I like to believe that if Europe just let Habsburgs kick some Serbian ass in return for the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand, the whole war wouldn't even take place. Instead, Russians defended their ally and it domino'd from there.
Europeans' overall approach to their colonies was always the same. Joseph Conrad describes it relatively well. I think British had an affair somewhere in the Africa with Boer folks back in 1900.
Oh, yeah.
Definitely Alliances had something to do with it.
Although the Boers actually humiliated us in the first war with them.
Something about wearing red wool uniforms in Africa, and fighting Farmers on their land assuming that they don't go hunting with guns, may have put us at a disadvantage.
Though the documentary mentioned that the Tsar might have been pressured into helping the Serbians because they had a revolution recently.
1.5 imperial gallons of tea were consumed during the writing of this postI am here now - thank you for the links.
...I totally read that in the Soviet Engineer voice.
The damned queen and the relentless knight.

I'm certainly not doubting that mainland Europe suffered a lot-
And in fact Britain itself did come under fire from German navies in a few towns along the south.
I'm not trying to defend the documentary, which some of which I really don't agree with. One part being that the Versailles agreement wasn't harsh and didn't propagate the second.
It was arguing that Germany turned what would've been a small Balkans war into a European conflict. Mostly because of the Kaiser's slightly unhinged personality and complete control over Foreign affairs.
WW 1 is certainly Morally ambiguous, but the German army supposedly had a propensity to brutality in regards to Civilians even before the war, as seen in suppressing one of their colony's revolutions. And of course- the reason why Britain believed it needed to enter in the war- Trampling on Neutral Belgium.
1.5 imperial gallons of tea were consumed during the writing of this post