Germany at that moment have not believed what lay in store for them. WWI, Weimar and wheelbarrows full of cash, the Third Reich. There’s a lesson in there for us.
The nihilists running wild must not be allowed the upper hand.
A bit of trivia also. In Berlin then, men had the vote from the 1870 era. SO in the war to make the world safe for democracy, the average German soldier could vote. The average British soldier couldn’t. No universal male suffrage in the UK till after the war. Only landowners before that!
i found this series really insightful (done by the BBC based on diplomatic correspondence)
It shows the events in the 37 days from the Franz Ferdinand assassination to the start of WW1.
The whole thing was a huge surprise to everyone - even the diplomats most deeply involved.
And the striking thing is how the events moved from what was seen as a Balkan flareup to something that none of them could stop.