"Can" is doing too much heavy lifting in your claim.
As best I can determine WWI "escalated" _because countries started mobilizing for total war,_ which is an entirely different thing.
Russia started it, which resulted in a chain reaction or thereabouts. There's debate over whether France started before Germany, _then_ they were thirsting for revenge after the humiliation and territorial losses from 1870, and worried declining birth rates put them on a timetable.