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Individual decisions start wars
Structure and individuals
Two explanations are easy to reach for: that structure decides everything, or that it is all about individuals. Both matter, and understanding the structural part is necessary to act on the global situation through individual action.
Leaders today
The leaders of the major powers today seem incredibly unsuited to the issues they need to deal with in a rapidly changing world, which is one of the parallels with the period before 1914. Many heads of state and government find it hard to navigate that kind of terrain.
How war gets avoided
Future historians writing about how war was avoided in 2026 or 2027 will likely put a lot of emphasis on leaders who thought these issues through and decided they might have to take a few steps back. They found compromise where it was possible, and played for stability even when it wasn't the kind they would ideally have wanted.
How have historians disagreed about the war's causes?
In 1961, the German historian Fritz Fischer argued in Griff nach der Weltmacht that Germany bore primary responsibility for the war. His claim set off a long debate in Germany and beyond. In his 2012 book The Sleepwalkers, the Australian historian Christopher Clark argued that leaders of all the powers stumbled into war through a series of decisions. The debate between those two positions remains central to the study of 1914.
Did the Kaiser try to stop the war?
On 28 July 1914, Wilhelm II read Serbia's reply to the Austrian ultimatum and wrote that it removed every reason for war. He proposed that Austria-Hungary occupy Belgrade as a pledge and then stop. The proposal was passed on to Vienna in the following days. Austria-Hungary had already declared war on Serbia on 28 July.
How did one officer stop a nuclear launch in 1962?
On 27 October 1962, during the Cuban Missile Crisis, American destroyers dropped practice depth charges on the Soviet submarine B-59 to force it to surface. The submarine carried a nuclear-armed torpedo. Launching it required agreement among three senior officers aboard. Vasili Arkhipov refused to approve, and the submarine surfaced.