Posted on 08/01/2016 8:10:06 AM PDT by C19fan
See # 19; it was the Austro-Prussian War a few years earlier that doomed the Hapsburg monarchy. Even though the peace was benign (leaving the countries as allies), it left Austrian with little to rule...
As I understood it years ago, Serbia HAD agreed to the terms - but the mobilizations caused by the alliance systems put things on a crash course anyway. I have no horse in this race, so I’ll concede we may never know the truth (and I could believe either side’s version of events).
My wife has a rare genetic skeletal disorder and was the subject of a scientific paper. Most noticeably her hips did not fully develop at puberty and the bones in her arms and legs are disproportionately long and narrow for her height. She has very small wrists. There are other traits and minor problems associated, but these are the externally noticeable issues.
She is a descendent of the Romanov family and this condition along with hemophilia was one of the disorders that plagued the Romanovs and the other royal families. In the past 100 years the number of her relatives marrying one another decreased dramatically, so the disorders have all but disappeared. Neither her mother or her father had the same skeletal disorder, but she was told that it was passed down through her mother’s genes. None of our kids or our grandkids inherited the issue.
My wife’s grandmother was in her 40s when she gave birth to my wife’s mother. My wife’s mother was 42 when she gave birth to my wife. My wife is now in her 60s. This effectively brought my wife a couple generations closer than most would be to the issue.
At this point her genetic disorder does not cause her any serious difficulties, but she is a curiosity for doctors who study this type of thing.
As the clock wound down and the deadline approached, Russia was put on high alert.
The Hapsburg concept of a multiethnic empire failed due to the rise of nationalism, the same force that deprived it of political connections with southern Germany, with which the German portion of the empire was culturally and religiously tied. However, the multiethnic empire worked for centuries examples being the Roman Empire, the Byzantine Empire, India in certain periods, and the Russian Empire.
Whatever bad can be said about the Hapsburg Empire, what followed its collapse was worse. The successor countries were mostly authoritarian regimes, some of which sided with the Nazis during World War II. Just because you were now ruled mostly by your co-ethnics did not mean any increase of freedom. After the fall of the Axis powers, almost the entire area of the Hapsburg Empire became subject to Communist tyranny until 1990. The Hapsburgs did not impoverish the subjects, did not massively execute or imprison dissidents, nor barred overseas emigration.
I studied this years ago, so my information is outdated, but I seem to recall that the terms wouldn’t end Serbia’s autonomy; they would just be forced to let Austria investigate within Serbia (however that would work).
In the end, there were too many countries/governments that seemed to feel they were doomed WITHOUT a war to unify their people; while Ottoman Turkey was slowly crumbling, Austria-Hungary and Russia were both facing a steady decline into chaos. It was no accident that Russia collapsed first (if anything, it was impressive that they lasted so long); countries with significant minorities were hard-pressed to stick together. I do recall reading that the Austr0-Hungarian army had to deal with dozens of languages; imagine that?
Watching this all come full circle 20 years ago was bizarre; the same allies that awarded Austria-Hungary’s minorities to Serbia 80 years before (creating Yugoslavia) demanded that Serbia give them up, and attacked Serbia to force them to do so...
Number 5 was a doozy. (5) To accept the collaboration in Serbia of representatives of the Austro-Hungarian Government for the suppression of the subversive movement directed against the territorial integrity of the Monarchy;
bkmk
Was told by relation that my family had a distant princess in the Hapsburg family. Too hard to trace so I gave up.
Yes, that would be a tough one to swallow, though it seems similar to our “drug war” involvement in countries like Mexico or Colombia.
I recommend “The Army of Francis Joseph” by Gunther Rothenburg. It has a good bit of information regarding the internal politics of the final years of the Dual Monarchy.
I, OTOH, am thoroughly silly and think of this ... http://youtu.be/O5jK31CONVI
(That earlier comment was to be humor, btw)
You can be a valid and viable state, but if your neighbors and rivals are more viable, you’ll have trouble. What might have worked splendidly in 1700 or 1800 was having problems by 1900.
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