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Cataclysm: The First World War as Political Tragedy

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David Stevenson has written a superb history of the First World War that describes how and why the war lasted for over four years. The first factor according to Stevenson was the unreal war goals of both of the combatants. Another factor was that all of the great powers were able to keep large armies on the field for an indefinite amount of time due to advances in medicine. Military technology impeded further advances on the front since railways could transport troops to threatend sectors of the front and thereby making any future breathroughs by either side impossible. The final factors was the support of elites and the ability of the governments to alleviate economic hardships on the homefront due to stipends to farmers and wives of servicemen. The Austro-Hungarian, Ottoman, Russian, and later German empires fell because they lacked public mobilization and were unable to tend to the hardships of their citizens.In the end the allies won beacuse they were able to out produce the Germans and had better tactics that allowed sustainable advances by the British and French forces. Stevenson concludes his book by stating that the Peace Treaty of Versailles failed not because of harsh penalites, but because the Russians and the Americans were left out of any postwar security arrangements. The main weakness of the book is that it tends to be somewhat dry and academic and probably will not appear to readers of popular history.Another failing of this book is that the author does not fully described the faults of Russian munition makers as written in Jonathan Grant's work about the Puitilov factory. Otherwise, I would highly reccomend this book to those who are serious students of European and military history.

It has been a while since I've really gushed about a book, but I won't be able to help myself with this one. Cataclysm: The First World War as Political Tragedy, has to be one of the best books I have ever read on World War I, and one of the most compact yet comprehensive history books I've seen. It is less than 500 pages, but it covers every aspect of the war, from the strategy involved to the politics of starting, running, and, most importantly, ending the war. It goes beyond even that, though, by discussing the impact the war had on the post-war years, analyzing the years between the two world wars and even how memories of the war affected how the second one was fought. As a final thought, the conclusion discusses how the war has been looked at over time, how perceptions have changed, not only of who started the war, but also how it was fought.

All of this in under 500 pages? The coverage must be fairly superficial then, right? Not at all. Not only is Cataclysm thorough, but it's incredibly dense. This is not a book that you will read quickly. I am a fairly fast reader, and it took me nearly two weeks to finish the book, because it is extremely packed. Long paragraphs (sometimes almost a page long) abound, with the richness of the detail flowing off the page. Some books take this long to read because they are excessively dry, trying to stuff everything into the book but not integrating it very well. This book doesn't do that. Everything is related, and Stevenson draws the reader in with a lot of interesting information about whatever he is talking about.

The flow of the book is logical, but it is not completely chronological. The first section discusses the outbreak of the war, giving extensive detail about what led to the war. He even gives a few details about the minor wars that happened in the years leading up to World War I, such as the Balkan Wars of 1912-13, and discusses what the world was like before the outbreak of the war. He uses all of this information to give insight into the thought processes and events that led to the almost inevitable conflagration that turned into one of the most horrific wars of our time. After this section, he discusses the widening of the war, the battles of 1915-1917, and then jumps back to cover other aspects of the war. This includes the home front, the political maneuverings in all of the belligerent governments, naval warfare, tactics, economics, and war aims, just to name some. He then moves on to the outcome of the war, how it ended, the politics of the ceasefire, and the collapse of the German army. Finally, he discusses the aftermath, and he doesn't just stop at the peace treaty. He goes all the way up to the end of World War II and beyond.

This is what I loved about Cataclysm. Stevenson doesn't just give us what happened. He discusses the purpose (or at least what the purpose was at the time, even if it doesn't seem to make any sense in modern times) of what happened, what the politicians were thinking, and what they were trying to accomplish. He delves into how the politicians managed to keep the civilians engaged in the fighting, and how limited any anti-war movements were until the war seemed to be an intractable stalemate. Stevenson even gives great detail about lesser-known campaigns, such as that in the Middle East which has produced much of the modern-day strife. He covers Austria-Hungary and their battles against both Russia and Italy, as well as the war with Serbia, most of which have been given short shrift in World War I books I have read.

