One Murder, a World at War

No one in Sarajevo that day grasped what they had set in motion.

• A small plot succeeded only after a string of lucky breaks
• Ferdinand, ironically, had been a leading voice against war with Serbia
• Rigid alliances and military timetables turned a local killing into a continental war
• Roughly 15 to 20 million people died before it ended

A century later, historians still debate the same question: was this war waiting to happen, or did a few wrong moves make it so?