Lions and donkeys: 10 big myths about World War One debunked

[Allezfan]

But as the years go on, and we have less invested in the narrative, history gets interesting. We peel back the layers. This is what I find so fascinating about it and for the life of me can't understand why anyone would hate history (that has half a brain).

I agree that history is utterly fascinating but the idea that we ever have less invested in the narrative is naive to the extreme.

Orwell nailed the importance to current regimes of having a history which suits it in '1984'. See the textbook wars in a great deal of schools at the moment demanding a certain narrative in history needs to be maintained even if the facts don't fit it.

 

[harry]

I've got one about the Zulu war. the majority of the men who fought at rouke's drift were English and not welsh like in the film Zulu. at the time of the battle they were still the 2nd Warwickshire regiment and not the south wales borderers.

 

[roydo]

As someone who studied European History at a Master's (Graduate School) level, the interesting question for me has always been, who writes the History? It's the elites. The educated. The literary.

Much of what we now feel as collective memory comes from the soldier poets et al. Your average factory worker from Durham wasn't writing journals, wasn't publishing poems, and wasn't publishing novels or memoirs. He simply joined up, did his part and either died, got wounded or went back home and got on with it.

The second part is that there is always a race to find the narrative. The story that makes it all worthwhile. The Germans had their own narrative (which as we see was based on a fallacy of "capitulation" rather than surrender in the face of the facts). And the allies had theirs.

But as the years go on, and we have less invested in the narrative, history gets interesting. We peel back the layers. This is what I find so fascinating about it and for the life of me can't understand why anyone would hate history (that has half a brain).

I love history. What worries me is what our kids now get taught though. Like I did European history 1814-1914, WW2, well, the origins of it, for example. My lad, now 20, did for his same course, US history, post WW2. Christ, even stuff that happened when I was alive ffs! Now it was all very interesting, and tough to argue that the Civil Rights struggle, JFK/Cuba are not important subjects , with a relevance in todays world, but the lack of depth and analysis was awful.

I honestly reckon he got more context from me, (US Civil war re civil rights for example), than the texts he was learning from.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

LOL at the way the british upper class are hitting the revisionist history about this one so hard.

Bless them.

The express did an editorial where, without a hint of irony, they argued that WW1 was a noble fight against imperialism. By a country which owned most of the world.

Baffling. Imperialism did undoubtedly play a part though. Austria were struggling, hence why they started venturing into the Balkans. The Ottoman empire was on the brink of collapse as well, so there was squabbling over the entrails of that, with Germany particularly keen to grab a slice of imperial glory to match their economic might.

To be honest though, it all seems a lot like the ruling classes looking out for their egos. Russia largely went to war in a desperate bid to stave off a revolution, but also had their pride battered by the Japanese at the turn of the century. The French were piqued over Germany pinching some of their territory after the Franco Prussian war. Germany wanted to be respected politically as they were economically (hence why they embarked on a naval building battle with Britain). The Austrians wanted to seem important and not like Germany's poodle.

You get the sense that we only really entered the thing because we'd promised France we would, and that Germany insisted on attacking France by first invading neutral Belgium.

 

[roydo]

I've got one about the Zulu war. the majority of the men who fought at rouke's drift were English and not welsh like in the film Zulu. at the time of the battle they were still the 2nd Warwickshire regiment and not the south wales borderers.

I didnt know that. Shows what power films have I guess. And why Americans think they broke the Enigma code, not us!!

 

[Garrick]

Baffling. Imperialism did undoubtedly play a part though. Austria were struggling, hence why they started venturing into the Balkans. The Ottoman empire was on the brink of collapse as well, so there was squabbling over the entrails of that, with Germany particularly keen to grab a slice of imperial glory to match their economic might.

To be honest though, it all seems a lot like the ruling classes looking out for their egos. Russia largely went to war in a desperate bid to stave off a revolution, but also had their pride battered by the Japanese at the turn of the century. The French were piqued over Germany pinching some of their territory after the Franco Prussian war. Germany wanted to be respected politically as they were economically (hence why they embarked on a naval building battle with Britain). The Austrians wanted to seem important and not like Germany's poodle.