The writing, as I have said, is quite dense, but it's not his prose which makes it a slow read. I did not see any superfluous text in the book at all, and almost all of it was interesting. I kept stumbling upon things that I didn't know, or I knew little about, and Stevenson covers it all in a depth that is surprising in a book under 500 pages. I did have to laugh at his introduction, where he says that he has deliberately kept the end notes to a minimum in each chapter. Then I discovered that there are many chapters with notes that run into the three digits. I think this is a good thing, as I love notated history books, but I did find it funny that he would say that. Cataclysm is thoroughly researched, and the number of notes reflects this. The bibliography is quite extensive too. All of the maps are at the front of the book, and there are definitely many.

The only minor fault was the use (or non-use) of commas, and this could just be a legitimate way of doing it that I have never heard of before. A number of times, I would read a sentence and have to go back and re-read it because a comma appeared to be missing, completely jarring my understanding of the sentence, or at least the flow of it. However, if that is the worst thing I can say about the book, it must mean the book is wonderful. And it is. This could be considered the definitive book on World War I and all its aspects. I do know that you won't find anything like this in as small a package as Cataclysm is. If you have any interest in the war, or just military history in general, you should pick this one up.

David Roy

I stumbled on this excellent book via a review in the Atlantic Monthly, and bookmarked it as a curiosity. Receiving it as a gift by surprise, I immediately put it in line behind other books on my shelf. For some reason though, the mood struck me to open it, I barely put Cataclysm down until I finished.

Stevenson interjects no sentimental pining for the time before the 20th Century's wars, and leaves no room for romanticized notions of warfare. He could be accused of cold rationality. But his objective and unsparing view allows for a great massing of facts and analysis in a compact but thorough history. The reader can sense the depth of understanding lying behind Stevenson's words, without having to wade through an historian's primary sources and two-handed waffling.

Having spent many an hour considering the Second World War and the Cold War, I now understand how "cataclysmic" the Great War was in its day. It was perhaps an even more important event in world history, in terms of the turn the world took from the past, than either of the later world wars. Further, I have new appreciation for how the First sowed the political, economic, diplomatic, military, and cultural seeds for the rest of the 20th century and beyond.

Stevenson has given us an important gift for understanding this critical event in world history. Don't miss it.

This is not a book for the casual student of World War I. In fact I would not recommend it as a first introduction into the subject. The book's organization could be confusing. However, if you are a serious student of WWI then this book will make a marvelous addition to your library.

Stevenson avoids the all too familiar chronological inventory of the battles and political manueverings. Although there is a chronology to the book, it is a loose outline. What he does instead is organize the the subject thematically and that is its strength. He is truly masterful in explaining the role of the financiers, and the munitions manfacturers. He recognizes the role of strategy, or rather the lack of it. He discusses morale of both the troops and the populations at home, and effects of technology. He also does the best job I've read in explaining the reasons why a peace was never negotiated once stalemate was reached. I have to admit that he gave me new ideas to consider when it comes to my personal assessment of the war and its conduct. I don't agree with all his ideas but that in no way detracts for the power of his insights.

I particularly liked part four of the book especially the closing chapter where he summarizes his conclusions. All too often historians of the war end it at the signing of the Treaty of Versailles. Stevenson shows the longer term effects of the conflict and how they set the stage for subsequent conflict.

What prevented me from rating this with five stars? First the writing style was a bit too academic, not the worst thing in the world but this is not a book you scan. You have to invest time to read it well. The second reason for losing a star was his excessive use of acronyms. It might have been unavoidable but it didn;t stop it from being irritating. I had trouble remembering them all.

In conclusion. If you want to be challenged, if you want to really begin understanding this war in all it's dimensions then read this book. You will not walk away disappointed. Oh! A comment about other reviews. This is a well reasoned, thoughtfully written book. It does not in any way exhalt the role of the British army. In fact I thought he was fairly harsh in his overall assessment.

This book is written by an economist rather than a professional historian and as a result the narrative structure is different. Rather than looking at the details of individual battles the book looks at the result of offensive periods and the phases of the war.

