Luzinski's Gut wrote:World War One was the most destructive political and societal event since the Hundred Years War in Europe. You should be pissed off. It destroyed many vestiges of the world political and economic system, it directly brought about World War II, and directly brought the Communists into power in Russia.

The French were so badly bled in World War One - they suffered 73% casualties of the men who word the uniform (the Russians suffered 76% casualties if you can believe it) - that they suffered war exhaustion for an entire generation. That's the underlying reason why the Maginot Line was built and why the French collapsed so quickly...they had no will to fight.

TenuredVulture wrote:The armistice was signed at 5 am, but didn't take effect until 11 am. In the final six hours, fighting continued for no particular reason. Over 2000 soldiers were killed in 5000 wounded in those final hours.

I've always been revolted by WWI, but now I'm more pissed off than ever. What a bunch of #$!&@.

Also, had the US not entered the war, it's quite possible that the continuation of the stalemate would have resulted in communist revolutions throughout Europe.

And it's pretty easy to understand why the Allies (including the US) would be so reluctant to challenge Hitler militarily until they were backed into a corner.

great thread

This is right on. DeGaulle was literally the only French officer who understood what the Germans were up to and tried to emulate their doctrine and training. As you correctly state, the French authorities generally told him to piss up a rope. That being said, the French Char (tank) models were superior in armor and armament to the Germans...but they were designed to fight as infantry support weapons, not as part of a mobile combined arms team.

The Germans started to examine their performance in 1921, under Von Seeckt, the Chief of Staff. He was ruthless in his approach to finding out what went wrong and began to drive a new doctrine and training regiment using the strosstruppen tactics as a start.

The British deliberately ignored what occurred in WWI until I think 1928 or 1929. I think they were afraid to reflect on how piss poor their performance was, especially those of the senior field commanders. Interestingly enough, the British starting experimenting with mobile warfare doctrine and mobile combined arms teams as early as 1927. In fact, every major power sent observers to the Salisbury Plain to watch the British Armored Brigade conduct operations. Unfortunately for the British, they had to make a decision....they had to choose from a witches menu...

The British first had to choose what service to fund and resource. The British Navy had built the Empire, it would remain fully funded. The fledgling Royal Air Force was tasked to defend the British mainland; the political and royal powers were not pleased that the Germans could launch zeppelin and then bomber raids (I've actually been to the spot where the first German night bomber raid was conducted)...the RAF had to be given a lot of money to ensure the protection of the British cities and people. That left the Army...and the discussion was either to have an expeditionary force like the one that was created in 1914, or to have a colonial police force to monitor the Empire's possessions. They kept the colonial policing force and let the remnants of World War One army slowly fester, poorly funded and resourced, and unwilling and probably unable to recreate itself after the bleeding of World War One.

A serious historian friend of mine, an American, has said that the Allies winning in World War One was the best thing that could have happened to America, and the worst thing that could have happened to the rest of the world. I suspect he is correct in his perspective.

dajafi wrote:

Luzinski's Gut wrote:There's an excellent book by Robert Citino called The Quest for Decisive Victory which describes the period between 1870 and 1939.

Gotta run. Will write more later.

Awesome posts like this probably explain why I never quite can bring myself to quit BSG. Thanks.

I think it could be said that the worst thing for the Allies militarily in WWII was winning WWI. The victory, which I think was mostly a matter of the infusion of American resources allowing them to outlast the Central Powers, meant that they didn't seriously re-evaluate after the war. De Gaulle I believe had a clue about mobile warfare in the '30s, but I gather was such an asshat that they essentially benched him for most of the interwar period.

A hilarious take on WWI warfare is Black Adder Goes Forth. I don't know how spot on it is historically, but I think it accurately reflects some of the mindset of the soldiers and the general insanity that was trench warfare.

One of my favorite TV shows.

The British officers I served with in Afghanistan hate, I mean absolutely hate and loathe the show. I can understand why.

It's not very apt historically, but it does give a sense of the madness.

Christ, the Germans said "The British troops were lions, unfortunately they were led by donkeys."

slugsrbad wrote:A hilarious take on WWI warfare is Black Adder Goes Forth. I don't know how spot on it is historically, but I think it accurately reflects some of the mindset of the soldiers and the general insanity that was trench warfare.

Luzinski's Gut is a Jedi Warrior for real. This thread really shows it. Great stuff LG.

