An Utterly Pointless World War

On June 28, 1914, a diplomatic crisis began that led in five weeks to the First World War, a cataclysm that claimed millions of lives and ruined countless more. Under blue skies in Sarajevo, terrorists with shadowy links to the Serbian government killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the throne of the rickety but splendid Austro-Hungarian Empire, and his wife. Vienna issued a strident ultimatum to Serbia, and Germany took the side of the aggrieved Empire; Russia, driven by Slavic solidarity and confident that her ally France would join the fray, mobilized against Germany; and Britain, outraged by the German violation of Belgian neutrality, reluctantly came to the aid of France. The conflict that followed was the end of a world, and unleashed horrors that made the 20th century the bloodiest in history. European civilization shattered like a glittering chandelier fallen on a marble floor.