More Central Powers?

[LightSpectra]

How's that completely wrong? Everyone knew Russia would hardly remain idle while A-H was crushing its only potential ally in the Balkans. A-H was playing with fire, and it dragged Germany into the affair hoping that German involvement would dissuade the Russians from attacking.

It's wrong because you're assigning an assumption made by Serbia to Austria-Hungary. What you said was that Austria-Hungary went to war, not fettered by the fact that Russia would intervene. In actuality, Russia supported the Austro-Hungarian ultimatum given to Serbia, and Serbia gambled that they could decline it and still have Russia as an ally. So, in essence, Serbia was playing passive-aggressive, which mucked up the whole ordeal.

Revisionist nonsense. Austria basically demanded that Serbia removed officers from its military/civil administration whose names would be provided by Austria. Serbia accepted everything except this single point.

That point was a very reasonable one on part of Austria-Hungary, given that (to their knowledge) there was at least one terrorist leader in the Serbia government and General Staff. Sergei Sazonov didn't object to this point either; but Serbia did, because that allowed them to preempt the Austrian invasion while maintaining a pretense of moral high ground (that they were willing to compromise to avoid war). Again, the gamble was that Serbia could go against the Russian foreign ministry but still retain Russian military support despite there being no formal alliance.

It's well sourced that Austria actually re-drafted the ultimatum to make it so outrageous that the Serbs would never accept it, and that Germany had actively encouraged this behaviour.

As described by Entente historians during and after the war. Look at it from academic sources that post-date 1970 and you'll see an entirely different story.

That's a lie, basically everyone in the A-H government (except the PM, ironically) was in favour of war, they were just looking for ways to make it look at least partially legitimate, hence the ultimatum.

Not quite the same thing. Austria-Hungary gave a strict ultimatum (with every right, considering the unscrupulous state of the Serbian government), and they also wanted a war (which was also to be expected, considering that nationalists had been terrorizing their country for years). However, that's not the same thing as "would've declared war even if the ultimatum was obeyed." There were members of the General Staff who advocated unconditional war, but they didn't make foreign policy; nobody in the Austro-Hungarian cabinet suggested that they go to war, even if the ultimatum were obeyed.

1. The analogy is wrong and biased (Serbia did accept everything except relinquishing its sovereignty in matters pertaining to sensitive internal affairs)

"Sovereignty" is an interesting word. Do bands of ruffians get sovereignty by hiding behind their nation's name?

2. If the said 3rd world country was a under protection of another superpower which was practically guaranteed to go to war to defend it, then HELL YES, it would be totally reckless.

So you're allowed to do wildly amoral things, so long as you got the backing of somebody really strong to deter justice?

Are you serious? Germany encouraged A-H's aggressive behaviour the whole time.

Sources that post-date 1970 will be appreciated.

Their role was limited to the latter part. If France hadn't mobilized and made it clear to Germany that it wouldn't support Russia in its war against Germany/A-H, the Germans would have had no reason to invade it. Conversely, Britain should have made it clear from the beginning that it would defend France.

I don't think you understand how alliances work.

 

[Winner]

It's wrong because you're assigning an assumption made by Serbia to Austria-Hungary. What you said was that Austria-Hungary went to war, not fettered by the fact that Russia would intervene. In actuality, Russia supported the Austro-Hungarian ultimatum given to Serbia, and Serbia gambled that they could decline it and still have Russia as an ally. So, in essence, Serbia was playing passive-aggressive, which mucked up the whole ordeal.

I'll repeat it once again - there was no doubt that Russia would go to war if Serbia was attacked. Not in Vienna, not in Berlin. So what that the Russians pressured the Serbs to cooperate? They could have hardly pretended that shooting members of royal families was OK, and basically the whole world condemned Serbia for its role in the assassination.

When Austrians decided they would go to war against the Serbs, they knew very well that Russia would intervene, which would inevitably lead to a general war. They knew they'd be crushed if they fought Russia alone, so they asked the Germans for help - and the Germans were only too happy to offer it, again knowing well that it would in all likelihood lead to a war with Russia. Germany didn't want war per se, but it certainly wasn't eager to avoid it.

That point was a very reasonable one on part of Austria-Hungary, given that (to their knowledge) there was at least one terrorist leader in the Serbia government and General Staff. Sergei Sazonov didn't object to this point either; but Serbia did, because that allowed them to preempt the Austrian invasion while maintaining a pretense of moral high ground (that they were willing to compromise to avoid war). Again, the gamble was that Serbia could go against the Russian foreign ministry but still retain Russian military support despite there being no formal alliance.