A friend of mine from the olden days believed we entered WWI on the wrong side. He said none of the countries were real democracies and that the US was closer to Germany philosophically than to England and France. His theory made some sense when he explained it to me but that was in 1981 or so so I don't remember the details. I think a lot had to do with what happened to Russia/the Soviet Union.

He could be right as far as how the world may have ended up.

smitty wrote:Luzinski's Gut is a Jedi Warrior for real. This thread really shows it. Great stuff LG.

A friend of mine from the olden days believed we entered WWI on the wrong side. He said none of the countries were real democracies and that the US was closer to Germany philosophically than to England and France. His theory made some sense when he explained it to me but that was in 1981 or so so I don't remember the details. I think a lot had to do with what happened to Russia/the Soviet Union.

He could be right as far as how the world may have ended up.

That's an interesting theory. Philosophically we were probably closer to the Germans, but.. spiritually? by birth? by something, we were closer to the Brits. I have seen plenty of What If? Nazis winning, but I think a well researched novel speculating what would have been had we joined the Germans would be something worth reading.

Then again, so many events would have to change, namely the Lusitania and the intercepted message to Mexico.

I would disagree--Britain remained a limited democracy throughout the war and even maintained a degree of civil liberty--pacifists were persecuted, and COs were jailed but there were limits. Germany went from monarchy to military dictatorship as the war went on, and at the end, the military put in place a civilian government that would have to acquiesce to the terms of the Versailles Treaty and thus deliberately diminished the civilian government's legitimacy. The German military was able to maintain (with some accuracy) that up until the end, they never lost a major engagement, thus making setting the stage for the scapegoating that would lead to the rise of the Nazi party.

Been a few yrs since I read it, but you guys might find Niall Ferguson's The Pity of War worthwhile. It covers a lot of the ground from this thread, plus a crap ton of economic analysis of the two sides before and during the war.

Another point on DeGaulle... some of you probably know that he spent most of WWI as an involuntary guest of the Germans. He escaped something like six times, and was recaptured every time owing to the difficulty of hiding when you're 6 1/2 feet tall with a nose visible from space. IMO this is both hilarious and maybe tragic, in that perhaps the high brass would have had to listen to him later if he'd stayed in the field and distinguished himself.

slugsrbad wrote:

smitty wrote:Luzinski's Gut is a Jedi Warrior for real. This thread really shows it. Great stuff LG.

A friend of mine from the olden days believed we entered WWI on the wrong side. He said none of the countries were real democracies and that the US was closer to Germany philosophically than to England and France. His theory made some sense when he explained it to me but that was in 1981 or so so I don't remember the details. I think a lot had to do with what happened to Russia/the Soviet Union.

He could be right as far as how the world may have ended up.

That's an interesting theory. Philosophically we were probably closer to the Germans, but.. spiritually? by birth? by something, we were closer to the Brits. I have seen plenty of What If? Nazis winning, but I think a well researched novel speculating what would have been had we joined the Germans would be something worth reading.

Then again, so many events would have to change, namely the Lusitania and the intercepted message to Mexico.

One important aspect of my buddy's theory -- I'm pretty sure he wrote a paper on it at West Point -- was that this was at the height of the Cold War. If we went with the Krauts in WWI, there would never have been no commies in Europe. I think that was a big part of it. I believe he had a pretty decent argument that the post-war stuff would have been less catastrophic to the world had we and the krauts teamed up and made the peace treaty.

It was interesting at the time especially since we were facing a huge Godless Red Army and their sub-human allies at the time. Plus they had all those sneaky KGB spies everywhere (have you watched the Americans on FX yet?). Part of us were like, you know this Cold War/Nuclear weapon mutually assured destruction kinda sucks and maybe a post war world developed by the American-German victors would have worked out better. Further, the Middle East may well have turned out better somehow without the Brits and French screwing stuff up there. (We still wanted Israel to exist though so not sure how that wouldda worked).

TenuredVulture wrote:I would disagree--Britain remained a limited democracy throughout the war and even maintained a degree of civil liberty--pacifists were persecuted, and COs were jailed but there were limits. Germany went from monarchy to military dictatorship as the war went on, and at the end, the military put in place a civilian government that would have to acquiesce to the terms of the Versailles Treaty and thus deliberately diminished the civilian government's legitimacy. The German military was able to maintain (with some accuracy) that up until the end, they never lost a major engagement, thus making setting the stage for the scapegoating that would lead to the rise of the Nazi party.

