats

Don't think they could have stopped the ad-hoc International Force from a Decade earlier, that went wherever in China they pleased, let alone a determined full scale invasion from anyone else in that list, even A-H or the Turks.
 
Imperial Russia. Germany and Austria feared them as the unstoppable juggernaut if they were allowed to mobilize, France viewed them as a trump card, Britain viewed them as a credible threat to India, Japan only narrowly won their war with Russia, which was pretty much in Japan's back yard, China couldn't stop them from marching all over them in the aforementioned war, and the Ottomans couldn't win against the Russian Army in any capacity outside of it self destructing during 1917. On paper, Russia was the dominant force on Earth. In reality, not so much.
 
20150625115154723.jpg


Ok, it took me a few days but here is some stats on the Republic of China, specifically the New Army (direct precursor to the Beiyang Army) :cool:. Since most of the information I found was written in Chinese, I had rely on a cursory translation of I found on a paradox forum. Here's a summary:

FwwlOD9h.jpg

Size: 400,000+

By the revolution there were either 1) 14 divisions & 18 mixed brigades or 2) 16 divisions & 16 mixed brigades, and actual strength varies between little more than a glorified mixed brigade (26th) or a fully prepared division (8th)

20150625115215663.jpg


Armaments:
The actual small arms the New Army (immediate precurser to Beiyang) had used include Mannlicher M1895, Gewehr 88 and Arisaka Type 30, probably with Gewehr 88 as the intended final candidate, as "Hanyang 88"
The artillery pieces used during Wuchang Uprising were Japanese Type 31. Some other divisions used Krupp or Gruson guns of the same caliber (75mm). There were Maxim machine guns, but didn't become standard equipment until 1909.

20150625115311609.jpg


Here is the source of my information

All together it seems my hypothesis could be wrong if you look at the state of the New Army in a vaccum but with out concrete stats on the far better trained better equiped and better lead Beiyang Army, the jury is still out.
 
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7 votes for Germany already? Jeez

I'd say Republic of China, really because of the mobilization potential and the nature of warfare at the time. You can't win an attrition war with China after all.

I voted China. Because why the fuck not. :p

Beiyang Army under Shikai and his lieutenants was actually pretty freaking strong (enough to give any European power a run for its money). Though I'm having trouble tracking down stats

Considering they did want to sign the 21 Demands, though, they're not very smart...

Wait a minute... Guys, are we talking about an army which could only hold 48 hours, according to Duan Qirui, in case of a Japanese invasion in 1915?

For the battle of Marne alone Germany amassed 1,485,000 troops for one battle, larger than the entire Beiyang paper strength in the same period of time. The Republic of China was, at that time, a pre-modern state unable to hold a general mobilization and utilize its human resources.

Even if the Beiyang Army had any military power, they would be restricted by its poor financial situation.

I'm of the opinion that a militarized China able to hold down a foreign invasion was the by-product of the Warlord Wars and ideological civil wars, before that the entire country was under-armed.
 
On paper, the Russians were the strongest after Germany. In fact if you looked purely at numbers, training and equipment Russians were more than a match for Germany. What led to the humiliation in the war was due to
1) Incompetence of their Leadership ( The Tsar making himself Commander-in-chief after Gorlice-Tarnow was a dumb move.
2) Lack of infrastructure, the railways and supply stations were simply inadequate to serve the needs of the truly massive Russian Army.
I'm a bit surprised at Britain being picked. I think that most people missed the "ON PAPER AT JAN 1, 1914" part. At the outbreak of the war they maintained only an entire standing army of 400k of which only the 120k strong Expedetionary Force was dispatched after the German DOW on Belgium. On paper there army was quite famously dwarfed by those of the other belligerents. Kaiser Wilhelm and Joseph Geoffrey, the French Commander-in-chief both were both famously contemptuous of the miniscule British army under John French ridiculing it as "a toy army", until they proved their worth at Lille and Ypres.( Ironic I know especially considering that it was the FRENCH accusing the Brits of incompetence.)
Of course, quality was different matter as theirs was the only professional army in the world at that time, composed of battle hardened and experienced veterans who were career soldiers not the draftees everyone else used. But the point stands. Even a 120k strong battle hardened veterans can't do much against million man forces fielded by the other Great Powers.
Their navy now was a different matter as it was larger then the next four largest combined. Overall Britain was the strongest power from late 1915 onwards but at 1914 they simply weren't.
No.2 or 3 perhaps but not THE best
 

Daniels

Banned
Lets see - in 1915 the German army simultaneously fought the French, British and Russian armies - with a little help from the Austro-Hungarian Empire - and held its own. So its pretty obvious who had the best army.
 
First, thanks so much for finding this(how on earth did you find this :closedtongue:). I should also say though that I'm still not convinced that the Chinese were an army that could stand up against the Japanese, the former has continuous training experience of ~10 years by WWI(I found the pics were from 1908) while the Japanese have at least 30. The Chinese certainly showed their capability in fighting big wars with these modern weapons during the warlord years in the 1920s and 30s, but the Japanese were already among the best in the world in the 1910s. The Chinese army would get beat around northern China and then Japan would probably suffer another Triple Intervention after biting a tad big for their size.
 
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