# Gavrilo Princip and the Archduke **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 21, 2014, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306 "2014-06-21T17:29:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2014, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/41 "2014-06-25T01:33:37Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > And the Russians were the first to mobilize. Russia mobilized as soon as the ultimatum was issued…before the Russian government had even read it, and the Russian mobilization was accompanied by the freezing of German assets. They definitely deserve some sort of moral responsibility for the situation, because they had committed to war before anyone else. They began to mobilize, and as a result of the Germans. Every cartridge had to be carried by sled to the front. The second wave across the trenches was not armed; they were instructed to retrieve weapons from their fallen comrades. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2014, 2:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/42 "2014-06-25T02:54:40Z")
They began to mobilize before the Germans. Saranov gave the mobilization order on July 24, and the mobilization in Western districts started on July 25 followed by general mobilization on July 30. German mobilization started July 31-August 1 in response to Russian mobilization. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2014, 11:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/43 "2014-06-25T11:18:56Z")
Thanks. And I’ve read Nicholas and Alexandra and the Guns of August. Shame on me. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2014, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/44 "2014-06-27T20:27:59Z")
Well this just seems wrong: [Bosnian Serbs Honor Assassin Who Triggered WWI](http://www.nbcnews.com/news/europe/bosnian-serbs-honor-assassin-who-triggered-wwi-n142561) I realize one side’s terrorist is another side’s freedom fighter. Nevertheless Princip started the ball rolling on two world wars which ultimately claimed in the neighborhood of 80 million lives. What’s more, and something I never understood, is the Archduke was about the best friend the Serbs had in the A-H government. Hardly seems the the source of all their problems. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2014, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/45 "2014-06-27T21:02:46Z")
The war did end with Bosnia part of a greater South Slavic state ruled by a Serbian king, so win for the Bosnian Serbs there. Plus, a lot of Bosnian Serbs figure they’re still under foreign rule. So he’s a symbol of someone who stood up to the occupiers for a greater Serbia. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2014, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/46 "2014-06-28T03:51:37Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > So he’s a symbol of someone who stood up to the occupiers for a greater Serbia. I would be fascinated to know what Princip would choose to do if you went back in time and showed him what he set in motion (WWI and WWII). I would be surprised if he would be willing to pull the trigger if he knew what it would lead to. Fewer people died in WWI than in WWII in raw numbers but WWI set standards of horror for war that are unsurpassed before or since (and that is saying something as no war is ever “clean”). That is a helluva butcher’s bill the Serbs charged for not a whole lot and as a country I am not sure I would want to put up statues to a guy who got WWI rolling. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2014, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/47 "2014-06-28T04:10:54Z")
Serbia actually suffered, as a percentage, the highest loses of all the belligerent powers. About half of its army was destroyed. It suffered the loss of about half of its male population, and about a quarter of its total population. Serbian casualties represented about 8% of Entente losses, which might not seem like a lot until you realize that Serbia was, by far, one of the smallest of the Entente nations. So, who knows. Princip might not have thought it worth it. Then again, maybe he would have. But, this statue isn’t about Princip and WWI so much as it is about the current Bosnian Serb population, their discontent about sharing the government with Bosniaks and Croats, and their desire to be part of a greater Serbia. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2014, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/48 "2014-06-28T12:55:57Z")
I think that if he knew what he would set in motion, he’d probably be thrilled. Not many people have a chance to change history as he did, and if I recall correctly, he was unapologetic about what he caused up to his death in 1918. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/49 "2014-06-29T04:28:32Z")
BTW the BBC is doing a “live” report of the assassination of the Archduke recreated with today’s reporting techniques. > **[28 June 1914: Archduke Ferdinand and wife assassinated - BBC News](https://www.bbc.com/news/live/world-27978407)** > > Minute by minute coverage of the day that led to WW1. ---
