Learn how the "The Great War" started in this lecture from Professor John Ramsden on the buildup to World War I. He talks about the rise of Germany as an imperial power which sought to rival Britain. Ramsden also describes the alliances that had formed at the dawn of the 20th century such as the Franco-Russian Alliance which the British would eventually join and the alliance between Germany, Austria–Hungary, and Italy. As these alliances began to entangle, Germany saw itself as being threatened and when the Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated in June of 1914 it lead to a series of events which triggered the world's first truly global war. At the end of the lecture Ramsden examines which nation was most responsible for the war and he cites that most contemporary historians blame Germany.