The continuing impression of the war is one of a long pointless stalemate in which incompetent commanders used young men as cannon fodder in pointless attacks against well-entrenched infantry. Something which caused so much disillusionment that the regimes responsible for the war, those of Germany and Austria collapsed as did other such as the Russian autocracy who fought the war so incompetently.

Much of that image of the war can now be seen as having some partial truth but in reality being wrong. The highest casualty rates occurred early in the war when massed armies met each other in the open field. The development of the trench system led to far lower casualty rates for most of the war. The trenches providing protection against artillery and machine gun fire. Over time both sides developed offensive skills which allowed for attacks to be more successful. The Germans developed storm trooper units who were heavily armed with machine guns, trench mortars and flame throwers and used infiltration techniques. The allies used tanks extensively and also developed the use of light machine guns, hand grenades, trench mortars and air support. Both sides developed the use of artillery so that it became more accurate and barrages were aimed at fire suppression rather than elimination of the enemy.

Despite the fact of German revolution and the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy the next few years saw most of the belligerents keen for war again. Italy and Germany were taken over by nationalistic movements and the Axis did not consist of those countries alone. Hungary, Roumania, Bulgaria and Slovakia were part of the deal. In reality the war pushed most countries somewhat to the right.

During the war both sides faced different problems and that was the reason for the long period of the conflict. Germany was somewhat better at warfare and throughout the conflict inflicted more casualties on their opponents. They were however outnumbered and had to not only to fight both France and Britain but also Russia. Their one real ally was the Austro-Hungarian Empire which had a poorly equipped army and whose leaders were incompetent. The balance kept subtly shifting through the war. The casualties suffered by France were offset by the development of a large conscript army by Britain and the entry into the war of Italy and Romania. The defeat of the Russians by the entry into the war of the Americans.

The book re-affirms the reality of German war guilt. Previous historians had seen the interlocking system of alliances combined with both sides mobilisation plans as something which lessened the ability of individual politicians to make decisions about whether there would be war or not. In reality this was not the case and the German monarchy could have resisted but saw war as inevitable at some point.

This book is probably the best single volume history of the war so far printed but it is not for those who are keen on a narrative history.

While my other esteemed reviewers rightly highlight the impressive scholarship into virtually all social, political, military and diplomatic aspects of the Great War, I think the real treat of this tome is the final chapters on the Versailles Treaty, rememberance of the war and its impact on later European developments. The author impressively argues that the Peace was not in fact a Diktat in practice, but largely the outcome of precedence and geo-political and social necessity. Likewise, the author rightly in my mind faults the Allies for abandoning France in terms of the enforcement of the peace, debunking the notion that Gallic torpidity and passivity caused French leadership to crumble at the onslaught of Facism. As insightful as the discussion of the war, its causes and the social aspect of the conflict, I think that his final chapters on peace and aftermath are truly revealing.

Cataclysm. An apt one word description of the tragedy of World War War which led to the deaths of over ten million human beings in battlefields from the Marne to the Middle East. This cataclysm is covered in depth by Dr. David Stevenson professor of international history at the London School of Economics.
The war saw the demise of such great empires as Russia, Austria-Hungry, the Germany of Kaiser Wilhelm II and the Ottoman Turkish empire. Stevenson explains the political background to the beginning of the war. He also goes into incredible detail on each of the major participants in the war. Well covered are the domestic issues, the economics, the war policy and the battles engaged in by each nation involved. Stevenson surveys the Versailles Treaty and shows how the mistakes made at that major postwar division of the spoils sowed the seeds which bore bitter fruition with the rise of Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy and Imperial Japan. Stevenson is also excellent in showing the development of weaponry during the new age of mass industrial murder which is called war. There are macabre passages in the narrative which transports the reader to the hell of trench warfare.
The book resembles a treatise and is devoid of telling anecdotal information. It can be dry and slow reading but the author is an expert on the subject and somehow one continues to read as the horrible story is unfolded. This is not one for a person who lacks little knowledge of the war and its major players. It is an awe inspiring work of years of scholarship on the war and should be on the shelf of every serious student of World War I.