If A-H was really interested in a fair punishment of the perpetrators and not in a vicious collective punishment of whole Serbia, it would have phrased the ultimatum so that the Serbian government would be assured that its sovereignty wouldn't be seriously infringed. In reality, A-H did the exact opposite with the intent to bring about war with that country.

Not quite the same thing. Austria-Hungary gave a strict ultimatum (with every right, considering the unscrupulous state of the Serbian government), and they also wanted a war (which was also to be expected, considering that nationalists had been terrorizing their country for years). However, that's not the same thing as "would've declared war even if the ultimatum was obeyed." There were members of the General Staff who advocated unconditional war, but they didn't make foreign policy; nobody in the Austro-Hungarian cabinet suggested that they go to war, even if the ultimatum were obeyed.

Since the ultimatum was just a ruse, they'd likely declare war anyway. There are literally thousands of ways to refuse any positive reply because of a formality or a vague formulation or something of that sort.

So you're allowed to do wildly amoral things, so long as you got the backing of somebody really strong to deter justice?

Do you want an idealist or a realist reply?

The way I see it, starting a general war that will kill millions of people over one murder, however reprehensible, is even more amoral. Which is the whole point. A-H knew a general war would result, but it went on with its little punitive expedition anyway. That was reckless, and I stand by that point.

I don't think you understand how alliances work.

Actually, I do. Italy knew it too

 

[Tahuti]

Couldn't Sweden have joined the Centrals to recover Finland?

 

[ParkCungHee]

You know, as one hair-brained corporal pointed out, one of the real problems with the "The Central Powers wanted a war" thesis is why they chose to have it in 1914. Surely there were much better opportunities if they were just waiting for the chance.

 

[enaks]

You know, as one hair-brained corporal pointed out, one of the real problems with the "The Central Powers wanted a war" thesis is why they chose to have it in 1914. Surely there were much better opportunities if they were just waiting for the chance.

The Fashoda Incident looks most interesting. But for the central powers, I guess only Germany would intervene. Maybe Austria-Hungary if Russia also intervenes.

 

[Phrossack]

I'm a bit ignorant on the subject, but Mexico was never going to be a Central Power member. It was too weak, the US was too bloody strong, and it had some minor internal difficulties at the time.

 

[enaks]

Spain could maybe be a decisive country. I don´t think they were so strong but if the also attacked France, I don´t belive France and UK could fight a two-way war in France so long. It would certainly drag men from the german lines and enabling them to advance easier.

 

[ParkCungHee]

The Fashoda Incident looks most interesting. But for the central powers, I guess only Germany would intervene. Maybe Austria-Hungary if Russia also intervenes.

If they were looking for a time to attack Serbia, that would be a good one. Russo-Japanese war would be even better as Russia would be powerless to act, and even if it could, Britain was in the akward position of being allies with Japan, which would put it vaguely in the anti-serbo-russo camp. Italy was a little more closely aligned to the Central Powers at the time, and it sounds like a grand old time for an EUIII-esque war for territory-and-stomping-your-enemies this theory thinks WWI was.

 

[enaks]

If they were looking for a time to attack Serbia, that would be a good one. Russo-Japanese war would be even better as Russia would be powerless to act, and even if it could, Britain was in the akward position of being allies with Japan, which would put it vaguely in the anti-serbo-russo camp. Italy was a little more closely aligned to the Central Powers at the time, and it sounds like a grand old time for an EUIII-esque war for territory-and-stomping-your-enemies this theory thinks WWI was.

So if the Russo-Japanese War evolved to WW1, how would the alliances look like? Would it be Russia and France vs Britain, Germany, Japan, Austria-Hungary and Italy? And if it looks like that I also thinks the Ottomans attacks Russia.

 

[Dachs]

I'll repeat it once again - there was no doubt that Russia would go to war if Serbia was attacked. Not in Vienna, not in Berlin.

This is both right and wrong. Some people in the Vienna government were convinced that they could get away with it, for the same reasons that the GGS was convinced that the German war plan for 1914 would work: because it had to, otherwise they were screwed. And some people were convinced that the whole thing was an apocalyptic war that would result in the destruction of the Monarchy, win or lose, and figured that it was best to go down fighting. The fact that the Russians were sending mixed signals over the whole thing and that the Russians had not stepped in in 1912-3 when the Balkans blew up did not help things.

