The Two World Wars and the Distortions of Hindsight (sorry Brian Bond!)

DuxBelisarius · 2時間前

I didn't know he'd written one? I've read all his books on the wars except for Finest Years and Bomber Command.

kosterhaus · 11時間前

The Operations on the Ancre? Manoeuver Albrecht? Arras? Chemin Des Dames? La Malmaison?

Sure, "lack of movement".

kosterhaus · 11時間前

No, he is absolutely right; there are still the remains of trench systems in France and Flanders today. However, by 1917, they had ceased to be the centerpiece of the battle; for the Western Allies, they were mere jumping off points, while they demarked 'battle zones' for the German defence in depth.

Once again, you are wrong; congratulations!!!

kosterhaus · 11時間前

Watching movies

Ohhhh, cool story bro! You watch movies!!! 'Birdsong' and 'War horse' don't count as historical sources.

primary sources

I have a PDF on my laptop right now; it is a scan of a document entitled, on the training of Platoons, dating from 1917. It represents the unofficial doctrine of the British infantry. I too could quote someone who was there, Lt. Charles Carrington, informing you of why the stalemate in the trenches 'lasted only from 1915-16'.

after Stalin killed anyone who could think

Zhukov, Vasilevsky, Koniev, Vatutin, Sokolovsky, Rokossovsky, Chernyakovsky, Bagramyan ... Wow, turns out there were plenty of people with brains who were still alive! GOLLY GEE, YOU'RE WRONG!!!

Half the war supporters in the US wanted to side with Germany

I'd like very much to see your source for this; I could use a good laugh.

kosterhaus · 11時間前

no amount of research can make historical events go away

It was NOT a historical event; it was a myth created by politicians and pacifists at the time and afterwards to explain why they failed to prevent (or in the case of Austria and Germany, aided and abetted) the outbreak of the war.

world war 2 was the only massively popular war in US history

Besides WWI of course

Then explain why it lasted for 4 years

Explain why WWII lasted 6 Years

The battle lines being pretty static because of the very slow adoption of modern tactics is pretty well settled in historical discourse

The tempo of operations on the Western Front, from casualties, weather and logistical concerns, led to a gradual stagnation of fighting by December 1914. When 1915 came, shortages and insufficient training hampered the armies, but ultimately by 1916 the stalemate was beginning to breakdown. The fighting in 1917 was characterized as 'semi-open', with Franco-British set-piece attacks having the means to 'break-in' indefinitely, while the Germans shifted to elastic defense in depth, creating a more fluid battleground. Of course, the fighting of 1918 returned to high-tempo mobile operations.

Your entire argument here seems to ignore events that do not comport themselves the argument of who ever it is you are quoting. That is bad history

Pot calling the kettle black, pal. It's clear you're in an echo chamber and don't care to listen to arguments that disprove your own lack of understanding. I'm not wasting my time with you; good day.

The why and so-what can be discussed

You claim that this was because of generals spamming men into machine guns and barbed wire. You have clearly read NOTHING, repeat, NOTHING on the military history of the war that has been published since at least THE 1980s.

kosterhaus · 12時間前

nationalist propaganda that lead up to the war

This was a product of the outbreak of war, as Adrian Gregory, Catriona Pennell, Jean-Jacques Becker, and Jeffrey Verhey, to name but a few Social Historians of the war, have said. It may have been there before the war, but there was plenty of pacifist prosthelityzing going on before the war, and left-wing Socialist parties dominated in Germany, Austria and France.

the pro-war parades in the streets in 1914

Again, you're playing up the old myth of 'War Enthusiasm', and utterly ignoring at least 3 decades of research. There were anti-war demonstrations in London, Berlin, and St. Petersburg, and major labour unrest in all three of the so-called 'Triple Entente' countries.

Massed infantry charges into barbed wire, machine gun nests, and artillery supported positions are very much examples of outdated tactics

This is a tired cliché of the war; while I will not deny that there were unfortunate cases early on in the trench war, and to an extent on the north front of the 1st Day of the Somme, claiming that they represent the norm for the war is ridiculous. By autumn 1915, the French army had already settled upon highly modern infiltration tactics, which the Germans subsequently copied with their Stosstruppen in 1916. The British were adopting similar tactics by the height of the Somme in September, 1916, and codified them in the training of platoons in 1917, training manual SS 143.