This book is written by a historian, and is therefore very long --- about 500 pages. For this reader, it is probably the most important book he has ever come across, since it explains to him, why he he lives where he does, namely in the United States, having married someone he met in England; instead of living in Germany where he his ancestors lived for at least the last five hundred years.

The book deals with World War One, called "The war to end war", and analyses public opinion in the main war participants, namely Germany,Austria-Hungary and Turkey, on one side, and Russia,France England, Italy, Japan and decisively the United States on the other.

Being a historian, Stevenson points out that both sides
were afraid of causing the total break-down of their society, which of course actually happened in Russia, by battle field losses, which might amount to 25,000 dead and 40,000 wounded, in a single day!

For this reader, the most interesting part of Stenvenson's tome, are the chapters on what persuaded Wilson to bring the USA into the war, and what happened after the German-Austrian-Turkish defeat, and how it led to the rise in Germany of a true mad-man, who led the world into an even more destructive conflict, 21 years after the first one ended.

In conclusion, I can only express the hope that all the world's diplomats and political leaders will have the opportunity to read this VERY IMPORTANT BOOK!

Organized into four parts, Outbreak, Escalation, Outcome and Legacy, Stevenson's Cataclysm: The First World War as Political Tragedy traced glimpses of humanity throughout the war from the foolhardiness of the military command, compassion among the soldiers, to machinations of the politicians.

Outbreak

`Emperor Franz Joseph and his advisors believed they faced an intolerable problem for which peaceful remedies were exhausted and came to see the war as the last chance to force internal reform. 12 Wilhelm's presence grievously undermined European stability.' `Wilhelm and Bethmann reasoned that an Austro Serb conflict was likely to stay localized. But they accepted squarely the prospect of a European conflagration.' `Crucial to the escalation process was the Russian decision not only to stand by Serbia but also to start the militarization of the crisis.'

In the Battle of Tannenberg, Stevenson asserted that the decision to send `two extra corps to counter Russian invasion of East Prussia stemmed less form anxiety than from over-confidence.' For this misjudgment, Moltke perhaps made a big difference in the battle of the Marne. The war between the invading Austrians and defending Serbs could be best described as `determined defenders and a hail of munitions defeated a hasty attack plan executed with inadequate forces.' In the struggle for Flanders, `the first battle of Ypres was remembered for the destruction of the old BEF; in Germany, for the Kindermord, or `massacre of the innocents', i.e. the student volunteers, (many of them now lie in Langemarck cemetery). The Christmas Truce on Christmas morning 1914 was a poignant reminder of the bond of humanity shared among the combatants. ` British and German soldiers met in no man's land, chatted, smoked, played football, posed for photographs and buried their dead... The episode seems to encapsulate the lack of rancor between many front-line soldiers.'

The naval stalemate was attributed to Germans' self-restraint enabling a successful execution of British strategy of a `distant blockade, with warships at Scapa and Dover available to support interception of merchant ships in the North Sea and the Channel.' Stevenson posited that `if the Germans had attacked the BEF troopships the Grand Fleet would have been too remote to forestall them' since `Scapa Flow was so far from the Channel that it was a curious choice of location for the most powerful British warships.' Wilhelm's reaffirmed that the fleet must be protected as a `political instrument', and should not seek battle outside the German Bight.'

Escalation

`In this middle period of the war between late 1914 and the next major turning point in spring 1917, its key features were escalation and stalemate, both sides applying rising levels of violence yet failing to terminate the impasse.' `The escalation had been driven by the strategic impasse and the determination of both sides' leaders to intensify their efforts rather than negotiate for less than victory.'

With the exception of the US, Turkey's entry into the war `had more impact than any other new belligerent on the overall course of the conflict.' `Turkey's war down to 1917 can be divided into three phases: initial Ottoman assaults against the British and Russians and their own Armenian citizens; unsuccessful failed Allied offensives at the Dardanelles and in Mesopotamia; and finally more successful Allied advances in the Caucasus and against Bagdad that showed Turkish resistance was failing.' `Yet although the Turkish government claimed to be retaliating against disloyalty and preparations for insurrection, the Ottoman Armenians appear to have been guilty of neither until the action against them began.' The sacrifice at Anzac Cove well remembered by Austrailian and New Zealand and the overall failure of Gallipoli campaign terminated Churchill's dream of a more promising alternative to the impasse on the Western Front.