Bethmann and Berchtold believed that Russia would stand back for three reasons. First, they thought the Austro-Serb quarrel could be isolated. Given European opinion in the immediate aftermath of the assassination, this was not an unreasonable supposition. Second, they thought that the tsar was so convinced that war meant revolution in Russia that he would refuse to back mobilization. This was also quite reasonable: Nikolai II brought these concerns up at the Council of Ministers meeting on 24 July, backed by Durnovo, the interior minister. The rest of the cabinet overrode Durnovo in that meeting not because of his opinions about revolution, but because he was an adherent of the 'Asiatic' diplomatic school that wanted Russia to focus on expansion in Asia instead of in Europe, a position that was quite unpopular after the events of 1904-7. And third, the Central Powers believed that the French would not aid the Russians in a war, based on, again, the experience of the past six years. Bethmann and Berchtold failed to calculate that the French would support the Russians precisely because such support had not been forthcoming under extenuating circumstances in the past; effectively, they picked the wrong crises to learn from.

 

[aelf]

I basically agree with you. Entente apologists have found several ways to suggest that the Central Powers were to blame for the war; that Germany was "evil" or "ultra-militaristic" or "proto-Nazis" (all preposterous); that Germany made war inevitable by initiating the arms race (even though it takes two to race, and the subject usually brought up is the battleship race with Britain, which Germany withdrew from in 1912, two years before the July Crisis); they'll bring up the colonial genocides by the hand of the German Empire (even though Britain and France also did that); they'll bring up Germany's belligerent foreign policy and gunboat diplomacy (even though Britain also did that); they'll bring up how Germany goaded the war by giving the blank check to the Austro-Hungarian foreign ministry (even though the decision for war was already made at that point); they'll bring up how Germany's war plan was a zero-sum game (even though the "Schlieffen Plan" thesis has evolved substantially since the publication of the Guns of August); they'll claim that Germany wanted a war the whole time (without an adequate explanation for how they actually caused it); they'll declare the Austrian ultimatum to Serbia to have been unreasonable (even though the person who ordered the assassination of Franz Ferdinand, Dragutin Dimitrijević, was a member of the Serbian General Staff and the government was probably sheltering him); they'll insist that Germany had no obligation to assist Austria-Hungary (even though they had a contractual alliance, whereas Russia did not have the same for Serbia); they'll suggest that the whole war was about monarchism against democracy (even though, of all the major players in the war circa 1914, the only republic was France); they'll claim that the Russian Empire was forced to mobilize because if they didn't, their sluggish rail system would've left them at a severe disadvantage (even though that's a ridiculous Casus belli, and the opening of the Soviet archives has revealed this to be blatantly untrue); and they'll claim that the Central Powers were at fault for post-facto things utterly irrelevant to the issue, including but not limited to: the invasion of Belgium, mustard gas, unrestricted submarine warfare, the Armenian genocide, the Zimmerman telegram, the Nazis, the Manifesto of 93, Mitteleuropa, etc.

Meh, I still blame Wilhelm II for being an incompetent diplomat.

 

[Dachs]

Meh, I still blame Wilhelm II for being an incompetent diplomat.

Pft. The way European diplomacy worked, it didn't matter what the Germans did, because they lost every time. If they backed down in a crisis defending their legitimate interests - like in the Boer War, or over Morocco - they lost ground, and [insert one: UK, France, Italy, Russia] gained it. If they didn't back down in a crisis - like over Bosnia, or the height of the naval race, or Liman von Sanders - everybody else immediately raised the chorus of "German aggression!" and solidified their ties even more, so that the only gains secured were short-run, and in the long run Germany became even more screwed.

It seems clear to me that, so long as they played within the system, the Germans would end up holding the Pooper Scooper, regardless of whether their persona was Mr. Nice Guy, Big Old Meanie, or Semi-competent Bombastic Jerk. Wilhelm II could've been an incompetent diplomat, and he was (although his particular brand of assertive PR played very well outside of Europe; much of the Arab world, in particular, thought he was great), but if he'd been a smooth, suave, calm man who didn't trip over his words things wouldn't have been any better for Germany's international position. The Germans - or rather, some Germans - correctly realized this in 1914.

 

[LightSpectra]

But the Daily Telegraph affair caused World War I!!!111

 

[aelf]

Pft. The way European diplomacy worked, it didn't matter what the Germans did, because they lost every time. If they backed down in a crisis defending their legitimate interests - like in the Boer War, or over Morocco - they lost ground, and [insert one: UK, France, Italy, Russia] gained it. If they didn't back down in a crisis - like over Bosnia, or the height of the naval race, or Liman von Sanders - everybody else immediately raised the chorus of "German aggression!" and solidified their ties even more, so that the only gains secured were short-run, and in the long run Germany became even more screwed.

