A question about a world without the great war

I'm new here, so I apologise if this has already been asked. I've used google to try and find threads about this and the consensus seems to be that the first world war was by no means inevitable until the first shots were fired. My question is, what, bar a pan-European war or any war involving a European great power of similar scale, could prevent the outbreak of any major war in Europe until the present day, using a POD after 1900?
A second, related question is could an outside threat or perceived threat cause the European empires to put aside their differences for the sake of mutual interests? If so, what might this threat be?
 
Pretty much nothing short of an alien invasion would prent a war between France and Germany. After the war of 1871, there was going to be a follow up, unless Germany would give back AL, which is beyond unlikely.
 
But need this follow up take the form of an outright war? Could a proxy war make both sides wary of an outright war?
 
But need this follow up take the form of an outright war? Could a proxy war make both sides wary of an outright war?

Could you give us an example of what form a proxy war might take - e.g. which countries are the proxies involved, where in the world does it take place, and approximately when?
 
It doesn't really matter what France does or wants. She isn't anywhere near strong enough to take on Germany alone.

So the real question is whether war between Germany and Russia can be avoided.
 
WW1 was not inevitable, the German General Staff estimated that when Russia completed the modernisation of its military by 1916/17, the combined strength of Russia and France would be too great for Germany and it would have to adopt a defensive posture. This would have meant there wouldn't have been anything like the Kaiser's blank cheque to A-H IOTL that encouraged them to invade Serbia. France will remain seething over the loss of A-L but if a Sarajevo style provocation doesn't arise then peace may hold for a considerable period .

Now this is a best case scenario and there would still have been other conflicts, another Balkan War is a possibility as well as Fashoda/Morocco style colonial disputes but if there isn't the provocation for a major war then the mass slaughter of WW1 could have been avoided.
 
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