The Road to Hell? Intentions, Uncertainty and the Origins of World War I - Sebastian Rosato
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- čas přidán 9. 06. 2024
- A century after the outbreak of World War I, there is still little consensus on its causes. The lessons learned are of particular importance for the United States and the world today. University of Notre Dame Professor Sebastian Rosato specializes in the theory and history of great power politics and will question established explanations and develop new arguments about the causes of the Great War.
The event is part of the Hesburgh Lecture Series and is presented in partnership with the Notre Dame Club of Kansas City.
Recorded April 19, 2015 in J.C. Nichols Auditorium at the National World War I Museum at Liberty Memorial.
For more information about the National WWI Museum and Memorial visit theworldwar.org
This man says he's British but he sounds like someone from Massachusetts and it's throwing my for a loop.
Perhaps Zuber is right that Schlieffen did want the army increased in size to execute his plan. However his argument that the Germans planned defensive battles and were drawn into the advance to the Marne is arguably totally undermined by their invasion of Luxemburg before the declaration of war and their ultimatum to Belgium during mobilisation demanding free passage for their armies and offering compensation at France's expense when they won. Also the well known quote about being lost once Schlieffen's notes had come to an end cleary indicated an intention to invade. Having 90% of your army in the west facing the numerically smaller enemy and only 10% facing the Russians, admittedly with Austria, hardly suggests a defensive intention.
It was defensive in the east
Your points are all valid.
Zuber's argument is bonkers and Rosato entertaining these thoughts and not even taking a stance is disappointing. He comes across like a conspiracy theorist who doesn't have an argument so he is "just asking questions".
Zuber touches on something real, though. By conducting a lot of wargames, the Germans knew they didn't have the strength to make the Schlieffenplan a success. Yet they didn't bother to change it and when the war started, that's what they went with.
His explanation of how the German advance into Belgium and France just looked like the Plan is lame. If they weren't following it why on earth would they have invaded Belgium and brought England in? Totally unbelievable.
As the french, after their defeat in the franco prussian war, started to "harden" the border to germany with many huge fortresses the direct way would have been to costly in manpower and unmanagable. Sot the only way around it was through Belgium. (Have you seen switzerland? and the long way round through Austria and Itala would be almost like through Switzerland just without beeing shot at...)
Even the french military planned (for the case they would have to attack germany) to go through Belgium and violate their neutrality.
There are protocols in which the english cosidered that if the germans would only use the southmost part of Belgium it would not be enough for them to intervene. But things came differently: Germany told the Belgians whats comming in a telegramm, asking for free passage. Hoping they would let them through and thus pulling the whole of Belgium into fighting (If you knowinlgy let others move through your souveranity as a country is "in question").
Belgium in 14 was the fourth industrial country in the world,
With most of the steel industry in the Ardennen. Near Luik. If Belgium let the prussians pass to France, we would have commited suïcide, if not the same. So we dit the only reasonable. Let nobody pass was the only solution.
Please Belgium was until the 40 neutral even throughout the Great war. We dient participatie in the Great offencive because of it.
And Belgium want praiseband for that
The von schiefflen plan was the only losse plan the prussians had. Take the most industrial part of Belgium with the steel industry at hand.
But they forgot the belgian resistance. We bought the Time for the allies, we are the forced adjustment to the plan. We we harrassing the prussians till after the battle of antwerp. Around the time of mons.
We won a fel battles, like the battle of the siver helmets, we stalles the prussians in Luik for almost a Month…
We fought hard and bought time.
The plan is reused and adapted 26 years later. But it wasn’t the von shieflen plan it was the only solution. Belgium and Nederland where just buffer states between France and prussia it was our only reason of existence…
@@beeldpuntXVI Julius Caesar said that the Belgians were the bravest of all the Gaulish peoples. You gave the Germans a hell they did not expect, at huge sacrifice. France, and Europe, owes you a great deal, and we thank you. Belgian food, beer, chocolate and hospitality is the best in world, unless you're a German on your way to invade France.
Because Belgium is flat and easier to move an army through quickly than the alps, and the french has heavily fortified their border. Moltke didn't implement the plan as it was, he bastardised it and knew it properly wouldn't work but wanted a war
@@GuinessOriginal
There never was a "plan" in the sense normally employed.
I fear the whole fantasy is now too firmly implanted in pop history ever to be uprooted.
