Killing the Past: Can Assassins Change the Course of History?

On April 14, 1865, President Abraham Lincoln was shot by John Wilkes Booth and died the next day. Roughly 150 years later, Benjamin Jones and Benjamin Olken published an opinion piece in The New York Times asking whether assassins really can change the course of history. The two academics looked at data from both successful and failed assassination attempts from 1875 to 2004 and discovered that while assassinations do have a better chance of causing significant change in autocracies, robust democracies on the other hand are better able to survive the death of their leader. If this is true, suddenly The Interview is a much smarter movie than anyone realized.

Although the article was not alternate history, plenty of alternate and counterfactual historians jumped on the findings. And why not? As Evelyn Leeper pointed out in 2001, alternate histories focusing the assassination of JFK remain one of the most popular topics in alternate history. Both Stuart Schneiderman and Gavriel Rosenfeld commented on the article and while they both approached it from different directions, they generally reaffirmed the power of human agency while criticizing the study for not considering the changes caused if someone survives their assassination (like Lincoln or JFK).

What do I think about the power of assassins to change history? I am going to give a very lawyer answer and say: it depends. For alternate history, it certainly matters. The untimely death of powerful men and women (whether by assassins or other causes) is one of primary means of creating a point of divergence and without it we wouldn't have some of our most influential works (i.e. The Man in the High Castle and "For All Time"). Human agency, however, matters in alternate history because the story needs it to matter. Alternate history has always leaned toward the "rule of cool" thus we often stretch the limits of plausibility so we can tell the story we want to tell.

For counterfactual history, however, things get a little more complicated. Changing the actors on the stage doesn't necessarily change the outcome of the story. For example, assassinating Lincoln in 1861 when the American Civil War was just beginning won't provide the Confederacy with the strategic thinkers, industry, railroads or manpower it would have needed to defeat the Union. Thus the Confederacy still loses the war, but Lincoln's successors (Hannibal Hamlin and whoever comes next) could make enough different decisions during and after the war that in the long-term we may see a vastly different present from the one we inhabit now.

Honestly whether you believe assassins can change the course of history is really a matter of opinion. If you believe in the power of human agency, then yes killing a world leader would create a vastly different history from the one where he or she is still alive. If you believe in the ultimate power of the intangible forces governing history, than no, killing a world leader only changes the names we write in the history books, but not the actual outcome of history. The weakness to both sides, however, is that we will never know for sure. Until someone invents a time machine that allows us the spin off new timelines for study, we are stuck with the history we know, along with the same hypothetical questions on who would you kill/save if you could travel through time.

Which brings me to my final point, I generally find arguing whether killing/saving someone of importance in the past will make a "better" world, is pointless. There are just so many variables it is nearly impossible to predict what may happen and, if Jones and Olken are to be believed, the chance that nothing will happen if your target is the leader of a democracy is rather good.

To sum up: its fun to speculate whether an assassin can change history, but whether they actually do is still up for debate.

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Matt Mitrovich is the founder and editor of Alternate History Weekly Update and a blogger on Amazing Stories. Check out his short fiction. When not writing he works as an attorney, enjoys life with his beautiful wife Alana and prepares for the inevitable zombie apocalypse. You can follow him on Facebook or Twitter.

Preview: Shattered Crowns

Guest post by Christina Croft.

Any list of the causes of the First World War invariably includes the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian Empire. While researching my trilogy of novels – Shattered Crowns – following the lives of the royalties from 1913 to the Treaty of Versailles, however, it became increasingly apparent that rather than being an unfortunate event which sparked the war, the Archduke’s murder was probably deliberately staged in order to provoke the conflict, and ultimately to destroy the three most powerful autocracies in Europe: Russia, Germany and Austria-Hungary.