Claiming that did not happen requires explaining trench warfare

He can make that claim because he has read more than one book on the subject of actual note from the last 20 or 30 years. You, I'm going to guess, have not.

kosterhaus · 14時間前

Social Darwinism and ethnic nationalism

Those can help us contextualize the times, but they don't change the fact that once the Blank Check was given, little would be done to stop the Dual Alliance.

favourable perception of war as a means of mediating conflict

Which of course explains why all the previous crises between the Great Powers before July 1914 ended in peace; why the Great Powers were swift in trying to negotiate (and on both occasions succeeding) an end to the Balkan Wars; the Treaty of Portsmouth that ended the Russo-Japanese War; things like the Hague Conventions; and the huge popularity of pacifists like Andrea von Suttner, Alfred Nobel, Norman Angell, and Ivan Bloch; I'm sure it also explains the major anti-war rallies that took place in London, Berlin and St. Petersburg when the war began.

Nilfgaard · 16時間前

why go to all this trouble?

Because such things as sovereignty exist? Because they couldn't be sure if the Germans would leave when they were finished with France?

More specifically, the Treaty of London in 1839 stated that Belgium would defend against any invaders should it's neutrality be violated, and that in turn the signatories of the Treaty would support Belgium against invasion.

Why start a conflict you know for a fact will destroy your country?

Belgium wasn't destroyed; certainly damage was done, but the German invasion was thrown off it's schedule, the advance was halted, and ultimately the Germans were driven from the country (albeit in 1918), and Belgium received reparations to rebuild. And it wasn't entirely clear how long a conflict might last; there was speculation, but nothing really solid. I think your basing a little too much of this on hindsight.

DuxBelisarius · 19時間前

"I sure hope you like Tofu!" "I sure hope he's kidding!"

kosterhaus · 1日前

What I'm getting at is the idea of the 'winners' having the dominant role in 'shaping history' is highly exaggerated, the 'War Guilt Question' being a case in point. Holger Herwig demonstrates it pretty solidly in Clio Deceived:

vi.uh.edu/pages/buzzmat/DH%20articles/HerwigClioDeceived.pdf

kosterhaus · 1日前

the caveat is that the winners were able to wield their influence and have the ultimate say in who the 'good guys' were

Gee, that's strange, when one considers that the dominant narrative on the causes of WWI, the 'slither into war' was basically the result of a German propaganda campaign launched after WWI, right up there with article 231 of the Treaty being a 'War Guilt Clause' (it wasn't).

kosterhaus · 1日前

Although it is simplistic to think in terms of 'good guys' and 'bad guys', broadly speaking Germany and it's allies in both world wars were essentially the 'bad guys'. In the case of WWI, Germany and Austria-Hungary had been preparing for war since 1912-13, based on a pessimistic and paranoid conception of being 'encircled' by the so-called 'Triple Entente'. It was their initiative that led to war in July, 1914, and once the war had broken out, Germany especially pursued expansionist war aims that envisioned military, economic and political hegemony in Europe, and dominance on the African continent. In the course of the war, about 40 000 Belgian, 40 000 French and c. 100 000 inhabitants of the Russian Empire died as a result of military action and crimes against humanity, largely under Central Powers occupation. The occupation of Serbia was conducted with flagrant brutality by the Austro-Hungarians (whom alone killed perhaps 60-70 000 civilians in their initial invasion) and Bulgarians, often with the aim of depopulating areas for potential resettlement in the future; the Germans had a similar plan for the 'Polish Border Strip' in 1918, that went un implemented. They also did next to nothing to curtail the Armenian Genocide, and some German advisors seem to have encouraged Ottoman actions (though this was after it had begun; they did not force or coerce the Turks into actually embarking on the path to Genocide). The treaties of Bucharest and Brest-Litovsk in 1918 provide a glimpse as to what the plans of Germany and the Central Powers would have been for victory.

Dan Carlin's 'Blueprint for Armageddon' podcast

I'd caution you towards relying on Dan Carlin for the history of WWI; he relies too heavily on first-hand accounts and memoirs, which tend to be subjective and unable to provide a good idea of the 'bigger picture'.

DuxBelisarius · 1日前

Excellent post, as always, by the way. Thank you for it.

Thank you very much! Glad you enjoyed it!

Meyer's A World Undone

I must admit, while I've seen it mentioned before, and I've seen it at book stores, I haven't read it. Could you perhaps give a brief summary, or highlight some points he makes? If that's not too much to ask; I may have another book to add to my (rather large) list!

RealBigSalmon · 1日前

His chief of staff was primarily in charge of running the Belgian Army, but this should by no means be seen as him sitting back and letting someone else do his job. He was involved in decisions of strategy and policy, and did take an interest in the state of the forces under his command.