It seems ridiculous to claim the Germans didn't enact some form of the Schlieffen plan. Otherwise, they wouldn't have gone through Belgium and would have kept the bulk of their army on the Rhine. You could still argue the plan was basically defensive, seeking to knock out France to avoid a two front war.
Why be on the Rhine when you have Alsace-Lorraine!
I find Russia's behavior in 1914 hard to understand. I realize they had commitments to Serbia, but they weren't ironclad and I don't understand why the Tsarist regime would want to fight what they knew could blow up into a major war when they had just fought and lost a war against Japan in 1905 that sparked a revolution that threatened to topple their entire regime. I also find it hard to understand why they would want to support a regicidal Serbian regime when the Romanovs themselves had been subject to regicide and ongoing attempts on the lives of members of their royal family and their government by radicals and ethnic nationalists.
Marmocet The Russians wanted a warm water route to the Atlantic. Through the Black Sea.
They needed new war that they win and also to distract public from domestic problems, or revolution. It backfired as we saw.
Not all Russians were for the/a war, the former Premierminister Stolypin (who got killed) and his minister of finance and successor Kokowzow (who was fired 1914) were against war. The Rest was more or less in favor of a war (just read about Nicholas Hartwig for example) and managed to convince the Tsar and the rest of the politicians that it would be embarressing and "unmanly" if they would not go against Austria Hungary. Oh and one of them even promised the Serbian Polititians that russia would back them in any case when refusing the ultimatum, before the russians even had discussed what to do. (So after this promise they would be embarressed if they backed down.)
And lastely Russia with money from france was able to grow its army and infrastructure much more than anyone thought, so they were quite confident. (Even the some of the french grow worried that russia would soon not need them anymore as an ally)
They really did not seem to grasp reality, they must have been stuck in the past.
I've actually seen better arguments that Russia wanted the war than for Germany. Starting with the fact that the Russian army was in much better position to fight Germany and Austria at the outbreak than anyone thought possible.
I'd disagree that there is a convention that the Triple Alliance and Triple Entente were rock-solid locked in. It's well known that the British commitment was somewhat informal and indirect for instance. I am also not sure about treating the influence of the Schlieffen Plan as a myth. It seems to smack of an obsessive revisionism.
22:50 "There was no Schlieffen Plan." 23:50 "...there's no intention to attack France."
Utter nonsense. Here's Wikipedia's article on it: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schlieffen_Plan . Moltke's 1914 implementation was of course not the same as Schlieffen's 1905 Aufmarsch I West, but the basic plan to evade a direct assault on the fortified Franco-German border region by going through Belgium is exactly what Germany tried to implement. And of course Germany intended to attack France in the event of war. Moltke famously told the Kaiser that Germany COUDN'T just attack/defend against Russia, and it anyway would have been highly problematic to turn east and let France attack at its leisure.
@@gandydancer9710 please don't quote Wikipedia, it is not a bastian of facts by any stretch, even though in this case I largely agree with you.
@@GuinessOriginal Wikipedia is an aggregator of facts, and on subjects not related to its political biases as reliable as any other source. Evaluating any particular claim may require checking its footnotes, but it's not as if those don't generally exist (unlike, say, every claim made in this presentation).
Returning to this lecture for the third time I'm surprised by the hostile comments. There are some fascinating hypotheses rousted on the cause of the war and the predictability of the tactical stalemate which I think are well evidenced. Not conclusively but what can you expect in a short time.
Yes, he stumbles a bit to start with, but once up to speed he is clearly comfortable. I'm sure I've delivered worse and I'd suggest a lot of the critics have never left the bleachers.
Tamlan Dipper the content was great but the delivery, especially for a professional, was dire.
I think you are hostile
34:47 There was no inflation to talk of in 1912, what is your source ?
You know what, actually over past couple of months, I've seen a couple of different presentations making this case that WWI was "unexpected" or a "surprise", etc. ...Certainly fascinating to consider this perspective.
garrett tedeman wars generally are.
@@tonyromano6220 depends who you mean. i expect there are a fair handful of people who predict them with some consistency.
They predict them constantly. They are only sometimes right.
He’s right about us (the USA) staying out of everyone else’s business all the time. The average person doesn’t benefit from this constant intervention. We’ve become the world’s bully.
We think of our defining war as The Civil War. Check out the stats on that one.