Well, his thinking was influenced by the fact the Germans were pretty good at this Capitalism stuff (even though they have a lot of socialist flavor to it) and were thriving compared to the Brits and French. This was in the late 70s/early 80s era. We were Post-Vietnam/Post-Watergate living through the Jimmy Carter stagflation/Iran hostage era. A lot of alternatives looked pretty good back then.

It's an interesting theory and I'm not sure I disagree. But probably the bigger determinant would have had to do with the nature of the peace, whoever won. The Germans had a legitimate beef in that they were forced to terms totally out of whack with what happened militarily. Public opinion in England and France demanded this, and Wilson (whom I view far more as tragic than evil) couldn't sway them.

There was enough proto-fascist stuff swirling around in all of central/western Europe that I suspect there would have been a problem at some point. Unless you think the economic collapse itself wasn't inevitable; take that out of the equation and maybe things turn out ok.

Let's get back to Smitty's original assertion on the Peace of 1919.

The Allies, specifically England and France, were out for blood. They had been bled white, from an economic and manpower perspective. They saw the Germans as the root cause of the issue - although there is probably an argument that the Byzantine secret treaties of the pre-war period was just as responsible. They were not going to settle for any kind of compromise, despite the fact they really had not beaten the Germans. The Germans had been starved to death by the naval blockades...the Army capitulated in the field because the government had exhausted its resources trying to feed the people.

The Italians - and the book The White War goes into great detail about this (and I have to give it large props, it is the best book on WWI from the Italian perspective) - were out of their mind. They were Allies, but had been involved in a stalemate against the Austro-Hungarians (I think there were 12 battles there) and the Germans sent two or three corps there to reinforce them...and ended up pushing the Italians 50 miles outside of Venice before their offensive was exhausted. Well, the Italians, despite having almost no juice, demanded that they were given territory on the EASTERN SIDE of the Adriatic along the Dalmatian coast as war reparations against the Austro-Hungarians. Well, since that Empire collapsed into the polymorphous mess known as the Balkans, there was no representation to really argue against the Italians.

The Russians were ass deep in the middle of a civil war, one that sent at least two American infantry regiments into Russia to actually fight the Communists. The ones I know about were sent to the Arcangel area in the Kola Peninsula, and another was sent along the Trans-Siberian railroad to fight with the Japanese and White Russians. The Russians actually managed to defeat the White Armies - a miracle in itself - and then decided to attack the Poles in 1920. Well, the Poles just received their independence for the first time since the Middle Ages, and they allowed the Russians to penetrate deeply into the heartland, and then counterattacked and destroyed an entire Soviet Red Army.

The American, led by the hapless Woodrow Wilson, the utterly corrupt Ed House and the ambitious Henry Cabot Lodge, were pushing the 14 Points program as well as the League of Nations. Wilson, this hapless schmuck, didn't even see if his own country would approve these new programs...and they didn't. The Democrats formed a block of German and Irish representatives that effectively blocked the passage, and Wilson's pride wouldn't allow for compromise. Wilson was also completely powerless to stop Clemenceau, the French minister, and Lloyd George, the British minister, from pushing for reparations.

The Turks were forgotten about as the Ottoman Empire effectively died. Mustafa Ataturk ended up being the first President of Turkey after a three civil war.

The French and to lesser extent, British economic demands directly led to the German hyperinflation and economic collapse. In the fantastic book, When Money Dies, Adam Fergusson shows how the French kept hounding the Germans for payment on schedule, and how the German politicians were not able to keep employment high without devaluing the currency. This leads to the French and British continuing to occupy the Saar until 1935; the Saar is the industrial center of Germany at this time, with the steel and coal mills in full force. This led to the Germans becoming more radical, even after the "Stabbed in the Back" theory was going full bore...there was widespread terrorism by German nationalists. The Saar issue became a strong narrative with the National Socialists as well...

The point of war, we are taught at the School of Advanced Military Studies, is to provide for a better peace. The Peace of Versailles was nothing close to a fair peace; in fact, Marshal Foch of the French Army said "This is not a peace, this is an armistice for twenty years after the Treaty was signed. The bitter resentment of the French and British - again, completely logical and understandable from their perspective - laid the foundations for another war with more radical ideologues in charge of the German and Russian countries...and the result was over 50 million dead.

