Nationalism DOESN’T explain WHY Austria-Hungary collapsed 

@Rän There were certainly some dangerous tensions to it, but not of the same existential extent.

Largest war in history *so far*.

Austria lost three key wars back to back: against Napoleon, against Prussia and ww1

@@ekekonoiseTracing a parallel: the U.S. has lost at least five of the five last wars it got involved with and, nonetheless, it stands…

​@@michaeldelisieux5252 none of those were as big as the other three

I see a man of culture there

He was a military genius tough!!!!

@Mars Attacks Actually don't think the rest of the high command tought he was, he was a oppurtunist warmongorer that was put on his post by Franz Ferdiand (who they praise for being the man to save the empire, actually it was his inner circle and desicions, especially this decision, that sealed the deal for A-H)

@Mars Attacks Don't want to be harsh now, but if A-H would not have reacted on the provocation it would have been better, as Franz Ferdinand was loathed by everyone but the Slavic population (which was in minority). Funny tough that he was killed by a slav nationalist, so that is probably also kinda a myth, the Bohemians loved him, pretty much everybody else hated him. The Habsburg family, Austrian ruling politicians and the Hungarians had a hellish loathing especially.So he would have fucked up everything. Franz Joseph should have taken Charles under his wings eairlier and decided that since his marrige he can not accend to the throne. Think that would have been possible, it has happened before in history, and they could take the desicion that his children would never get a claim on the throne. Well, this is just my opinion.

@@therealignotus7549 Franz Josef was a stickler for legality, and correctly imo since The Empire had nothing else to hold it together.

Personally, I think hyperinflation was a huge factor in the collapse of the Roman Empire. Debasing your money and turning it into fiat currency is never good

​@@TheImperatorKnight Hyperinflation was certainly a large part of it. Then we had other factors such as agriculture exhaustion (expect Egypt), multiple waves of plauge, 'barbarian' invasions, the lack of competency of the Roman Emperors, the undermining of civil institutions vis-à-vis military institutions, multiple civil wars, declining administrative efficiency and so forth. The reasons for the fall can be made endless. It was not like the Empire suddenly collapsed one day, it was slow process that took hundreds of years. Heck, modern studies have shown that even climate change may have played a large part in the collapse.

@@LightxHeaven Ethnicity was still a very important factor. Don't forget that pan-Slavic movements were very strong at the time and the dual German/Hungarian dominated monarchy was resented by most Slavs.

"Hyperinflation was certainly a large part of it. Then we had other factors such as agriculture exhaustion (expect Egypt), multiple waves of plauge, 'barbarian' invasions, the lack of competency of the Roman Emperors, the undermining of civil institutions vis-à-vis military institutions, multiple civil wars, declining administrative efficiency and so forth." True. But which came first, the chicken or the egg? Hyperinflation or all these other factors? Did the hyperinflation lead to these, or the other way around? Or both!

@TIK more like the international trade that cause Roman gold to siphon to India, then the plague of 168 AD disrupt the entire international trade, killed lots of Roman population (potential tax payers) and the Military, and then you have incompetent Emperors who inherited a troubled Empire, a fear of military mutiny and constant Civil War, all rise the upkeep of the Roman military and therefore make hyperinflation possible. My source from this is Roman Empire and the Indian Ocean

I want a "But as always, Socialism destroyed the economy." T-shirt.

@@juliancate7089 but but true socialism has never been tried

I want a "is this really the case" suitcase.

There should be a whole line of "But is really the case" Shirts Mugs Posters Ect

@@kevinbrown4073 LOL. I thought of posting that as a separate post, but I then I realized many people would think I was serious instead of mocking Socialists. I've learned to expect the worst from the Internet.

Exactly. The exact opposite of what is implied in the video.

Probably exacerbated the food crisis though

Franz Joseph kissed the hand of the Tzar in order to ask some 30.000 men to help the Royal-Imperial army. He got 230.000

Exactly. Man TIK is absolute garbage unless he’s showing micro movements of military battles. Anything that requires more intuitive thought he just cherry picks and shows massive bias. Shame really, he gets picked apart quite often in r/badhistory

Agree my point

In July 1849, the Hungarian Revolutionary Parliament proclaimed and enacted the WORLD's FIRST laws on ethnic and minority rights. It gave minorities the freedom to use their mothertongue at local administration, at tribunals, in schools, in community life and even within the national guard of non-Magyar councils. However these laws were overturned after the united Russian and Austrian armies crushed the Hungarian Revolution of 1848. After the Kingdom of Hungary reached the Compromise with the Habsburg Dynasty in 1867, one of the first acts of its restored Parliament was to pass a Law on Nationalities (Act Number XLIV of 1868). The situation of minorities in Hungary was not even comparable to the contemporary pre WW1 Europe. Other highly multiethnic /multinational countries were: France Russia and UK. See the multi-national UK: The situation of Scottish Irish and Welsh people in "Britain" during the English hegemony is well known. They utmost forgot their original language,only English language cultural educational institutions existed. The only language was English in judiciary procedures and in offices and public administrations. In Wales Welsh children were beaten by their teachers if they spoke Welsh among each others. This was the infamous “Welsh Not” policy... See: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_Not The contemporary Irish question and tensions are well documented. The situation of Ireland was even a more brutal story. It was not a real "United" Kingdom, it was rather a greater England. See the multiethnic France: In the era of the Great French revolution, only 25% of the population of Kingdom of France could speak the French language as mothertongue. In 1870, France was still similar-degree multi-ethnic state as Hungary, only 50% of the population of France spoke the French language as mothertongue. The other half of the population spoke Occitan, Breton, Provençal, Catalan, Corsican, Alsatian, West Flemish, Lorraine Franconian, Gallo, Picard or Ch’timi and Arpitan etc... Many minority languages were closer to Spanish languages or Italian language than French) French governments banned minority language schools, minority language newspapers minority theaters. They banned the usage of minority languages in offices , public administration, and judiciary procedures. The ratio of french mothertongue increased from 50% to 91% during the 1870-1910 period!!! The situation in German Empire was well known (Polish territories) Just look some Eastern countries in the oreintal so-called Eurasian (aka. Orthodox) civilization : The legal system of pre-WW1 Kingom of Serbia did not know minority rights. Also, the legal system of pre-WW1 Kingdom of Romania did not know minority rights, morover, Kingdom of Romania applied strong dicriminative laws against Jewish people similar to Tzarist Russia. Just examine the high contrast between Kingdom of Hungary and contemporary pre WW1-era Europe: The so-called "Magyarization" was not so harsh as the contemporary western European situation, because the minorities were defended by minority rights and laws. Contemporary Western European legal systems did not know the minority rights, therefore they loudly and proudly covered up their minorities. 1.Were there state sponsored minority schools in Western European countries? NO. 2. How many official languages existed in Western-European states? Only 1 official language! 3. Could minorities use their languages in the offices of public administration in self-governments , in tribunals in Western Europe? No, they couldn't. 4. Did the minorities have own fractions and political parties in the western European parliaments ? No, no they hadn't. 5. What about newspapers of ethnic minorities in Western Europe? They did not exist in the West.... We can continue these things to the infinity. The Austro-Hungarian compromise and its supporting liberal parliamentary parties remained bitterly unpopular among the ethnic Hungarian voters, and the continuous successes of these pro-compromise liberal parties in the Hungarian parliamentary elections caused long lasting frustration for Hungarians. The ethnic minorities had the key role in the political maintenance of the compromise in Hungary, because they were able to vote the pro-compromise liberal parties into the position of the majority/ruling parties of the Hungarian parliament. The pro-compromise liberal parties were the most popular among ethnic minority voters, however i.e. the Slovak, Serb and Romanian minority parties remained unpopular among their own ethnic minority voters. The coalitions of Hungarian nationalist parties - which were supported by the overwhelming majority of ethnic Hungarian voters - always remained in the opposition, with the exception of the 1906-1910 period, where the Hungarian-supported nationalist parties were able to form a government.[48]

I'd say they had exactly two reasons. 1. That The Dual Monarchy had in effect been assimilated to the German Reich and it was hard to see how the two could be separated again. 2. President Wilson wanted it.

