[nkycincinnatikid]

In the 19th century they were the Russians cover for the advance on the Bosphorus. In the 20th after Russia became the puppet of the French, the Serbs were the assasins who brought down the Central powers.

[RossA]

The author ignores the most spectacular example of Russian support for Serbia: the support that cost Nicholas II his throne and Russia an enormous amount of land.

World War I started when Austria-Hungary attempted (justly by most accounts) to punish Serbia for an assassination. Russia, foolishly and needlessly, elected to support the Serbs and declare war on A-H. Germany then was obligated to declare war on Russia; and France, in turn - and with England in tow, to declare war on Germany.

Ultimately, Russia suffered the 70-year-blight of Communism plus land losses in at the treaty of Brest-Litovsk: 1/3 of Poland, the Baltic states, parts of Czechoslavakia (Russia "surrendered" to Germany before the Germans did so to the Allies).