Jason Epstein on the First World War from his Review Essay “Always Time to Kill”
(Extracts selected and edited by
Library of Social Science)
John Keegan’s book, The First World War, is an invaluable summary of how (but not why) the destruction of Europe began, In the years preceding World War I, “It was inevitable that [relations] between all [countries] should be infused with suspicion and rivalry. Policy was guided not by the search for a secure means of averting conflict, but by the age-old quest for security in military superiority.” As in the case of the Greek city-states, the strategies of defense were inseparable from the preparations for war.
Keegan finds no insuperable diplomatic or political obstacles to peace in 1914. The explosive element was the military preparations themselves, undertaken routinely and in secret by the general staffs, often without consulting the diplomats or politicians. The nations of Europe went to war mindlessly as each general staff raised its degree of mobilization in response to the others until finally the kettle boiled over.
By the time war broke out the immediate cause—Austria’s demand that it be permitted to investigate the murder by a state-sponsored Serbian terrorist of the Austrian archduke on a visit to Sarajevo—was largely forgotten. Austria did not get around to attacking Serbia for another two years.
The governments of the original belligerents—Germany, Russia, France, Austria—claimed not without justification to be defending themselves preemptively against the others. Keegan shows that even Germany can be said to have acted defensively. Its invasion of France by way of Belgium was meant to protect its rear while it prepared to confront Russia.
Although political leaders were not enthusiastic, soon the crowds—aroused by the talk of war—were roaring in the streets. The momentum which had been building through years of peace was irresistible. The politicians could not stop it, not did they try. The war ignited itself. It was not the continuation of politics by other means. It was the abandonment of politics to the military and to the streets.
The mere existence of nation-states and their general staffs, not their irreconcilable differences, had given rise to the war—as if war-making had been the underlying function of these militarized tribes all along. In the streets of Berlin, St. Petersburg, Vienna, and Paris men and women, accompanied by martial music, were calling for the blood of people just like themselves of whom they had hardly been aware a month ago, and whom they had no reason to hate now. In St. Petersburg, women tore their dresses off and gave them to the troops. Parisian women showered the soldiers with kisses.
By late July events were beyond the control of politicians and would remain so for four bloody years. In his Advent sermon for 1915, the Bishop of London urged Englishmen to
kill Germans…to kill the good as well as the bad, to kill the young men as well the old,…to kill them lest the civilization of the world should itself be killed. As I have said a thousand times, I look upon it as a war for purity…for the principles of Christianity I look upon everyone who dies in it as a martyr.
A German religious journal printed a version of the Lord’s Prayer that began “Give us each day the enemy dead…” Before the rules of civilization could be restored, nine million people would be killed in battle and the aftershocks would reverberate into the following century. But Great Britain and Germany had no compelling reason to fight.
In 1914 Europe had not learned the price of industrialized war fought by huge conscript armies. The bishop’s war cry, which could have landed him in an asylum had he delivered it a year earlier, did not cost him his pulpit. Bloomsbury and some unions opposed the war, but the troops went to slaughter with the bishop’s best wishes and with wide public support.
In July 1914 millions of Europeans—including an exuberant Hitler, who can be seen in a famous photograph amid a throng of excited Bavarians in Munich’s Odeonsplatz—were demanding war despite widespread misgivings. Keegan shows that they had no compelling reason to fight. Yet they fought without stopping for four horrible years until the Germans ran out of manpower and quit. To this day no one can say with confidence why they fought—any more than one knows why the Greeks fought beneath the walls of Troy unless it is the nature of human beings to fight until they can fight no longer.
Aggressive war is a human trait that makes no adaptive sense. For the aggressor, the fruits of victory are often ephemeral and unintended. The Muslim conquest benefited the cities of Spain aesthetically but was ruinous to the Arab aggressors, who have yet to recover their self-confidence. The French would have been better off without Napoleon, whose bloody conquests came to nothing.
Had the United States found ways to share the continent with the native tribes instead of killing them like buffaloes, its people would be no less rich today. History teaches that prosperity rewards peace far more than it does war, but why since long before Homer have war and the preparation for war been the practice and peace only an illusion? We know why we play games, educate our young, and defend our cities. But “why,” in Keegan’s words, “did the states of Europe proceed as if in a dead march and a dialogue of the deaf, to the destruction of their continent and its civilization. |
|
|
|
In 1989, I was on the fourth floor of the Bobst library at NYU. Having read most of the books on Nazism, Hitler and the Holocaust, I drifted across the aisle and started browsing through the volumes on the First World War—and was astonished at what I discovered.
I was astonished—not only by the persistence and magnitude of the slaughter—but by the blasé way historians described what had occurred. It seemed as if mass murder was taken for granted: nothing special. At least the Holocaust evoked shock and bewilderment. But the extermination of 9 million human beings (most of them young men) evoked little amazement.
I began studying the topic more deeply, assuming historians would reveal the causes. What was so significant that could generate such massive slaughter? Of course, historians were able to trace how one event led to another. But why did the slaughter take place? Why was it necessary? Gradually, I realized historians were unable to answer these questions.