Exactly.......he doesn't know a tenth of what he thinks he knows, typical Brit. It is insulting to sit through a lecture being talked down to by a guy who doesn't have the courtesy to stand still or look-up often.
@@michigan1291 he’s not British he’s Australian
What's the source for the military budgets/army size?
How did the invasion of Serbia turn out for the Habsburg Empire?
Successful? After some major set backs of course they ultimately pulled it off.
Interesting ideas and perspectives, though I feel the speaker didn't go in depth into any of the topics nearly enough. For instance, I remain unconvinced about the Schlifen plan and a few other things
All in all, a good lecture that raises important questions
Probable reasons in my opinion: 1) all of the major actors in the conflict had territorial ambitions at the expense of each other,2) All of the powers suspected that their neighbors were plotting to attack them, and thought that the best way to end these threats was by preemptive strikes. 3) All of the powers possessed sizable armed forces and politically influential officer corps. Generals often feel and inclination to fight wars because a) it is their job and b) having spent a lot of time and effort preparing for war, (war plans, acquisition of new weapons systems, traing troops, etc.) they didn’t want all that time and effort to go to waste, and c) a successful war gives generals glory and opportunities for wealth and political influence after victory is achieved.
Enjoyed this lecture. Thank you
I appreciate the counter-intuitive perspective on how WW1 was more of a fluke than not. But I dunno...a LOT of cultural works and writings from the generations alive BEFORE WW1 were pretty damn-well primed for SOMETHING to blow up in the world order at the time. Maybe in 1914, the events didn't seem to be the ones everyone expected to be the causes of it, buuuut...the fact that you had competing imperial powers constantly testing each other still lends more creedance to the idea that if it were for the events in 1914, it probably would have been something else. Lets face it, World War I led to the death of 3 major empires (German, Austro-Hungarian, Russian)...so we cannot deny the role imperialism played in allowing the war to happen.
Its VERY interesting to hear these comparisons about the conflict between China and the U.S./West, as seen 8 years ago when this was filmed (I guess 2015?). But we now know that not only is Russia a weak child of a military/world power (thanks to the war in Ukraine)...but that China is ALSO not the omnipotent growing power of the future. The economic rot they experienced in recent years, exacerbated by COVID, has kinda put that country on the ropes...and the fact that the U.S. is increasingly NOT wanting to be the policeman of the world, and especially the seas, means that the globalization that we, the U.S., helped create and allowed countries like China to modernize...is going to start disappearing...and China has a few trump cards in terms of raw materials for computers and such, but they have NO internal resources for oil, their agricultural isn't strong enough to maintain their bloated economic growth, etc., and they are not nearly as dominating of a power as they want other countries to believe.
I have to disagree with his statement at minute 16 when he says the Somme was the worst defeat of the British Army. The Somme was NOT a british defeat. Was it bloody, messy and the origin of the expression that the British soldiers were ´´lions led by donkeys?´´ Yes. BUT and this is a huge BUT, the Germany Army concluded AFTER the Somme that they were unable to defeat the British Army in the field given their current commitments on 2 fronts. The battle of the Somme ended late November and in early December the Kaiser put out peace feelers which the Allies found unacceptable and rejected. The German peace conditions included occupation and integration of conquered territory (ie Belgium, Luxembourg and western Poland) into Germany - ie a peace that rewarded their military conquests, so of course the Allies rejected talks on any basis. I also find a disturbing anti-British thread underpinning Dr Rosato´s tone and lecture that undermines his credibility.
Jefferson Wright while the Somme was hardly Waterloo it was nonetheless a shattering experience for the Germans as well.
I'm not sure what you are basing your argument on, but it certainly was not a victory by any means. Given the context of what he is talking about (casualty figures) the Somme offensive was the greatest loss of life ever experienced by the British Army, which is what I believe he was meaning to say.
The worst British defeat is widely regarded as the Fall of the city/colony of Singapore in January 1942. No greater number of British soldiers have surrendered than then.
Totally agree, the Somme inflicted high casualties on the German army as well as the British army and helped relieve pressure on Verdun. Without the Somme offensive, greater German reserves would have been available for use at Verdun and on other fronts including the east with unknown but dangerous consequences. If the Somme had been regarded at the time as a defeat, how can it be explained that attacks were kept up for several months pushing many miles behind the original front? One quibble, that phrase about lions led by donkeys goes back to the Crimean war and was also applied to Loos, a year before the Somme attack.
