The Alliance System and the Long Fuse In a recent New York Times Op-Ed column (10/12/00), William Safire drew an analogy between Ariel Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount and the assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand. In both of these instances the press and the general public have found a answer to the question of "who started it?". In Sharon's case, the recent crisis in Israel and in the other, World War I. Safire was using …showed first 75 words of 927 total…

…showed last 75 words of 927 total…Thus it was that Alfred von Schlieffen's dead hand pulled the trigger that started World War I." (www.worldwar1.com) Once Russia began it's mobilization, Germany had no other choice but to declare war, thereby dragging Austria and Italy in, and since Russia was now involved France and England had to follow. It was the alliance system, or more likely the failure of the earlier alliance systems, that dragged the whole of Europe into conflict.