The Purpose of the First World War: War Aims and Military Strategies

by Holger Afflerbach (Editor)

Overview

Nearly fourteen million people died during the First World War. But why, and for what reason? Already many contemporaries saw the Great War as a "pointless carnage" (Pope Benedict XV, 1917). Was there a point, at least in the eyes of the political and military decision makers? How did they justify the losses, and why did they not try to end the war earlier? In this volume twelve international specialists analyses and compares the hopes and expectations of the political and military leaders of the main belligerent countries and of their respective societies. It shows that the war aims adopted during the First World War were not, for the most part, the cause of the conflict, but a reaction to it, an attempt to give the tragedy a purpose - even if the consequence was to oblige the belligerents to go on fighting until victory. The volume tries to explain why - and for what - the contemporaries thought that they had to fight the Great War.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9783110435993
Publisher:	De Gruyter Oldenbourg
Publication date:	07/01/2015
Series:	Schriften des Historischen Kollegs , #91
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	268
Sales rank:	170,295
File size:	2 MB
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Holger Afflerbach, University of Leeds.