Apart from the effect of his assassination, Archduke Franz Ferdinand appears largely as a footnote in history but, looking more deeply into his life, several interesting facts come to light. While his short temper and morganatic marriage to a lady-in-waiting are often cited as reasons why he appeared so unpopular in Vienna, it is clear that his forward-looking views were the real reason why he was hated and feared by the most powerful ministers. At the time, Austria-Hungary comprised many different ethnic groups, several of which resented being ruled from Vienna. Unlike many of his contemporaries in the Austrian Court, Franz Ferdinand was well-travelled and had taken the opportunity to study alternative forms of government. It was his intention, on becoming Emperor, to give greater autonomy to each of the different groups and, while maintaining the royal traditions, to created a sort of Federal Austria-Hungary similar to that of the United States, but with an emperor rather than a president. He was also eager to maintain peace in Europe by forming stronger ties with Russia and, only a week before his murder, he was paid an informal visit by Kaiser Wilhelm who agreed to this plan, which was totally at odds with the views of many senior ministers – and bankers and industrialists! - who were desperately seeking an excuse to invade Serbia, which would almost inevitably lead to war with Russia. It was also widely known that Franz Ferdinand had already drawn up lists of ministers who would replace the present incumbents and he had stated that he would refuse to be crowned King of Hungary until a fair system of suffrage was implemented.

Naturally, the possibility of his becoming emperor gave rise to a good deal of anxiety among the ministers and that anxiety was surely heightened in the winter of 1913-1914 when his aged Great Uncle Emperor Franz Josef suffered a serious and potentially fatal bout of bronchitis. It was during this time that the Archduke received an invitation to review the troops in Sarajevo, Bosnia (a territory annexed by Austria in 1908) the following June, and to add an extra incentive, the invitation was extended to his wife who, until then, had been frequently humiliated and snubbed due to her lowly origins. This was the Archduke’s first opportunity to attend an official public engagement with his beloved Sophie and by coincidence or design it was set to take place on their 14th wedding anniversary. The date – June 28th – also coincided with a Serbian National Holiday so the arrival of the heir to the Austrian throne would almost certainly arouse antipathy among the Serbs. In the days leading up to the visit, Franz Ferdinand stated many times that he suspected that he was about to be murdered, probably by Freemasons. Nonetheless, he and Sophie travelled to Sarajevo and received a warm welcome from the crowds until an unsuccessful assassination attempt disrupted the planned visit. Franz Ferdinand and Sophie decided to visit the wounded in hospital before leaving the city, but, strangely considering the tension in the city and the possibility of further attacks, they were again driven in an open-car with no armed escort or military presence, allowing Gavrilo Princip to step out from the edge of the road and fire point-blank at his victims.

The crime was said to be the work of the ‘Black Hand’ – a Serbian terrorist group. I have yet to discover any other successful terrorist activities carried out by this group. Moreover, it was said to comprise senior military and political figures. Why then would they employ a tubercular boy, who had never fired a pistol before, for so important a task?  History is filled with ‘patsies’ and I strongly suspect that Gavrilo Princip was one of them. With the death of the Archduke, however, a much larger plan could be set in motion...

The discontent, which Franz Ferdinand’s and the Kaiser’s plans would have prevented, was exacerbated by the horrors of the war. Within a few years, the three major autocracies were destroyed and access to the Russian oilfields, the ‘grain basket’ of the Ukraine, the thriving German chemical industry and the economies of Germany, Russia and Austria-Hungary was available to foreign industrialists and bankers.

This is but the tip of a very murky iceberg, which I have sought to uncover in my Shattered Crowns trilogy of novels, based on actual historical events.  The first two books of the trilogy: The Scapegoats (1913-1914) and The Sacrifice (1914-1917) are currently available in paperback and Kindle formats. The third book, The Betrayal, is coming soon...

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Christina Croft is a writer and speaker who lives in the north of England.  Learn more about her and her works at Hilliard & Croft, Shattered Crowns: Queen Victoria & Other 19th Century Royalties and Grand Duchess Elizabeth And Other Stories.