**Author:** ![C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b2d939/32.png) [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 11:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/50 "2014-06-29T11:57:58Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > Well this just seems wrong: [Bosnian Serbs Honor Assassin Who Triggered WWI](http://www.nbcnews.com/news/europe/bosnian-serbs-honor-assassin-who-triggered-wwi-n142561) See also: [HuffPost - Breaking News, U.S. and World News | HuffPost](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/27/gavrilo-princip-statue_n_5538356.html) , citing > [@](#): > > During the unveiling ceremony Friday, a young actor dressed as shooter Gavrilo Pricip ran on the stage and fired two shots in the air. He then cited a poem Princip wrote in captivity which was followed by a Serbian folk dance. Later the actor pointed his gun into the air while posing in front of Princip’s statue as people in the crowd shouted he should “shoot at NATO” or “shoot at the EU.” Sigh. I’m with **Whack-a-Mole** , this just seems wrong, in so many ways. Other reading on WWI, I found the book [George, Nicholas, and Wilhelm](http://www.amazon.com/George-Nicholas-Wilhelm-Cousins-Vintage/dp/1400079128) by Miranda Carter to be very well-written, amusing and insightful. Her basic premise is that the three cousins were completely incompetent. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/51 "2014-06-29T15:05:33Z")
> [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](#): > > See also: [HuffPost - Breaking News, U.S. and World News | HuffPost](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/27/gavrilo-princip-statue_n_5538356.html) , citing Sigh. I’m with **Whack-a-Mole** , this just seems wrong, in so many ways. They’re still unhappy about Dayton. ---
**Author:** ![Miltonyz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Miltonyz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miltonyz)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/52 "2014-06-29T15:46:32Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > They began to mobilize before the Germans. Saranov gave the mobilization order on July 24, and the mobilization in Western districts started on July 25 followed by general mobilization on July 30. German mobilization started July 31-August 1 in response to Russian mobilization. According to Dan Carlin, the Russian mobilization is what finally catalyzed Germany into action. Knowing that a two front war was unwinnable, the battle plan was dependant on smashing France before Russia could enter the war. They had an impossibly short timetable assuming that Russia was starting from scratch. If Russia was completely mobilized before a shooting war broke out the Germans would have been much worse off. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/53 "2014-06-29T16:34:17Z")
> [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](#): > > Her basic premise is that the three cousins were completely incompetent. We need to read another book to learn this? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Miskatonic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mr.miskatonic/32/310_2.png) [@Mr.Miskatonic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Miskatonic)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/54 "2014-06-29T16:38:32Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > Well this just seems wrong: [Bosnian Serbs Honor Assassin Who Triggered WWI](http://www.nbcnews.com/news/europe/bosnian-serbs-honor-assassin-who-triggered-wwi-n142561) > > I realize one side’s terrorist is another side’s freedom fighter. Nevertheless Princip started the ball rolling on two world wars which ultimately claimed in the neighborhood of 80 million lives. > > What’s more, and something I never understood, is the Archduke was about the best friend the Serbs had in the A-H government. Hardly seems the the source of all their problems. It seems a classic problem in Eastern Europe. The radicals end up killing the leader who is making the most reforms. Several radicals tried to kill Czar Alexander II, then one succeeded. Yeah, enjoy Alex III and his love of autocracy, kids. ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/55 "2014-06-29T18:35:50Z")
Radicals depend upon the concept “the worse, the better.” Conciliatory moderates make their quest more difficult than their opponents on the other extreme. ---
**Author:** ![vontsira](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/51bf81/32.png) [@vontsira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vontsira)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/56 "2014-06-29T21:11:54Z")
> [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](#): > > Other reading on WWI, I found the book [George, Nicholas, and Wilhelm](http://www.amazon.com/George-Nicholas-Wilhelm-Cousins-Vintage/dp/1400079128) by Miranda Carter to be very well-written, amusing and insightful. Her basic premise is that the three cousins were completely incompetent. > [@carnivorousplant](#): > > We need to read another book to learn this? > 🙂 One rather gets the picture that – while, to put things mildly, none of them were geniuses – George and Nick were sweet, bumbling, well-meaning guys. Will, not so much so (while falling short of actual fiend status). If the last-named had been more like his two cousins, things might perhaps have gone better – or perhaps not. ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/57 "2014-06-29T21:28:01Z")
> [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](#): > > See also: [HuffPost - Breaking News, U.S. and World News | HuffPost](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/27/gavrilo-princip-statue_n_5538356.html) , citing Sigh. I’m with **Whack-a-Mole** , this just seems wrong, in so many ways. Other reading on WWI, I found the book [George, Nicholas, and Wilhelm](http://www.amazon.com/George-Nicholas-Wilhelm-Cousins-Vintage/dp/1400079128) by Miranda Carter to be very well-written, amusing and insightful. Her basic premise is that the three cousins were completely incompetent. I’m not really all that familiar with this chapter in European history. How was George the VI responsible for WWI to the extent that his two cousins were? He only became King just before the start and as far as I know the King at the time had little influence on foreign policy. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/58 "2014-06-29T22:29:36Z")
