I WWI was a bar fight

Dave Rogers said:
Getting back to the subject of the thread, if anyone's interested, here's my synopsis of the First World War.

Germany, Austria and Italy are stood together in the middle of the bar-room, when Serbia bumps into Austria, and spills Austria's pint.
Austria demands Serbia buy it a complete new suit, because there are splashes on its trouser leg.
Germany expresses its support for Austria's point of view.
Britain recommends that everyone calm down a bit.
Serbia points out that it can't afford a whole suit, but offers to pay for cleaning Austria's trousers.
Russia and Serbia look at Austria.
Austria asks Serbia who it's looking at.
Russia suggests that Austria should leave its little brother alone.
Austria inquires as to whose army will assist Russia in compelling it to do so.
Germany appeals to Britain that France has been looking at it, and that this is sufficiently out of order that Britain should not intervene.
Britain replies that France can look at who it wants to, that Britain is looking at Germany too, and what is Germany going to do about it?
Germany tells Russia to stop looking at Austria, or Germany will render Russia incapable of such action.
Britain and France ask Germany whether it's looking at Belgium.
Turkey and Germany go off into a corner and whisper. When they come back, Turkey makes a show of not looking at anyone.
Germany rolls up its sleeves, looks at France, and punches Belgium.
France and Britain punch Germany. Austria punches Russia. Germany punches Britan and France with one hand and Russia with the other. Russia throws a punch at Germany, but misses and nearly falls over. Japan calls over from the other side of the room that it's on Britain's side, but stays there. Italy surprises everyone by punching Austria.
Australia punches Turkey, and gets punched back. There are no hard feelings, because Britain made Australia do it.
France gets thrown through a plate glass window, but gets back up and carries on fighting. Russia gets thrown through another one, gets knocked out, suffers brain damage, and wakes up with a complete personality change.
Italy throws a punch at Austria and misses, but Austria falls over anyway. Italy raises both fists in the air and runs round the room chanting.
America waits till Germany is about to fall over, then walks over, waves a fist at Germany while Britain knocks it out, then pretends it won the fight all by itself.
By now all the chairs are broken, and the big mirror over the bar is shattered. Britain, France and America agree that Germany threw the first punch, so the whole thing is Germany's fault. While Germany is still unconscious, they go through its pockets, steal its wallet, and buy drinks for all their friends.

Nobody comes out of it looking particularly good.

Dave
Click to expand...

Voilà!
 
I received permission to re-post this to one of my long-defunct blogs. I can't think of where else someone might have got hold of this.
 
I've just finished watching 37 Days, a docudrama about the events leading up to the start of WWI. The ridiculously cartoonish portrayals of all foreigners almost completely ruined it for me (srsly, the Austrian ambassador to Germany was an absurd caricature, the Germans all had pointy helmets and the Czar actually looked like a bear) but the evens were almost exactly as outlined by Dave Rogers.
 
I'm going to post this here as the most recent thread on WWI, and maybe someone can help me out.

I dimly recall a number in the film "Oh, What a Lovely War" that I can't find. I have conflated the title with a Tom Lehrer song,.... "It's Time to Change Partners Again" because it was about the constant shuffling of the allegiances and alliances leading up to the war.

Does anyone else recall the number? It was funny and relatively accurate to my then twenty-something brain. I saw the move ages ago and really don't want to invest in a copy of it just to answer this niggling question in my addled old brain.
 
Foolmewunz said:
I'm going to post this here as the most recent thread on WWI, and maybe someone can help me out.

I dimly recall a number in the film "Oh, What a Lovely War" that I can't find. I have conflated the title with a Tom Lehrer song,.... "It's Time to Change Partners Again" because it was about the constant shuffling of the allegiances and alliances leading up to the war.

Does anyone else recall the number? It was funny and relatively accurate to my then twenty-something brain. I saw the move ages ago and really don't want to invest in a copy of it just to answer this niggling question in my addled old brain.
Click to expand...

Probably this one:


Belgium Put the Kibosh on the Kaiser
 
Brainache said:
Probably this one:


Belgium Put the Kibosh on the Kaiser
Click to expand...

Nope. I'd swear it included a huge map of Europe and had all the various countries switching allegiances and moving around the map. I'm pretty sure they had faux national costumes but the players in the scene were all upper crust diplomat-y types.

I could well be imagining it, for all I know. I seem to have imagined the title, after all.
 
