Franz Ferdinand Survives Assassination Attempt

OK....so here is something that really bothers me about history. How the hell did Franz Ferdinand die in the assassination in Sarajevo? there are just SO MANY coincidental actions that led to this killing. It SHOULD have failed, by all means I just feel like it SHOULD have been a failure. Either the assassin chooses to eat lunch at a different place, the driver takes a different wrong turn, or the Archduke deciding not to go to the hospital to visit the wounded....


So what would have happened if Ferdinand, by whatever POD, survives. I definitely feel that World War 1 probably would have still happened. The tensions in Europe were just too high that some other event wouldn't have set them off. There were plenty events that could have set it off before the assassination anyways, I.E. the Morocco Crisis. I think the first effects you'd see would be on Austria herself. I can't find much information on this, so excuse me if I'm wrong, but wasn't Ferdinand a supported of the "United States of Greater Austria?" Maybe he puts this plan into effect and quells most nationalist sentiment within the state. Not sure how that would effect the rest of Europe though.

Anyone have any thoughts?
 
The idea that the First World War was inevitable is a popular supposition but, in my view, a largely unjustified one. Some sort of major European war was very likely indeed, but the alliances of Europe were much more fluid than the popular image of the First World War as some chain of rigid unbreakable alliances where everyone knew who the enemy was and then marched to war against those long-known opponents once the tripwire was sprung. The Franco-Russian Alliance started off as an alliance as much against the United Kingdom as against Germany! To give an example of this fluidity, the Anglo-Russian Convention was on the verge of breaking down; it was due to be renewed in 1915 and it probably would not have been because of Anglo-Russian tensions in Persia, to the extent that even the most Russophilic figure in the British Foreign Office was warning that a major change in the European diplomatic alignments was likely to take place. To give another example, the Schlieffen Plan which triggered the German invasion of Belgium would likely not have been carried out if the war had started later so Russia had had time to advance a few years and further her infrastructural and army development; add that to the fact that the confusion over the British stance was due in great part to the actions of one particular man, Sir Edward Grey, who may not still have been in power if the war had started later, and British entry to the war is hardly guaranteed, especially when considering that there were attempts at Anglo-German rapprochement. To give yet another example, Germany's entry to the war was triggered (and here I do deliberately say triggered, not caused) by Russia's idiotically inflexible mobilisation plans which were unable to mobilise against the Habsburg Monarchy without also mobilising against Germany; it is possible that Germany would have entered the war without Russia already mobilising against Germany as it did in OTL, but one cannot guarantee it, so any serious revision of the Russian general staff's mobilisation plans, which could very easily be imagined to take place if the war had been delayed by a little while and the diplomatic situation changed dramatically in 1915 with the non-renewal of the Anglo-Russian Convention, could have restricted the expansion of the war. To give yet another example, the alignment of Serbia and Romania towards the Triple Entente and Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire towards the Central Powers was not set in stone, and indeed the diplomatic alignments of the Balkan states were shifting multiple times in the era leading up to the First World War. To give my final example, even if a major European war did start with a Habsburg-Serbian flashpoint (which does have a significant probability, given the efforts of Serbian-sponsored Serb and Yugoslav nationalists in Habsburg territory) it is still not inevitable that the war would resemble OTL's; a PoD as simple as the location of Wilhelm II at the time of the assassination could have had dramatic changes in European history, as OTL's Wilhelm II, upon hearing of the Serbian reply to the Habsburg Monarchy's ultimatum, sent a letter to Gottlieb von Jagow in Berlin, saying that he thought this was an excellent response, a diplomatic victory for the Habsburg Monarchy and removed any need for war and commanding that this be sent to Emperor Franz Josef; Wilhelm's government disagreed and instead gave the Habsburg Monarchy the infamous 'blank cheque' for war. It's true that there were certain constants in European diplomacy which could not reasonably be altered—Franco-German enmity, Russo-Ottoman enmity and Habsburg-Russian enmity for instance—but there were plenty of things which weren't. The fact that the war started as it did gave us a snapshot of European alliances at one particular moment, not a continuous perfect picture.

