Sever Poryvay Pundit. What does the description of the Balkans as the powder keg of Europe mean? This name is accurate because the Balkan Peninsula was the battlefield for much of the war as well as its own ethnic conflicts and clashes before the war. It was also the home to a Slavic power struggle between Serbia and Austria-Hungary. Muhamed Masbaum Pundit. Why was the Balkans an unstable area? The Balkans have traditionally been an area of turmoil and political instability.
The explosion of nationalism throughout the region and the intervention of the Great Powers in the s earned the area the reputation as the powder keg of Europe.
Jacquetta Jano Teacher. What nations are found in the powder keg of Europe? Turmoil in the Balkans also contributed to powder keg-like conditions. Just so we are clear, the Balkan region refers to the part of southeastern Europe where countries like Greece , Bulgaria , Albania , Serbia , Yugoslavia , and others are located.
Anabel Jorig Supporter. How was Franz Ferdinand? While in power, he attempted to restore Austro-Russian relations while maintaining an alliance with Germany. In , a Serb nationalist assassinated him. Gianpaolo De Horra Supporter. How did the powder keg lead to ww1? Venice Beyersdorf Supporter. Why did US enter ww1?
This system began to fall apart as the Ottoman Empire, seen as a check on Russian power, began to crumble, and as Germany, a loose confederation of minor states, was united into a major power. Not only did these changes lead to a realignment of power, but of interests as well. All these factors and many others conspired to bring about the First World War. The Chancellor of Germany in the late 19th century, Otto von Bismarck, correctly predicted it would be the source of major conflict in Europe.
Balkan Troubles: Germany, France, Russia, Austria-Hungary, and Britain attempting to keep the lid on the simmering cauldron of imperialist and nationalist tensions in the Balkans to prevent a general European war. They were successful in and but did not succeed in , resulting in the outbreak of World War I.
The continuing collapse of the Ottoman Empire led to two wars in the Balkans, in and , which was a prelude to world war. By nation states had formed in Bulgaria, Greece, Montenegro and Serbia. Nevertheless, many of their ethnic compatriots lived under the control of the Ottoman Empire.
In , these countries formed the Balkan League. There were three main causes of the First Balkan War. Opposing them the Ottomans had , soldiers, experienced at fighting insurgencies but—except for the men tied down in Libya—not the standing armies of other states. The Ottomans also had to guard against the possibility of Russia swooping in to seize Istanbul or the Caucasus while the Ottomans were defending their Balkan territories. Russian encouragement of the Balkan states was a dangerous sign, as was the tremendous enthusiasm in the Balkan countries for a war.
The Turkish people, by contrast, were tired of conflict and anxious to focus on internal problems. Knowing they lacked the power individually to defeat the Ottomans, the Balkan nations threw in together despite their clear mistrust of one another.
As early as the states began to work out the details of joint mobilization plans and defensive alliances with obvious anti-Ottoman dimensions. In February Serbia and Bulgaria agreed to mobilize , and , men, respectively, in the event of war.
Bulgaria and Greece signed a mutual defensive alliance shortly thereafter. Tensions built inside the empire, as Ottoman subjects began to fear the potential disloyalty of their non-Turkish neighbors. A massacre of Christians in July at Kochan in present-day Bulgaria nearly led to war.
The Serbs and Montenegrins responded by smuggling arms to anti-Ottoman rebels in Albania while Bulgaria and Greece dispatched more troops to the border. Bulgarian nationalists began to stage border incidents in the hopes of sparking an Ottoman response that could justify starting a war.
As tensions rose, the Ottomans seized Greek ships they claimed had entered their territorial waters and dispatched more troops to Macedonia and Thrace. The great powers, notably France and Britain, sought to reduce the tensions and open negotiations, but the Balkan states, itching for a fight, showed little interest in diplomacy. In late September Montenegro and Bulgaria signed a mutual-defense pact, uniting the Balkan states through bilateral and multilateral agreements.
The Ottomans then agreed to the demands of the rebels in Albania in order to focus on the growing threat from the Balkan states. The members of the Balkan League saw the Ottoman action as a sign of weakness and issued an ultimatum demanding major reforms to Ottoman governance in Macedonia.
Sensing that war was imminent, the great powers tried once more to avert hostilities but were too late. The Russians, too, realized they had overplayed their hand. They had strengthened the Balkan League but did not want those states to attack the Ottomans and upset the balance of power Russia was still rebuilding from its massive defeat by the Japanese in They had hoped that a pro-Russian Balkan League would be an effective anti-Ottoman and anti-Austrian instrument, but they did not want to risk war before they had rebuilt their shattered army.
With the Balkan League so determined for war, however, the great powers could only declare their neutrality although most Western Europeans had pro-Balkan and pro-Christian sympathies and naively ask the warring parties not to seek any territorial changes.
Bulgaria, anxious both to grab Ottoman territory and to keep Greek gains to a minimum, invaded Thrace in October. At the same time Serbia and Montenegro invaded Albania and Novibazar Novi Pazar , a finger of land along the southern border of Serbia.
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