Academic literature on the topic 'Balkan conflicts'

The paper studies the ways in which international situation in June-July 1914 was covered by «Kiyevlianin», a daily influential newspaper published in Kyiv, then Russian Empire. This research focuses on the main international themes covered by the «Kiyevlianin» newspaper after assassination of Habsburg hair Archduke Franz Ferdinand, and until the Austro-Hungarian Note to Serbia was reported. The major focus of the study is international situation in the Balkans, especially the conflict between Austria-Hungary and Serbia, and Russian Empire’s Balkan policy. The author considers those days’ newspapers a valuable source for a historical research as they provided information while the events were ongoing, and their direction and outcomes were not known yet. The understanding of those days’ events by contemporaries may differ from later academic interpretations. For this reason, the study of these newspapers deepens our understanding of international situation before the Great War. The research has revealed that the Austro-Serbian conflict was only one of the numerous conflicts in the Balkans. The international situation on the peninsula dramatically changed after the Balkan wars of 1912-1913 in favor of Serbia, and the potential of further conflicts essentially increased. The reporters understood that any minor changes in the situation could trigger a new Balkan war. The major driving forces behind the Austro-Serbian conflict were “Great Serbian” idea, Serbia’s positioning as the “Piedmont” of Southern Slavs (at the expense of Austro-Hungary), and Russia’s Balkan policy. The latter was represented by the Russian envoy to Belgrade Nikolay Gartvig. According to him, backing of Serbia was caused by Russia’s geopolitical interests of anti-Austrian character. Russia’s backing in July 1914 prompted the Serbian regent Alexander not to comply with the Austro-Hungarian Note and to escalate the conflict. Thus, Russia’s pro-Serbian and anti-Austrian policy was the major factor which caused the war.

The initial phase of the First World War in the Balkans 1914-1915 was a natural continuation of the conflicts opened during the Balkan Wars, but national fervor now encompassed all of the Balkans, from Rijeka and Ljubljana to Athens, Sofia and Bucharest, because the role of the Dual Monarchy had changed from that of an arbiter to that of a participant in the conflict. With the demise of the Ottoman Empire, the further survival of the Habsburg Monarchy was challenged by the Serbian government's Yugoslav project, creating conditions for implementing the nationality principle in all of the Balkans. It seemed that, in support of the alliances that were being created in the Balkans and in Europe as a whole, the time had come for the final fulfillment of the national aspirations of the Balkan peoples. The outcome of this third Balkan war no longer depended solely on the balance of power inside the Balkans, but also on the overall course of the war. After the initial victories in 1914, Serbia suffered a defeat in 1915 and her armies were forced to retreat southward to Albania and Greece, but her Yugoslav project was the foundation of her future policies and the basis for materializing the concept of a common South-Slavic state.