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Probably. Ferdinand was a liberal and would have responded to growing Slavic nationalism with increased autonomy for those peoples. Maybe restructuring the Dual Monarchy to make it a Multi Monarchy. Russia saw herself as the leader of the Slavic peoples and this would have salved her concerns. In France the desire for revanche was already receding. Germany, for all her bellicosity, was not about to start a war for no reason. She had given up the naval race with England, had her small place in the sun, and could have gone on happily for quite some time. The Ottomans were finally out of Europe and her decay had run out of opportunities to upset the equilibrium.
On the other hand, something might have come up. Oil was just coming into prominence and at some point access to it would become a point of contention. But by then Europe might have been far different in many ways and a way to manage the issue might have been resolved peaceably, like colonizing Africa was.
Rockets, jet planes, atomic bombs were just around the corner. A depressurized Europe would have recognized what these meant in war. A completely different path could have emerged.
It would have prevented WW I from breaking out in the manner that it did, but that does not mean that something else would not have triggered it....or that the sides would have been the same.
You can't control these things....as in changing one historical event and assuming that all else would remain constant. To change one thing is to ultimately change all.
WWI or something like it would have happened regardless; the murder of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his consort was just the rash that finally broke out from a long simmering illness.
Simply put the old order that had survived through Edwardian period was being challenged almost in every single country in Europe. The industrial revolution unleashed forces that were colliding and going up against the old world where everyone know their place and royalty/nobility were on top.
In particular Kaiser Wilhelm II was itching for a fight (Germany had been building up a great navy and other military for years), in order to show his country could take it's place as a world (super) power. This included challenging the dominate naval and world power at that time; Great Britain.
Wilhelm also played at Nicholas II, in attempts to get the Czar to back out Russia's alliance with France. At one point even writing that the country "had known no peace since the (sic) murders of their royal majesties (Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette)".
Even after Nicholas II made the fateful mistake of mobilizing Russia's military had Germany *not* launched a series of invasions and declarations of war things might have ended differently. But alas not......
WWII widely is seen as something inevitable and warned of by many at the Treaty of Versailles and afterwards.
Post WWI Germany was not only humiliated, but was to be made to pay for her actions. Of course no one could have predicted stock market crash and the great economic depression that hit USA, Europe and pretty much elsewhere. As wont to happen when things go badly people look for a cause (for Germany it was the nearly always hated Jews), and savior (Herr Hitler). The rest as they say is history.
It is telling that post WWII despite plans for harsh treatment of Germany, much of the Morgenthau Plan was either not enacted and or reversed/lessened. Calmer heads had realized going down the same path as post WWI was not going to solve anything nor prevent another great war. Furthermore there was a new enemy for the West; Stalin and Communism. It is not in the best interests for UK, France, USA and others to have Germany fall under that regime, thus extending the Soviet Union's reach across almost all of Europe. So a different plan of action came about.
What WWI started in Europe; killing off of the old order, was finished by WWII.
It's been said, that there was not WWI and WWII. It was one continuous war with exhale between the two.
Both were already planned by the Global Predictor and implemented as planned.
Who or what was used as pretext - killing and archduke or false flag operation in Glivitze - is utterly irrelevant.
It would have prevented WW I from breaking out in the manner that it did, but that does not mean that something else would not have triggered it....or that the sides would have been the same.
You can't control these things....as in changing one historical event and assuming that all else would remain constant. To change one thing is to ultimately change all.
WWI was a war waiting to happen. If he hadn't been assassinated something else would have triggered it.
My money would have been on Kaiser Wilhelm II doing something dumb to the French or Russians or with the Imperial Navy. Or maybe something in Africa.
Without two key actors; Russia and Germany there wouldn't have been WWI. Nicholas II for mobilizing Russia's military, and the Kaiser for egging everyone on, stirring the pot then finally finding out of "honor" he and his country would come to the aid of the "old Archduke" to save him from being ganged up upon by Russia and France.
That being said the two largest empires in Europe at that time; Russia and Austria-Hungary were both having major internal issues. Sooner or later something in one or both (had it not been for Franz Ferdinand's murder), would have triggered things, and there would have been the Kaiser again stirring that pot.
If anything WWI had to happen as the world of monarchs and others in charge of things by virtue of birth alone was not only being challenged, but coming to an end, if those in charge did by know it.
Of course the crowned heads of Edwardian Europe along with their courts and aristocracy simply believed too much in their own press. All those inter-marriages and other familial relations were in theory supposed to bring peace. However when push came to shove that was nonsense and worse as the war progressed it became clear the monarchs had no real power at all.
An unmentioned factor in the evolution of early 20th century Europe are the Socialist parties in the different countries. They were gaining strength year by year in every country and were adamantly opposed to war. They were the largest party in Germany's Reichstag in 1914 and were on the fence on voting war credits. Ultimately, they felt they had to.
Also, Emperor Franz Joseph died in 1916. His circle was extremely autocratic and imperialist. They were the ones who annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina, aggravating Serbia's pan-Slavic elements. They were the ones who presented the hard line to Serbia. The first thing Ferdinand would have done on succession would be to address this situation and remove these elements from the government.
Wilhelm was militaristic but did not want war. To the last minute he tried to avoid it and thought he had when Serbia accepted almost all of Austria's demands. But Austria wasn't satisfied, Russia mobilized to protect her, and the die was cast. At that point Wilhelm felt he had no choice.
There was nothing inevitable about WWI. There were no strategic or economic interests impelling Europe to war. If anything, it was caused by flaws in the political structures of Germany, Austria, and Russia. And the system of alliances the continent adopted after 1870.
A few years time, as well as giving Wilhelm a little more sorely needed maturity, could very well have allowed these flaws to be ironed out.
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