If you could change one event in history,

[wnylib]

44. I have read some of Tuchmann's works,

but not Guns of August, so I take your word on what she wrote. An excellent historian. Fortunately for the US and tge world, JFK also read Guns of August and used his understanding of it during the Cuban Missle Crisis in assessing the risks and dangers of how to proceed.

The drive for unification of Germany did not originate in Prussia. It had existed for centuries. Following the end of the Holy Roman Empire, there was the loosely knit German Confederation. In 1848, there was the failed German Revolution attempt to unite the various multiple German states and principalities into one nation. The working and middle classes were behind it in an attempt to establish a parliamentary constitution and civil rights.

Since Prussia was the largest and most powerful of the German states, the leaders of the 1848 revolution offered the crown of a unified Germany to the Prussian king Frederick William IV (NOT the same Frederick William in the OP) who refused it out of arrogant pride that it was offered to him by "rabble."

During the revolution, Frederick William IV's brother, Prince Wilhelm, fled with his wife and son to Britain where his son, the Frederick William of the OP, met the Princess Royal Victoria, whom he later married. Prince Wilhelm became king when his brother died. He appointed the ultra conservative Bismarck as his Chancellor.

Several liberal and progressive parties grew out of the 1848-1849 revolutions and continued to push for unification under a parliamentary system, which Bismarck opposed until he realized that a united Germany would strengthen Prussia's power over Austria. Bismarck pushed for unification at the end of the Franco-Prussian war and Wilhelm became the Kaiser as Wilhelm I. His liberal leaning wife wife detested Bismarck and Wilhelm's son, Frederick William, opposed Bismarck's policies.

Crown Prince Frederick William and his English wife, Victoria, supported the progressive and liberal party reforms and developed a supportive following among political leaders, but the entire movement collapsed when Frederick William died after 3 months as kaiser. His son, Wilhelm II, had been strongly influenced by Bismarck to reject his parents' reforms and to regard himself as kaiser with absolute power.

Wilhelm II denounced the reforms as treasonous and foreign (English). The reformers were imprisoned as traitors or escaped to other countries. Wilhelm II was obsessed with the military like a child with a toy army. In many ways, he reminds me of Donald Trump. He loved royal pageantry and absolute power. He dismissed Bismarck, who, in spite of his ultra conservatism, at least had brains and diplomatic skill. Wilhelm II lacked both and promoted a nationalistic reactionary backlash to his parents' policies and reforms.