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On June 28, 1914, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir presumptive to the throne of Austria-Hungary, was visiting Sarajevo, in Bosnia, a province of Austria-Hungary, when he and his wife, Sophie, were assassinated by Gavrilo Princip, a Bosnian Serb revolutionary.

Austria-Hungary wanted revenge and presented Serbia with a list of demands that it couldn't accept. So, to teach the Serbs a lesson, Austria-Hungary, backed by its ally Germany, declared war on Serbia. The Serbs had the support of Russia, which declared a mobilization on July 30. On August 1, Germany declared war on Russia.

Well, that was one of the triggers. Throughout the month of July and early August, there was all sorts of diplomatic wrangling and exchanges of messages among the future participants.

In any event, war would have come anyway. In 1903-5 Germany developed the Schleiffen plan to invade the Low Countries and France and attack Russia. The plan was changed in 1906, when Helmuth von Moltke succeeded Count Alfred Schleiffen as chief of the German general staff. Moltke altered the plan and, it is generally believed, weakened it (but that's another story).

The plan called for the invasion of Belgium. Britain had pledged to guarantee Belgium's neutrality. When Germany actually invaded Belgium, Britain declared war on Germany. On August 3, Germany declared war on France. Belgium was next on August 4. Also on August 4, Britain sent Germany an ultimatum to stop violating Belgium's neutrality.

That's the gist of the war's beginning. The chain of events leading up to war is complicated-- Gjampol

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15y ago

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