Today I found out what started World War I.
The commonly held notion that it was started out of outrage over the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife Sophie at the hands of Serbian nationalist secret society known as the “Black Hand” isn’t entirely correct. In fact, the Emperor Franz Josef himself expressed relief over the assassination because it rid him of an heir whom he deeply disliked. The Emperor commented that “God will not be mocked. A higher power had put back the order I couldn’t maintain.”
Indeed, it wasn’t just the Emperor who was relieved; it was reported by an Austrian newspaper that the general consensus among the various political circles was that the assassination, though a tragedy, was for the best. As far as the Austrian people were concerned, it was noted “The event almost failed to make any impression whatever. On Sunday and Monday, the crowds in Vienna listened to music and drank wine as if nothing had happened.” Indeed, it took the government itself a full three weeks to react.
As you’ll see shortly, the “treaty alliance system” that was prevalent in Europe with numerous treaties interconnecting the various states was really at the heart of why what would have been a small conflict, not noteworthy in any way in history, escalated into one of the bloodiest wars in human history with over 15 million people dead. Somewhat ironically, the spark that set it all off was the assassination that nobody really cared about.
So why go to war over an assassination, if nobody cared? Because, while nobody seemed to much care about the assassination itself, Austria-Hungary had been looking for an excuse to wage a “preventative war” against Serbia as a state in order to weaken or destroy them so as to take back territory in the Balkans, which had been taken during the Balkan Wars. They had not taken it back up to this point because they lacked Germany’s support; without that support, they feared Russia too much, because of the treaty Russia had with Serbia.
With the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife on June 28th, 1914, Austria-Hungary was able to secure the promise from Germany that it would aid in a war with Serbia and possibly Russia, if Russia chose to enter the fray due to their treaty with Serbia. It should be noted here that Austria-Hungary did not really expect Russia to enter the fray as they expected this to be a very small war that would be over quickly, before Russia would be obligated to respond. Now with Germany’s support if Russia did enter the fray, Austria-Hungary issued an ultimatum to Serbia with remarkably severe terms that Serbia would be sure to reject, thus giving Austria-Hungary an excuse to go launch a limited war on Serbia to reclaim territory in the Balkans.
Surprisingly, Serbia responded relatively well to the ultimatum, but they did dispute a few minor clauses, which gave Austria-Hungary the excuse they needed to go to war. At this point, the following general series of events happened due to a variety of existing treaties between various nations, which escalated this minor clash into the first “Great War”.
Russia bound by their treaty with Serbia decides to come to Serbia’s aid.- Germany, with the recent treaty with Austria-Germany, declares war on Russia.
- France, bound by an existing treaty with Russia, now is at war with Germany by association. Germany then invades Belgium to have easy access to France.
- Britain, allied to France with an existing treaty, declares war against Germany. This was unexpected by Germany as they expected Britain to stay out of the war, due to the fact that the treaty with France was loosely worded and not entirely binding. However, Britain also had a 75 year old treaty with Belgium. So because of both of these treaties, they decided to declare war on Germany.
- With Britain now warring with Germany, Canada, India, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa enter the war as they were colonies of Britain.
- Japan honors an existing treaty with Britain and declares war on Germany.
- Austria-Hungary declare war on Japan for declaring war on Germany.
- The U.S. tries to stay out of the war but in 1917 decides to enter due to Germany’s submarine’s hindering the United State’s commercial shipping because the U.S. was shipping a lot of supplies to the Allies.
So in the end, a small quick war over a minor land dispute got turned into a lengthy war that was joined by powers all over the globe due to a variety of existing treaties dating back as much as 75 years before the war started.
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Nice post!!
One thing that’s missing here is the reason why the archduke was assassinated by the Black Hand! A lot of it has to do with the animosity of the Orthodox religion against the Catholic Church which was at the heart of the conflict; a tension which still continues to linger in some Orthodox countries.
Although I’m not sure when Australia,NZ, and SA officially gained their independence, Canada most certainly NOT a British Colony at the time of WWI. We had close ties to Britain still and were obligated to enter the fray do to these, but we became a country in 1867.
Kaiser Wilhelm was the biggest factor for WWI – a spoiled little brat with a gimpy left arm with HUGE inferiority complex ready to take it out on the world – responsible for both World Wars
wikileaks will trigger the next war?
Rick, there is much more animosity of the Catholic Church against the Orthodox religion in last century. Vatican used to re-baptize Orthodox people during II World War and thus convert them to the Catholic Church. Black Hand was an organization who was against Austro-Hungarian annexation of Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1908 and there were not only Serb nationalists, but Muslims too. Here is a caricature from Austrian newspapers calling for war against Serbia right after assassination as a proof that war was desired by Austria-Hungaria:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/15/Serbien_muss_sterbien.jpg
I really suggest that whoever wrote this article, read Hew Strachans’ “The First World War”. It’s a really great book detailing the causes, duration, and effects of the first world war. If you can not read the book for what ever reason, then I suggest you watch the documentary by the same name. In fact, anyone who reads this and is interested in the First World War, I suggest this to you.
@ Chris:
you did not become a nation in 1867, in 1867 you combined british colonies under confederation into one provence under the word Canada. But up until 1937 you still relyed on Britian for foreign affairs and other things. It wasnt untill 1937 that you got more autonomity from the brits. Then FINALLY in 1982 you severed all ties to the British Parlament (vestige and legal independence). Your relationship was quid pro quo…
and by 1907 the start of the war, considering you were reliant on the british for foreign affairs (which what ww1 was to the canadians) then walla you got British control over Canada to enter the war…
there are other gaps but you get the idea…you cant claim independence when your suckling on the nanny states ‘tata’s for the next century…
Actually Anthony, Canada, New Zealand, Australia and S.A. were all self governing members of a very close knit commonwealth of english speaking former colonies. Their going to war when England did was a independent act of their respective parliaments. Because of the various dates of internal self governance being within 50 years of WW1′s start, there remained a very close attachment to England and their shared head of state King George V. However all had independent parliaments and prime ministers as head of gov’t……
Very nice. This helped me with my social studies essay.
We are learning about this now, 8th grade Social Studies evolves alot around WW1.