Der Erste Weltkrieg; 100 Jahre Einmal

This June 28 is the 100^th anniversary of the assassination of Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand, heir to the throne of the Habsburg Austro-Hungarian Empire, and his pregnant consort in Sarajevo, which led to the conflict commonly referred to as the First World War.  This was a conflict that had a profound effect on the World and which is still effecting the lives of everyone on the planet, and effecting them in such a way to make people realize that the wrong side won the conflict.  Here I shall go into why this is the case.

            Upon reading this many may wrongly assume I am a nazi.  Far from it if the Habsburgs and their allies had won hitler and those who formed the nazis would have had nothing to fight about, hitler would be another marginalized malcontent who few would have paid attention to.  That would have meant that communist elements inside the Habsburg Empire and it’s allies would have been under control as well, seeing how the workers in those countries were treated better than those in Britain, France, Russia, Italy, and any of the other countries, and would have remained confined to Russia, and possibly snuffed out there.  These same people who cry Nazism forget it was the British who invented the concentration camp for use against those in rebellion in their African colonies.

            That brings up another point, had the allies lost colonialism would have ended sooner and would have been less violent.  The Deutsches Reich only grabbed foreign colonies to prevent Britain, France, and other countries from seizing all territory for themselves, and the indigenous peoples in German colonies had the best treatment out of all the colonial powers, partly because the soldiers who comprised their military focused equal attention to protecting indigenous peoples as to their own countrymen.  Additionally, the Habsburgs and their allies favored ending colonialism, which meant Raj India, Khalj Fars and the Indian Ocean, Indochina and East Asia, Africa, and the Pacific would have been independent per a victory by the Habsburgs and their allies, and because advanced armaments were not available to the peoples in those regions any ensuing conflicts would not have been so violent and many people would not have died.

            Though it must be admitted the Habsburgs and their allies would have lost some colonies and territory, however in the case of the Habsburgs and Germany they still would have retained those territories as trading partners, in the case of the Ottomans the loss would have been through their own mismanagement and radical nationalism, as the cases of the Arabs and Armenians demonstrates.  It must be remembered that in 1913 Germany was producing better quality products than the British and their allies, and were selling them for less.  People need to remember that although the British and their allies won that war they were weaker, being dependent on American products.  If the Habsburgs and their allies had won the economic situation in the World would be similar, however without the bloodshed over the past 100 years.

            Overall, if the Habsburgs and their allies had won WWI much of the unnecessary suffering that has occurred over the past 100 years would NOT have happened.