Dependency inversion principle from history

I think I found earliest example of inversion of control/dependency inversion principle.

Context: In 1885 an Austrian parlament held a session to discuss a military conflict in the Balkan between Serbia and Bulgaria over some Turkish land caused by some unbalanced serbian king. At that time Austria was an ally of Serbia and Russia was an ally of Bulgaria.

Everyone in Austria was eager to help Serbia because enemies Russians where on the other side. A parlament member asked minister of foreign affairs count Kálnoky a question whether Austria is determined to defend Serbia’s interest under any circumstances?

Austria can not defend interests of Serbia under any circumstances. Doing that she would make her politics dependent upon one much smaller country, who besides that does not give enough assurance that “it would not be governed by impulses but by reason”.

If you think a little bit WW1 and WW2 started because of violation of this principle. Everyone was connected to everyone through network of interlocking alliances. Assasination of prince Ferdinand and the war that followed was not localised between Serbia and Austria. Russia, violating this principle, felt it necessary to back Serbia and that triggered domino effect.

So the next time you violate IOC principle be aware of the consequences it had.

Adendum: If country is entity, and alliance is coupling, what is alliance’s purpose? It seems it is to defend vital interest of country for survival and only in that circumstances coupling is allowed. What is an analogy in software?

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