Posted on 06/28/2019 7:12:51 AM PDT by Antoninus
It is not too far-fetched to say that Christian Europe officially died on June 28, 1914. On that day, the heir to the imperial throne of Austria-Hungary and his wife were gunned down on the streets of Sarajevo. In modern parlance, we would call the assassin, 19 year-old Serbian radical Gavrilo Princip, a terrorist. His act would lead directly to the outbreak of the Great War a little over a month later.
Following is an article that appeared in The Outlook, an important New York-based political and social journal, from a week after the assassinations. It is notable that the terrible ramifications of the slaying had yet to be recognizedstories regarding the political maneuvering of Theodore Roosevelt and the situation in Mexico were given priority in this issue.
The Assassinations at SarajevoThe assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and Duchess Sophie destroyed their young familytheir three children, Sophie, Maximilian and Ernst were sometimes described as the first orphans of the Great War. The assassination also led directly to the destruction of the last vestiges of Christian Europe. Considering the events that have followed up to the present, and the dark and uncertain future that Europe faces today, it is perhaps not out of place to remember these victims as signs of contradiction to the mess that liberal democracy and socialism have made of the once cultured and prosperous nations of the continent.All friends of Austria-Hungary were shocked by the murder on June 28 of the heir to the throne, the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, and his wife, the Duchess of Hohenberg. Those in exalted stations are never free from some sudden attack by some crazed man, as the cases of Lincoln and Garfield and McKinley, of King Humbert of Italy and King George of Greece, remind us.
In the present instance, murder has removed those who were about to succeed to great power. Franz Ferdinand was not a popular prince. He was reserved, taciturn, moody, opinionated, supposed to be under Jesuit control, a jingo, a militaristnot all together a happy combination. Accident made him, as the nephew of the venerable Austrian Emperor, heir to the throne. The world looked on with misgiving. For of all monarchs the Emperor of Austria-Hungary has best known how to manage the conglomeration of the many different nationalities which make up the Dual Empire. It might well be triple, as Franz Ferdinand himself suggested not long ago, the third part to be Slav.
With bitter irony, the Prince met his death at the hands of a Slava Serb. The Archduke and his wife were entering Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia, when a bomb was burst immediately behind their motor, shattering the motor which followed it and injuring its occupants. Moved by this circumstance, the Archduke, before replying later to the Mayors message of welcome, said: An amazing indignity has been perpetrated. You have received us with bombs. With his wife, he then drove towards the hospital to inquire after the condition of the sufferers from the bomb, when a young man sprang out of the crowd and aimed a pistol at the Duchess. Her husband immediately threw himself in front of her to shield her. The weapon used was an automatic pistol. Both occupants of the motor received mortal wounds from which they soon expired
The tragedy gains deeper pathos because it leaves the venerable head of the house of Hapsburg (Emperor Franz Joseph) so utterly alone. His has been a life overborne by grief. A quarter of a century ago, he lost in a most tragic way, his only son. Sixteen years ago, his wife was murdered. His brother, Maximilian, became Emperor of Mexico, only to be shot there, and Carlotta, Maximilians wife, became an inmate of an insane asylum. The Emperors sister-in-law, the Duchess of Alencon, was burned to death in Paris. The Archduke John, who suddenly renounced his rank and became plain Johann Orth, disappeared. And now comes the loss of another nephew, the heir presumptive.
As the children of Franz Ferdinands morganatic marriage are debarred from the throne, the new heir presumptive is Charles Francis Joseph (later Blessed Karl of Austria), the son of the late Archduke Otto, who married Josefa, daughter of the late King of Saxony.
The assassination of the Archduke and his wife was followed by bloody riots at Mostar, the capital of Herzegovina, between Mohammedan Croats and the Serbs. In the attempts of the Croats (aided by Austrians) to drive the Serbs back into their own quarters many serious incendiary fires were started, which at one time threatened the destruction of the city. It was reported that in the street fighting in Mostar, over two hundred Serbs were killed. Rioting also broke out in other towns in Herzegovina.
Ferdinand was a dictator called a monarch. He wasn’t voted into office. Anyone who calls himself a monarch should expect it when someone removes them from office in the only way possible.
Another godless muzzoid terrorist?
How is Kant’s thought “disintegrated”? His theories, whether right or wrong, were highly organized and integrated.
Russians have always loved war
In those 50 years, Europe began to end.
Are you confusing Crown Prince Rudolph with Grand Duke Franz Ferdinand?. After the Crown Prince’s suicide - Mayerling incident
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mayerling_incident
Franz Ferdinand became the heir.
He was thoroughly disliked by the Emperor Franz Josef I.
I have seen historians describe Franz Ferdinand as a “liberal”. He would have evolved the Austrian Empire to a sort of United States of Austria under a imperial system. Other historian say that’s myth!
If so one of history’s great “wtah ifs”!
As GK Chesterton said “We worship a God that knows the way out of the grave”.
Given the colossal egos involved, I think that all of the leaders, with certain foreknowledge, would have still embarked on war; certain that THIS time they would win. After all, there was honor and chivalry at stake. They all thought of war as something noble. They had a mindset and world view that is hard to fathom today.
There was a wonderful series on YouTube called
“The Great War,” that followed the war week by week.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FrCOKVnBxBM
Oh, horse puckey. You're cherry-picking a bunch of Latin American countries, all of which have a similar culture and history even excluding religion. All them are not "inherent failures of despotism," either. Costa Rica is certainly not. Chile is arguably not. Colombia is arguably not.
Now consider countries that are not Latin American, but still Catholic. Poland, despite being occupied by foreigners for much of its history, was reasonably prosperous until war and Marxism, imposed from outside, changed that. Malta is hardly an "inherent failure of despotism". Czechoslovakia, which was majority Catholic, had the highest standard of living in Europe before the war.
Thanks...but I was asking what was his religious background - not if he was a Serbian nationalist.
Muzzoid?
Christian?
Bkmk for later, careful reading.
Nominally Serbian Orthodox, but he was a terrorist and a nihilist in real life.
Agree. Kant was very rational and organized. That said, his Categorical Imperative untethered morality from Christianity.
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