RealBigSalmon · 1日前

fought in the trenches alongside his countrymen ... did he ever 'go over the top' to attack the Germans?

He neither fought nor went over the top; he did, however, make frequent visits to the Belgian positions on the northern end of the Western Front. As a head of state, and as the head of the Belgian Armed Forces, this would have meant and did mean a lot to his men. In the other armies, British, French and German, such visits would have been comparatively rare due to the amount of forces and the tasks that their leaders were responsible for. Albert, on the other hand, was 'in charge' of five divisions, and was at the moment only responsible for the Belgian exile community and a small sliver of his country still in allied hands.

DuxBelisarius · 2日前

The defence of the Empire was the primary concern of the British; the issue of the Berlin-Baghdad Railway had been settled between the British and Germans before WWI even broke out, with both sides agreeing to divvy up resources. The idea of the British 'going to war for oil' has become fashionable since 2003, but it is not supported by facts. The German naval threat, and the threat of German hegemony on the continent were the primary concerns of the War Cabinet; territorial gains, although to be expected in a war among empires, were secondary. Hence the BEF numbered 60+ divisions in 1918, facing the Germans, while the forces facing the Ottomans were largely British-Indian Army, and nowhere as numerous. Had the primary goal been to block German access to oil, one would expect a larger commitment to the middle east, and an expectation that France should continue to shoulder the bulk of the weight, but this was not the case. With the exception of the Gallipoli fiasco, continental concerns always had first priority.

DuxBelisarius · 2日前

Well, Britain lost her empire as a result of the war

They lost it as a result of the Second World War; they gained German East Africa, connecting their colonies from the Cape to Cairo. They secured valuable territories in the Middle East as well.

On the other hand, it would have been possible to avoid entering WWI with bearable loss of prestige

The British had commitments to France and Belgium, and the Balance of Power on the continent had been a cornerstone of British foreign policy for centuries. Allowing a hostile power (and Germany was hostile) to control the continent and threaten the British Empire was unthinkable.

On the longer view, Tirpitz was certainly anti British, but Wilhelm was not

We must be thinking of a different emperor here; the Tirpitz Plan was Wilhelm's pet project, and the whole purpose was to challenge Britain's position as a Great Power. The Krueger Telegram and Daily Telegraph incidents clearly demonstrated his disregard for Britain; his poor relationship with his mother didn't help his Anglophobia.

So a naval agreement to limit the arms race would have needed careful diplomacy, but would have been possible

This was sought by the British, but the Germans refused anything accept for full naval parity; unthinkable, when most of those ships would have sat in the channel ports, a figurative gun to Britain's 'head'.

So the French inability to construct a continental security architecture that includes Germany was a precondition for the escalation from a regional crisis to a world war

Well, considering the Germans had invaded in 1870-71, killed French civilians, shelled Paris, humiliated the French Army, forced France to pay reparations to the tone of 5 billion francs, pay for the German occupation, and follow a most favoured nation policy towards Germany in trade (which the French upheld until 1914), and then Bismarck spent his career as Chancellor diplomatically isolating France, I think it's understandable why France had 'difficulties' including Germany.

Being a innocent bystander is a meaningless tragedy, almost by definition

Defending their homelands from invaders, and achieving independence, are pretty meaningful I'd say.

no side, except the US, actually archived their war aims

France, Britain, Japan all enjoyed territorial gains; Britain's greatest fear, German naval power, was eliminated, Belgium and France were secured, the German military was heavily reduced, and wouldn't begin truly rebuilding until 1935, France avoided submission to German aims, while it regained Alsace-Lorraine and also benefitted from the Rhineland being demilitarized, the transfer of the Saar to French control, and received reparations from Germany. The League of Nations was a major war aim for the allies from 1917 onwards, and that to was achieved.

DuxBelisarius · 2日前

Yep

"That Carton de Wiart is one bad mutha-" "SHUT YO MOUTH!" "What, I'm just talkin' 'bout the colonel!" "I can dig it."

DuxBelisarius · 2日前

My mom and my uncles loved those books; their dad (my granddad), a WWII veteran, used to read to them.

DuxBelisarius · 2日前

How was it possible to be mobile when the force you're fighting is (presumably?) in a heavily fortified trench with machine guns, mortars, artillery, landmines, barbed wire, etc?

