Even good leaders make mistakes.

That was still true back in 1754 when tensions were running high between the dominant world

powers of the day, Britain and France.

After centuries of global conquest, these nations were growing very tired of always bumping

into each other, and that frustration was at a boiling point.

In May of 1754, the British were trying to manage that tension on the edge of the

world in the backwoods of North America.

Britain and France both had colonies there, and they were constant disputes over territory.

So in late May, they sent a 22-year-old lieutenant colonel to represent the crown in a meeting

with French forces.

But it didn't go very well.

On the way to this diplomatic meeting, the officer decided on his own that it would be

okay to ambush a group of French scouts, and in the chaos their leader was killed.

So when word of the officer's attack reached the French authorities, it was like touching

dry kindling with a lit match, and everything went up in flames.

That little unauthorized attack on the French erupted into what historians now refer to

as the Seven Years War.

It was a global conflict that claimed over a million lives as it burned between the French

and the British, pulling in allies on both sides and playing out in the New World and Europe,

and all because of a good leader's mistake.

Oh, and how do I know that this particular lieutenant colonel was a good leader?

Well because two decades later he would find himself in the middle of another conflict

...