Germany declared war on France and thus truly began what we call "World War I" or what the French call La Grande Guerre - The Great War. One could argue the date, since the beginning of that war was sort of a rolling process over a period of weeks in the summer of 1914. But that date will do as well as any other.
Americans being largely ahistorical, most of us, even those who read a site like this one, likely know little of the reality of that war. I've been a little bit of an exception, as I've long had some idea of what an insane war that was. Pretty much by chance, I happen to be reading an amazing book: "To End All Wars" by Adam Hochschild. This is a superb look at the war and at the cultural milieu that made it possible - and helped make it so horrifying. But over the last ten years I have also had a long series of experiences that have allowed me to understand that war on a deeper, more visceral level.
First, a little bit about Hochschild's book: He focuses on pairs of people - brother and sister, husband and wife, father and son - in which one became a leading advocate for the war and one resisted or opposed it. The book is Anglo-centric, at least as far as I have read so far. He details the stunning, staggering, mind-blowing incompetence of general officers who sent wave after wave of men charging across open ground into concentrated machine gun fire - because that was what they believed war was supposed to be, that was the way war had been fought in their youth, that was the way a gentleman fought a war. And then after 10,000 had been slaughtered one day, they proceeded to do it again the next day. But, then, I have these other experiences.
For the last ten years, I have been lucky enough to travel to Europe most years. Mostly to France, and mostly to rural France - La France Profonde. The small towns and villages of Provence, Languedoc, Bordeaux, Borgogne, Bretagne, The Midi. A total of about 21 weeks in the French countryside, alll of it traveling by bicycle or on foot. And, in the process, I have had the opportunity to learn something about La Grande Guerre, about France's part in it, and how that scarred the French psyche and affected the history of the 20th century. I've learned that, not from books, but from stone monuments. Stone monuments that are mostly just lists of names. The names of the dead from La Grande Guerre. Every town and village in France has such a monument. With a few garishly jingoistic exceptions, it's a very simple stone pillar. Four sided. Standing in the central place of the town, near the mairie. At the top are the words "Mort Pour la Patrie" - Dead for the Fatherland. Below that are just lists of names, usually arranged in order by date of death - 1914, 1915, 1916, 1917, 1918.
I've read at some length about this war. I've read the masterful and moving "All Quiet on the Western Front". I've seen the numbers - the thousands slaughtered in a day, the millions of tons of munitions fired. I know that of all French men between the age of 18 and 32, one half died in this insane spasm of violence. I know the insane futility of this war in my head. But I think there is only one way to know it in your heart: Stand in a small village in the French countryside. Look around you at the lovely old stone houses, at the vineyards on the surrounding hillsides, at the tourists who come to soak in its bucolic beauty. Then count the houses in the village - 30? 40?. And go to the memorial and read the names. Count the names. Note how close the number of names is to the number of houses - 25? 35? Note how many times the same last name appears two or three times - or even more. Were they cousins? Brothers? How many families lost all their sons?
Like most Americans, I was brought up to believe in a mythological history of both the World Wars, a history in which the American role was the only one that mattered, a history in which there was no understanding of the French and British reluctance to confront the growing Nazi threat during the 30s. But go there, stand in those village squares, read those names. I make myself do that in each town. It's my personal homage to the dead, my personal penance perhaps, for being lucky enough to be alive. I read those names one by one. Do that, and you too will come to understand that distant war - and all wars - a little bit differently.