It is popular nowadays to suggest that the death of Franz Ferdinand was just a trigger for a conflict of a predetermined nature to break out when that conflict was shaped and formed by other reasons, but I don't believe the arguments for this stand up to scrutiny. In addition to the fluidity of European alliances which I have spoken of above, the death of Franz Ferdinand was not just a pretext for Germany and the Habsburg Monarchy, or Serbia and Russia for that matter, to gleefully carry out long-prepared war of aggression. Multiple sides genuinely did feel they were under threat by the aggression of their enemies. It's true that Emperor Franz Josef had little fondness for Franz Ferdinand, but the Habsburg Monarchy saw a conspiracy which they suspected (correctly) included elements high up in the Serbian government assassinating the heir to the throne of an empire held together by its monarchy at a time when the Emperor was very old and surely soon to die, and this is good reason to construe as an attempt against the existence of the Habsburg Monarchy itself. Given well-known Serbian opinion of the Habsburg Monarchy and the vast influence of the Black Hand in Serbia it was understandable for the Habsburg Monarchy to not trust the Serbian government to investigate the incident and bring the perpetrators to justice itself; and it was equally understandable for Serbia, defending its sovereignty, to refuse. The Russian Empire saw a Habsburg mobilisation against Serbia which it misconstrued as a mobilisation against both Serbia and Russia, due in part to poor intelligence. The Germans saw a Russian mobilisation against both the Habsburg Monarchy and itself, and therefore chose to mobilise themselves because a key advantage of theirs (dating back decades) was the speed of their mobilisation so they could not afford to delay it for political reasons if a war was imminent; perceiving apparent Russian aggression, the Germans told the French rather imperiously to not militarise their own border, which was an understandable request under the circumstances but, with Germany apparently preparing for war, looked to the French like a preparation for German aggression, so France, understandably, refused; and thus the assassination of an archduke turns to a war between France, Russia and Serbia on the one hand and the Habsburg Monarchy and Germany on the other hand, and broadens further. This was not the simple idea of a spark setting alight alliance-tripwires which thus set off the explosion of war, a war that would be the same regardless of where the spark happened to be, that some segments of the press like to imagine, nor was it the simple case of German/Serbian/whoever's nasty evil aggression that other segments of the press like to imagine; it was a series of diplomatic misunderstandings and failures that led to every side doing what it thought of as defending itself, where the shape of the war was determined in great part by the shape of the crisis that caused it.

I am not certain what sort of war might have broken out in Europe, and what the alliances of Europe might have been at the time it did, if there hadn't been one from the July Crisis, but I don't think it's as easy to predict as "Oh, the First World War would have happened sometime, count on it".
 
This should go in the After 1900 section, as the assassination happened in 1914.

and there are dozens of threads about this part of history.
 
So what would have happened if Ferdinand, by whatever POD, survives. I definitely feel that World War 1 probably would have still happened. The tensions in Europe were just too high that some other event wouldn't have set them off. There were plenty events that could have set it off before the assassination anyways, I.E. the Morocco Crisis. I think the first effects you'd see would be on Austria herself. I can't find much information on this, so excuse me if I'm wrong, but wasn't Ferdinand a supported of the "United States of Greater Austria?" Maybe he puts this plan into effect and quells most nationalist sentiment within the state. Not sure how that would effect the rest of Europe though.

Anyone have any thoughts?

It's a common view, but not quite true. Franz Ferdinand rejected the "United States of Greater Austria" plan. He was more of a neo-absolutist than anything else. Willing to make some small concessions to liberalism and federalism (though he only sometimes considered it, and even then only within historical "crownlands", which wasn't nearly as valuable); but they were intended to actually strengthen the power of the monarch and turn back the clock to the old Habsburg bureaucratic absolutism.

It's hard to predict exactly what Franz Ferdinand would do, especially as we can't even be sure when his reign would start. But between his reactionary tendencies, desire to Germanize the administration, unhealthy obsession with the Hungarians, no real solution to the problems of many nationalities etc...he sounds like an Emperor who would quickly make a lot of enemies, but very few friends.
 
It's a common view, but not quite true. Franz Ferdinand rejected the "United States of Greater Austria" plan. He was more of a neo-absolutist than anything else. Willing to make some small concessions to liberalism and federalism (though he only sometimes considered it, and even then only within historical "crownlands", which wasn't nearly as valuable); but they were intended to actually strengthen the power of the monarch and turn back the clock to the old Habsburg bureaucratic absolutism.

It's hard to predict exactly what Franz Ferdinand would do, especially as we can't even be sure when his reign would start. But between his reactionary tendencies, desire to Germanize the administration, unhealthy obsession with the Hungarians, no real solution to the problems of many nationalities etc...he sounds like an Emperor who would quickly make a lot of enemies, but very few friends.

