Crisis in Sarajevo
"In the forty years following the Franco-Prussian War . . . there developed a system of alliances which divided Europe into two hostile groups. This hostility was accentuated by the increase of armaments, economic rivalry, nationalist ambitions and antagonisms, and newspaper incitement. But it is very doubtful whether all these dangerous tendencies would have actually led to war, had it not been for the assassination of Franz Ferdinand. That was the factor which consolidated the elements of hostility and started the rapid and complicated succession of events which culminated in a World War . . . ."
~Sidney Fay, 2: 558
~Sidney Fay, 2: 558
On June 28, 1914, the heir to the Austrian throne was assassinated by Serbian nationalist Gavrilo Princip in Sarajevo. Despite Archduke Franz Ferdinand's general unpopularity, his death proved to be the perfectly timed spark needed to ignite a European war.