Orion and I were reading back issues of the New York Review of Books earlier this week—as a model for Library of Social Science Book Reviews—and came across a terrific article by Jason Epstein. In his review essay, Epstein poses several questions I have been thinking about during the past 25 years.
Reviewing John Keegan’s The First World War, Epstein conveys this great historian’s conclusion: that the nations of Europe (and the world) “had no compelling reason to fight.” Keegan asked: “Why did the states of Europe proceed as if in a dead march and a dialogue of the deaf, to the destruction of their continent and its civilization?” It is this question—and others like it—that we pose in this Newsletter, and through our Websites.
The most profound flaw in the thinking of historians and political scientists is their assumption of rationality. They proceed as if it is possible to identify “real reasons” for mass murder—and for the tendency of nation-states to proceed as if self-extermination was their objective.
Epstein cites a sermon presented by the Bishop of London in 1915, who urged Englishmen to
kill Germans…to kill the good as well as the bad, to kill the young men as well the old,…to kill them lest the civilization of the world should itself be killed. As I have said a thousand times, I look upon it as a war for purity…for the principles of Christianity. I look upon everyone who dies in it as a martyr.
The words in this brief passage (that easily could have come out of Hitler’s mouth) reveal several themes that have emerged from my research on collective forms of violence.
Warfare revolves around the idea that it is necessary to kill or destroy the enemy. There is blind passion in the Bishop’s words—he insists it is necessary to “kill Germans,” the “good as well as the bad,” the “young men as well as the old”. Why this belief that it necessary to kill—or kill off—each and every member of another nation or societal group?
Nations and enemies go together. It seems that one requires the other, almost as if nations need enemies in order to energize themselves—to stay alive. The nation’s identity seems to be dependent on its capacity to identify an enemy to hate, revile—and possibly kill.
The Bishop asserts that it is necessary to kill Germans “lest the civilization of the world should itself be killed.” I have found that the idea of “rescuing civilization” is central in generating warfare. War is not about “primitive aggression.” Rather, nations initiate acts of war when they imagine that the future of civilization is at stake.
Somehow, the other civilization (or group) is imagined to threaten the existence of one’s own civilization. This principle applies to contemporary political struggles—as well as the First World War. Warfare arises as a form of morality, or moral righteousness. The enemy Other is imagined to be acting to destroy one’s own society. Violent acts are therefore necessary—required.
Hitler explained, “We may be inhumane, but if we rescue Germany, we have performed the greatest deed in the world.” If you think about any case of political violence that you have studied or are familiar with, you will probably conclude that Hitler’s statement is applicable. Collective forms of violence are undertaken in the name of a rescue fantasy. “Yes, we are performing acts of inhumane violence. However, if our nation or society is to survive, we have no other choice but to undertake them.”
The Bishop’s war cry, Epstein observes, could have “landed him in an asylum” had he delivered it a year earlier. Warfare, it would appear, renders normal what in other circumstances would be judged insane. Outside the context of war, asking men to get out of trenches and to run into machine gun fire and artillery shells for four years—would be considered a form of insanity.
I worked with a psychiatrist in 1998 developing an all-day seminar on warfare. She was not a historian and was unfamiliar with the First World War. We were sitting on a couch watching Stanley Kubrick’s Paths of Glory (1957). When we came to the scene in which soldiers were compelled to get out of their trench and move into no man’s land—in the face of massive shelling (click the link to view the video), she jumped up from the couch and screamed, “It’s crazy. It’s insane.”
This, perhaps, is the normal or natural reaction of a human being who has not been socialized into the historical discourse on the First World War. And yes, what occurred between 1914 and 1918 was insane. However, we don’t like to say this. We shy away from acknowledging that insane forms of behavior are contained within the fabric of civilization.
What’s more, human beings to not seem to be ashamed of their proclivity toward mass murder and self-destruction. Leaders who are responsible for the deaths of millions of human beings often live to a ripe old age. Perhaps we are even proud of our willingness to kill and die for abstract ideas—our sacred ideals. It’s what distinguishes us from other animals.
Can we begin to “bracket” the ideology of warfare—to conceive of this institution as something other than who we are? Post-modernists have deconstructed nearly everything. However, the idea of warfare (and of the nation-state, which generates war) reigns supreme.
It is easy to be “against” war. However, we have yet to pose and answer fundamental questions: Precisely what is warfare? Why do we need it? Why have human beings become so attached to the idea or ideology of warfare? These are questions we seek to answer through our Library of Social Science Newsletter, our Ideologies of War website, and through Library of Social Science Book Reviews.
We may not be ready to conceive of warfare as an institutionalized form of insanity. So let’s say that warfare is like a dream that many people are having at once: a collective fantasy that has been embraced and called “reality.”
We hope you will join us in our project of working to awaken from the nightmare of history.
Best regards,
Richard Koenigsberg |