OT - WWI on my mind...

[awp101]

95 years ago today Gavrilo Princip assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife Sophie in Sarajevo. This event triggered the alliances and treaties between various European powers which led to WWI and in effect shaped world events we feel to this day.

[gamekeeper]

Gavrilo Princip's bullets sure killed a lot of people.

[awp101]

Gavrilo Princip's bullets sure killed a lot of people.

More than he ever imagined I would suspect. His actions triggered WWI in a roundabout way (the politicians and media of the day had a helping hand). The Versailles Treaty ending WWI and the harsh treatment of the Central Powers (well deserved IMO) almost directly led to WWII and WWII evolved into the Cold War with it's standoffs and proxy wars. The backing of "freedom fighters" in the proxy wars gave rise to the terrorist groups of today and here we are.

Yes, an incredibly simplistic reading of events but what do you want from an internet hack?

Another by product of WWI was the rise of Lenin and the Bolsheviks. Lenin had been exiled by Imperial Russia and the Germans smuggled him back in to Russia to further their aims of bringing the Czar and his government down and closing the Eastern Front.

So for the cost of 2 bullets and a grenade in an earlier attack the reaper collected roughly 40 million military casualties in WWI alone, another 30 million or so military casualties in WWII, over 100 million civilians in both wars and probably another 100 million deaths of all types due to the rise communism and the various and sundry conflicts triggered since the end of WWII.

I wonder if he'd had that knowledge beforehand if he would have tried to achieve Serbian independence by other means?

[Ysabel Kid]

My grandfather fought in the Great War. He was a "long boy" - operating the primative (by out standards) mortars of the day. Those entangling alliances are what George Washington warned us about. Still, in this one we should have jumped in earlier - might have made more of a difference, and might have not allowed the conditions to set up for WWII.

[Thunder50]

And today is the 55th. anniversary of the Corvette!!!