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What event sparked World War I?
On June 28, 1914, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir to the throne of the powerful Austria-Hungary, was assassinated along with his wife in Sarajevo, in Bosnia and Herzegovina, which was under the control of Austria-Hungary. The assassin, Gavrilo Princip, was a 19-year-old Bosnian Serb student, a nationalist, and an opponent of Austro-Hungarian control of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The assassination of the presumptive heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary was no small matter, but there was little indication when it occurred that it would trigger a massive World War that would eventually claim tens of millions of lives.
What was the July Crisis?
Soon after Franz Ferdinand’s assassination, a diplomatic dispute called the July Crisis erupted. The government of Austria-Hungary believed that the Serbian government was involved in the assassination and demanded to be involved in the investigation and judicial process within Serbia. No other countries had a direct interest in the matter, but Russia and Germany were the next to get involved—not directly because of their longstanding animosity toward each other but because of their obligations to support and protect their allies, Serbia, and Austria-Hungary, respectively. France, Britain, and the Ottoman Empire had even less interest in the dispute between Serbia and Austria-Hungary.
Was the Serbian government culpable in Archduke Franz Ferdinand’s assassination?
There is strong evidence that the secret separatist group that Gavrilo Princip belonged to, the Black Hand, was aided by elements within the Serbian army. The Black Hand provided training, arms, and other tactical support to carry out the assassination to Princip and his co-conspirators.
Was World War I inevitable?
It can be argued that the outbreak the war across Europe in August 1914 could have been avoided if Russia and Germany had simply kept out of the dispute between Serbia and Austria-Hungary stemming from the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. On the other hand, long-simmering tensions had existed among many of the principal nations prior to the war, and these conflicting ambitions contributed to the war’s escalation.
For example, the naval arms race between Germany and Britain was intensifying, and growing German colonial ambitions raised the tension level further. Additionally, the spread of nationalism in southern Europe was destabilizing Austria-Hungary, making the country dangerously vulnerable to minority uprisings. Thus, many historians and strategists have stated that an armed conflict between the European powers was inevitable. The disagreement over the archduke’s assassination simply provided a spark and an outlet. Interestingly, the view that war would have occurred even if the archduke had not been assassinated is reportedly what his assassin, Gavrilo Princip, believed as well.
How did diplomacy not just fail ot prevent the outbreak World War I, but actually but spur it?
Although diplomacy traditionally is used to prevent armed conflicts from happening, in the case of World War I, it in many ways played the opposite role, whether intended or not. Few of the combatant nations in World War I were directly interested in the disputes between Serbia and Austria-Hungary, and in many cases, they became involved only because of treaties obligating them to defend other countries. Although some of these treaties were publicly known, many had been made in secret, preventing potential enemies from ascertaining the consequences of their actions.
This opaqueness of diplomacy was arguably one of the main factors that led Germany to make such aggressive moves early in the war, as many German leaders believed that Britain would never enter the war against them. Russia likewise pursued a number of secret treaties and agreements both before and during the war. Italy went so far as to secretly shop around when trying to decide which side offered it the greatest potential benefits. Ultimately, these secret diplomatic maneuverings escalated the war to catastrophic levels. A result of the diplomatic disasters that contributed to the start of the war was that one of President Wilson’s “Fourteen Points” was that henceforth, all treaties and trade agreements between nations be held with full public disclosure.
How did the causes of the war compart to the reasons for it continuing in 1918?
In some ways, World War I in mid-1914 and World War I in mid-1918 are unrelated. What started as a local conflict over a political assassination had become an unbelievable bloodbath: the Indian troops fighting in Mesopotamia, the Australians fighting in Gallipoli, and the Americans fighting in France had no stake in the conflict between Austria-Hungary and Serbia. The same was largely true at the government level in many of the warring nations. For the Allied Powers, the fight was mostly about Germany, not Austria-Hungary. By 1918, those who were still fighting were doing so because they could not find a way to stop without facing unacceptable losses.
What role did nationalism play in ending World War I?
Nationalism—the direct cause of Archduke Franz Ferdinand’s assassination—had existed in southern, central, and eastern Europe long before was the assassination occurred in June 1914. Four years after the war began, nationalism was still very much an unresolved issue. It became the major cause of mutinies in the Austro-Hungarian army. Ultimately, these mutinies caused Austria-Hungary’s collapse, isolating Germany, and helping to bring about the war’s end.