In this period, war aims crystallized and turned peace feelers into a dialogue of the deaf. `Central Powers saw peace feelers primarily as a means of splitting their enemies, while the Allies refused to be split.' Germany was reluctant to `undertake massive annexations of unwilling subjects, preferring to rely on indirect safeguards through military occupation and through economic provisions, ,'such as the plan for Mittleeuropa . `Public and explicit commitment promising a future independent Polish kingdom could not be retracted, and created yet another obstacle to a Russo-German separate peace.' On the Allied side, the Pact of London of September 1914 bounded Russia, Britain and France to make no separate peace and the `Chantilly agreements provided stronger inter-Allied liaison' and coordinated offensives. `Battle of the Loos marked a transitional stage towards the more wholehearted British commitment to a Western Front offensive strategy in 1916.'

Military leaders also came around to the idea of a war of attrition. After failing the objectives of the Verdun offensive and mirroring the evolution of strategic thinking on the Allied side, Falkenhayn expected to prevail through an offensive version of attrition administered through massive quantities of heavy artillery and high explosive shells.' Therefore, `given the failure to capture the whole of the Verdun simply inflicting casualty became OHLs primary rationale for the campaign and he intended less to take territory than to mete out casualties until France could stand no more.'

The economic consequence of the conflict was `forgoing investment income in the future, thus compromising the Allies' long-term prospects in order to met short-term needs.' `Even with the excess profits duty, `tax revenues rose little in real terms until 1916/17 and expenditure left them far behind. European treasuries were caught between untrammeled military outgoings and the political imperative of not reviving peacetime controversies through tax increases.' `Hundreds of thousands of institutions and private citizens in the belligerents and the neutrals lent to governments whose outgoings were racing ahead of income and whose repayment capacity would be questionable even if they won. The European middle classes proved willing to gamble with their own prosperity as well as with their children's lives.'

Russia was `a victim of its success as industrial output grew rapidly, and many of the army's shortages were overcome. But success was achieved only on an unsustainable basis of generous subsidies and contracts for Russian manufacturing.' The more serious upshot `was dislocation the civilian economy and a crisis in urban food supply.' `Rising prices, worsening quality and an outright lack of basic commodities undermined patriotism and unity.'

Wilson's ambition produced a less than dispassionate American diplomatic position. British decision to erode ` the status of conditional contraband rendering Declaration of London in 1909 meaningless' and `subverted the framework of law altogether.' Scheer's unrestricted submarine warfare gained currency as Germany's rightful retaliations. `America's credibility arising from inaction would jeopardize Wilson's ambitions to mediate. He Attached greater urgency to Germany's threat to American lives than he did to Britain's to American property, even if his indifference to the starvation of German civilians compromised his impartiality from Berlin's perspective. Bryan saw this point and wanted Wilson to protest against both U-boats and blockade.'

`Had the U-boats continued to follow cruiser rules their rapidly growing numbers would have inflicted not much smaller losses... As in 1914, Berlin forced the issue and staked all on such a gamble, rather than pause in the hope that the situation would improve. The parallels matter, for it was precisely its willingness to opt for such expedients that made imperial Germany such a menace to its neighbours and ultimately caused its downfall.'

Outcome

February Revolution and American intervention, Spring 1917. In Russia, `disaffection of the masses as represented by industrial workers and peasant soldiers.' `The removal of the Romanov dynasty, intended to help contain the revolution, probably did more than anything else to convince the peasantry that they could challenge the social order with impunity. By dismantling the structure of repression, the new authorities hoped to neutralize the risk of counter-revolution, but they left themselves exposed to greater radicalization.' `The`Kerensky offensive' was arguably the most disastrous. It undermined the Provisional Government and prepared the way for Bolshevism.' `Zimmermann Telegram, however, made a German security threat seem palpable not only in the east but also in the south-west and west.' `American leaders believed their contribution to defeating Germany would shape their influence at the peace conference.'