It seems clear to me that, so long as they played within the system, the Germans would end up holding the Pooper Scooper, regardless of whether their persona was Mr. Nice Guy, Big Old Meanie, or Semi-competent Bombastic Jerk. Wilhelm II could've been an incompetent diplomat, and he was (although his particular brand of assertive PR played very well outside of Europe; much of the Arab world, in particular, thought he was great), but if he'd been a smooth, suave, calm man who didn't trip over his words things wouldn't have been any better for Germany's international position. The Germans - or rather, some Germans - correctly realized this in 1914.

But wasn't all that partly because France played its cards right and Germany didn't manage to one-up it diplomatically?

And I'm of the belief that losers deserve what's coming to them because of their incompetence. How else can I maintain the mythology of success?

 

[Dachs]

But wasn't all that partly because France played its cards right and Germany didn't manage to one-up it diplomatically?

It had nothing to do with that. The French were perfectly capable of pulling outrageous stunts on a par with anything the Germans did; Fashoda itself, had it occurred between (say) the Germans and British, would have been enough to sink any talk of alliance once and for all, but the French not only got away with their behavior, they managed to secure a colonial understanding with the British six years later.

It was less that the French were better at playing their cards, which they weren't, but that the French were dealt great cards in the first place. They were sufficiently dangerous to the British to be worth an alliance; the British believed that the Germans, on the other hand, weren't. Same with the Russians, really.

And I'm of the belief that losers deserve what's coming to them because of their incompetence. How else can I maintain the mythology of success?

I suppose I can't fault you for believing in the ethic of success even if I don't agree with you (if you really do, of course, and I don't think you do), but there's a difference between saying incompetent people get what's coming to them, and saying that all failure ever can be ascribed to incompetent people being incompetent.

 

[ParkCungHee]

But the Daily Telegraph affair caused World War I!!!111

I like this explanation because it puts the blame where it belongs: squarely on the shoulders of the Daily Telegraph.

 

[aelf]

I suppose I can't fault you for believing in the ethic of success even if I don't agree with you (if you really do, of course, and I don't think you do), but there's a difference between saying incompetent people get what's coming to them, and saying that all failure ever can be ascribed to incompetent people being incompetent.

Heh, the mythology of success is usually quite clearly willing to rationalise any outcome in terms of an ethic of success, so I'd say that it either has to bite the bullet on the latter or resort to obfuscation.

 

[Lord Baal]

I like this explanation because it puts the blame where it belongs: squarely on the shoulders of the Daily Telegraph.

Alternatively to the Romania question, why did Bulgaria, an historically pro-Russian state, join the Central Powers as opposed to the Entente? Yes, I know, territory, but couldn't they also have taken territory from Greece and Romania - both neutral in the early stages, with the former in a civil war - and the Ottomans rather than from a pretty worthless Serbia? What induced them to join in on behalf of the weaker party in the war? I would think even neutrality would suit them better than belligerence on Austria-Hungary's part. Was pride over their losses in 1913 that bad?

 

[LightSpectra]

Alternatively to the Romania question, why did Bulgaria, an historically pro-Russian state, join the Central Powers as opposed to the Entente? Yes, I know, territory, but couldn't they also have taken territory from Greece and Romania - both neutral in the early stages, with the former in a civil war - and the Ottomans rather than from a pretty worthless Serbia? What induced them to join in on behalf of the weaker party in the war? I would think even neutrality would suit them better than belligerence on Austria-Hungary's part. Was pride over their losses in 1913 that bad?

The reason why Russia had to aid Serbia during the July Crisis was because the Second Balkan War forced Russia to pick between Serbia and Bulgaria, which essentially locked Bulgaria out of the Triple Entente's circle of influence.

 

[Lord Baal]

The reason why Russia had to aid Serbia during the July Crisis was because the Second Balkan War forced Russia to pick between Serbia and Bulgaria, which essentially locked Bulgaria out of the Triple Entente's circle of influence.

And Russia picked Serbia because Bulgaria was behaving too independently? Or too aggressively? Or just because they lost? I know plenty about the July Crisis, but not much about what happened with the nations outside of the main six antagonists (Serbia, Russia, France, Britain, Germany and Austria-Hungary).