This section examines the catastrophic war that broke out in 1914 and would engulf Europe and the world until the end of 1918.
Section 19.1 considers the Balkan region of southeastern Europe between 1877 and 1914. The deterioration of the Ottoman Empire created a power vacuum of new states over which the great powers competed for regional hegemony, making a future war a strong possibility.
Section 19.2 overviews the great powers on the eve of the war showing how the conflicting interests of each made a major international war an inevitable outcome.
Section 19.3 examines militarism as a background cause of the war and explains how Germany's strategic planning for a future war with France and Russia made that war a reality.
The events of the summer of 1914 (Section 19.4) demonstrate how a political assassination in Bosnia would escalate into a major international war.
Section 19.5 is a year-by-year chronological overview of the war.
Section 19.6 examines the 1919 Paris Peace Settlement, a peace that would redraw the map of Europe and create a League of Nations committed to future harmony among the world's states.