@@alanpennie8013 In July 1849, the Hungarian Revolutionary Parliament proclaimed and enacted the WORLD's FIRST laws on ethnic and minority rights. It gave minorities the freedom to use their mothertongue at local administration, at tribunals, in schools, in community life and even within the national guard of non-Magyar councils. However these laws were overturned after the united Russian and Austrian armies crushed the Hungarian Revolution of 1848. After the Kingdom of Hungary reached the Compromise with the Habsburg Dynasty in 1867, one of the first acts of its restored Parliament was to pass a Law on Nationalities (Act Number XLIV of 1868). The situation of minorities in Hungary was not even comparable to the contemporary pre WW1 Europe. Other highly multiethnic /multinational countries were: France Russia and UK. See the multi-national UK: The situation of Scottish Irish and Welsh people in "Britain" during the English hegemony is well known. They utmost forgot their original language,only English language cultural educational institutions existed. The only language was English in judiciary procedures and in offices and public administrations. In Wales Welsh children were beaten by their teachers if they spoke Welsh among each others. This was the infamous “Welsh Not” policy... See: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_Not The contemporary Irish question and tensions are well documented. The situation of Ireland was even a more brutal story. It was not a real "United" Kingdom, it was rather a greater England. See the multiethnic France: In the era of the Great French revolution, only 25% of the population of Kingdom of France could speak the French language as mothertongue. In 1870, France was still similar-degree multi-ethnic state as Hungary, only 50% of the population of France spoke the French language as mothertongue. The other half of the population spoke Occitan, Breton, Provençal, Catalan, Corsican, Alsatian, West Flemish, Lorraine Franconian, Gallo, Picard or Ch’timi and Arpitan etc... Many minority languages were closer to Spanish languages or Italian language than French) French governments banned minority language schools, minority language newspapers minority theaters. They banned the usage of minority languages in offices , public administration, and judiciary procedures. The ratio of french mothertongue increased from 50% to 91% during the 1870-1910 period!!! The situation in German Empire was well known (Polish territories) Just look some Eastern countries in the oreintal so-called Eurasian (aka. Orthodox) civilization : The legal system of pre-WW1 Kingom of Serbia did not know minority rights. Also, the legal system of pre-WW1 Kingdom of Romania did not know minority rights, morover, Kingdom of Romania applied strong dicriminative laws against Jewish people similar to Tzarist Russia. Just examine the high contrast between Kingdom of Hungary and contemporary pre WW1-era Europe: The so-called "Magyarization" was not so harsh as the contemporary western European situation, because the minorities were defended by minority rights and laws. Contemporary Western European legal systems did not know the minority rights, therefore they loudly and proudly covered up their minorities. 1.Were there state sponsored minority schools in Western European countries? NO. 2. How many official languages existed in Western-European states? Only 1 official language! 3. Could minorities use their languages in the offices of public administration in self-governments , in tribunals in Western Europe? No, they couldn't. 4. Did the minorities have own fractions and political parties in the western European parliaments ? No, no they hadn't. 5. What about newspapers of ethnic minorities in Western Europe? They did not exist in the West.... We can continue these things to the infinity. The Austro-Hungarian compromise and its supporting liberal parliamentary parties remained bitterly unpopular among the ethnic Hungarian voters, and the continuous successes of these pro-compromise liberal parties in the Hungarian parliamentary elections caused long lasting frustration for Hungarians. The ethnic minorities had the key role in the political maintenance of the compromise in Hungary, because they were able to vote the pro-compromise liberal parties into the position of the majority/ruling parties of the Hungarian parliament. The pro-compromise liberal parties were the most popular among ethnic minority voters, however i.e. the Slovak, Serb and Romanian minority parties remained unpopular among their own ethnic minority voters. The coalitions of Hungarian nationalist parties - which were supported by the overwhelming majority of ethnic Hungarian voters - always remained in the opposition, with the exception of the 1906-1910 period, where the Hungarian-supported nationalist parties were able to form a government.

Huh figures, ‘propaganda’ won in the end not the people’s desires. The Habsburg should’ve focus on their own propaganda to win in that case

Yes, the only problem with the "prison of peoples" is that it's not true. It was a propaganda even before WWI for decades. Against a country which really had rights of minorities. While others didn't have. That's why the minorities had words too, and even these lies. (And btw the empire had totally different areas, and even calling it an empire is not precise, it was the Austrian empire and Hungary which suffered under Austria. It was not a happy marriage.) While after the treaty there was no propaganda, Austria and Hungary didn't have words. Althought the winner states were really prisons of people. Many people were persecuted, the minorities's properties were simply taken, minorities didn't have rights, millions of people died in genocides. Just one example: in the Czech and Slovakians constitution the whole Hungarian and German minority have collective sins (I dont know why... well I know, they could stole everything with such laws from the people of minorities, and they still actually have these laws in 2023).

Good point. It still confirms my point at the end - that the external powers wanted to save Austria in 1848, but not in 1918

@@TheImperatorKnight I absolutely agree with your conclusion, for the record.

@@TheImperatorKnight As much as I disagree with some of the economic points, I do agree with the global political ones. Also, Austrians lost A LOT of wars, but usually had a lot of diplomatic success, during the entire 19th Century.

@@Alex.HFA1 Was there however a real sustained success against first-class power? I mean, Austria did OK at times, as part of larger coalitions, but on it's own the successes were long time ago(and fewer territories ago yet) and there were quite a few defeats.

They , the rusdians, were invading, because Hungary wanted to break free. After the revolt was put down, many Hungarian leaders were executed at Arad, I don't think this can be qualified as " helping out".

TIK is the heroe that we need.

@@gryf92 He really fails here. If you follow his own maxim.

>My parents breaking up Tik: But is this really the case?

nope, i asked the question. and fun fact; it's not as much as the empire collapsed but that the Habsburgs were FORBIDDEN on thread of outside intervention to return to the throne in Hungary or Austria. secondly, Woodrow Wilson that piece of shit made his famos 14 points and than virtually ignored them cause you know, a large portion of eastern europe and mediterranean had already been promised... Brits wanted to keep the empire, and americans - always ignorant, biased and shortsighted - disagreed. result was a clusterfuck in eastern europe, with holochaust as one of it's consequences as well... because one A-U stopped existing there was no power to balance out the germans. and this balancing of power was a historic role of habsburg empire. so yea.

@@bluemoondiadochi AH countered Germany really well in 1860ties and especially in 1914...

What was the option? It wasn't immediately apparent that a refusal to fight could lead to splitting the empire for the minorities. At first the great war seemed like it wouldnt last too long. Losing the war could've seen as letting your hometown and family have a worse life in the future, because nobody really thought in 1914 that the empire could even fall. But as soon as Romania joined the war, many Romanians deserted or refused to fight against their nation state. The czechoslovak legion is another example of the empires citizens fighting against it. Are there such examples about other countries like France?

Yeah he doesn't really understand much aside from battlefield lines. No wonder he couldn't get a job with his degree

@@GhostKiller755 BUT IS THIS REALLY THE CASE? :D

I laughed when he spoke of "distribute goods fairly among those who contributed most to the economy". Did he thought that the soldiers on the field were "contributing to the economy"? Did he forgot that soldiers on the field do not produce, that horses and mules used to drive supply trains do not plough the fields? Maybe he could read a book or two that explain modern war in depth. Not to mention the fuss he makes about TWO (2!) Socialists being appointed to an ADVISORY board, and the fact that an organization was called "Kommisariat".