In reality, the governments of Great Britain and Germany not so different except the Brits had far more people under their heel (Indians, Irish, Nigerians, Kenyans, etc.).than
the Germans in fact more people under their heel than the Nazis did at their prime in 1941.
"Not wrong but they don't stand up to scrutiny."
Anyone with knowledge of WW1 knows the 29th Div was the last all regular formation Britain raised. It came from regulars who were serving in various colonies. You should have known that. The Somme (as a campaign, not just 1 July) was not a British defeat. 'The Somme was the muddy grave of the peacetime trained German army' according to one German officer. 'We must protect the men from another Somme' according to another. At the beginning of 1917 the Germans fell back to the Hindenburg line. The Somme was a victory but at great cost and not a decisive one.
It never felt like one
The Somme (as a campaign, not just 1 July) was not a British defeat... At the beginning of 1917 the Germans fell back to the Hindenburg line. The Somme was a victory but at great cost..."
That the Germans subsequently straightened out their line by giving up a useless salient and retiring to the Hindenberg Line is not remotely sufficient to turn the bloodletting into a British victory. From Wikipedia:
" Casualties and losses
British Empire c. 420,000[3][4][5]
French Third Republic c. 200,000[6][7][5]
German Empire 434,000-445,000[8][5][7]"
Germany didn't lose because it lost its peacetime-trained army. The successes (insufficient, but real) of the Ludendorf Offensives demonstrate what it was still capable of (but also the logistical limits on what was possible at the time), and it's not like its opponents had any more left of their pre-war armies. It lost because the success of the British blockade destroyed the legitimacy of the German regime. All the fighting on the Western Front after the trench systems became impermeable was a pointless sideshow with no "victories" of consequence before the will of the German Army to fight collapsed along with homefront morale.
Really enjoyed this lecture by Prof. Rosato. His comparison between Germany and Great Britain then and America and China today is uncanny, if not worrisome. However, it is not the first time there has been such potentially consequential power play: That the US and the Soviet Union did not blow us all to hell in a hand basket during the Cold War is remarkable! Prof. Stephen Pinker believes we're rather like ungrateful beneficiaries of what he calls the Long Peace we're enjoying -- a somewhat noticeable but silent march of human rationality and reason over barbarity. But, surely as the two great wars of the last century painfully remind us, there is nothing inevitable about peace or war. (The current war on terror is not any more rational or reasonable than any other before it?) Even in Pinker's own rosy conception our nature is made up of "four angels and five demons" -- a paradox whose only constant perhaps is to surprise us, one way or another.
Grovel! Grovel! Grovel! Is that what Americans expect, or even want?
If you're going to post I think I have a right to expect some clue as to what you might be talking about.
Thank you. Another interesting lecture.
The Kaiser was certainly militaristic. And the Veterans Of Germany not being militaristic makes little sense? Are they not all military to be a Veteran?
"Military" and "militaristic" are different words for a reason.
The 2 Moroccan Crisis.
*It all started in 1880, with the Treaty of Madrid, when honorable states guaranteed the independence of a 1,000-year old sovereign nation.*
Apparently, these signatures under "a scrap of paper" meant nothing when it came to the allure of territory and empires, as in the case of Italy ("appeased" with a free hand in Libya), and GB ("appeased" with a free hand in Egypt).
The so-called sovereignty of a little nation Morocco? Pfffft...who cares?
The independence of "poor little countries"? Nah. Just a "scrap of paper".
Concerning the "throwing away" of "little nations to the crocodile":
The independence of a thousand year old state was going to be thrown to wolves, intent on "carving it up" like Sunday roast.
These distinguished men in suites, who went to the best schools and always wore suites, had the choice between "dishonor or crisis".
*They chose dishonor, and got a crisis.*
I thought this talk was about 1915. He spends the whole time about the lead up to the war. Why couldn't they stop sending men to their death? In 1915 were the leaders on cruise control?
Having lost so many, they thought it was too late to turn back now. Well, of course they should have. But what politician, or for that matter, monarch in revolutionary times, wants to admit defeat when so much has already been lost? But I hear ya.
Are you confusing this talk ("...Intentions, Uncertainty and the Origins of World War I") with, say, the one titled "1915 -- An Ecstasy of Fumbling"?
