"How valid is it to claim that Europe "stumbled into" a world war in 1914"
             The late 1800's brought upon a growing trend of Imperialism towards Europe and five of her most powerful nations, Russia, France, England, Austria-Hungary, and Germany. Bureaucratic perimeters were being established and once solitary countries, were know becoming great empires. The turn of the century however, brought many modernistic and menacing ideals upon the European State systems including nationalism, socialism, liberalism and militarism. Events that took place before 1914, were all contributors to the outbreak of the Great War. World War I was a war unlike any war the world had witnessed before. Because it was a Total war, opposing forces were brutalizing civilians and economic strategies were changing in order to positively effect the war effort. The claim that the European countries unintentionally stumbled into a war that they could not withdraw from would in some ways be true but others may argue the fact that Europe did not stumble into a war, but that the war was in fact an inevitable situation. To understand the complex origins of the Great War would raise questions such as " was World War One a triumph of democracy over imperial expansion or an exercise in military futility?"
             Unlike its title, the "July Crisis" stretched outwards from the time-frame of the assassination of the Austro-Hungarian heir to the throne, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the 28th of June, 1914, up to the point in which a declaration of war was presented in early August. Officials within the Austro-Hungarian government had longed for a legitimate reason to assail Serbia during the Pre-war years but after the assignation of the archduke, they had a justifiable reason to claim war. Russia's involvement within the crisis became clear as they were bound into an agreement to protect their "Sisterland" Serbia. This led to the in...