the blue countries are called the triple
entente. The yellow countries are neutrals.
The alliance system had a knock on affect
if one country went to war then they would
drag their allies into war and soon it became
a world war . The act which triggered the
alliance system would be awarded to the
murder of Franz Ferdinand. Austria Hungary
declared war on Serbia, Germany declares war on Russia and on France, invades Belgium. Britain declares war on Germany. There are a few arguments that you can make that the world war started because of the alliance but it would have started anyway but maybe would not have been so big.
Assassination
Two bullets fired and killed two people lead to a world war. Franz Ferdinand, eldest son of Carl Ludwig, the brother of Emperor Franz Josef, was born in 1863. He was shot by a man called Gavrilo Princip who was in a gang called the Black Hand gang. The Serbians wanted the Serbs in Bosnia to rebel and when Franz Ferdinand said that he would make the Serbs living in Bosnia happier, they decided they would get rid of him as then the Serbs would not rebel and they can never gain independence. Franz Ferdinand was going to visit Sarajevo and that’s were they said they would kill him.
The 7 assassins lined up on the road which the archduke was going to take. Here is a map of how the assassins lined up. The first attempt to kill the arch duke failed. Mehmed Mehmedbaši did not do anything the next assassin was a man called Nedjelko Cabrinovic. He threw a grenade at the car but then forgot about the delay and missed. He stuck to the plan and took the cyanide and jumped into a river but he never died the cyanide was old and just made him vomit and the river was just a few inches deep. Then the archduke cancelled his visit to the museum and went to visit on the hospital to visit the injured people by Cabrinovic grenade. The Driver made a wrong turn and as the car changed the gear the gears jammed and Gavrilo Princip was there buying a sandwich he took out his browning pistol and shot Archduke and his wife.
Balkans
This part of Europe was not stable. It was made up by lots of new countries. One of which were Serbia. Serbia wanted to become a bigger and a more powerful country. Some of the Serbs lived in a place called Bosnia. The Serbs wanted to take over this land and encouraged terrorists to attack. The Balkans did not know how they should separate the land surrendered by the Ottoman Empire. Russia was backing the Serbs because the Serbs and Russians were similar and Russia wanted the Balkans and same with Germany.
Rivalry
Britain and Germany were suspicious of each other. Britain worried that the German’s navy threatened it and that Germany was overtaking Britain as the leading industrial nation in Europe. Germany was jealous of Britain’s Empire and felt they deserved a large empire too. Germany and France disliked one and another. In 1870 they fought a war. After the war Germany took away the French lands of Alsace Lorraine. The French never forgave the Germans they wanted it back. Austria and Russia were suspicious of one and another, both wanted power and influence in an area of Europe called the Balkans. The Russians were stirring up trouble against Austria-Hungary in the Balkans. All the great powers never liked one and another and were scared of wars and so made alliances with each other. The triple entente and the triple alliance. France wanted to go to war with Germany because of Alsace Lorraine.
Conclusions
The World War 1 did not start on just that short term assassin. The World War 1 could have started because of the Rivalry and the Balkans nationalism. I think that it had quite a lot of things to do with the long term. The Balkans for an example, If the Balkans separated the land equally the countries may not have to war with the other countries. For example if Austria-Hungary had equal land as Serbia then they might have prevented from fighting and may have not caused the war. The alliances might have had something to do with the war. If Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia and Austria-Hungary never had a German alliance and if Serbia never had a Russian alliance the war wouldn’t have been big. If there wasn’t an alliance the World War 1 probably would have happened now or later.