The UK did have socialism in WW2.

He lost me with Utopian Libertarianism vs Central Planning. The Achilles heal of all that thought is people will do the right thing given freedom. But unfortunately enough never will.

Which nobility? Most members of the lower house in the parliament were not even noblemen. And lower House had the real power who created the laws. MAny prime ministers had no noble origins. What are you talking about?

@@chriswanger284 and who led the revolutions that eventually led to the creation of the Austro-Hungarian Empire? In Krakow, in Galicia, in Hungary? Peasants? No, it was the nobility. Especially in the Polish lands. And if this nobility were not eventually appeased, the Austro-Hungarian state would have never been created, let alone functioned. So yes, it was the eventual support of the nobility for Franz Joseph that played a major role in keeping the Empire as stable as it could be.

@@zedxyle The revolution was sparked in the Pilvac cofeehouse by 4 intellectuals, none of tem was noble. The new suffrage law (Act V of 1848) transformed the old feudal estates based parliament (Estates General) into a democratic representative parliament. This law offered the widest suffrage right in Europe at the time.[28] The first general parliamentary elections were held in June, which were based on popular representation instead of feudal forms. The reform oriented political forces won the elections. The electoral system and franchise were similar to the contemporary British system.[29] Read about April laws: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/April_Laws And read this: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March_Constitution_(Austria)

@@zedxyle In July 1849, the Hungarian Revolutionary Parliament proclaimed and enacted the WORLD's FIRST laws on ethnic and minority rights. It gave minorities the freedom to use their mothertongue at local administration, at tribunals, in schools, in community life and even within the national guard of non-Magyar councils. However these laws were overturned after the united Russian and Austrian armies crushed the Hungarian Revolution of 1848. After the Kingdom of Hungary reached the Compromise with the Habsburg Dynasty in 1867, one of the first acts of its restored Parliament was to pass a Law on Nationalities (Act Number XLIV of 1868). The situation of minorities in Hungary was not even comparable to the contemporary pre WW1 Europe. Other highly multiethnic /multinational countries were: France Russia and UK. See the multi-national UK: The situation of Scottish Irish and Welsh people in "Britain" during the English hegemony is well known. They utmost forgot their original language,only English language cultural educational institutions existed. The only language was English in judiciary procedures and in offices and public administrations. In Wales Welsh children were beaten by their teachers if they spoke Welsh among each others. This was the infamous “Welsh Not” policy... See: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_Not The contemporary Irish question and tensions are well documented. The situation of Ireland was even a more brutal story. It was not a real "United" Kingdom, it was rather a greater England. See the multiethnic France: In the era of the Great French revolution, only 25% of the population of Kingdom of France could speak the French language as mothertongue. In 1870, France was still similar-degree multi-ethnic state as Hungary, only 50% of the population of France spoke the French language as mothertongue. The other half of the population spoke Occitan, Breton, Provençal, Catalan, Corsican, Alsatian, West Flemish, Lorraine Franconian, Gallo, Picard or Ch’timi and Arpitan etc... Many minority languages were closer to Spanish languages or Italian language than French) French governments banned minority language schools, minority language newspapers minority theaters. They banned the usage of minority languages in offices , public administration, and judiciary procedures. The ratio of french mothertongue increased from 50% to 91% during the 1870-1910 period!!! The situation in German Empire was well known (Polish territories) Just look some Eastern countries in the oreintal so-called Eurasian (aka. Orthodox) civilization : The legal system of pre-WW1 Kingom of Serbia did not know minority rights. Also, the legal system of pre-WW1 Kingdom of Romania did not know minority rights, morover, Kingdom of Romania applied strong dicriminative laws against Jewish people similar to Tzarist Russia. Just examine the high contrast between Kingdom of Hungary and contemporary pre WW1-era Europe: The so-called "Magyarization" was not so harsh as the contemporary western European situation, because the minorities were defended by minority rights and laws. Contemporary Western European legal systems did not know the minority rights, therefore they loudly and proudly covered up their minorities. 1.Were there state sponsored minority schools in Western European countries? NO. 2. How many official languages existed in Western-European states? Only 1 official language! 3. Could minorities use their languages in the offices of public administration in self-governments , in tribunals in Western Europe? No, they couldn't. 4. Did the minorities have own fractions and political parties in the western European parliaments ? No, no they hadn't. 5. What about newspapers of ethnic minorities in Western Europe? They did not exist in the West.... We can continue these things to the infinity. The Austro-Hungarian compromise and its supporting liberal parliamentary parties remained bitterly unpopular among the ethnic Hungarian voters, and the continuous successes of these pro-compromise liberal parties in the Hungarian parliamentary elections caused long lasting frustration for Hungarians. The ethnic minorities had the key role in the political maintenance of the compromise in Hungary, because they were able to vote the pro-compromise liberal parties into the position of the majority/ruling parties of the Hungarian parliament. The pro-compromise liberal parties were the most popular among ethnic minority voters, however i.e. the Slovak, Serb and Romanian minority parties remained unpopular among their own ethnic minority voters. The coalitions of Hungarian nationalist parties - which were supported by the overwhelming majority of ethnic Hungarian voters - always remained in the opposition, with the exception of the 1906-1910 period, where the Hungarian-supported nationalist parties were able to form a government.[48]

The question if it was nobility or not is misleading - it is rather the question of economy and power structures, no matter of nobility status. To say that nationalism, without explaining what is meant, was the most important factor is distortion by mixing notions and oversimplifying. The problem was less "nationalism" and much more aggressive "anti-nationalism" - cultural and language hegemony and homogenization, i.e. disrespect and oppression on ethnic ground. Quite aggressive germanization and magyarization has led to broad mistrust and grievances which at the same time solidified the idea of ethnic nationalism. That's the impression I've got from my parents and ancestors who actively participated in rediscovery, development and preservation of ethnic languages and cultures.

My grandfather was a Croatian AH soldier fighting the Russians , the first chance he got he was off joining the revolution , when he came home the Yugoslav government arrested him as a communist .

I think the fact that the successor states were multiethnic is not an argument in the way the video presents it as. It only demonstrates that the Empire itself was multiethnic and that chopping it up on ethnic lines was basically impossible, well, not while retaining a nice map shape for the successor states.

@@bezukaking6860 it's also hilarious to belive that the empire fell because of socialism. Hungary also collapsed, was also splitted in different parts occupied by Yugoslavia and Romania + all the rutenians declared independance and joined Checozlovaquia this failure of hungary state was also because of socialism? The entente had already in mind a repartition of AH empire...they promised some lands to the serbs, poles and romanians and that was all. Germany was also starving, ready for Revolution (spartaquist league...), No socialism there? Or just because the entente didn't have such ethnic minorities as a substrate to dynamitate the country in multiple identities?

I find your explanation far more persuasive that that of TIK.

@@sanchez231996 nothing was occupied by "yugoslavia", it was occupied by Serbia, which latter adopted name "yugoslavia" for PR purposes

"Besides that, I agree with the general conclusion and agree that its dissolution was not inevitable and I agree that the main cause for the dissolution seems to be that foreign powers decided it would dissolve." Except the foreign powers were persuaded by dissenting nationalists from the empire/exile groups, on idealistic principles and on realpolitik factors.

Sorry but Hungary was the second largest grain and flour exporter of the world after the United states..

@@chriswanger284 you mean before farmers were conscripted, horses and other animals were also conscripted, part of farmland become battlefield and fertilizers could not be imported?

@@llllibThere were no lack of food in Hungary during WW1 or WW2. Famine arrived always after the war was ended. You confused Austria and Germany with Hungary. Austria and Hungary were not one country and one economy! There were no battlefields in the territory of Hungary during the WW1, except a short period 10km deep Russian breaktrough under Brusilov. (10km is nothing in a country like Kingdom of Hungary, which was bigger than the combined territory of the two big British isles.

