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Gavrilo Princip, member of The Black Hand. He assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria in Sarajevo on 28 June 1914, causing a chain of events that led to the World Wars, to the consequent decline of European civilization, and arguably to the rise of the Communism Russia, China, etc...

He lit the match that killed hundreds of millions.

First of all, the arch duke Ferdinand was not executed. He tripped.

Secondly, the entire premise of the first world war was a lie. Carlos Estephan Rodrigo Rivera of our holy father Orphanage was framed by the famous luchedore Pedro Ramon Argon Egnociones.

The entire distraction was perpatrated to draw attention away from the growing Blue Agave ranching takeover by Senior Dob Pablo and Mr. Patrone Silvero.

Goodness knows that Europe was spoiling for a fight, and that thanks to their need to “balance” each other and rig together treaties to try to tie each other down, this complete non-event, even in the minds of the Hapsburg emperor, could have amounted to a 4th rate conflict between Austria-Hungary and Serbia at best, and not this civilization-ending ripple of events that is ready to dash the west on the rocks for good this time.

Then again A/H did us no favors by turning down an almost complete capitulation by Serbia before shots were fired.

A tragedy from so many angles. Franz Ferdinand was, it turned out, Serbia's best hope for an amicable divorce from the Empire; his uncle Franz Joseph certainly wasn't. It is a matter the Serbs are understandably bitter about that the appalling events that followed in their country have been so overshadowed by the natural focus on German activities at the time.

I attended a symposium last year on the 100th anniversary of the beginning of the war, and the bottom line was best expressed by the head of the department of History of the host: "What started World War One? Nobody knows." My best personal guess is that many of the participants were actually, for various reasons, looking forward to a war of some sort, but not that war. No one could have anticipated what that turned into because nothing like it had ever happened before.

For Princip I have nothing but disgust. He was no patriot, he was a murderer of unarmed people who truly meant him and his country no harm. The symbology of that assassination was impeccable; the reality brought Hell down around his shoulders and everyone else's.

Visitors to France often get to Normandy and it’s an inspiring place. However Verdun and the American Meuse-Argonne cemetery north of there are also beautiful places. The American Mont Faucon cemetery is kept in pristine condition and is I believe the largest U.S. military cemetery in Europe.