Posted on 02/20/2014 2:15:56 PM PST by Ravnagora
Royal cousins Wilhelm II and King George V went to war
As nations gear up to mark 100 years since the start of World War One, academic argument still rages over which country was to blame for the conflict.
Education Secretary for England Michael Gove's recent criticism of how the causes and consequences of the war are taught in schools has only stoked the debate further.
Here 10 leading historians give their opinion.
Sir Max Hastings - military historian
Germany
No one nation deserves all responsibility for the outbreak of war, but Germany seems to me to deserve most.
(Excerpt) Read more at bbc.co.uk ...
“A World Undone” by G.J. Meyer is a GREAT book on this subject.
It was just what had gone on in Europe for centuries. They named wars like this:
—Hundred Years War
—Thirty Years War
Some in the US felt it unwise to be drawn into their perpetual cycles of war, but nevertheless we did enter, to start a new method of naming:
—World War I
—World War II
Germany was the aggressor and that is undisputed....
It was an absolute mess. My suggestion? Read Barbara Tuchman’s “The Guns of August” for the best take I’ve seen.
The answer is probably "yes" but it tends to diffuse the blame. German planners probably had the most to do with WWI, but people plan for war all the time that never takes place. Of the sundry heads of state involved, Wilhelm appears to me to be the most bellicose by far. There were simultaneous cases of paralysis within the Austrian, British, French, and Russian state ministries at the time for various reasons having little to do with the actual war (my source for this is The Sleepwalkers). And yes, the Serbian radicals did want to precipitate armed conflict, but not of that type and certainly not of that incredible scope.
Barbara Tuchman thought railway schedules had a good deal to do with the difficulty of stopping mobilization once it started, and if she tended to overemphasize this a bit in The Guns Of August as a cause of war, it does seem to me that it made the thing hard to stop. Britain, Russia, and Germany all had chances to put the brakes on things once the positions of Austria and Serbia had hardened, the Serbs for their part conceding nearly everything demanded. Whether those brakes would have worked cannot be known. But if any one of them had managed to sit the thing out, would it have made a difference, or would they have been sucked in eventually anyway, as the United States was for reasons that are nearly equally difficult to define?
I don't think there's a definitive answer to the question, only the wonder of so many things cascading in the wrong direction that one almost suspects the inevitability of history. And that isn't an answer at all, it's giving up on one.
You sound like a real class act. I'm sure that the relatives of those who died share beliefs! Do you feel the same about this?
That is the epitome of cool.
The Great War was a mistake. The royal couple was found living on the French Riviera two years after the war ended.
As if there was *any* chance of that happening.
It sad family feud
I still blame Kaisher William
I have no idea of what Hillary or the twin towers have to do with your point. And the twin towers were attacked by Saudis, not Afghanis or Iraqis.
The Lusitania was carrying military supplies to the British, and an ad had been put in the papers.
This was just a war desired by Wilson and the ‘Progressives’ to enhance their power. There was no national interest in going to war and we have never recovered from departing from the common sense of having NOTHING to do with the wars of Europe (or Asia
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IuRxjjcPgOo
1916 - Motorhead
16 years old when I went to the war,
To fight for a land fit for heroes.
God on my side, and a gun in my hand
Chasing my days down to zero.
And I marched, and I fought, and I bled and I died.
And I never did get any older.
But I knew at the time that a year in the line
was a long enough life for a soldier.
We all volunteered, and we wrote down our names
And we added two years to our ages
Eager for life and ahead of the game
Ready for history’s pages
And we fought and we brawled and we whored ‘till we stood
Ten thousand shoulder to shoulder
A thirst for the Hun, we were food for the gun
And that’s what you are when you’re soldiers
I heard my friend cry, and he sank to his knees
Caughing blood as he screamed for his mother
And I fell by his side, and that’s how we died,
Clinging like kids to each other
And I lay in the mud and the guts and the blood
And I wept as his body grew golder
And I called for my mother and she never came
Though it wasn’t my fault and I wasn’t to blame
The day not half over and ten thousand salin
And now there’s nobody remembers our names
And that’s how it is for a soldier
I have no idea of what Hillary or the twin towers have to do with your point, if you had one other than brainless jingoism. And the twin towers were attacked by Saudis, not Afghanis or Iraqis.
The Lusitania was carrying military supplies to the British, and an ad had been put in the papers saying the Germans knew this and intended to treat this vessel as the military vessel it was acting as. Allowing civilians onto it, knowing what we knew, was a cowardly and vile a provocation as the muzzie terrorists hiding amongst civilians, then whipping up a media frenzy of what they caused/
This was just a war desired by Wilson and the ‘Progressives’ to enhance their power. There was no national interest in going to war and we have never recovered from departing from the common sense of having NOTHING to do with the wars of Europe (or Asia).’
Do you have anything resembling a freaking clue as to how much treasure, how many dead and how vastly our completely unnecessary involvement cost our country? Are you actually arguing that 331,000 American causalities, including over 116,000 dead were worth it for one ship
yeah, well, you got me.
But it was.
Indeed. The legacies of WWI still echo. God help Ukraine once the Olympics no longer tie Putin’s hands.
Edward Mandell House was pulling Wilson’s strings. JPM and City National were going to lose their asses on war loans to England and France if the US stayed out...
Agreed. I expect the Russians to invade ‘their’ part of Ukraine about ten seconds after closing ceremony concludes in Sochi.
Right. In reading “Guns Of August” it shows how the Kaiser wanted the war real bad.
Maybe they were, but their aggression didn't arise in a vacuum.
Start with Napoleon who invaded the several German kingdoms, then move on to France which attacked Germany when the Germans united under Bismarck, then go to World War One which was a cluster but in which British and French hegemony were aligned against a rising German naval power. Follow that up with the punitive Versailles Treaty and then the invasion of Germany in 1923 with the occupation of the Ruhr by French and Belgian troops who reportedly raped and plundered at will.
The Nazis then came to power as a reaction of the German people to being beaten in war and then abused.
I am not trying to endear any sympathy to the Nazis, mind you, I am just saying that it was over 130 years of history that came to fruition in the European part of World War Two. Had there been an equitable peace after WW1 then WW2 in Europe would likely have never taken place.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.