Could the great power leadership have been scared of war by 1914

As I see it the crisis that resulted in WW1 need not have had that outcome.

Pretty well everyone was outraged by the murder of the Archduke and his wife (and rightly outraged)

Elements in the Sebian state had some culpability

The Serbian state should have been hurt hand humiliated but not ceased to exist

Now in OTL the Austrian and German leaderships seem to have been glad of a chance for war.


I am wondering whether a lot of media coverage saying that the Balkan wars were trully awful (which I suspect could have been provided without any actual lies) maybe the idea of war might have been scary
 
the idea of war is always scary, but there are some people that enjoy it. besides, the leaders in charge had to worry about how much they would lose or gain from what they already had. they didn't have to go and risk death every day.
 
Top