Princip and his fellow-assassins obtained the grenades and pistols for the deed via the Black Hand in Belgrade and with the help of Serb border guards crossed into Bosnia in early June 1914. On June 28, when the Archduke Ferdinand and his wife made their previously announced visit to Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia, the assassins lay in wait along the main thoroughfare as the imperial cavalcade drove by. With the murder of the royal couple by the shots fired by Princip on that fateful day, the Austrian opportunity to reckon with Serbia had arrived. The limit of Austrian patience had indeed been reached in relation to the anti-Austrian activities of what an official document described as "this crazy and deluded country." The assassination was the excuse not the cause of the aggressive stance adopted by the Austrian chief minister, Count Berchtold, and his anti-Serb policy makers. These latter regarded Serbia as a threat to the very survival of the Austro-Hungarian state by reason of the rabid pan-Serb rhetoric emanating from both the Serbian government and private nationalist organizations and directed to Serbs in Bosnia and other parts of the empire. Nor did the recent territorial aggrandizement of Serbia allay their concern for the preservation of the unwieldy and troubled multi-ethnic Austro-Hungarian empire.

Austria from the outset regarded the Serbian government as complicitous in the assassination, even though there was no evidence to suggest that this was true; later investigation revealed that some military personnel and customs officials had indeed been involved though, of course, this did not implicate the government itself. However, it did not go unnoticed in Vienna that the assassination had been greeted with elation by Serb public opinion and that the government in Belgrade, influenced by this, was doing little to investigate the crime that had originated within its borders or place curbs on the continuing anti-Austrian propaganda that hailed Princip as a martyr. The option for war was implicit in the action taken by Austria in the first week of the crisis, namely, to secure the expected promise of military support from Germany for whatever action she would take, a decision necessitated by concern over what possible counter-action her Russian rival might take in defense of Serbia. Accordingly, an emissary was sent to Berlin bearing the emperor's letter outlining the Austrian determination to effect "the isolation and diminution" of Serbia as well as detailing the danger to both empires inherent in Russian and Serb diplomatic intrigue in the Balkans. The replies from both the Kaiser (July 5) and chancellor Bethmann-Hollweg (July 6) could hardly be more supportive—an assurance of alliance obligations, leaving the decision for action to Austria, and promising support in the event of Russian intervention. Such was the famous 'blank check' that forever inculpated Germany in responsibility for the war that was to erupt within the next four weeks. It threw caution to the winds, leaving it to Austria to decide on peace or war despite the almost certain knowledge that an Austrian attack on Serbia, with all that that implied for the balance of power in the Balkans, must assuredly bring retaliation by Russia, with all that that would imply for the opposed system of alliances binding or dividing the European powers.

As the dominos were about to topple, the question of Britain’s position in the crisis loomed large for Germany. There was, of course, the accord of 1904 linking Britain and France but that Entente was not a formal treaty binding each to fixed military

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