Machine guns, mortars and artillery suppress machine gun nests, essentially the same with mortars, artillery utilizes counter battery fire to suppress enemy artillery, land mines weren't used until the second world war, and the artillery engineers and infantry deal with the barbed wire, as did the tanks. Franco-British set-piece attack favoured an advance of between 1-3000 yards/kilometers, 4000 at most. It was also found that cavalry could be useful for capturing certain positions, such as the British and Indian cavalry at Bazentin Ridge, July 14th, 1916 (the Somme), Monchy-le-Preux during Arras in April, 1917, and throughout the hundred days offensives of 1918. French cavalry were involved in similar roles on the Flaucourt Plateau during the Somme offensive in July, 1916.

Didn't tanks start becoming a major thing around 1916 or 1917?

Tanks débuted on the Somme in September, 1916. They were pretty slow, mechanically unreliable things, but they were good for crushing wire and taking out strong points.

Were they really that big of a deal that they would force troops to (presumably?) abandon their trenches?

Because of the Somme, the Germans moved towards a defensive system of elastic defence-in-depth. They abandoned static trenches, and emphasized dispersal. I go into greater detail here.

I do imagine that the feeling of (at least the individual troops) would be that nothing was accomplished.

No; in general the feeling in 1918 seemed to be one of a job well done. I'd recommend reading up on 1918, the gains the allies made were considerable.

DuxBelisarius · 2日前

I'm slightly concerned this will earn me a yelling at from the professor

Aside from being incapable of physically yelling at you, you are making a perfectly reasonable inference; I wouldn't be yelling at you.

the front line on the Western Front only ever moved a few kilometers through the whole war

Not true; there was the initial German invasion, then the retreat from the Marne, followed by the Race to the Sea in 1914; although the lines were relatively static 1915-16, key positions like Vimy Ridge and the Ypres Salient saw gains made and reversed. In 1916 the Germans nearly captured the right bank of the Meuse, opposite Verdun, which could have necessitated an abandonment of the French Salient there. The Somme made more gains than any Allied attack since the Somme, and while they appeared not significant, they led to the withdrawal to the Hindenburg Line in 1917. 1917 saw key German positions, Vimy Ridge, the Chemin Des Dames Ridge, and the ridges southeast of Ypres fall into allied hands, in the latter case nearly necessitating a German withdrawal to the Dutch frontier. Finally, the fighting on the Western Front in 1918 was quite mobile, with the German spring offensives and the Allied summer offensives, that pushed into Belgium.

If you spend 4 years fighting and ultimately don't capture much territory, your victory and defeat both seem kind of hollow

Clausewitz pointed out in On War that while the loss of men would lead to the loss of ground, the loss of ground would not necessarily lead to the loss of men, thus "it follows that it is always more important to preserve or, as the case may be, destroy [Vernichtung in the German] armed forces than to hold on to territory." This was the crux of the war of attrition the Allies were waging against the Germans from December, 1915 onwards. The Germans and Austrians occupied huge swaths of Russian territory in 1915, yet the Russians held on until spring 1918. Half of Romania was occupied in 1916, and yet it's army gave good account of itself in 1917-18. Serbia was occupied, with heavy losses to the population, but it's army remained in the hundreds of thousands to advance through Macedonia in 1918.

very little territory was lost or gained through military action makes it seem like nothing was accomplished militarily

The Central Powers were defeated for one.

Of course this also ties into the mentality of "when we talk about WWI, we're really only talking about the Western Front".

Definitely; WWI was more than just the trenches on the Western Front.

DuxBelisarius · 2日前

Yeaaaaaa-NO!

DuxBelisarius · 2日前

Gr8 B8 M8 I R8 8 out of 10!

DuxBelisarius · 2日前

Glad I could help!

DuxBelisarius · 2日前

Sure!

Mud, Blood and Poppycock by Gordon Corrigan
1914-1918: The History of the First World War by David Stevenson
Hundred Days: The End of the Great War by Nick Lloyd
Britain's Two World Wars Against Germany: Myth, Memory and the Distortions of Hindsight by Brian Bond
A War of Peoples by Adrian Gregory
A Short History of the First World War by Gary Sheffield

The ones I've included from the list above are all very short, Stevenson's being the longest at perhaps 600 pages, including end notes, foot notes, appendix, etc. The one by Gregory is part of a new series by Oxford University Press, to provide concise, current books for students on historical subjects (I read the one on Apartheid in my second year of Uni). Maybe 300-400 pages, up to date, and provides an excellent overview of the whole war. He also gives an excellent lecture about it here.

EDIT: > give a good overview of the causes of the war, the war itself, and it's aftermath?

That'd be Stevenson's book, 1914-1918

DuxBelisarius

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