re: #285 GeneJockey

From everything I’ve ever read about WWI, the reason it happened was because everyone expected it to. There was no cause that anyone was fighting for, there was no big, nasty aggressor, there was really no advantage to be gained, and everyone just figured they’d march across the enemy’s territory in a lightning move and it would all be over, and they’d have won, but they didn’t know what that would have meant.

It’s probably mankind’s most colossal fuckup, and whenever I hear people talking about the superiority of Western Culture, I think about WWI.

I have only the vaguest memory of High School History, but my general impression was that some small country had beef with some other small country, and they each had mutual defense treaties with medium-sized countries who had agreements with larger wealthier nations and everybody jumped to their allies’ sides and… it just sort of snowballed.