I agree. You could think of The Dual Monarchy (and its German ally) as besieged fortresses. All the authorities could do was manage the inevitable shortages as best they could.

This I think hits the nail on the head. The Habsburgs if anything received massive amounts of external help in 1848. What TIK doesn't mention is that the Russian army marching into Hungary was doing so as an ally of the Empire, to crush the Hungarian Republican revolution. The other great powers were either also allied (in the case of Prussia going German Republican stomping) or neutral, allowing the Habsburgs to regain their footing and crush the Italian and Hungarian revolutionaries. Things had really changed in 1918, where you had massive, well armed, wel ltrained, and technologically advanced Western Allied armies (British, American, French, Italian, Greek, Serbian, etc) forces advancing on the Empire on three fronts after wiping out the last front line worthy troops at Vittorio, and an estranged and also-beaten Germany incapable of helping. So the Habsburgs were diplomatically isolated just as their empire was being eaten up from the inside and out. That I think is what did them in.

@@vandeheyeric Technology and balkan states? What did you drink?

@@chriswanger284 Diet Coke mostly. And you think the Balkan States couldn't into technology? They had troubles sure, but not as much.as to make them stone age.

@@vandeheyeric Since the 7th century the arts, the artistic taste, dressing, culture and architecture of Byzantine Empire were heavily influenced by non-European cultures like Persians Syrians and other oriental influences, which is called as the Asianization/orientalization of the Greco-Roman heritage/culture. Persians not only influenced the Byzantine arts and taste, but the public administration system of Byzantines. Unlike the center of Roman Catholicism the Papacy, the Byzantines did not really care and/or did not put so much effort for the artistic cultural, economic and technological development of their christianized Orthodox "barbarians": the Eastern Slavs and Balkan Slavic or Vlach people. It was enough for them to spread their Othodox religion and their influence among these people. It was no wonder, because many of these Orthodox people have various wars and serious conflicts with the Byzantine Empire in the past. Thus the Orthodox region developed its Eurasian civilizational / cultural caracteristics long before the Mongol invasion of Eastern Slavs and long before the Balkan conquests of Ottoman Empire. Culturally, both islam and the semi-asian orthodox countries became traditionally west-hater civilizations. After the Great schism (1054), Orthodox priests taught to their believers, that the Western Christians are the "servants of the Satan". That belief system caused long lasting suspicion, distrust and hatred towards the West in the Orthodox countries and their populations since the early stage of their history and development. This attitude and their weak relationship with the western civilization deeply and negatively effected their societal, cultural, legal, economic and infrastructural development through the centuries. The Western civilization includes four major European regions: Western Europe: France, the British Isles, and Benelux states. Central Europe: Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Hungary, Czech lands, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia and Croatia, Southern Europe: Italy, Spain and Portugal, Northern Europe: Denmark, Sweden and Norway. THE WESTERN (Catholic-protestant) WORLD is depicted in dark blue on the map of prof. S. Huntington: upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2f/Clash_of_Civilizations_map.png What is Western Civilization? It is not a secret in history, that countries civilizations are/were not in the same level of development. It is well-known that Western and Central Europe, ( the so-called Western civilization) was always more developed than Orthodox Slavic or Eastern European civilization. The differences in culture (material and verbal), legal constitutional, societal, political, economical, infrastructural, technological and scientific development, between Orthodox countries and Western Christian (Catholic-Protestant) countries were similar great, as the differences between Northern America (USA Canada) and Southern- (Latino) America. MEMENTO: Western things which were not existed in orthodox world: 1. POLITICAL AND CONSTITUTIONAL development: Medieval appearance of parliaments (The parliament is a legislative body(!), DO NOT CONFUSE with the “councils of monarchs” which existed since the very beginnings of human history), the estates of the realm, the clergy, the nobility, and the commoners, 2. Local SELF GOVERNMENT status of big royal/imperial cities, which are the direct ancestors (the continuity) of modern local self governmental systems. Do not confuse the local self governments with the so-called city states. Sovereign city states were the earliest form of states in Human history ( For example: Sumerian city states), and that legal concept has nothing common with the self-governments/local governments of cities within a country or within an Empire. 3. ECONOMY: The medieval appearance of banking systems and social effects and status of urban bourgeoisie, the absolute dominance of money-economy (when the vast majority of trade based on money and the taxes customs duties were collected in money) from the 12th -13th century, instead of the former primitive bartel-based commerce (barter dominated the economies orthodox world until the 17-18th centuries.) 4. HIGHER EDUCATION: The medieval appearance of universities and the medieval appearance of SECULAR intellectuals, 5. CULTURE: Knights, the knight-culture, chivalric code, (and the technological effects of crusades from the Holy Land,) Music and literature: courtly love, troubadours, Gregorian chant, Ars nova, Organum, Motet, Madrigal, Canon and Ballata, Liturgical drama, Novellas, medieval western THEATER: Mystery or cycle plays, morality and passion plays, which developed into the renaissance theater, the direct ancestor of modern theaters. Philosophy: Scholasticism and humanist philosophy, 6. The medieval usage of Latin alphabet and medieval spread of movable type printing, 7. TECHNOLOGY: The guild system is an association of artisans or merchants, which organized the training education, and directed master's exam system for artisians. Due to the compulsory foreign studies of the artisian master's candidates, the guilds played key role in the fast spread of technologies and industrial knowledge in the medieval Western World. 8. The defence systems & fortifications: The spread of stone/brick castle defense -systems, the town-walls of western cities from the 11th century. (In the orthodox world, only some capital cities had such a walls . The countries of the Balkan region and the territory of Russian states fell under Ottoman/Mongolian rule very rapidly - with a single decisive open-field battle - due to the lack of the networks of stone/brick castles and fortresses in these countries. The only exception was the greek inhabited Byzantine territories which were well fortified.) 9. FINEARTS and ARCHITECTURE: western architecture, sculpture paintings and fine-arts: the Romanesque style, the Gothic style and the Renaissance style. The orthodox church buildings and „palaces(?)” were very little, they had primitive structure and poor decorations, their style were influenced by oriental non-European arabic, persian and Syrian influenced Byzantine ornamentics. 10.The renaissance & humanism , did not influenced/affected the Orthodox (Eastern European) countries. 11. The reformation and the enlightenment also did not influenced/affected the Orthodox (Eastern European) countries. 12. Before 1870, the industrialization that had developed in Western and Central Europe and the United States did not extend in any significant way to the rest of the world. In Eastern Orthodox Europe, the industrialization lagged far behind, and started only in the 20th century, mostly during the communist era. 13. INFRASTRUCTURE and Economy: The Orthodox infrastructural and economic development was also very very slow, and many determinant factors of modern civilization - as we called them as civilized way of life - (railways, the electrification of cities, drain & sewer systems, water pipe systems, spread of tap water and bathrooms, telecommuncations etc... spread many-many decades (60-80 years) later. 14. Medieval and Early modern Urbanization did not have signifficant effect in Orthodox countries. The real urbanization boom started in Orthodox countries only in the mid 20th century. Most of them experienced real urbanization with the socialist ferro-concrete block-of-flat programs in post ww2 period. It is no wonder that their contribution in science technology and innovations are completely negligible in Human history by the WESTERN standards.

@Steven Samuels I agree Italy was the main factor, but the British and French did fight quite a bit about the Habsburgs. People tend to forget the KuK's troops on the Western Front and Sinai, and Anglo-French ones in Italy and the Balkans.

However you forget the central planing was during the war, and nobody wanted to exterminate Austro-Hungarian people, but Hitler wanted to clean out the Slavs from Soviet territories. Huge difference.