This. He intensely disliked the Dual Monarchy construction and intended to put his coronation as King of Hungary on hold indefinitely (or at least until the Hungarian had accepted a severe reduction of their autonomy).

Franz II. would have tried to govern as militaristic neo-absolutist as possible. I suspect that his waffling between different reactionary and reformist concepts (crown lands federalism, nationality federalism, Austro-Hungaro-South Slav trialism, A-H-Czech trialism, radical centralism) would have remained unresolved for some time. Maybe long enough to create serious internal conflicts.
OTOH, in contrast to FJ he was convinced that things in A-H somehow had to change. Therefore, he was opposed to a war with Serbia and wanted to ignore them. In foreign politics, he saw a firm alliance with Germany and Russia as desirable, so that the three emperors could protect each other against revolutions.
 
As Perfidious mentioned WWI is not inevitable at least as we know it. WWI was sparked by a series of events that easily could have gone a different way and war might have been avoided. But let's first focus on the next crisis and why it wouldn't erupt into war instead of discussing our own WWI.

At the time the next big crisis would undoubtably be the Greco-Turkish War that was on the horizon. This war would have broken out only a few months after Franz visited Sarajevo had he now been killed and war not begun. Basically as a result of Greece's holding of all the Aegean Islands that the Ottoman Empire viewed as vital to its own protection the two countries had begun a naval race of their own. Both countries were buying and ordering several ships. The Ottomans however were able to secure two British dreadnoughts. Those dreadnoughts would seemingly give the Ottomans naval superiority over all the Balkans and Russia's Black Sea fleet. This was a widely known and accepted fact so Greece was worried that once the Turks got the dreadnoughts a war would begin as the Turks attacked in an attempt to retake some or al of the Aegean Islands. Greece was right as the Ottomans planned exactly that. And since both nations were aware of when the ships would be completed it was as if there was a timer until the broke broke out and both sides were ready for it. On the Turkish side they planned to open the war as soon as the dreadnoughts arrived by invading the Aegean Islands and planned to keep the war a naval one as they'd have the advantage. Meanwhile the Greeks had two plans. One plan was rejected by the government but would countably have still gone on. This plan was that of the Greek admiral and it was a plan to use Greece's French subs to sink the Ottoman dreadnoughts in transit to Constantinople. The other plan was approved by the Greek government and was the plan of the Army. It was basically that General Metaxas would land on the Gallipoli peninsula and rapidly seize Constantinople, the landing would coincide with Greece's declaration of war to maximize surprise.

How the war would have played out is the Greek admiral would have launched his naval attack and sunk or severely damaged both of the Ottoman dreadnoughts, as the French submarines he intended to use weren't shitty ones. The greek admiral then would have returned to Greece and aaccepted bing arrested, as he later said he would have done. No doubt he would be courtmartialed and possibly executed (the Admiral was willing to allow this to happen). Meanwhile the Ottomans and Greeks would have exchanged a fiery set of messages in which the Greek government explained they were not part of the plot and that they would deal with the admiral according to law. The Turks would never accept that would issue an ultimatum that at least involved the turning over of the admiral and possibly compensation in the form or money or ships. The Turks would issue this ultimatum because they had believed that even without the dreadnoughts they had naval superiority over the Greek navy. Greece would never accept any ultimatum and reject it. At this time Metaxas would ready his army and begin the Gallipoli operation as war was imminent. And as the Greeks declared war Metaxas would probably land on Gallipoli.

Metaxas was military mastermind and a great leader, he had also intensely prepared for this operation, not D-Day preparations, but still lots of preparations. Metaxas also had studied the peninsula and had lots of intel on it. Meanwhile the peninsula itself was no where near as heavily defended as it was during OTL's Gallipoli operation and the Greeks would attack with complete surprise unlike how the Ottomans knew for quite some time that the Entente was coming to attack them. So I believe in light of that that Metaxas would have successfully conducted his operation and seized Constantinople and defeated the Ottoman army in the area. In the sea where the Ottomans expected the war to take place the Greeks would win, as they controlled the entrance to the Dardanelles with a set of islands. Their navy also had several advantages over that of the Ottoman one and without the Greek admiral would have been led by an able British one (part of naval mission and very loyal to Greece). The Greek navy was also better trained and able in general. Around this time after the initial round of fighting the great powers would intervene and call for a halt to the fighting, as the Greeks planned.