World War One was the biggest debacle of modern Western Civilization. It was the first shot to the side of the head of the European powers, World War Two delivered a few more, and the Cold War finished them off completely. To me, it is fascinating to see the linkages back into this time period...as today we see Germany being the strongest economic power in Europe, with de facto control over the European Union.

TenuredVulture wrote:The armistice was signed at 5 am, but didn't take effect until 11 am. In the final six hours, fighting continued for no particular reason. Over 2000 soldiers were killed in 5000 wounded in those final hours.

I've always been revolted by WWI, but now I'm more pissed off than ever. What a bunch of fucktards.

Also, had the US not entered the war, it's quite possible that the continuation of the stalemate would have resulted in communist revolutions throughout Europe.

I remember when the G2 or someone announced we were gonna do a cease fire at 0800 the next morning that would end the fighting in Operation Desert Storm. Having some experience training with NATO when we did stuff at local time and other stuff at Zulu time and there was always massive confusion about what time it was, I asked if it was 0800 local or 0800 EST (as the official announcement came from President Bush the Elder).

The Generals and Colonels looked at each other and were all like-- "Shit man, we don't know." General Griffith says, "We'll fellas, I guess we better find out."

Anyways, Bush wanted to cease hostilities exactly 100 hours after it started. Likewise, in WWI, they wanted to end the fighting at the 11th hour on the 11th day of the 11th month.


War is a funny game.

smitty wrote:.... Having some experience training with NATO when we did stuff at local time and other stuff at Zulu time and there was always massive confusion about what time it was, I asked if it was 0800 local or 0800 EST (as the official announcement came from President Bush the Elder).

The Generals and Colonels looked at each other and were all like-- "Shit man, we don't know." General Griffith says, "We'll fellas, I guess we better find out."

Anyways, Bush wanted to cease hostilities exactly 100 hours after it started. Likewise, in WWI, they wanted to end the fighting at the 11th hour on the 11th day of the 11th month.


War is a funny game.

here's hoping BSG Hall of Fame induction ceremonies don't conflict with our man Smith's Cabinet confirmation hearings

I finished Hochschild's book yesterday, and I knew about the 11:00 on 11/11 thing (it was even referenced on Downton Abbey) and it happened almost 100 years ago, but I'm still angry about it. It's as if the fact that 10s of millions died from war related causes wasn't quite enough. Another 2000 soldiers had to die for no reason whatsoever.

Then I'm sure you'll be even more pleased to know that millions more died from the influenza that was spread by demobilizing soldiers across the European, Asian, African and American continents.

Thanks to LG, smitty, TV, and others for this information. I found a lot of it very informative and interesting; and I kind of what to learn more about it now.

I know you have all recommended books so far in this thread, but what would you recommend for someone trying to learn more about WWI when they don't really know too much about it? Something that goes into the politics of the postwar would be cool, since that seems to be the most interesting aspect to me.

Luzinski's Gut wrote:Then I'm sure you'll be even more pleased to know that millions more died from the influenza that was spread by demobilizing soldiers across the European, Asian, African and American continents.

Yes, I knew that. But at least that wasn't intentional. Apparently, the outbreak began at an Army base in Kansas. So, US entry ended the war, but at a price of 50 million more lives.

SK790 wrote:Thanks to LG, smitty, TV, and others for this information. I found a lot of it very informative and interesting; and I kind of what to learn more about it now.

I know you have all recommended books so far in this thread, but what would you recommend for someone trying to learn more about WWI when they don't really know too much about it? Something that goes into the politics of the postwar would be cool, since that seems to be the most interesting aspect to me.

I don't think Hochschild's book requires much in the way of background. But it doesn't much go into postwar politics. Its focus is the British, and spends a great deal of time on the British left and pacifist movements. It also discusses how the Boer War was a kind of prelude to total war, a war without rules that made little distinction between soldier and civilian.

I don't know much about history curricula, but my sense is that WWI is under-emphasized. I'm in the beginning phases of some research on Anglo-American political thought of the late 40s through the early 60s, but I think that story really starts with WWI. Bertrand Russell's involvement in the British anti-war movement is perhaps where I'll start as prologue.