`At times doing something may be worse than doing nothing.' `Third Ypres was a wasteful failure 31 July nine British divisions BEF's tactical improvements could still not overwhelm the defense.' `Germans became victims of their success.' `Trotsky's no war, no peace' gambit opened the way for (Bad Homburg Crown Council) the advance to compel the Bolsheviks to sign the peace.' `Half a million troops tied down in the occupation. The Russian quagmire sucked in hundreds of thousands of Austro-German troops who might have fought elsewhere.' Worse though was Spring Offensive in spring 1918 along the Western Front, `by wagering all on the offensive option, Ludendorff had sacrificed the defensive one, as now became all too evident.'

`The Fourteen points would leave the Central Powers largely intact, obliged to `restore' invaded territories but not otherwise suffering financial penalties or even being disarmed.' `Alsace-Lorraine remained a fundamental point of issue between France and Germany, as did Belgium between Germany and Britain.' `The peace feelers owed their failure not only to continuing military stalemate but also to the survival of a pro-war consensus in the main belligerents and the new factor of American intervention.'

On political development, by inaction and adherence to the military leaders, Wilhelm inexorably abandoned his claim to rule as the military fortunes took a turn for the worst. `Bethamnn had resolved to resign unless he could introduce political reform at once. By backing his chancellor, Wilhelm would have opted for the path of peace negotiations and controlled democratization that Germany embarked on from a much less favourable starting point in October 1918.' `The power of emperor and chancellor ebbed away.' `Paul von Hintze Foreign minister Germany the best way to muffle the political aftershock that followed defeat would be a stage-managed democratization: a `revolution from above' to avert one from below.'

`German uprising originated from a mutiny in the fleet, provoked by secret plans for a naval offensive, or Flottenvorstoss, against Britain.' `Once more a misjudged military initiative made Germany's situation worse.' `In contrast to Russia, sailors and solider spearheaded the uprising.' `The revolution was a consequence, not a cause, of Germany's defeat, and the SPD leaders did their best to moderate it. It is also true, however, that if Ludendorff had kept his nerve German resistance could have been prolonged until early 1919, although probably not much longer. His actions determined the manner rather than the fact of Allied victory.'

By attaching to Germany, Austria-Hungary forced Germany `the Allies stepped up their support for the Habsburg nationalists as the only reaming card to play.' `National separatism rather than socialist insurrection that brought the Habsburgs down.' `Dual Monarchy found itself trapped, unable to break with the German alliance, yet by that same alliance antagonizing all but its German and Magyar subjects, whose leaders would rather see the empire liquidated than share power equally with the other nationalities.' The Habsburg `army's demise made it impossible for Karl to hold his empire together by force even if he had wanted to.' `Radicalization of the nationalist movements within Austria-Hungary final stage of its disintegration accomplished by domestic insurgent movements that the authorities were unwilling and unable to suppress.' `Standard pattern was therefore for power to pass to committees of the local nationalist parties, accompanied by patriotic and anti-Habsburg demonstrations but not by widespread violence or disorder.'

`No allied government revised its war aims as a consequence or felt bound by the American programme, the British and French continuing to stand by the Turkish partition agreements and the Italians by the London Treaty.' `Vienna still refused to accommodate both Italy's claims on Austria-Hungary or France's on Germany.' `In fact Czernin and Karl had probably decided to gamble on the outcome of the German spring offensive as the best hope of emerging from the war intact.'

`Fatherland Party, led by Tirpitz and by Wolfgang Kapp was a direct response to the peace resolution: it opposed any domestic reform until after the war, and it pressed for a `Hindenburg victory' and big annexations. Authoritarian and anti-Semitic, it has rightly been seen as a precursor of National Socialism.' For the British Empire, `war undoubtedly accelerated longer-term processes of decentralization and devolution.' 373

Legacy

`The real tragedy of the inter-war years was that it neither accommodated a lasting reconciliation with the new republican regime in Germany or ensured that it remained militarily harmless the more fundamental problem was their disunity.' `Disarmament and the Rhineland occupation made it impossible for the Germans to fight another war. The treaty could have stopped another bloodbath if it had been upheld.'

