Chapter 2 presents a chronological approach to the July crisis, the main theme emphasizing that it was Austria-Hungary that instigated the war, its leaders believing that Serbia had to be crushed. Particular attention is paid to the correspondence between the two general staffs and the emperors of Germany and Austria-Hungary. Demolishes all postwar Habsburg apologia and myths.

This chapter analyses Simmel’s worldview during his early period (until ca. 1900). It argues that Simmel held an unusually optimistic view regarding the contradictions of modernity at that time, subscribing to the idea that modern differentiation leads to a comprehensive unity which naturally emerges from variety. This claim is supported by an analysis of Simmel’s writings of the period, starting from his early monograph on Dante and ending with his early sociology and his interpretation of Kant’s philosophy. In respect of sociology, it is argued that the young Simmel subscribed to a kind of reductionist sociologism in the spirit of the founders of Völkerpsychologie, Lazarus and Steinthal. In respect of Kant, it is argued that the young Simmel conceived of his thought as the ultimate philosophical solution to the problems of modernity, and that he distanced himself from Kant once he began to doubt the possibility of reconciling the contradictions of modernity.

As the war plans of the great powers unfolded, few foresaw the stalemate that would set in by the end of 1914. Under Germany’s Schlieffen Plan, seven of its eight field armies were to attack France and achieve victory within six weeks, after which most of the troops would be withdrawn for action against Russia. In the meantime, Russia would have to be checked by Austria-Hungary, which Germany expected to abandon its own priority of crushing Serbia. The French, with the help of the British Expeditionary Force, won at the Marne against the Germans, who then dug in to consolidate their conquests. In “the Race to the Sea,” a series of failed flanking maneuvers by both sides established trench lines north to Flanders. By December 1914 a continuous Western front existed from the English Channel to Switzerland. Meanwhile, in the east, Germany’s Eighth Army, under Hindenburg and Ludendorff, defeated two Russian armies at Tannenberg, but Austro-Hungarian forces divided between Serbian and Russian objectives failed to conquer Serbia, were defeated by the Russians at Lemberg, and ultimately held the line of the Carpathians in a bloody winter campaign. The Ottoman Empire entered the war, creating another front against Russia in the Caucasus.