DBWI Russian Czar doesn't tour with the Archduke

A diplomatic meeting, the Austrian-Hungarian empire and the Russian one were having issues concerning the fate of the south slavs. Archduke Ferdinand invited Czar of Russia to go inspect for himself that the empire was trying to be reasonable with their Serbian subjects. To a lot of peoples surprise he agreed, then tragety struck as the serbian terrorist group known as the black hand struck.

Both the Archduke, and the Czar were killed.

But what if Nick had stayed at home, what would have happened if just the Archduke was killed?
 
Well, the fall of Nicholas opened things up for the Duma to re-emerge and gradually supplant the monarchy, but leaving internal Russian stuff aside, their support for an investigation forced the Serbians to accede to Austrian demands and get puppetized for the next thirty years. Without that, I think this might have been the big war that lots of people dreaded at the time but never quite got off the ground. So you'd have Russia and its Triple Entente allies against Germany's Triple Alliance. Not sure how that pans out, given both Russia and Austria-Hungary were on the ascendant economically, or how much that translated into military strength that the time. You can certainly expect the Russians to do better than they did against Japan, but how much better can't be said, given that they didn't fight any other major wars for a pretty long while.

The really interesting effects may also be in Britain, where this might have delayed or butterflied the Home Rule/Industrial Crisis that all but crippled the country for the rest of the decade. The British didn't realize how unwilling their own military was to enforce Home Rule against the Ulster Volunteer Force, and it cost them as much as the Boers ever did. Shocking stuff at the time, when everyone assumed that the Balkans were the world's premiere powderkeg.
 
The Ottomans may have found an ally that was willing to stop the bear from crushing them? With Britain distracted, there was basically nothing stopping Russia from finally making a move for Constantinople the moment the Tukrs made one misstep, with the Italians and Greeks hopping into the party. The dismemberment of the sick man was seemingly inevitable, but it was a great tragedy for anyone stuck in Anatolia.*

*Greek and Armenian "nationalists" may have my head for this, but the genocide is reality. Please stop claiming that Western/Eastern Anatolia was as overwhelmingly majority Greek/Armenian speaking in 1910s-1920s as it is today. It was not, and Manzikert was only rolled back over a mountain of bones.
 
Well, the fall of Nicholas opened things up for the Duma to re-emerge and gradually supplant the monarchy, but leaving internal Russian stuff aside, their support for an investigation forced the Serbians to accede to Austrian demands and get puppetized for the next thirty years. Without that, I think this might have been the big war that lots of people dreaded at the time but never quite got off the ground. So you'd have Russia and its Triple Entente allies against Germany's Triple Alliance. Not sure how that pans out, given both Russia and Austria-Hungary were on the ascendant economically, or how much that translated into military strength that the time. You can certainly expect the Russians to do better than they did against Japan, but how much better can't be said, given that they didn't fight any other major wars for a pretty long while.

The really interesting effects may also be in Britain, where this might have delayed or butterflied the Home Rule/Industrial Crisis that all but crippled the country for the rest of the decade. The British didn't realize how unwilling their own military was to enforce Home Rule against the Ulster Volunteer Force, and it cost them as much as the Boers ever did. Shocking stuff at the time, when everyone assumed that the Balkans were the world's premiere powderkeg.

I think "crippled" is rather an overstatment. There was bloodshed for sure, and a return to isolationism, but the British mainland was never threatened, and it secured a devolved Ireland within Britain up to the present. In fact many have argued that it was seeing British troops fight to protect them whih banded Irish Catholics to Britain more strongly than mere reform ever could. An as for the Industrial Crisis, while times were certainly bleak much of the popular perception of it is based more around the propaganda of the Macdonald, Maxton and Crips governemnts than the actual facts of the situation, occupying as it does a central place in the history of the Labour Party.
 
Top