Here is where it gets interesting. France, Russia, and Germany were all supportive of Greece for their reasons. Meanwhile the Austrians were opposed to the Greeks. And the Italians and the British were in the middle. The French liked the Greeks because they had believed the Ottomans crumbling and wanted the Greeks to help them in delivering the final blows hence France built much of Greece's navy and gave them loans and the like. Russia wanted an open Straits and hence were favorable towards a Balkan power controlling them, because though Russia wanted the straits for themselves a Balkan power was always better than the Ottomans. The Russians also had some close ties with Greece, who was a friend and ally of Serbia Russia's own ally. Russia had also sponsored the Balkan League which had attacked the Ottomans in the First Balkan War. Meanwhile Germany and Greece were extremely close as the Germans were building Greece a dreadnought,, had given them many loans and credit, and the kings of Germany and Greece were brothers in law but could have passed for brothers as they had harmonious personalities and liked eachother a lot. In fact the Greek king, who had led the Greek armies in the Balkan Wars, had had Prussian training and, to the ire of the French, public ally proclaimed the Greece's victory over the Ottomans during the First Balkan War was due to that Prussian training. That earned him many points with the German king. Austria was opposed to Greece as its friend in the Balkan region was Bulgaria. Bulgaria hated both Serbia, Austria's enemy, and Greece. It also shared the same territorial ambitions as Greece. And Austria was supportive of Bulgaria in many cases and the two even had a secret alliance or close to it I think. Meanwhile Britain and Italy were in the middle. Britain was more on the fence than Italy who was more out of the picture. Britain had plans for the Ottomans should they fall but didn't necessarily what the Ottomans to fall, as they still valued them as a pawn to use against Russia (with whom Britain had been growing more distant). The British also didn't like the idea of an open straits. However at the same time Greece was friendly towards Britain and hosted a British naval mission. The leader of which loved the Greek king and no doubt would write the British government that they should support Greece. And Britain was also supportive of Greece keeping the Aegean islands. Also if Britain supports one it wno doubt pushes the other to ally with Germany. Lastly Italy was sort of out of this fight and lacked much reason to get involved.

I'm not sure how the crisis would have ended, but it would not have ended in a great European war. The lack of aligned interest between allies was sure to prevent a war as no side wanted to enter a fight alone. Also Austria though split on whether or not a war was a good idea leaned more to the side of against war. In Russia they wanted to avoid war until 1918-19 when their military reform, double tracked Trans-Siberian, and European Russian railway system were all set to be completed. And considering they'd be the main movers in a Balkan Crisis I can't see war happening. In all honesty a set of events that was real specific needs to occur to truly launch a war.
 
Franz II. would have tried to govern as militaristic neo-absolutist as possible. I suspect that his waffling between different reactionary and reformist concepts (crown lands federalism, nationality federalism, Austro-Hungaro-South Slav trialism, A-H-Czech trialism, radical centralism) would have remained unresolved for some time. Maybe long enough to create serious internal conflicts.
OTOH, in contrast to FJ he was convinced that things in A-H somehow had to change. Therefore, he was opposed to a war with Serbia and wanted to ignore them. In foreign politics, he saw a firm alliance with Germany and Russia as desirable, so that the three emperors could protect each other against revolutions.

True, at least he had some interesting and - possibly - smart ideas about foreign policy. Though I think an Emperor with those ideas would have been more useful in the 1890s or early 1900s than in 1917 or so.
 
Princip was one of SEVEN known assassins dispatched by Serbia to Sarajevo for the purpose of killing the Heir Presumptive of the Austro-Hungarian Empire [and it was no accident that it occurred on the 525th Anniversary of the Fall of Kosovo]. If Princip hadn't been somehow not walked around that odd corner, it's quite probable one of the [at least] six others could have done the deed.
Let's just say I was not entirely sorry to hear that the MUSEUM built to honor Princip got bombed in the Bosnian War of 1992.
 
Yeah, I was watching a video about the assassination and that's what got me to think about this.

You guys have some really cool ideas here. I like the notion that the great war wasn't most certainty going to happen. Imagine a world without this conflict. It literally shaped almost everything in modern day politics. So much would be changed....I kinda wan't to make a map about it, although my maps suck :p
 
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