When a Serbian-backed assassin gunned down Archduke Franz Ferdinand in late June 1914, the world seemed unmoved. There was nothing to suggest that the episode would lead to conflict, much less a world war of such massive and horrific proportions that it would reshape the course of human events. In fact, World War I might have been avoided entirely had it not been for a small group of statesmen who, in the month after the assassination, plotted to use the murder as the trigger for a long-awaited showdown in Europe. The primary culprits, moreover, have long escaped blame.
