Beginnings of WWI

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I have been reading the Sleepwalkers by Clark.

Prior to the beginnings of WWI there was in Serbia a strong idea of pan Serbian nationalism, somewhat similar to the pan-German ideas of the Nazis in the 1930s.

For years Serbia had been peacefully aligned with AH, but in 1908, AH decided that they would formally annex Bosnia and Herz, two terroritories they already occuppied. But the annexation badly upset the Serbs and almost started a war in 08.

After the assassination, Princip said that part of the reason they killed Ferdinand was because he was a reformer and they believed he would grant privileges and greater autonomy to the people of Bosnia and Herz, and thereby ruin the likelihood that Bosnia and Herz would become part of Serbia instead.

It seems that the government of Serbia in the person of Pasic had advance knowledge of the plot and gave an ambiguous warning to Austria Hung that that week was not a good time for Ferdinand to be in Sarajevo. But after the war began and there were recriminations and investigations, both Serbia and AH denied that Serbia had warned AH of the plot.

For the years from 1908 to 1914 the Serbs had been inciting violence and problems in Bosnia and Herz and smuggling in guns and other weapons or items of problems. There had also been several assassination attempts against Austrian officials, and apparently Princip spent time at the grave of one of the assissantors in a failed assassination of an Austrian governor.

So Serbia looks a bit more guilty than we might have thought without knowing all these factors.

I will also get and read the book by McMeekin on the Russian responsibility for the war . . . and the month of July 1914!

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“So Serbia looks a bit more guilty than we might have thought without knowing all these factors”
Clark really made a good page turner but he doesn’t offer a lot of evidence of Serbian knowledge. Also he seems to travel a lot with John Rohl so they can discuss eachother. Both have different views and are respectful.

Austria Annexed Bosnia just after the Russian were defeated and weak, driving around in an open-topped car on a day that commemorated the Serbian defeat was not the smartest move to make, 6 years after the annexations. The Serbs and other Slavs didn’t like the Austrian treatment of them and hundreds of Serbs were hanged in Austria.

Austria made sure a war had to start, and make “exits” were ignored on the road to war. E.g the Archduke was important enough to start a war but not for a state funeral which would have led to the assembling of the Royalty who could at least have given a warning not to go to war.

I am not saying it is a bad book but one might want to cross-reference it with many other books written each often having a partisan selection of facts fitting a narrative.

I

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what Clark says or claims is

  1. Serbia was upset or unhappy with the anexation of Bosnia Herg in 1908;
  2. Serbia was acting in a clearly expansionist way in the first 2 Balkan wars and related crises;
  3. The Serbia government was not particularly stable and was divided between radical expansionists and moderates and the radical expansionists were often leaders in the military and some of the civilian government feared them, but approved of their goals;
  4. Princip and most of the other immediate conspirators were Serbs who were not upset at how Austria had treated them, but who wanted to see that Bosnia Herg were added to the “kingdom of Serbia;”
  5. various pan-Serb groups including the Black Hand and the National Front or whatever it was were in Bosnia Herz inciting, promoting and aiding insurrection for years prior to the assassination of Ferdinand. At various times AH would ask Serbia to stop or reduce the promotion of the insurrection, and Serbian civ government would claim that they had little or no control over the groups promoting the insurrection . . .

Were the people of Bosnia Herz mostly happy as part of Austria or upset and oppressed?

WWI seems to be the war of Bosnian “liberation” that got out of hand!

Now, after the assassination should Austria have gone easier on Serbia as the civ gov was mostly willing to agree to the demands of the Austrians? In retrospect, we can say so!

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