`Clemenceau's key objective was to keep in being the wartime alliance' but the British thought otherwise. `Not only were the French seen as colonial rivals but in Europe too, much of the British delegation from Lloyd George downwards suspected them of imperialist ambitions that would undermine a stable peace and might threaten Britain directly. These considerations set Britain against much of the French territorial and security programme.' The result was the `loss of guarantee to France - Lloyd George used American non-ratification of the guarantee as a pretext to pull Britain out of the arrangement as ell leaving Paris high and dry.' `The lesson the French drew from the Ruhr crisis however, was that unilateral action would not succeed, and they later stuck to this principle even when faced with more radical challenges. Faced with non-compliance the Allies would compromise.'

`The creation of Iraq which had never formed an administrative unit under the Ottomans and which comprised an unstable combination of Kurds in the north with Sunni and Shia Muslims in the center and south and by facilitating Zionist objectives, it set off repercussions that would last for decades.'

`On balance, the spread of communism outside Russia weakened the rest of the left, first by strengthening the reactionary right and governments' willingness to tolerate extra-constitutional procedures and second, by dividing the progressive camps.'

`On the connections between the war and the depression and between the depression and Nazism, the war was partly responsible for the over-capacity in primary producing countries that left them vulnerable when the American and Western European markets contracted and capital outflows dried up. Second, the war was the source of the reparations controversy and it was partly in order to alleviate this that the US authorities had encouraged the 1924 loan that began the outflow of American money to Germany. Third, it contributed to the 1931 financial crisis.' `In short, the war was essential to the Nazi takeover not only through its contribution to the economic crisis but also through its role in reawakening German nationalism as the memory of 1914-18 was re-evaluated.'

`The rulers of Austria-Hungary and Germany did not predetermine before 1914 their decision to resort to force, but in the July-August crisis they made a decision to start a Balkan war and to accept the risk that it would escalate into a European one.` `Yet both submarine decision and the `Michael' attack (part of Ludendorff Offensives) were responses to the Allies' slow strategic squeeze.' `Now that decades of historical research have stripped away the encrustations of hindsight and better enabled us to see the struggle as it appeared to the contemporaries who waged it, the governments seem more purposive, the armed forces more adaptive and the ordinary soldiers and civilians more willing and informed participants than once was thought.' `Intrinsic to all military undertakings, however legitimate their motives, is the risk that they will violate the principle of proportionality between ends and means.'

I wanted to give this book the highest rating, because the author is so obviously well-versed in his subject, but there were just too many flaws. First of all I liked the book and I recommend it, but the layout is rather cumbersome at times. For example, the chapters in Part II are perhaps the most well organized and concise, but the chapters of Parts III and IV are convoluted at best.

The book begins with a basic overview but then author David Stevenson quickly shows how global the war became. I enjoyed his theories and conculsions, particularly how he illustrates that generals and statesmen did not want the war to end as if they were on a collective ego trip at the expense of the common soldier. This trip lasted until Germany lost the will to continue in November, 1918. I also liked Stevenson's conclusion regarding Austria, that it actually won all of its major objectives (with German help) by Spring, 1918, but then was shackled to the German war effort and subsequently lost more than it had won.

My problems with the book are 1.) it's length-it belabors many points ad nauseum, 2.) his post-war chapters do not do the subject equal justice compared to how much effort he put into the war years, and 3.) by the end of the book he loses sight of all participants but France, Untied States, and Great Britain, with a seemingly over abundance of British references. He gets into historiography of the war but this doesn't seem to flow with his summary of the geopolitical landscape after Versailles. He conveniently cuts off his historiography without offering critiques of his contemporaries (Herwig, Gilbert, Strachan, and Ferguson). This is probably by design, but if he insisted on going down this path he would have served his purpose well to reflect on the recent (last 10 years) flurry of WWI studies.

Overall, this is a good book that any student of WWI should not overlook. There is a good bit of new theories and revelations. It just takes a long time to plow through it.