The first world war

MICHAEL HOWARD

THE

FIRST

WORLD WAR

'The peoples of Europe did not have to be whipped up by government propaganda. It was in a spirit of simple patriotic duty that they joined the colours and went to war.'

OXFORD UWIVBRSLSITY P-88

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The European powers were ready for war ~ I I 1914. Germany, fuelled b? 'archaic militarism. global ambitions, and neurotic insecurity'. tnok the offensive, in the misguided belief that it would shorten the conflict. Four years later. eight million people had died in the ~ r ~ o s t apocalyptic episode the world had knoan. Sir Michael Howard, pre-eminent m i l i t a ~ historian and author of such definitive works as The Fmnco-Prussinn War and War in Europrrrr, Histoy, has meditated on the subject of the First World War for several decades. The rest111 is a 'masterpiece of concision' (Hew Strachan). a succinct and highly readable account of thp events leading up to, and culminating in that conflict. With tremendous precision and rlarit!of vision he describes the effects of the conflict on soldiers and civilians alike, examining thr ~llilitarymanoeuvres of the Allies and the rival alliances: the inhun~anedeplopl~entof poiso11 gas on the battlefield, the accelerated development of mechanized warfare. the establishment of the Royal Air Force in Rritai~~. and the war at sea, which would draw Amrricn into the conflict. He highlights how the war fought at home - against the shortages of foocl. fuel, and raw ~naterialsfor industry - rausrcl the irreversible decline in C ~ r m a nmoralr. n demise which was to lead to the eventual s~~rrender of the Gennan state. Humiliated and bankrupt, utterly dise~npowered,Germany would nwer losr thr belief that the war had been i~nposedu p o ~hrr ~ by the Allies. It woald be that sense of it~justicr that would resonate thmugh the hedecades to in the follow - to find final, chilling rrtrihutio~~ hands of the Third Reich.

OXFORD

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