@@chriswanger284 Both nations had it implemented during a war, and the side that didn't want its own people to die had the economy collapse while the side that supposedly didn't care for the people it ruled over didn't have its economy collapse

@@4fallschirmjager Soviet economy was kept alive by the US during WW2.

@@chriswanger284 and then nearly fifty years of planned economy under sanction by the US before being illegally voted out of existence (and the economy collapsing during privatisation *not* before) but couldn't last only a few years?

Considerinng subsequent famines and lack of everyday goods in Soviet controlled states, it is a stretch to say said socialists nations implemented it "just fine".

Spain didn't fight in the war, France and Serbia had its minorities well-assimilated, USA was not multi ethnic and Russia did, indeed, also collapse into multiple countries

Russia did collapse into Civil War, Serbia became Yugoslavia then collapsed in the same century, France lost its multi-ethnic lands in Africa/other minorities were well-assimilated as the other OP said and America has numerous subcultures but not as ethnically divided as the Balkans or Austria-Hungary and Spain still suffers from ethnic issues, i.e Catalans and Basque.

What precisely would you like me to cover?

@@TheImperatorKnight People say Napoleon's invasion of Russia was doomed to fail but I wonder if that really was the case since Russian generals and the emperor stated the need to give battle for the morale of the army. There's also instances where Austria offered a favorable peace to Napoleon which would've prevented 200,000 men joining the war in 1813. The main question being was Napoleon really doomed during and after the Russian campaign? Were there instances where he could've kept a majority of his winnings?

@@TheImperatorKnight anything that made your eyebrows twitch when you were reading them in the Uni or since. Stuff that are explained like they are because of political reasons. I'm interested in anything post-Napoleon that you can question and recover the truth. :)

Those two states only split after the Cold War ~70 years later (with a brief split in WW2, but then rejoined)

pokecrafter2201 serbia is popular everywhere bcs no further conflicts were had 😂 No nato interventions were necessary 🤣

TIK well... What a surprise. The collectivist soviets reinstated them and prevented their disintegration. That must proof your point... Especially because austria hungary collapsed a minute after its creation? Oh wait, it didnt... It took time and crisis to further all the conflicts to the surface. Also a weakening of the central power. Just look at what keeps russia alive? I mean... You literally can see in ukraine, in the middle east the same thing happening right now. And you can also see what happened throughout the former soviet union when strong central power collapsed. Even chechnya... Multi ethnic states depend on huge centralized force or very small administrative systems-decentralization ( which can work in some cases if the cultures arent too different ) This is a historically proven fact just like that socialism/communism doesnt work. It has been repeated so often over and over again...

@@TheImperatorKnight As you know, History looks at end results and doesn't consider short time periods as significant. The Kingdom of the Vandals in North Africa lasted from 435 AD to 534 AD (a full century). We do not consider it a stable Kingdom. The Ostrogothic Kingdom lasted from 493 AD to 553 (60 years) and is considered nothing but a small 'blip' in the History of Western Europe. The First Kingdom of Jerusalem lasted from 1099 to 1187 (88 years) and is seen as ephemeral. So a timespan of less than 70 years only shows how weak and impermanent such States were.

@@TheImperatorKnight split on national ethnic lines mind you both in ww2 and after the fall of communism

Yes, well one of the glues that was holding the empire together was fear. First from the Ottomans, then the French "Republic? LOL" , Then Russian imperialism, Hungarian revolutionaries, then the German state itself LOL... Insert Germanization attempts LOL. With Germany destroyed, Ottomans destroyed, Russia destroyed. France destroyed also, at least all north of Paris parts of it/manpower. There is no reason to stick together, and if smaller nations are better able to micromanage the food situation on the ground, than that is all that matters. Now this part is sort of shooting from the hip, but applying some knowledge from the Ottoman first siege of Vienna. One of the problems of the 1848 Hungarian revolution would had been that to offset Germany/Austria and Russia, the Hungarian republic would had been a natural ally for the Ottomans. Meaning that their success would make any independence for slavic states that much harder.

"As for the planned economy, fact of the matter is that if you conscript significant part of farmers into army, significant amount of working animals into army(both for wagon train and cavalry), perhaps limit access to fertilizer and other goods, this is going to have great impact on the agriculture with the technology as it was at the time. And you can just forget about things like coffee, even if you could grow it in Central Europe (which probably you can't) doing that at expense of producing already collapsing basic food would be incredibly stupid. It's just sad that you again could not hold yourself from perpetuating the propaganda." Oh I see. The fact that the State forcefully conscripted people into an army, destroyed the economy due to central State planning, all for a war that the State started in the first place, isn't the fault of the State? Okay then... I guess I'm the one spouting propaganda...

Not to mention that the most productive, food wise, part, the Hungarian part was VERY agrarian, meaning most of the population was working the fields. If you conscript pretty much all able bodied men who aren't working in factories, you won't have nearly enough people to bring in the harvest. Add in limited to nonexistent mechanization, and it literaly means if you mobilize x% of workers you can expect x% or more drop in food production. Mobilization can have such severe impact that you literally HAVE TO end the war before a certain date, or demobilize a significant part of the army to bring in the harvest, or starve.

Absolutely correct. As so often TIK tries to smuggle his libertarian agenda in his videos. How could an unregulated free market succeed in an economic environment of total mobilization and shortages of food supply and production goods? He describes a regulated, centralised chain of supply as inferior, but doesn't deliver any kind of proof for his point.

@@TheImperatorKnight Be reasonable TIK. You made a statement that rationing and like was Socialism, and then blamed Socialism for famine. Fact of the matter is when you have vast majority of population be agrarian and have to work the fields to produce enough food, when you conscript a significant chunk of that population that will significantly impact the ability of anyone to produce food. Especially with little to no mechanization to offset loss of labor. No magic pixie dust of any economic idea will solve the problem that you just don't have enough people to work the fields and the same would have been the result if any other idea was used to solve the food crisis. All nations involved in this war that didn't have access to world trade or colonies were going hungry by 1918. Yes, the blame lies with the state for starting the war, but once that happened there would have been lack of food no mater what was done if the degree of mobilisation remained for years on end.

Wilson was entirely in the pocket of the Zionists, he was just a tool, no more and no less.

@@roodborstkalf9664 Erhm, if he was a tool of the Zionists, why did he broke one of the most Jew-tolerant countries?

But Czech hate Habsburg

@@stevensamuels4041 welcome to panslavism, son

@@thedevilneveraskstwice7027 LOL panslavism is a russian meme ideology

I do sometimes agree with the mainstream narrative... sometimes... I think.... Thank you for supporting! 🏅👍

@@TheImperatorKnight At least until the mainstream narrative stops being "Hitler bad", anyway... which I'm pretty sure is on the horizon.

True the victorious allies imposed the trianon treaty, the peace dictate was ready before they had heard the Hungarian delegation.

Trianon was against Wilson's self-determination theory, because it was NOT based on democratic plebiscite (general equal&secret ballots). Let's don't forget: Without democratic plebiscites about the borders, there was no demonstrable popular legitimacy/acceptance behind any territorial changes, so it could lead only to arbitrary political decisions (aka. dictate). It was not a wonder that Czech, Romanian and Serbian politicians vehemently PROTESTED against the very idea of democratic referendums about the borders at the Paris Peace Conference. Czech politicians didn't trust in Slovaks, because only very few Slovaks joined to the so-called "Czechoslovak"army against the Hungarians in 1919 (and Slovaks represented only 53% ratio in Northern parts of Hungary). Romanian politicians didn't trust in Transylvanian Romanians, perhaps they didn't want to join to the traditionally seriously backward & poor Romania (the ratio of Romanians were only 53% in Transylvania). Serbs were small minority (22% !!!) in Voivodine. Similar to Romania, Serbia was also a very backward Orthodox country without serious urbanization or industrialization. Just imagine how "civilized" were these countries: overwhelming majority of the population of the Kingdom of Romania and Kingdom of Serbia could not read and write in the era of the first WW1. It was not wonder that the US Congress did not sign this anti-democratic dictate. There was only one democratic plebiscite about the borders between Hungary and Austria: The Sopron area plebiscite in Western Hungary in 1921, there were general equal and secret ballots with electoral registers (or poll books) of the LOCAL residents, and every local citizen could take part in the elections over 18year, regardless the ethnicity, social status or sex. The polling stations and polling districts were under the control and supervision of the Western (Italian, British and French) ENTENTE officers. Some villages and towns voted to be part of Austria, some villages and city of Sopron voted to remain part of Hungary. Read about it here and watch the video: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sopron_plebiscite

Very good comment. Most of this is new to me. In general you can say that history is written by the winners.

