Paper is a network of composite fibers. The dried wood pulp fiber is a flat ribbon composite made of an amorphous hemicellulose and lignin matrix containing crystalline cellulose reinforcing fibrils. When the fiber is wet, the stiff fibrils are periodically disrupted by amorphous regions and so are modeled as finite length reinforcements. Microcompressions formed in the interfiber bonds due to fiber contraction during drying in the manufacture of paper strongly effect the mechanical behavior of paper. Buckling stress calculations support the hypothesis that the formation of microcompressions in the interfiber bonds of paper is a hinge mechanism in the discontinuously fibered composite. Further support is provided by estimates, based on published experimental data, of the transverse stress in a single fiber induced by swelling during moisture accelerated creep. This stress is large enough to release the delayed elastic residual stress in the microcompressions. Therefore the hypothesized mechanism for microcompression formation is consistent with a previously presented hypothesis that microcompression behavior influences moisture accelerated creep and hygroexpansion.