I can’t resist adding an IMO splendid “causes of WWI made [relatively] simple” passage from Ben Elton’s novel The First Casualty. It’s a conversation which takes place in 1917, in the course of a “comfort stop” made by a train of cattle-trucks which is slowly conveying a British army unit towards Ypres. The hero, Kingsley, has been charged with investigating a mysterious murder in the Western Front area with potential to be “political dynamite”. Though a well-educated middle-class guy; for the purpose of his mission he is trying, not very successfully, to pass himself off as an ordinary soldier.

With this being a conversation among a bunch of fed-up “other ranks” soldiers -- in the original, almost every other word is an obscenity. In the light of how JREF prefers things, I have cleaned up the language; and have abbreviated the passage a little.


“ ‘The question I always ask is, why did anyone care at all about this bleeding Archduke Ferdinand what’s-his-face in the first place?’ one fellow said. ‘I mean, come on, nobody had even heard of the twit till he got popped off. Now the entire world is fighting because of it.’

‘You dummy, that was just a spark, that was,’ another man admonished. ‘Europe was a tinder box, wasn’t it? Everyone knows that.’

‘Well, I don’t see as how he was even worth a spark, mate,’ the first man replied. ‘Like I say, who’d even heard of the jerk?’

A corporal weighed in to settle the matter.

‘Listen, it’s yer Balkans, innit? Always yer Balkans. Yer see, yer Austro-Hungarians –‘

‘Who are another bunch we never gave a damn about till all this kicked off,’ the first man interjected.

‘Shut up an’ you might learn something,’ the corporal insisted. ‘You’ve got your Austro-Hungarians supposed to be in charge of Bosnia but most of the Bosnians is Serbs, right, or at least enough of ‘em is to cause a t’do. Your Austrians ‘ave got Bosnia, right, but your Bosnians are backed by your Serbs, right? So when a Bosnian Serb shoots – ‘

‘A Bosnian or a Serb?’

A Bosnian and a bleeding Serb, you twerp. When this Bosnian Serb loony shoots Ferdinand who’s heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, the Austrians think, right, here’s a chance to put Serbia back in its bleeding box for good, so they give ‘em an ultimatum. They says, “You topped our Archduke so from now on you can bleeding knuckle under or else you’re for it.” Which would have been fine except the Serbs were backed by the Russians, see, and the Russians says to the Austrians, you has a go at Serbia, you has a go at us, right? But the Austrians is backed by the Germans who says to the Russians, you has a go at Austria, you has a go at us, right? Except the Russians is backed by the French who says to the Germans, you has a go at Russia, you has a go at us, right? And altogether they says kick off ! Let’s be having you ! And the ruck begins.’

‘What about us then?’ the first man enquired. The rest of the group seemed to feel that this was the crux of it.

‘Entente bleeding cordiale, mate,’ the corporal replied. 'We was backing the French except it wasn’t like an alliance – it was just, well, it was a bleeding entente, wasn’t it.'

‘An’ what’s an entente when it’s at home?’

‘It means we wasn’t obliged to fight.’

‘Never ! You mean we didn’t have to?’

‘Nope.’

‘Why on earth did we then?’

‘Freakin’ Belgium.’

‘Who could care less about Belgium?’

‘Well, you’d have thought no one, wouldn’t you? But we did. ‘Cos the German plan to get at the French was to go through Belgium, but we was guaranteeing ‘em, see. So we says to the Germans, you has a go at Belgium, you has a go at us. We’d guaranteed her, see. It was a matter of honour. So in we come.’

Kingsley could not resist interjecting.

‘Of course it wasn’t really about honour,’ he said.

‘Do what?’ queried the corporal.

‘Well, we’d only guaranteed Belgium because we didn’t want either Germany or France dominating the entire Channel coast. In the last century we thought that letting them both know that if they invaded Belgium they’d have us to deal with would deter them.’

‘But it didn’t.’

‘Sadly not.’

‘So what about the Italians, an’ the Japs, an’ the Turks, an’ the Yanks, eh? How did they end up in it?’ asked the original inquisitor.

‘I’ve no idea,’ said the corporal. ‘I lost track after the Belgians.’ “
 
The poor old Entente. They wanted something that would give them the deterrent benefits of an alliance without the onerous obligations of a defensive alliance… unfortunately it turned out to involve the obligations without having a deterrent effect on Germany.
 
"I heard some guy named Archie Duke shot an ostrich because he was hungry."

...long explanation of WWI...

"So the poor ostrich died fer nothing, then?"
 
When the fight was over, Russia and Germany were a bit shocked to find out that in the midst of the all the ruckus, they had somehow managed to jointly give birth to Poland.

They immediately start bickering over the custody issues, while Poland insists that he is big enough to manage his own affairs....
 
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