An Cosantóir

An Cosantóir June 2014 www.dfmagazine.ie 28 | by TERRy MCLAuGHLIN Lighting the Fuse Sarajevo 1914 O n 28th June 1914, gavrilo Princip, a 19-year-old bosnian-Serb nationalist, shot and killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian Empire, who was on an official visit to Sarajevo, the capital of bosnia, accompanied by his pregnant wife, Sophie. Six conspirators armed and instructed by the Serbian nationalist Black Hand organisation lined the route of the imperial cavalcade. After the first two would-be assassins failed to act, the third, Nedeljko Cabrinovic, threw a bomb at the Archduke's car. The several-second delay fuse led to the device bouncing off the car and detonating under the next vehicle in the convoy, seriously injuring its occupants and over a dozen spectators. The royal couple were quickly driven to safety. Later that day the Archduke and his wife decided to visit the injured in hospital. As a safety precaution the route was changed to avoid the city centre. However, the driver of the Archduke's car was not informed of the change and turned onto the original route along Franz Josef Street. When he became aware of his mistake the driver stopped and attempted to reverse but the car stalled. As fate would have it this happened close to the very place where Princip was waiting in the hope of still getting a chance to carry out the assassination. Seizing his chance, he stepped out of the crowd and fired two shots into the car, the first striking Franz Ferdinand in the neck, the second striking his wife in the stomach. Both were soon declared dead. While this is generally accepted as the incident that triggered the First World War, so many other factors were at play that views still differ as to their influ- ence. This article ex- press- es one such view. The degree that nationalism, timing, fate, and incompe- tence conspired in the assassination of the Archduke can be seen writ large in the lead up to war. Arguably, the main contributing factor was the ending of the old balance of power established by the Congress of Vienna in the wake of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815. The uni- fication of Germany through Prussia's actions in Schleswig- Holstein (1864), the Austro-Prussian War (1866) and the Franco-Prussian War (1870) upset the status quo between the major powers and, significantly, also led the new Ger- man state, with its Prussian militarist backbone, to believe it could achieve its objectives through force of arms. Over the next 40 years Germany grew rapidly, in popula- tion, economically and industrially, to the point that it chal- lenged Great Britain as the major industrial powerhouse of Europe. Late to the 'game' in terms of colonisation, Germa- ny also began flexing its muscles in Africa, where it came into direct competition with other major European powers. This destabilisation of the status quo caused nervous Great Powers to construct alliances aimed at protecting their own interests while curtailing those of their rivals. The main alliances emerging from this process were the Triple Alliance (1882) between Germany, Austro-Hungary, and Italy (although Italy subsequently signed a treaty with France in 1902 that rendered its part in the Alliance ineffec- tive) and the, looser, Triple Entente (1907) between Great Britain, France and Russia. These alliances would subse- quently lockstep the belligerents on the road to war. The rise of nationalism was another major contributor. This rise was particularly strong in areas controlled by the rapidly declining Turkish Ottoman Empire, such as Greece and the Balkans. By 1870, Greece, Serbia and Romania had attained a degree of independence and in 1878 at the Con- gress of Berlin the administration of Bosnia was given to Austria-Hungary. Much to the displeasure of Serbia, Bosnia was subsequently annexed by Austria-Hungary in 1908. In 1912 Greece, Serbia, Bulgaria and Montenegro formed Photograph of the Archduke and his wife emerging from the Sarajevo Town Hall to board their car, a few minutes before the assassination.

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