Well now, one third of your historic territory had been inhabited by orthodox Serbs at the time when WWI was over and Wilson and Clemenceau ordered that Dalmatia would only remain slavic if included in a sort of Yugoslav state of sorts. Nothing to complain about, if not for Yugoslavia in 1918, Croatia now would have lost most of its seaside territory to Italy. In all honesty, you had no choice !

@@roodborstkalf9664 ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-MoXYE5rj2w0.html

Serbia was crazy in it's wish to unite with the Croatians and Slovenes in a pan-Slavic state. It should have only taken the ethnic Serb populated territories and created a homogenous greater Serbian state not the multiethnic Yugoslav kingdom...

"Croatia felt threatened by Hungarian nationalist revolutionary government", but Jelačić didn't want to negotiate with the hungarians and in fact he attacked without provocation. Hungary wasn't openly hostile towards Crotia, thegovernment simply didn't decide what to do with the minorities, but they didn't made decisions about other important questions and btw the main reason Hungary made an army after the revolution was the threat of a south slav attack. "Croatian army under Jelačić helped squash revolution in Hungary" not really, the Croats were defeated, when they attacked. And they didn't really help the austrians defeat Hungary, because Austria didn't defeat Hungary. The russian intervention was the reason for the defeat. The austrian army was deafeated and nearly encircled.

For or less the same as we have now. In stead of a EU ruled from Brussels (informally ruled by the French) we would have another EU ruled from Vienna and/or Berlin (informally ruled by German speakers).

@@roodborstkalf9664 Well... modern EU is ruled by France/German partnership where Germany has the dominant role. France is more of a junior partner. Secondly... I am quite skeptical that Austro-Hungary would expand over western Europe... and quite skeptical that it would be willing to be overtaken by Germany in the long run.

@@shogomakishima7224 : In practice the French are boss in the EU. Look at what has happened in the last two years. It's quite clear that Macron is in control. If Germans had won the war, Belgium would have become a member of new German/Austrian state, just like it was in the 18th century. In that configuration Netherlands would have developed quite close ties to this German/Austrian state. The same goes for Switzerland and Northern-Italy.

@@roodborstkalf9664 How again France is the boss of the EU? I can't name one thing they managed to push threw without the German approval. If you look at the economies of both countries, it is pretty obv who is the major benefactor of the EU. Macron can't even control his own country tbh. It is hard to say what would happen if center powers won first WW... too much speculation. I was wondering more about what would happen if they lost but Austro-Hungary didn't fracture.

A-H would break up sooner or later. It was unstable because the many nations living in A-H did not want to be a part of A-H.

I would also say that while multiethnic and nationalist factors weren't fatal for an empire or nation, the Habsburgs ran into troubles. 1848 saw major nationalist revolutions that had to be quashed by (among others) Russian allied invasion, including a major Hungarian force that nearly reached Vienna. Stability only really returned after the Habsburgs and Austrians had to cede power to the Hungarian elite and make Austria-Hungary, and even then... Austria-Hungary was an unstable, multi ethnic mess *without a strong national character* because it was a dynastic state. And one that dabbled in odd Royal-Socialist economic nonsense to boot. Reform was possible (indeed, it kind of happened in a halfhearted manner in 1867), and multiethnic and imperial control wasn't fatal. But the combination of autocratic, dynastic definition rather than shared national identity, Socialist lunacy, defeat in a global war, and the opposition of now very powerful internal and external factions that wanted it gone did it in.

Yes, the Entente engineered it so that Central Europe would remain weak and divided for the foreseable future. But they did too good of a job. The 20s and 30s were full of ethnic strife and small wars all over the place, and this chaos is what allowed extremists like Hitler and the Nazi party to come to power in German and easily sweep up the remains of Austria-Hungary into the Reich. Opps.

@@jamestheotherone742 I don't think there was this idea behind it, and in any case there were opportunities to stop the Hitler(who's rise to power depended on mystifying cause of defeat and economic depression as well as nationalist greed and would be unaffected by situation in Austria even if his origin was there).

@@llllib I think there was a certain greed and ambition behind the harsh treatment of Versailles. For the French it was more personal and about revenge, but for the Anglo Americans it was almost purely economic (while with the Americans it was also idealistic to an extent, as folks such as Wilson dreamed of expanding 'Democracy')

@@llllib The situation in Germany was very similar to the Austrian experience. The strategy of the Entente and the aims of the Versailles et.al. treaties.

More Serbs lived in A-H than in Serbia Proper.

@@andreastiefenthaler3811 There were more than 3 milions living in Kingdom of Serbia in 1914, and between 1.5 and 1.8 living in Dual Monarchy. Numbers for Dual Monarchy are actually about citizens with christian-ortodox religion not nationality.

@@agrameroldoctane_66 The Number of Serbians in the Empire was around 3 million. (you forgot Bosnia-Hercegovina, I suppose). In Serbia proper there whee about 3,5 Million inhabitants. True. But how many where "Macedonians", Albanians, Bosniaks or Vlach? about 1 million at least.

The Hungarians had such a "real power" they couldn't stop the monarchy from going to war even tho they were strongly against it and did everything they could until it became unavoidable.. If you would have actually studied the power distribution you would know that Austria ruled absolute in all important ministries, especially in foreign relations. So its a real stretch to say Austrians and Hungarians had real power in it.

@@jacky9590 that's entirely beside the point.

