The Road Less Traveled

A revelatory new history that explores the tantalizing and almost-realized possibility that the First World War could have ended in 1916, saving millions of lives and utterly changing the course of history.

In August 1916, two years into World War I, leaders in all the warring powers faced a crisis. There were no good military options. Money, people, and food were running short. Yet roads to peace seemed daunting too, as exhausted nations, drummed forward by

patriotic duty and war passion, sought meaning from their appalling sacrifices.

Germany made the first move. Its government secretly asked Woodrow Wilson, President of the United States and leader of the only great power still neutral, to mediate an end to the Great War. As a token of good faith, Germany promised to withdraw from occupied Belgium. Wilson too was anxious to make peace. If he failed, he felt sure America would drift into a dreadful, wider war. Meanwhile, the French president confided to Britain's King that the Allies should accept Wilson's expected peace move and end the war.

In THE ROAD LESS TRAVELED, Philip Zelikow recounts the five months when, behind closed doors, the future of the war, and the world, hung in the balance. It is a story of civic courage, of awful responsibility, and of how some rose to the occasion or shrank from it. "Peace is on the floor waiting to be picked up!" pleaded the German ambassador to the United States. This book shows how right he was, and how close leaders came to doing so.

“"What a well-wrought and haunting book this is. Philip Zelikow lucidly recounts and dissects how the worst consequences of the war of 1914-1918 almost came to be averted. He shows how leaders in both belligerent camps and the neutral United States strove mightily to end that conflict in 1916 and early 1917. This is a must-read book for understanding World War I and its consequences." -- Professor John M. Cooper , "What a well-wrought and haunting book this is. Philip Zelikow lucidly recounts and dissects how the worst consequences of the war of 1914-1918 almost came to be averted. He shows how leaders in both belligerent camps and the neutral United States strove mightily to end that conflict in 1916 and early 1917. This is a must-read book for understanding World War I and its consequences."”

"Zelikow proves an effective storyteller with an easy, uncomplicated narrative that makes for good reading of solid, honest scholarship reminiscent sometimes of Barbara Tuschman's The Guns of August."--New York Journal of Books
"Through haunting depictions of forfeited opportunities, Zelikow reveals in his gripping history just how close several diplomats came to ending World War I two years before its resolution... With his rich archival study and ingenious recombination of documents, Zelikow relates a thorough, chronological tale of incompetence, missed signals, and misunderstandings in World War I." --Parameters, The US Army War College Quarterly
"The history of the almost-peace of 1916-17 is complex, multilayered, and poorly understood. Drawing on a wealth of source material from the archives and documentary repositories of the warring powers, Zelikow has skillfully unearthed the dispiriting tale of overmatched officials, missed cues, foregone initiatives, personal biases, political gamesmanship, and the powerful momentum of war. In The Road Not Taken, Philip Zelikow has given us a riveting, sometimes maddening, and ultimately heartbreaking account of the Great War's greatest might-have-been."--Journal of Military History
"Zelikow has written an important book. ... The professor plays the part of a detective, constructing a well-written and well-argued account of a tragically missed opportunity."--The National Interest
"(A) well-researched, well-written book... Focusing on the personalities and policies of the leaders of each of the Great Powers, Zelikow tells a gripping tale of the road not taken."--The Telegraph UK
"This fine and lucid scholarship has the additional benefit of the eye of an experienced practitioner."--Foreign Affairs
"Enthralling ... a masterpiece ... a page-turning narrative, based on meticulous archival scholarship yet a pleasure to read, the characters deftly drawn, the locations vividly realized. ... This is an instant classic of diplomatic history."--Niall Ferguson for Times Literary Supplement
"[The Road Less Traveled] offers an engaging and detailed account of the secret peace negotiations among the warring nations .... Zelikow, chronicling the futility of these efforts with the keen eye of a former diplomat ... does not shy away from attributing blame where he identifies missed or bungled opportunities in the past. But [the book] also speaks to the present." --Foreign Policy
"In The Road Less Traveled, Zelikow brilliantly tells the diplomatic story of what he calls 'the lost peace' of August 1916-January 1917."--The New York Journal of Books
"The failure of Germany, Britain, and France halfway through World War I to reach a compromise peace mediated by Woodrow Wilson proved as disastrous for subsequent world history as the outbreak of the war itself. Philip Zelikow's enthralling narrative, with all the tautness of a mystery and based on thorough multinational research, unravels the earnest hopes, miscalculated tactics, and narrow political ambitions that all played a tragic role. Today's policy makers should ponder the lessons."
--Charles Maier, Leverett Saltonstall Professor of History, Harvard University
"Despite the immense literature about World War I, there is, Zelikow attests, no history until now about this tragic impasse, making this supremely well-written work essential."--Booklist
"Marvelous. What a well-wrought and haunting book this is. Philip Zelikow lucidly recounts and dissects how the worst consequences of the war of 1914-1918 almost came to be averted. He shows how leaders in both belligerent camps and the neutral United States strove mightily to end that conflict in 1916 and early 1917. This is a must-read book for understanding World War I and its consequences."--John M. Cooper Jr, Emeritus Professor University of Wisconsin-Madison
"Deeply researched and scathingly critical of the war's foremost political figures, this history offers an intriguing look at what might have been."--Publisher's Weekly
"I read this book with unflagging interest, as my admiration for the carefulness of Zelikow's research and the nuance of his argument grew virtually by the page. This is a gripping, granular analysis of one of modern history's most fascinating and consequential might-have-beens, a must read for all practitioners and students of statecraft. "--David M. Kennedy, Stanford University, Pulitzer and Bancroft Prize-winning author of Freedom from Fear: The American People in Depression and War and Over Here: The First World War and American Society.
"Zelikow shines fresh light on a major historical crossroads.... Outstanding revisionist history demonstrating what could have been a far more peaceful 20th century."--Kirkus (starred review)

Phillip Zelikow is is the White Burkett Miller Professor of History and J. Wilson Newman Professor of Governance at the Miller Center of Public Affairs, both at the University of Virginia. A former career diplomat, he was the executive director of the 9/11 Commission. He worked on international policy in each of the five administrations from Reagan through Obama.

Philip Zelikow lives in Charlottesville, Virginia.

A revelatory new history that explores the tantalizing and almost-realized possibility that the First World War could have ended in 1916, saving millions of lives and utterly changing the course of history. In August 1916, two years into World War I, leaders in all the warring powers faced a crisis. There were no good military options. Money, people, and food were running short. Yet roads to peace seemed daunting too, as exhausted nations, drummed forward bypatriotic duty and war passion, sought meaning from their appalling sacrifices.Germany made the first move. Its government secretly asked Woodrow Wilson, President of the United States and leader of the only great power still neutral, to mediate an end to the Great War. As a token of good faith, Germany promised to withdraw from occupied Belgium. Wilson too was anxious to make peace. If he failed, he felt sure America would drift into a dreadful, wider war. Meanwhile, the French president confided to Britain's King that the Allies should accept Wilson's expected peace move and end the war.In THE ROAD LESS TRAVELED, Philip Zelikow recounts the five months when, behind closed doors, the future of the war, and the world, hung in the balance. It is a story of civic courage, of awful responsibility, and of how some rose to the occasion or shrank from it. "Peace is on the floor waiting to be picked up!" pleaded the German ambassador to the United States. This book shows how right he was, and how close leaders came to doing so.

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