You get the sense that we only really entered the thing because we'd promised France we would, and that Germany insisted on attacking France by first invading neutral Belgium.

Spot on this. All of the monarchs of Europe had an axe to grind at the time, they were just looking for an excuse to do it.

 

[Allezfan]

Baffling. Imperialism did undoubtedly play a part though. Austria were struggling, hence why they started venturing into the Balkans. The Ottoman empire was on the brink of collapse as well, so there was squabbling over the entrails of that, with Germany particularly keen to grab a slice of imperial glory to match their economic might.

To be honest though, it all seems a lot like the ruling classes looking out for their egos. Russia largely went to war in a desperate bid to stave off a revolution, but also had their pride battered by the Japanese at the turn of the century. The French were piqued over Germany pinching some of their territory after the Franco Prussian war. Germany wanted to be respected politically as they were economically (hence why they embarked on a naval building battle with Britain). The Austrians wanted to seem important and not like Germany's poodle.

You get the sense that we only really entered the thing because we'd promised France we would, and that Germany insisted on attacking France by first invading neutral Belgium.

Britain, as a small island off a larger continent, has a long standing policy off not wanting any single power to rule too much of europe.

Germany, as an ambitious power which wanted to carve out it's own empire, was basically seen as capable of doing that. And you don't remain the most powerful country in the world by letting new pretenders build their own power base.

Britain had been there and it was very much against anyone else doing that too. There's a similar narrative with japan in ww2, tbh.

But. like you say, ww1 wasn't an ideological war at all, the german way of doing things was pretty much the same as the french way or the russian way. It was an ego thing, the last of the many squabbles between europe's aristocracy as to which was the most powerful.

 

[SpeedEFC]

Most of what the historian said would be surprising to many but it's not really that ground breaking for someone who's read into WW1. What worried me though is I hope people don't try to cast WW1 in a positive light, it was a terrible war fought for imperialistic and nationalistic interests only and should not be used as a part of a nationalistic [Poor language removed] waving contest just because we won. I remember being told the first British deployment of the war was to the middle east to prevent the Germans getting their hands on the oil interests there. It's a shame that the war was fought with such outdated tactics as well, the military thinking at the start of the war wouldn't have been unfamiliar to the likes of Napoleon and Wellington and it was a good thing we managed to develop tactics and technology quickly enough to end the war before the stalemate got too much.

Saying that though one of the most interesting theories I've read is that WW1 was just a small part in a modern day "hundred years' war" since the context for WW1 was set by the 1871 Franco-Prussian war which pushed France toward their old enemy Britain eventually resulting in the Triple Entente. This was part of the reason why WW1 wasn't just another war in the Balkans and, as we all know, WW1 ended in a loss for the Germans with the implementation of the Treaty of Versailles. This then lead to WW2 when Hitler swept to power on the back of anti-Versailles sentiment. In short the Germans wrecked everything.

Funnily enough this was recognised by the Allies in WW2 so when they were talking about what they were going to do after the war they made sure to break up Prussia and remove its militaristic influence, they did this by basically giving most of Prussia to Poland. You can argue that this sort of worked because there hasn't been a world war since, at least a world war hasn't been caused by Germany since anyway.

 

[roydo]

You could make an argument that Germany kind of defeated itself though, by making the US enter it. There is little doubt their millions of extra troop/kit swung the balance in 1917.

If people dont know the story, basically, a lot of the US public were against them joining for tons of reasons. Then, in 1917, the germans invited Mexico to be an ally, offering them cash, plus help getting parts of the US back into Mexico. The Brits intercepted the telegraph, gave it to the US, and bingo!

A bit of an own goal really!

 

[johnnydawg68]

I agree that history is utterly fascinating but the idea that we ever have less invested in the narrative is naive to the extreme.

Orwell nailed the importance to current regimes of having a history which suits it in '1984'. See the textbook wars in a great deal of schools at the moment demanding a certain narrative in history needs to be maintained even if the facts don't fit it.

We're on the same side here. But I would suggest that to say we don't get more critical of history the further away from an event, that's naive. We obviously do. Historians build upon the research of others, over and over. New stuff comes out all the time.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

Britain, as a small island off a larger continent, has a long standing policy off not wanting any single power to rule too much of europe.