Basically millions of men are dead, are we going to suffer this for nothing? Or try and at least make it ‘worth it’ ?? All nations suffered so much that they couldn’t accept anything other than a victory sadly .
Yeah, the more I study it, the more I come to the conclusion that WW1 could've been avoided with competent leadership.
Exactly. Incompetent, complacent leaders with poor communication with, and command and control of, their military and its generals, leading to bad decisions, or good decisions made or communicated too late and a rise in instability, uncertainty and mistrust.
You can skip the first 10 minutes and lose nothing important.
"something that was bound to happen?...", but the speaker argues otherwise. Try this thought on for size: it happened, therefore it was entirely inevitable. The French foreign policy elite was hot for war: via their post-1871 War policy of encirclement and revanche against the Germans. Serbia, esp. the Black Hand terrorists, were equally desperate for war: only way they could take down Austria-Hungary and enable their South Slav state. The Italians were eager to help carve up the tottering Austrian Empire. The Austrians were pessimistic but determined...to go down fighting and take the Serbs with them. Russia, bribed off by years of French military-economic largesse and then offered Constantinople and the Straits, were fearful but willing. The Germans, trapped in a tightening encirclement by Russia, France, and Britain, decided "now or never" and gave the Austrians a go-ahead to attack Serbia after the Serbian act of State terrorism at Sarajevo. And years before 1914 the English had thrown over their traditional ally, Germany, and lined up with France...enabling a Navy-enforced starvation blockade of Europe Central. The only remarkable thing is that the Great War didn't break out even earlier.
Excellent points, especially about the French resentment over getting their ass promptly kicked in the Franco-Prussian War.
The Serbians weren't so hot for war, otherwise they wouldn't have accepted the Austrian ultimatum
I would argue that WW1 was not inevitable, a better argument would be that WW1 was almost inevitable. From an abstract POV, nothing is inevitable. Different decisions, policies, leaders, etc could have changed everything
If the British 6 Divisions come in after the slaughter then their aid may be effective and psychological in the continuation of the war crisis..
Excellent presentation, I have read Terence Zuber’s “The Real German War Plan” and it was very informative.
I think Zuber goes too far in describing German operational thinking as defensive.
Offensive - defensive is probably a better description.
They didn't really want a anymore territory in Europe (being obsessed with Africa) but thought it better to fight a European War on other people's territory and not their own.
@@alanpennie
It was defensive in the sense it was a preemptive strike. Imagine a guy is threatening you and corners you, you would be justified in lashing out
Of course there was a Schleiffen Plan - and it was well discussed.
No there wasn't.
It was a fiction created by the German General Staff to scapegoat Moltke for the defeat at The Marne, or more exactly to exculpate themselves.
Moltke was formally responsible for the defeat but the German military system as a whole proved inadequate and bizarre excuses were devised to explain this away.
I think the problem is that the term Schlieffen Plan tends to get used as a synecdoche for German invasion of Belgium, because it's cooler and quicker to say.
It's somewhat objectionable, given the fictitious character of "The Plan", but maybe excusable if you're talking about 1915 and not 1914.
Some of the arguments and facts he presented were valids, but still, he missed the real point, history is made by a long process of different elements..German empire was built despite the Austrian Hungarian will, that ruled the German league until 1866, after the defeat against the Prussian, Bismark built on the Prussian Empire and 4 years after, consolidate his power against the other great continental power, France, felt, with some reason, one of the maximum obstacle to Germanic unity..More over, Bismark masterpiece, after helped Italians against Austria hungarian empire, they bond each other in a very strange alleance with Germany..When the new Kaiser Willelm took power and fired Bismark, the System of complicate alliance and strategies to isolate France from other nations felt.Russia Empire..crossed various crysis, but despite that he was a very grooving economic power, and he was in great competition for supremacy in the balcan against, the remains of ottoman empire, Austro hungarians, and new born Germanic empire...And still, nationalism, competition, spirit of revanche ( the Alsazia/Lorena)..The new century brought the competition for economical supremacy at the top, searchin for markets snd raw material, the europeans countries were constantly in a sort of costant attrition.and in each country the growth of the industrial economy brought to new social tension and the growth of socialist movement.. .but still the old world played an important role...the national tension inside the Austro/Hungarian empire, the irredentism in Italy (Trentino and venezia Giulia, still under Austria).. Well the reasons of world war 1 are a good mix of old and new stuff....The European powers still considered war a normal practice to solve conficts..they never have faced a war like this one before...they're still in thr XIX century...when they realized that it was completely another task..they failed in find out solutions...the only reasonable one should make the peace after the Xmas truce...but none, soldiers apart, has the courage to make the peace.
