Admiral Beez
Captain
A Last-Ditch Effort to Prevent a War
Read a telegram exchange between Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany and Tsar Nicholas of Russia in which the leaders attempt to prevent World War I.
www.facinghistory.org
"As the Austrian army began to invade Serbia, Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany and Tsar Nicholas of Russia, who were first cousins, made a last-ditch effort to contain the conflict through an exchange of telegrams"
If only these two leaders had sorted this out. Though I wonder how much power the Kaiser had to roll back the German general staff's planned offensives once the die was cast. Reading the final telegrams, it really falls to the Tsar rather than the Kaiser, IMO. Had Russia not mobilized when Austria-Hungary did the former could have relied on pressure from Germany upon the Austrians to leave Russia's Serbian allies alone.
It's hard to imagine the differences in the 20th Century had the First World War been averted, at least in its historical guise. Britain and Germany will still have their naval race - which was always stupid, considering that by 1913 Britain was by far Germany's largest trading partner. The USA will soon match all of Europe's combined economic and industrial might. Japan and Italy will be looking to expand their empires.
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