In July 1849, the Hungarian Revolutionary Parliament proclaimed and enacted the WORLD's FIRST laws on ethnic and minority rights. It gave minorities the freedom to use their mothertongue at local administration, at tribunals, in schools, in community life and even within the national guard of non-Magyar councils. However these laws were overturned after the united Russian and Austrian armies crushed the Hungarian Revolution of 1848. After the Kingdom of Hungary reached the Compromise with the Habsburg Dynasty in 1867 (Ausgleich), one of the first acts of the restored Hungarian Parliament was to pass a Law on Nationalities (Minority rights law: the act number XLIV of 1868). The situation of minorities in Hungary was not even comparable to the contemporary pre WW1 Europe. Other highly multiethnic /multinational countries were: France Russia and UK. See the multi-national UK: The situation of Scottish Irish and Welsh people in "Britain" during the English hegemony is well known. They utmost forgot their original language,only English language cultural educational institutions existed. The only language was English in judiciary procedures and in offices and public administrations. In Wales Welsh children were beaten by their teachers if they spoke Welsh among each others. This was the infamous “Welsh Not” policy... See: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_Not The contemporary Irish question and tensions are well documented. The situation of Ireland was even a more brutal and bloody story. It was not a real "United" Kingdom, it was rather a greater England. English legal system did not know the minority rights until the post ww2 period. See the multiethnic France: In the era of the Great French revolution, only 25% of the population of Kingdom of France could speak the French language as mothertongue. But even in 1870, France was still similar-degree multi-ethnic state as Hungary, only 50% of the population of France spoke the French language as mothertongue. The other half of the population spoke Occitan, Breton, Provençal, Catalan, Corsican, Alsatian, West Flemish, Lorraine Franconian, Gallo, Picard or Ch’timi and Arpitan etc... Many minority languages were closer to Spanish languages or Italian language than French) French governments banned minority language schools, minority language newspapers minority theaters. They banned the usage of minority languages in offices , public administration, and judiciary procedures. The ratio of french mothertongue increased from 50% to 91% during the 1870-1910 period!!! The situation in German Empire was well known (Polish territories and Sorbs) Just look some Eastern countries in the oreintal so-called Eurasian (aka. Orthodox) civilization : The legal system of pre-WW1 Kingom of Serbia did not know minority rights. Also, the legal system of pre-WW1 Kingdom of Romania did not know minority rights, morover, Kingdom of Romania applied strong anti-Semitic disciminative laws against Jewish people, which was similar to Tzarist Russia. Read about it here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_Romania#Treaty_of_Berlin_and_aftermath Slavery disappeared during the high medieval period on Western Christian European soil, however it existed in Romanian territories until the mid 19th century! The Gypsy slavery and slave markets were abolished only in 1852!!! (Gypsies of Romania had similar status like blacks in USA before the civil war) See: books.google.com/books?id=df2mIOnbrDoC&pg=PA49&lpg=PA49&dq=gypsy+%22slave+markets%22+romania&source=bl&ots=5MY5_TxutD&sig=ACfU3U1E8Dvv2rkKhRSfOrnAbfwQgnlv3g&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwith4_qqbntAhWSuIsKHZ37CpwQ6AEwAXoECAIQAg#v=onepage&q=gypsy%20%22slave%20markets%22%20romania&f=false and see: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_Romania Just examine the high contrast between Kingdom of Hungary and contemporary pre WW1-era Europe: The so-called "Magyarization" fantasy was not so harsh as the contemporary western European situation, because the minorities were defended by minority rights and laws. Contemporary Western European legal systems did not know the minority rights, therefore their political leaders loudly and proudly covered up their minorities by the force of law. 1.Were there state sponsored minority schools in Western European countries? NO. 2. How many official languages existed in Western-European states? Only 1 official language! 3. Could minorities use their languages in the offices of public administration in self-governments , in tribunals in Western Europe? No, they couldn't. 4. Did the minorities have own fractions and political parties in the western European parliaments ? No, no they hadn't. 5. What about newspapers of ethnic minorities in Western Europe? They did not exist in the West.... We can continue these things to the infinity. The Austro-Hungarian compromise and its supporting liberal party remained bitterly unpopular among the ethnic Hungarian voters, and the continuous successes of these pro-compromise liberal parties in the Hungarian parliamentary elections caused long lasting frustration for Hungarians. The ethnic minorities had the key role in the political maintenance of the compromise in Hungary, because they were able to vote the pro-compromise liberal parties into the position of the majority/ruling parties of the Hungarian parliament. The pro-compromise liberal parties were the most popular among ethnic minority voters, however i.e. the Slovak, Serb and Romanian minority parties remained unpopular among their own ethnic minority voters. The coalitions of Hungarian nationalist parties - which were supported by the overwhelming majority of ethnic Hungarian voters - always remained in the opposition, with the exception of the 1906-1910 period, where the Hungarian-supported nationalist parties were able to form a government.

In answer to TIK's signature "But is this really the case?" -- in this case, Yes.

But in the sources I have, they talk about all the ethnicities and nationalities rallying to the Austro-Hungarian flag at the beginning of WW1. So, why did they do that, if the regime was so oppressive of ethnic minorities? (The exception in 1914 was the Serb minority, because obviously they went to war with the Serbs and they did start oppressing them then.)

@@TheImperatorKnight I know precisely what you mean by "all the ethnicities and nationalities rallying to the Austro-Hungarian flag at the beginning of WW1." Europeans at the time were largely influenced by the war hysteria and the "warmongering culture" of early 1900's, which was so influential it even made many generals, as in what is supposed to be serious military personnel, extremely overconfident. The journalists, the intelligentsia, the military, talked about a war to cleanse Europe of decadence, to test out nation's strength in a noble battle, to crush the hated enemy etc etc. Of course not everyone thought so, but jingoism was popularized. But the nationalists were mostly not that enthusiastic. As I have stated, once the empire became weak, the nationalists were able to bring their vision into reality. By then, the bizarre atmosphere of pre-war Europe, where everyone except for the pacifists and socialists was all too eager to finally engage, was gone, the war destroyed all the illusions and provided a ground for the nationalists to gain a lot of support: hunger, sorrow, poverty, death of friends and relatives, frustration. The Czechs remembered that their nobility had been exterminated by Austrians in the 1600s and their population germanized so much, that their language had to be created anew, because it was only spoken by peasants, who of course formed no formal standards of language. Slovaks were then basically seen as mountain Czechs. The Romanians living in the Carpathians wanted to unite with Romania. Obviously, the ethnic situation there was and still is complicated with that big ethnic island of Szeklerland. The Poles always wanted to rebuild their nation and treated Galicia And Lodomeria only as Poland's Piedmont. The Ukrainians in East Halychyna (Galicia) were largely influenced by Russian Panslavic propaganda, but their nationalism was, at the time, in very early stages. The Serbs were obviously hostile and wanted to take Western Balkans, inhabited by people who spoke the same language (except for Slovenia, different story). Such were the points nationalists made when they wanted to escape the Austrian rule. Even Hungarians wanted to be free, as the treatment of Hungarians within the Empire wasn't exactly all too kind until 1867. Even then, Hungary was the lesser partner and Hungarians remembered 1848 very well. OF course, Hungarians were treated very, very harshly by the Entente, but that's a different story. My source is mostly "Suicide of Europe. Great War 1914-1918".

@@TheImperatorKnight To paraphrase Zinn: there are no opinion polls from that period. Personally, I would be very skeptical of sweeping statements such as "all the ethnicities ... rall(ied) to the Austro-Hungarian flag." Sure, you'll find examples of newspapers praising the war effort and rallying to the flag - not doing so would likely have landed somebody in jail. I'm from Slovakia, and I can assure you, based among other things on the various novels I've read set in the Great War, often by people who had lived through it, that this was not the case. One of the best books about the war, The Good Soldier Švejk, opens with Švejk being arrested because his enthusiastic expressions of support for the war are construed as mocking the emperor. If the mood had been one of everybody rallying to the flag, this scene would have come off as fake. The author had served in the war, the first part of the book was released in 1921. It should be considered a semi-reliable source for what the popular mood may have been like. In Slovakia, the people were so poor I would very much doubt their enthusiastic support of anything, let alone the war. The books written by Slovak authors virtually always treat the war as yet another tragedy that befell an already impoverished and opressed people. And speaking of the regime being oppressive - it wasn't one regime, it was two. The Austrian part was fairly liberal as well as more economically developed - which ironically led to the development of intellectual movements demanding greater autonomy and/or liberation - often in the shape of a pan-slavic country often led by Russia. The Hungarian part was much more heavy handed in its treatment of ethnic minorities - especially after the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867, which led to a policy of "Magyarization" - the closure of schools teaching in minority languages, making Hungarian the sole administrative language within the Kingdom of Hungary, police crackdown on intellectuals advocating nationalist (ethnic) causes. So, I'm not sure how accurate your soures are on this topic, I would wager that the answer is not very.

@@varhYT The notion that the Czech language had to be "created anew, because it was only spoken by peasants" is not correct. Sure, the language was codified, but not because it had fallen into disuse, it hadn't. Czech national revival had taken place in the first half of the 19th century and there were a number of Czech language books, newspapers, plays, and operas. Slovaks did not have a political presence at the time, most of their intellectual life took place in the US. What Slovak intellectuals there were were opposed to the war, I very much doubt the average peasant would have been particularly excited to leave his family to go fight a war.