My information comes from my grandparents who were teenagers in 1914. They told me that Germany, the Kaiser was definitely building up the military and a lot of contemporary people thought that Germany army go to war at any time. The uncertainty was that nobody thought it would become a complete disaster.
Contra the speaker, Germany didn't start WWI. Some Germans thought they should go to war because they overestimated Russia and the pace of its buildup, but WWI started because Austria-Hungary decided to go to war with Serbia.
The more I read about the FWW, the more I believe it would have been far more merciful if France had collapsed in 1914
I literally just commented and you were the first in my feed. YES. If I could have a historical reset button I would reset August 3, 1914.
German militarism might still be a problem, but I can't see how that would manifest itself worse than it did. Hindsight goggles.
Or Germany.
Or Russia.
Or England.
What, like it did in second world war?
@@GuinessOriginal Ne German defeat in WWI, no Hitler. Something to be said for that.
*IT WAS A DIVINE RETRIBUTION*
Sorry. Never quite impressed with the historical analyses of political scientists. None of these empires were fully democratic as we understand the term. How many of the leaders were pacifists? How many of them were still committed to victorian ideals of empire? Let us not forget that the German empire had a large chunk of what had been Poland...
What's Poland got to do with your point?
Might want to avoid discussions of the current world order and US projection of power if you haven't thought critically about it. "The US should just ignore China and Russia and leave Japan, South Korea, Germany, Britain, and everyone else to fend for themselves because they can, and then we'll be super popular" is a dumb thought.
There is something to be said for the old strategy of "Walk softly -- and carry a big stick".
Trumpian
@@jehl1963 America stamps loudly whilst shouting and throwing bombs
US involvement in Ukraine has turned out well. Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, Vietnam, Korea, they were all brilliant. Well done America, well done. The British had an empire for 300 years and never managed successes like that
@@GuinessOriginal "US involvement in Ukraine has turned out well..."
For whom?
Is this guy British or from brooklyn?
Australian living in the New York I think
He makes some good points that question the validity of the war's causes (the commonly accepted ones).
But the rest of the lecture is full of mistakes, half-baked reasoning, and terrible conclusions. At 1:21:40 , he asserts Germany would've won had the U.S. not intervened. That's totally false. The German 1918 offensives had failed before U.S. troops truly became involved. And the British blockade was starving Germany; that alone meant Germany would lose (if not in 1918, certainly by 1919).
I agree. Germany would have won as none of the Entente would have had access to new resources. Brest-Litovsk would have given the Germans the resources.
His answer to the last question is quite interesting and, I believe, absolutely correct; Germany would have won WWI if the US had not entered the war. Germany had won on the Eastern Front, France was running out of men and with a collapsing morale, as shown with the mutinies and the UK did not have the money or the man-power to win it, or possibly even stop the 1918 offensive, without massive US help.
Given how the 20th century worked out, I don't know if that is good or bad. I don't believe the school that insists Germany was 'the bad guy' in WWI (unlike in the next war), is right. And a German dominated Europe would probably not have gone to war 20 years later nor have allowed the Bolsheviks to consolidate themselves. But this is all now 100+ year water under the bridge now of course.
I don't think that he's correct about the answer, Germany was suffering badly and at the end of its tether at the time of the Spring offensive. Most German soldiers thought of it was one last good throw of the dice, either they win with this attack or they lose the war. Obviously they lost in the end but most importantly they lost against french and British troops for the most part, not American. Amercans played an important part in the counter offensives leading into the 100 days, but German morale had already been broken with the failure of it's own offensive. Britain still had reserves of manpower left. Look at his slide about how many men are mobilised at the begining, comparing France and Britain, Britain has a larger population, but still fewer men mobilised than France. In addition The french mutinies had been quashed by the end of 1917 and even during them they were about refusing to go on seemingly pointless offensives, not about refusing to fight in general, although I have to admit the arrival of the americans was a factor in restoring morale so it's hard to say how they would have developed without american intervention.
