I was looking just a tiny bit at the history leading up to the assassination generally blamed for the first World War. The data seem so surprising I just have to ask what I'm missing...
Oskar Potiorek had some apparent bona fides:
He is said to be the target of the assassination plot before it switched to Ferdinand.
He was rabidly anti-Serb, to the extent of supporting tremendously oppressive laws against all organizations, while provoking riots that were a major step leading up to the modern war in Bosnia.
I assume he would have had authority over prior prosecutions of Serb activists later involved in the plot.
On the other hand...
He ignored an urgent report of an assassination plot two weeks in advance.
He taunted the Archduke to ignore the first attack with a grenade saying "Do you think Sarajevo is full of assassins?", even while chivalrously encouraging the wife to stay at City Hall
He "forgot" to inform the driver of a route change that would have made the car not pass by the shooter.
He ordered the driver to turn around (apparently the car then stalled) a few feet in front of the assassin!
He was the one in the car not shot.
His role as a general in the war afterward was remarkably incompetent.
Now I'm not actually seeing a contradiction in these things. A role in persecuting Serbs would have given him a chance (with a little legerdemain) to organize selected individuals into a plot. What evaluation has been made of his involvement?
