There were many immediate and underlying or fundamental causes of World War I. The difference between an underlying and immediate cause is that an underlying cause develops over a long period of time and indirectly leads to a specific event, and an immediate cause is a specific short-term event that directly leads to another event or series of events. While the immediate cause of World War I was the assassination of Francis Ferdinand, the archduke …showed first 75 words of 485 total…

…showed last 75 words of 485 total…Triple Alliance and Triple Entente created extremely high tension in Europe which motivated countries to move into war for an inane incident such as the assassination of the archduke of Austria. Europe was divided into two opposing groups and each nation was ready to enter war due to militarism. The high tensions between European nations ultimately led to the declaration of war on Serbia by Austria on July 28, 1914, marking the beginning of World War I.