That is just talking about the Western Front. In and around Salonika, the southern flank of the Central Powers collapses with the withdrawal of Bulgaria from the fighting, a front which sees no direct american contribtution, but is nevertheless critical to encouraging the German high command that their position is untenable.
I'm not saying the Allies would have definitely won hands down without American intervention, I just want to say that I think that it is far from a sure German victory if the Americans don't join.
The turning point was the second battle of the Marne, where very little Americans participated. The quick flux of troops to the front after the spring offensives came from the UK. Lloyd George had kept a huge reserve to starve Haig of troops so he couldn't launch more costly offensives. After the spring offensives he agreed to ship the troops over.
Also Austria-Hungary collapsed at Vittorio-Veneto and the way was open for the Italians and the army of Salonica to invade southern Germany. ALso 500-760 thousand Germans had already died of malnutrition and the kaiser was told they would face famine if the war didn't finish by winter.
That is why they threw everything they had at the spring offensives. They failed. The war was over. Even without American entry into the war.
But the French or the British could not have fought without money and material from the US.
Utter rubbish. This is John Mosier crap. The Germans were starving and out of raw materials. They were stretched to the breaking point. They would have lost regardless of the USA. But the Yanks sped it up a bit.
This analysis makes no sense at all. The German March attacks used the last soldiers in the German army willing and capable of offensive operations. Their aftermath had already been contained before significant numbers of Americans entered the line. After this, the German army's morale collapsed quickly. Germany's allies were starving and wanted out of the war. Germany was starving due to the British blockade. There is no possible way for Germany to "win". At best it could have staved off defeat for a bit longer. It's true that the French army was too weakened for large offensives by mid 1918 but the British army was not. On the contrary, it had mastered combined operations and the Germany army had no answer to British attacks. French morale was not collapsing. It collapsed in 1917 but it recovered. Look at the German navy. Ordered out on a "death ride", it mutinied. That's nothing to do with the Americans. It's to do with war weariness and hunger. Austria Hungary was falling apart internally. It was about to drop out regardless of the Americans. Bulgaria wanted out. As soon as that happened, all the large numbers of British and French soldiers in the Med would have become available for the Western front. Even without America, Germany couldn't avoid losing.
As usual the Americans arrive late and claim the all glory. Reality Germany was already beat the "Allies" and America rolled in to protect their money.
oh my gosh.
the NUMBER ONE question that has never been satisfactorily answered to this day.
what were the REAL intentions. the REAL agenda. the REAL purpose.
I just can't believe we fell for it.
or rather I can't believe that people at the time always think to themselves; "well the ramifications of what I'm doing now won't affect me today, so its worth it to me to sell out my entire species to have a good life for myself right now."
that's really what it's all about on an individual level if you think about it.
Lucky us we still reap the atrocity of the DMV
What's the dmv?
Self-contradictory argument on the “real” cause(s) of the war. At first you say it isn’t because the traditional reasons: alliances, arms/navy, imperialism, militarism... but rather it’s because the uncertainty of the opponents which led to competition or conflict... this doesn’t add or change the traditional narratives at all and the evidence used to refute it is narrowly confined and unnecessarily based upon common myths and revisionism. Domestic pacifism is not the same as a defensive foreign policy. Economic imperialism is stronger than direct military conflict and build up. And the consistent investment in defense and industry adds up overtime, especially when technology and investments compound over time.
The uncertainty principle doesn’t address anything directly on how, expect point out the nature of humans inability to predict the future when so influenced by the past.
@@Great-Documentaries yeh. This is basically the other side of the coin of those super illogical sjw teachers. This is the theological version.
But I will admit some of the points may have contributed...atleast to how the war was accepted at first by the masses.
Everyone wanted a war. The 2 wars that benefited the Serbs before this...really deluded people. They didnt understand the difference between similarly equal level nations in terms of tech, warring...vs. the multiple, "wars," to push imperialism. Against weaker opponents.
I wanna hear about what was in the history lessons for students in UK/France/Germany/Italy etc. BEFORE ww1 happened. It may explain a lot more about how ww1 happend.
Is there anyway to find out what the university...and/or,, even the k-12 equivalent students learned in history class? Was war overly romanticized?
I guess they weren't taught about the hell that was the USA civil war. Ironic that it was 50ish plus years before ww1...but served as a better indicator for what was to come..than the European conflicts around the same time
Very unconvincing arguments placed. Made it seem like a very weak lecture in general that had way more "ummm" than needed.
