The Decline of Bismark's European Order: Franco-Russian Relations, 1875-1890

In an attempt to discover some of the underlying origins of World War I, diplomat and writer George Kennan focuses on a small sector of offstage events to show how they affected the drama at large, long before the war even began.

In the introduction to his book George Kennan tells us, 'I came to see World War I...as the great seminal catastrophe of this century...the event which lay at the heart of the failure and decline of this Western civilization.'

It is from this perspective that Mr. Kennan launches a 'micro-history' of the Franco-Russian relationship as far back as the 1870s in an effort to determine the motives that led people 'to wander so blindly' into the horrors of the First World War.

In describing the forces and events that brought about the gradual disintegration of the close German-Austrian-Russian relatinship of the early 1880s, and thereby opened the way for an alliance between Russia and France, Mr. Kennan emphasizes the personal and psychological background of the policy decisions of the various governments involved.