I think he was on the list to how much better the world would be if they all had been figureheads. Sort of the control. “We have three identical, stupid people. Two can do whatever they please; we’ll call them ‘emperors.’ The third will have no power and we’ll call him a ‘king.’ Let’s see what happens.” ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/59 "2014-06-29T22:43:00Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > I’m not really all that familiar with this chapter in European history. How was George the VI responsible for WWI to the extent that his two cousins were? > > He only became King just before the start and as far as I know the King at the time had little influence on foreign policy. He wasn’t. Nicholas would have made a good small town Fire Chief; he would wait until his subordinates severely screwed up and fired them. He would take advice from the last person he spoke to; if the Minister of Education wanted to build state schools in Muslim areas, so that the kids would grow up to think of Russia instead of Islam, the Minister of Transportation wanted to build a railway from the Western end of Russia to Europe, and the Minister of the Admiralty wanted to build more ships, he would agree to all of them, and end up only building ships because there wasn’t enough money to do all three. Wilhelm spent his life playing soldier and compensating for having a deformed arm, crippled by the physician’s forceps at birth. As a child, he bit one of his English relatives at a Royal Wedding. I suppose George’s responsibility came from not knocking his cousin’s heads together and reminding them of what their Aunt, Queen Victoria would have thought of their actions. HE too may have suffered of relying on his Ministers and Parliament. I have not read of him as much as I have of the other two. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306/60 "2014-06-29T23:19:32Z")
From [_An Incomplete Education_](http://www.amazon.com/An-Incomplete-Education-Revised-Edition/dp/0345391373), by Judy Jones and William Wilson: > [@](#): > > Obviously, blaming World War I on what happened at Sarajevo is like blaming Norman Bates’ slasher impulses on Janet Leigh’s turning on the hot water. Europe had been on the verge of a nervous breakdown since at least the turn of the century as a result of both family and personality problems dating back to the 1870s. That was when Germany, having just trounced the French in the Franco-Prussian War, started angling for its own place in the sun among the powers of Europe. In order to consolidate the new German position and forestall any thoughts of revenge on the part of the French, Bismarck, then Germany’s chancellor, ran around forging secret alliances with anybody who’d let him in the door; specifically the Hapsburgs, who were looking for an ally against the Russians in their attempt to grab a bigger piece of the Balkans, and the Italians, who like the idea of siding with a winner. Virtually everyone else was offended by the Germans, who struck them not only as parvenus, but as too ambitious, truculent, and devious to make acceptable neighbors. Bismarck’s Triple Alliance turned an undercurrent of resentment into out-and-out paranoia. Pretty soon France, Russia, and Great Britain had formed, not anything as formal as an alliance (Britain was too determinedly isolationist for that) but an entente cordiale, known thereafter as the Triple Entente, whereby each would pitch in to help out if either of the others was attacked by members of the Triple Alliance. By the early 1900s, every major power had armed itself to the teeth, and Europe was divided into two camps, each nervously waiting for the other to draw first. > > In such a high-stress situation, a German unexpectedly scratching his ear might have been enough to set things off, but there was a better catalyst: The Balkans. A cluster of wild, backward countries that had only recently gotten out from under the thumb of the crumbling Ottoman Empire, the Balkans were the object of perpetual rivalry between the Russians and the Austro-Hungarians, both of whom were on their last legs without realizing it, and were, therefore, semi-hysterical much of the time. . . . > > Thanks largely to the Serbs, who had a tendency to register discontent by forming secret societies and committing terrorist acts, both rival empires were, by 1914, ready to be driven around the bend. An assassination was just the ticket. It was also the chance the Germans had been waiting for. Fed up with being treated, as they saw it, as second cousins, and convinced that the Russians, who had been notoriously unreliable allies up to that point, wouldn’t fight, they gave full rein to their ambitions – and to the military strategy they’d already had prepared for ten years. As for Great Britain, it feld honor-bound to declare war on Germany when German troops invaded Belgium on their way to smash the French. At this point, no one was thinking clearly and everyone was wishing the whole business would just go away. But, as the British historian A. J. P. Taylor noted, politicians and generals had a hard time keeping up with each other’s point of view in those days and before they knew it, the heads of state had lost control. “Their sensations, when diplomacy collapsed,” wrote Taylor, “were those of a train passenger who sees the express thundering through the station at which he intended to alight.” > > And that’s only what was happening on the surface. Behind all these global neuroses was a new-found conviction, born out of the traumatic effects of Darwinism . . . on human consciousness, that Nature was a struggle for survival of the fittest; that, in the case of people, the fittest meant the best-armed; and that, under the circumstances, war was inevitable anyway. Those who still hoped this wasn’t true tended to believe that enormous military strength on all sides would act as a deterrent, and that common sense would surely prevail. Wrong again. Not only was World War I out of control virtually from the beginning, it went on for four years, and it wound up signaling the end of European domination of the world. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gavrilo-princip-and-the-archduke/691306.md?page=4)