alternatehistory.com

Ok, here's a timeline wherein Austria-Hungary survives WW1 intact, and procedes on an unexpected course.

1914 June. Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and his wife Sofia, narrowly escape an assassination attempt by the
Serbian nationalist Gavrilo Principe. Ferdinand is terribly shaken by the attempt on his life.

1914 July Austrian Emperor Charles 1 dies during an exhibition of miltary preparedness. A biplane fighter plane, parading before a record crowd in Vienna, careens out of control and crashes into the royal viewing platform The emperor and his wife and 6 other people are killed, with 9 other injured. Archduke Franz Ferdinand is crowned as the King of Austria, and Emperor of the united kingdoms of Austria and Hungary.

1914 August. Tensions between Germany and Russia lead to open hostilities. Germany declares war on Russia on August 8, immediately followed by a
declaration of war by Germany on Russia's ally, Schlieffen plan implemented. Germany invades Belgium and presses into France. Britain declares war on August 9th. Emperor Franz Ferdinand of Austria-Hungary, tormented by the attack on his life, and by the loss of his predecessor, does not assist its ally, Germany. Italy jumps at the chance to be Germany's go-to member of
the Triple Alliance and starts to mobilize. Aug 20, Italy declares war on France and marches towards Marseille, aided by German divisions. Austria-Hungary declares its neutrality. Germany pushes into France through Belgium.

1914 September. Sept 1, Russian army defeated at Tannenburg. Sept 8, Battle of the Marne, German forces prevented from taking Paris. Sept 11, Austria-Hungary withdraws from the Triple Alliance and declares
strict neutrality.

1914 October. Oct 18 FIrst Battle of Ypres. Oct 25, Italian Navy sorties, immediately returns to port. German battlecruiser Goeben scouting for Italian fleet. Oct 31 Turkey declares scrict neutrality. Trench warfare becomes the norm on both Western fronts.

1915 May 7 Lusitania sunk by German Uboat.

1915 June 14 Battle of Isola Di Montecristo. The Italian battle fleet sorties to intercept a portion of the French navy. In one of the largest naval battles ever fought, the French fleet suffers the loss of 2 battleships, 1 armored cruiser and 3 destroyers. A British contingent loses the battlecruiser Inflexible. The Italians suffer only 2 destroyers lost and several ships damaged.

1915 August. Germans capture Warsaw from Russians

1916 February. Start of the Battle of Verdun. March 15, spurred on by the successes of the Goeben and the Italian navy, the High Seas Fleet sets sail and is intercepted by the British Grand Fleet. The resulting Battle of the North Frisian Islands is the largest naval battle ever fought. Germany loses four battleships and two battlecruisers, as against only one battlecruiser
and a light cruiser on the British side. The High Seas fleet retreats home never to sortie again.
1916 June. Start of the Brusilov Offensive against the German lines. German forces lose ground, but hold. Reinforcements however are sent west for exptected offensives there, and the Russians hold great swaths of
German territory.

1916 July Start of the Battle of the Somme. Start of the Battle of Dignes-les-Baines. German and Italian forces push through French lines and take Marseille.

1917 February. Start of Germany's unrestricted submarine warfare.

1917 April. 6th USA declares war on Germany. 17th. The Kaiserlin Offensive drives deep into German territory. Revolts break out all over Russia. Full scale Revolution takes place.

1917 May Germany and Russia reach an armistice. Germany is poised to send thousands of trooops back to the Western Front. May 22 The French Offensive in the west falters.

1917 June 8 "The Hand that held the dagger has stabbed it into the back of its neighbor" words of Paul von Hindenberg upon learning that the
Austro-Hungarian Empire declared War on Germany and Italy. Germany rushes troops meant for the West to its new southern front. AUstrian troops crush the few Italian defenders sent to defend north-east Italy at the Battle of Caporetto.

1917 July The Franco-Italian front collapses. Surging Austrian and French troops meet near the town of Verese, near Milan. The Italian government collapses and Germany fights on alone.

1917 July Third Ypres. A massive offensive by French, British, and some newly arrived American troops convulses the German lines. The Germans lose
miles of ground but hold on.

1917 October. German counter-offensive in the West falters.

1918 February The surprise Winter Offensive by the Germans catches the British off guard. A stand by a fledgling American division near the town of Bastogne holds up the German advance. It peters out by March.

1918 April. Fresh American troops, in time for the ambitious Cambrai offensive sends the Germans reeling. Despite valiant efforts by the German army to hold on to its territory, French, British, and American troops push deep into Germany proper, Austrians advancing from the south. Germany sues for peace.

1918 May 22. World War One officially ends.

1919 The Treaty of Versaille -- VIctorious allies put harsh measures on defeated Germany, basically disarming her, setting the stage for another war to come. The Austro-Hungarian Empire is given the Italian areas of Veneto and Friuli-Venezia Giulia as reparations. France takes the Italian areas of Piemonte and Vale d'aosta.

1920-1938
Germany, seething from its humiliation from the victorious allies, embarks on a re-armament program implemented by the dictator Adolph Hitler. As Germany prepares for another war, the victorious Austro-Hungarian Empire goes through internal struggles. The Austro-Hungarian monarchy collapses and into the vacuum steps a young nationalist leader Josip Broz Tito in 1934. He is elected in a landslide, using draconian methods to hold the fragmented nationalities and religions of Austria-Hungary
together. Like Hitler, Tito prepares for a war that he senses is coming. France plays politics, safe behind their new Maginot Line. The Soviet Union thrives and struggles under Joseph Stalin. The Ottoman Turkish
Empire teeters on the edge of collapse.

The Face of Europe.

Italy in 1938 now has a population of 37 million. It is a fledgling democracy with a shaky history. Hit heavily by reparations and restructuring, Italy leans to the Western democracies, but there is a strong tendency towards Communism. Sentiment in the nation is to never follow Germany's lead again in any sort of a war situation.
The army is small but slowly rebuilding. The Italian navy, sacrificed largely due to reparations, has only a couple of new capital ships built in the 1930s, armed with 8x14 in guns. It does however, boast a first rate air force.

France in 1938 has a population of 42 million. It gained part of the northern Italian territories and part of the Italian fleet. The refurbished ex-Caoio Duilio, ex-Andrea Dorea, and ex Giulio Cesare were armed interwar years, along with their own existing ships, giving France the 4th largest Navy in the world. They boast a large standing army, but insist on the security of their Maginot Line for their defense.

Germany in 1938, having lost part of their pre-Great War territory to France and Austria-Hungary, still boasts a population of 72 million. The German dictator Adolph Hitler is rebuilding Germany rapidly, and is prone to thwarting or ignoring existing treaties. His Nationalist
Socialist Party rules Germany with a steel fist.

Austria-Hungary in 1938, consists largely of the same territory as occupied by the AH Empire in 1914, with additional areas of German Bavaria and the Italian Tyrol region of Northeastern Italy. Austria-Hungary boasts a population in 1938 of 60.6 million, making it the
second most populous nation in Europe, excluding the USSR. Austria-Hungary boasts an army larger than France and an updated Navy consisting of 4 1930s era construction battleships and 4 battleships of the 1910s-1920s era. They have one aircraft carrier, the
Vienna, of approximate size and air complement of the French carrier Bearn. Once allied to the West, Austria-Hungary's dictator Tito has strong slavic ties to the SOviet Union, but seems closer than ever to drifting into the shadow of Adolph Hitler.

The world watches, and waits, as the drums of war once more begin to rumble.

There it is. I suspect that Japan, the US, the UK, and the Soviet Union are all in the same place as they were historically. Let her rip.
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