For you history buffs......

[Deleted]

On this day (100 years ago), June 28, 1914 Archduke Franz-Ferdiand of Austria-Hungary and his wife, Sofie Duchess of Hohenberg, were assassinated in Sarajevo. This murder would, within weeks, spark a European war that became known as World War I. In its time it was known as either the Great War or the World War.

Here is my blog post on the subject.


europeanroyalhistory.wordpress.com/2014/06/28/100th-anniversary-of-the-assassination-of-hih-archduke-franz-ferdinand-of-austria-este/

[thedude]

Ken Follet's Fall of Giants does a pretty good treatment of the complexities surrounding the start of WWI.

Two things that always stand out to me about WWI are
1) with industrialization and greater freedoms in the west for more people, there was an assumption that war was a thing of the past and
2) how treaties that bind nations to defend one another from an enemy can create wars where the objective seems to be more about honoring one's commitment to the treaty rather than really thinking through if the war is a good idea

[Deleted]

Jun 28, 2014 9:47:10 GMT -5 thedude said:

Ken Follet's Fall of Giants does a pretty good treatment of the complexities surrounding the start of WWI.

Two things that always stand out to me about WWI are
1) with industrialization and greater freedoms in the west for more people, there was an assumption that war was a thing of the past and
2) how treaties that bind nations to defend one another from an enemy can create wars where the objective seems to be more about honoring one's commitment to the treaty rather than really thinking through if the war is a good idea

Yes, to both of those points. I think the alliance system, where one country was duty bound to defend the other when attacked, was a big cause of the war. Plus there were ethnic rivalries in the Balkan states that came to a head as the Ottoman Empire was decaying and the major European powers were swooping in to take control. Plus Britain and Germany had an arms race in the first decade of the 20th century as the Kaiser, a grandson of Queen Victoria, wanted Germany to surpass Britain power.