Just one thing I wanted to point out. The 3rd Reich did not have a Imperialist nature. It had a social-darwinist casus-belli against lesser races. Hitler despised western empires who conquered land then started interbreeding with other races. The intent of Imperialist conquering was to extract and subvert a population into its dominion. Hitler would've exterminated almost all peoples to make space for lebensraum. The plan was known as General Plan Ost and it was in act since they started stealing all food of the conquered people. All of this because I know the difference between being a Pole in the 3rd Reich and being a Native in Portuguese Brazil.

@@Jojo-hm1do I dont think colonialism and imperialism are conflated with one another: typically, colonialism is strictly driven by commercial intentions, while imperialism needs to be ideological. Colonialism also suggests some distinctive separation (geographical, legislative...) between the empire and its colony. I am well aware of the plan, but it also differed greatly from place to place. While Poles and Russians were indeed meant to "make room" for German settlers, inhabitants of Bohemia or Moravia certainly were not and were intended to be mostly assimilated and gradually germanized, not to mention many puppet states like Hungary and Slovakia that were given relatively free hand.

@@f4ust85 I know I took a different route of Imperialism: Colonization. But what I was trying to explain was that Imperialism is just conquering land and annexing to a existing empire. Also I know Hungary, Bohemia and others countries didn't suffer that much by the hands of the Nazis. It's because they were to be considered in a caste closer to the Aryan race or Nordic race. Such qualifications was given trough out the Reich to almost anyone who were considered cooperative to Hitler. You may or not already know that Arabs were considered the same as Italians. This just because the guy from palestine flew to Germany to enter in direct contact with Hitler. (I don't remember his name, but he was a very important man to the british) I would say that no matter how we view Nazi Germany, we would always get the conclusion that everything they did was because of Racism. Imperialism is more about power and control, Nazi ideology is more about the annihilation, competition and assimilation of certain races. Is just applying everything that darwin said to Humans then turning it upside down. Peace!

@@Jojo-hm1do I would still say that the racial drive is very problematic - lets not forget other nations and ethnicities that were not only allies, but formed their own SS divisions, some one and half million Soviet citizens fought on the Axis side (typically against other Slavs), many of them worked as "Hiwis" that actively participated on the Holocaust (one could almost make a bad joke that there are more war criminals from Auschwitz with Ukrainian than German surnames). All this was ideologically explained and legalized. Is Wilhelm II also driven by racism when he actively pursued very much the same geopolitical advances? Its just like claiming that Soviet expansionism was fully driven by class struggle, the komintern and world revolution - while in reality, it was an imperialist policy that simply followed the principles, borders buffer zones and long-term strategies set forth by tsarist Russian empire already, well-being of the working class in Mongolia or Latvia had very little to do with it. Ideologies come and go and geopolitics stays largely the same.

Spot on. I thought the exact same thing. Perhaps a chicken & egg argument, but nationalism was definitely a contributing factor.

Socialism explains why the harvest was ~60 lower than pre-war levels

@@TheImperatorKnight I can find 40% lower by the end of the war. Are there articles that explain economical model that directly contributes to lower harvest? For example Tsarist Russia had huge issues with food in 1916 already. And it was everything but socialst.

@@Lasstpak : The control of the state on economy, that disregards the economic realities, is to blame in those cases. It is the power at the centre squishing the individual for "the greater good". From this perspective the term "socialism" is justified.

@@bkucinschi Doesn't 'proof' that this was direct case. Food rationing and 'controling of production' is something most of fighting parties did. Like UK for example. Dammit US economy exploded after ww2. You can't just say. Something is always bad. Something was implemented that looks like that bad thing. So it is bad. Just like TIK say himself: "Was this really the case?". I am not sure if it was.

@@bkucinschi And which economic realities? That there was shortage of basically everything? How can 'free market' solve it, when you are cut off from international trade. As TIK mentioned himself.

As I understand it, Britain looked quite favourably towards the formation of Germany. During the 19th century, Britain's greatest rivals/threats were the French and the Russians. This was largely because Britain was a naval power with far flung interests, and only France & Russia could potentially challenge those interests. Germany then appears in the middle of Europe, a land based power with little coastline, no naval aspirations and also considering France and Russia to be her greatest potential threats. That makes Germany a clear and obvious friend and (potential) ally to Britain. Germany had to work really hard to screw that up. They did this by directly challenging British control of the oceans by building up the second largest battle fleet in the world. If Germany hadn't made the foolish decision to build a huge fleet that they did not need and served only to provoke Britain, then WWI would either have not happened at all, or happened very differently. As in, a war with Britain allied with Germany against Russia & France. That would change everything.

I'm Southtyrolean... so keep calm :D

They lost the war because they bet on the side that ended up loosing and their own ability to wage war was not up to snuff of a major industrial war. Too much agriculture too little industry. Of course the major parts of their population sympathizing with the enemy did't help, but it wasn't the only and key reason.

Stupid argument

I didn't say that central planning caused the end of the Austrian Empire. Please actually watch the video before commenting.

@@TheImperatorKnight Not it alone, but you presented it as a factor that at best had a major contribution because of the hardship and famine that it produced and the corresponding disillusion to the population. You basically recognize it as a root cause (one of them). Then spent a good few minutes critiquing it, before returning to the "nationalism conundrum". Furthermore it is a permanent feature of your analysis (free market economy critique) in any of your not pure military videos and that is why it is so noticeable (for god shake black market exploiters were presented in the video about greek famine as "economy heroes"). When i comment i watch the video first, dont worry.

Originally this was a different comment that TIK gave a heart, but when i edited it the heart went away. This is the day i learned youtube is smarter than me.

@@TribuneAquila lol

Yes. But it was bc these states were very bad and weak and had the opportunity to disintegrate. But the empire was strong and not so bad for many ethnic groups. And not all ethnic groups wanted independence, but mainly in the Austrian half. Austria was really an artificial entity. All of the minorities wanted an own state, probably even the Czechs and Slovenes who were close to the Austrian society. But the Hungarian half was natural. Minoriries didnt want an own state, only the Croats. Even Slovakians didnt want and they were weak. For instance they fought for Hungary during previous wars, when the czechs occupied Slovakia, almost all soldiers were czech in the czechoslovakian army...The other hungarian parts were too little (slovakia was already too little) or mixed. For instance almost 50% of transilvania was not romanian. So after a complete collapse a czech, maybe a bosnian and slovene, a croat state would form, austrian would have joined Germany, but Hungary would have lost only croatia. There were different types of slovaks, they were mainly loyal to hungary, and they slowly assimilated into the hungarians, and slovakia was cut in half by a german area, the slovakian economy depended on hungary and vice versa, so they would have never got independence.

Austria and Hungary was not one country. Galicia belonged to the Empire of Austria

@@chriswanger284 Legally it was. Both were part of a personal union, with domestic autonomy, but in terms of military and foreign affairs, the Austrian Emperor was the boss.

@@Kalimdor199Menegroth Austrian Emperor had no rights n Kingdom of Hungary, only King of Hungary was official person. Educate yourself: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Austro-Hungarian_Compromise_of_1867

@@chriswanger284 Read the compromise again. He had rights in 3 domains: military, foreign affairs and financial spending for the 2.

@@Kalimdor199Menegroth No, it was not the Emperor in Austria. King of Hungary and Emperor of Austria had no relationship. It was a personal union only.

I would say that economic failure was a necessary condition to the collapse. Even with a somewhat functioning economy the collapse would be pretty much impossible. If you think that Russia left the USSR even before some other republics...

Yeah but when that happened? Far into the future in a different era. And again for Yugoslavia, everyone want it dismantled.

Slovaks are more nationalist than Czechs. In most countries, the Social Democrats have not been very nationalistic since the turn of the millennium.