Germany, as an ambitious power which wanted to carve out it's own empire, was basically seen as capable of doing that. And you don't remain the most powerful country in the world by letting new pretenders build their own power base.

Britain had been there and it was very much against anyone else doing that too. There's a similar narrative with japan in ww2, tbh.

But. like you say, ww1 wasn't an ideological war at all, the german way of doing things was pretty much the same as the french way or the russian way. It was an ego thing, the last of the many squabbles between europe's aristocracy as to which was the most powerful.

The daft thing was Wilhelm was a grandson of Queen Victoria (or some such). Tsar Nicholas was also a cousin or something. Pretty much the whole sorry lot were part of the same family. I think I'm right in saying that a few weeks before it all kicked off, Wilhelm was racing his boat at Cowes ffs.

 

[johnnydawg68]

I love history. What worries me is what our kids now get taught though. Like I did European history 1814-1914, WW2, well, the origins of it, for example. My lad, now 20, did for his same course, US history, post WW2. Christ, even stuff that happened when I was alive ffs! Now it was all very interesting, and tough to argue that the Civil Rights struggle, JFK/Cuba are not important subjects , with a relevance in todays world, but the lack of depth and analysis was awful.

I honestly reckon he got more context from me, (US Civil war re civil rights for example), than the texts he was learning from.

I would argue that the best thing schools can give students is a love for learning and a fascination with certain subjects, so they can continue reading and learning on their own or at a higher level of learning. I was NEA about Math and Science but couldn't get enough of English and History. That's just how I'm wired.

 

[Garrick]

Most of what the historian said would be surprising to many but it's not really that ground breaking for someone who's read into WW1. What worried me though is I hope people don't try to cast WW1 in a positive light, it was a terrible war fought for imperialistic and nationalistic interests only and should not be used as a part of a nationalistic [Poor language removed] waving contest just because we won. I remember being told the first British deployment of the war was to the middle east to prevent the Germans getting their hands on the oil interests there. It's a shame that the war was fought with such outdated tactics as well, the military thinking at the start of the war wouldn't have been unfamiliar to the likes of Napoleon and Wellington and it was a good thing we managed to develop tactics and technology quickly enough to end the war before the stalemate got too much.

Saying that though one of the most interesting theories I've read though is that WW1 was just a small part in a modern day "hundred years' war" since the context for WW1 was set by the 1871 Franco-Prussian war which pushed France toward their old enemy Britain eventually resulting in the Triple Entente. This was part of the reason why WW1 wasn't just another war in the Balkans and, as we all know, WW1 ended in a loss for the Germans with the implementation of the Treaty of Versailles. This then lead to WW2 when Hitler swept to power on the back of anti-Versailles sentiment. In short the Germans wrecked everything.

Funnily enough this was recognised by the Allies in WW2 so when they were talking about what they were going to do after the war they made sure to break up Prussia and remove its militaristic influence, they did this by basically giving most of Prussia to Poland. You can argue that this sort of worked because there hasn't been a world war since, at least a world war hasn't been caused by Germany since anyway.

The Hohenzollerns were done after World War 1 anyway. The warmongering royal house that unified Germany and tried to build an empire during WW1 really had little to do with WW2, except perhaps establishing a pro-Grossdeutschland mindset among the populous.

Taking away Prussian homelands and the Sudetenland was really just payback for the similar actions they committed before and during WW2 against Czechs and Poles.

 

[Hellerad]

History begins with the stories of survivors and spectators. It is quickly distorted by the romantics and realists. Eventually it is a pawn of the powerful or set aside for something more poignant.

The modern historian must at once be neutral and critical. The truth and the narrative are too often confused and their roots forgotten.

 

[roydo]

We're on the same side here. But I would suggest that to say we don't get more critical of history the further away from an event, that's naive. We obviously do. Historians build upon the research of others, over and over. New stuff comes out all the time.

Also, it depends from which angle you view it. Political, Royalty, Religious, or through the eyes of the combatants, would all have "different" but totally linked views and reasons about why things happened. There are seldom just one reason why something occurred.