-- Posted by fezzy at 8:59 pm on Sep. 11, 2008 For the past few days in my IB Global Studies class we've been doing a peace conference simulation on July 30, 1914 to see if World War I could have been avoided. My group is Austria-Hungary. Our main motive is to be able to investigate the murder of our heir to the throne, Franz Ferdinand, and we need to send troops into Serbia to investigate. Although Serbia agreed with most of our ultimatum, they wouldn't let us go in and investigate. After a lot of negotiating--including seeing if Russia would stop helping them if Germany would stop helping us--we came to a peace coalition with Serbia. Both nations would investigate the murder, and we would only send in the investigators and bodyguards... no other military. So from this really awesome simulation it seems that WWI happened because Austria-Hungary was being really selfish. And to think we blamed it all on Germany! Any opinions? (I know I'm going to be bashed for something I said here.) -- Posted by airemaye at 10:10 pm on Sep. 11, 2008 Oh my God. I would love to do something like that! It's not all Germany's fault. It's not really even Germany's fault at all. It was just the system of alliances at the time- Germany was allied with Austria-Hungary because they both felt that that was the only way they had a chance to compete with the powerhouse Triple Entente. (France, Britain, Russia) And Germany was kind of bitter about the TE because they felt as though Germany was coming up short on the world stage next to the three stooges. The alliances were quite binding- if one nation went to war, they all went to war. So even though the war started out as a civil war of sorts in A-H, Germany had to get involved. And in turn, the TE had to step in, because they had promised to defend and protect Serbia. We just like to blame Germany because Germany is so easy to blame. Because I mean, WWII. -- Posted by Drace at 10:28 pm on Sep. 11, 2008 Yeah, Germany is blamed because well most people are retards and don't know the history, and they are fooled since Germany is was quite active in the war. You never really hear of Austria if you just hear of WW1 out of the blue. And of course the war could have been avoided. "Selfish" is the wrong word though. Sending in bunch of tanks and men into a another country is not so beneficial (Especially when Russia gets involved ^^) Stupid a better word? -- Posted by Blackadder at 3:12 pm on Sep. 13, 2008 lol..... thats really cute.... unfortunatly, Princips actions was a mere straw, which broke the cammels back. -- Posted by fezzy at 10:58 pm on Sep. 13, 2008 So here's how it resolved: A-H and Serbia decided to have a peace coalition. Together they would equally investigate the murder in Serbia. A-H would only send in investigators and bodyguards, and there could be no interference from allies (Russia and Germany, respectively). However Great Britain, France, and Russia still had troubles over some disputed land and that issue could not be resolved in the time that we had. It seems that war could not have been avoided as there was so much tension. Had it not been that date, it would have been some point some time later. -- Posted by The Samsoniteman at 1:19 pm on Sep. 14, 2008 What about the deep yearning of the majority of the Russian aristocracy to fight and win a nice quick war in Europe? The AH empire was no more greedy than any other country in Europe at the time.