Agree on both points.
I’ve seen all the WW1 Museum videos in this series and read/annotated about 30 books on the topic of outbreak from 1880-1914.
This is by far the most misleading video in this series. I would take nearly all this casual conclusions with a skeptical eye.
I’m not doubting his quotes, just his analysis and conclusions.
His UNEXPECTED slide and comments are valid. So is 56:50 “Uncertainty [about allies] causing conflict” is valid but not innovative at all. Most analysts write about this.
At 53:30 he lays bare his lack of coherence of this topic.
But beyond what I (an serious AMATEUR historian) think of this, I have not seen any of the major historians citing Rosato as a source.
Good content, but I wish he would stop saying "right" after virtually every point.
An Americanism he soaked up I think. I dont think Brits say 'right' in the same way although I could be wrong.
Right?
Irritated you? Resolve your problem with some calming pills and focus on the delights of the speech.
Seems like the Italians successfully cloned John J. Mearsheimer. They did a perfect job!
Who are you talking about, Rossato? He's Australian
A lot of dead Italians would disagree with you.
"Um, Um, Um..."
This was not a very inspiring lecture. It shows that he has only spent six months studying the war, it’s lead up and what and how diplomacy failed. Not exactly with the assuredness of Nieburg or anyone of the historians who study this period. Very superficial unfortunately. If his argument had not been presented with such uncertainty it might have been convincing and I’m just not convinced. Got it, um… Given that he is a political scientist it stands to reason he might have focused on the failed diplomacy.
This is easier to listen to at 1.25x.
18:00 causes of the war, the assassination was just the trigger
43:20 Socialism, not militarism, franchise
53:55 Uncertainty due to instability, mistrust and paranoia causes conflict
58:00 parallels to today
Spratly Islands.....Japanese territory. The Spratlys are thousands of miles from Japan. Japan has no claim on them.
AS IF NOBODY NOWS THIS NARRATIVE?
If you already have a very large army (Germany, France) than 3% is a high rate of growth. If you have a very small army and you grow it the percentages will look much larger. The "Arms Race" was a Naval dreadnought Arms race. Rhis guy needs to go "back to school"
"The "Arms Race" was a Naval dreadnought Arms race."
No. It wasn't.
And a 3% rate of growth is only a 3% rate of growth.
Ok you are all going to get mad, but the problem was always Britain and France from the start... Britain had all the colonies , they gave France a small piece of the pie, but there just never was enough to go around for Germany. Germany wanted to be an upstart colonial power. If the British had let the French and Germans battle it out on the field it would have been a short war much like 1870. And I'm pretty sure Germany could have handled both France and russia. Britain is the real bad guy here. They always use propaganda to make someone the scapegoat. They still do it today. They also use America as their muscle. I blame Britain for everything even Hitler rising to power. If they had never made the Hohenzollern family give up the throne in Germany there would have never been the war of extermination in 1939 - 45. The only question is how could they have avoided the Bolsheviks rise to power? Well once again if Britain hadn't starved Germany out with the blockade, then Germany never would have been desperate enough to send Lenin back into Russia. Maybe America and the allies would have been in a better position to attack the communists if the war had been kept between Germany , France , and Russia , and Serbia. Idk... just food for thought.
Ex-lent...too bad Anglophobe American history and culture cares less about the truth and more about the British/
Why would anyone need a "better position" to be able to squelch the USSR in 1918?
What was lacking was the will to do so, not any deficit in "position".
As an antimilitarist, I like where he mentions that war hurt the military, near where he brings up Colin Powell wanting a 10 to 1 advantage. This brings up the opportunity for antimilitarist war, that is antimilitarist support for war for the purpose of hurting the military. Such a war with abortion banning Iran, could help protect abortion rights supporting Russia and North Korea, by depleting the US military against Iran, and Afghanistan, so that war weariness sets in before the militarists can attack North Korea or Russia, thus defending abortion rights on a worldwide basis. However one must wonder why US occupied Iraq, in 2004, was not covered by Roe in the same way as US occupied Puerto Rico and Guam; Hopefully US occupied Iran and Afghanistan will be; perhaps like US occupied Bahrain.
You seem to have abortion on the brain but I can't otherwise make any sense of what you you are trying to say.
stop bouncing around!
This has not aged well with respect to Ukraine & Russia commentary.