Author: Thomas Boghardt
Publisher: Naval Institute Press
ISBN: 1612511473
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 346
Book Description
By the winter of 1916/17, World War I had reached a deadlock. While the Allies commanded greater resources and fielded more soldiers than the Central Powers, German armies had penetrated deep into Russia and France, and tenaciously held on to their conquered empire. Hoping to break the stalemate on the western front, the exhausted Allies sought to bring the neutral United States into the conflict. A golden opportunity to force American intervention seemed at hand when British naval intelligence intercepted a secret telegram detailing a German alliance offer to Mexico. In it, Berlin’s foreign secretary, Arthur Zimmermann, offered his country’s support to Mexico for re-conquering “the lost territory in Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona” in exchange for a Mexican attack on the United States, should the latter enter the war on the side of the Allies. The British handed a copy of the Telegram to the American government, which in turn leaked it to the press. On March 1, 1917, the Telegram made headline news across the United States, and five weeks later, America entered World War I. Based on an examination of virtually all available German, British, and U.S. government records, this book presents the definitive account of the Telegram and questions many traditional views on the origins, cryptanalysis, and impact of the German alliance scheme. While the Telegram has often been described as the final step in a carefully planned German strategy to gain a foothold in the western hemisphere, this book argues that the scheme was a spontaneous initiative by a minor German foreign office official, which gained traction only because of a lack of supervision and coordination at the top echelon of the German government. On the other hand, the book argues, American and British secret services had collaborated closely since 1915 to bring the United States into the war, and the Telegram’s interception and disclosure represented the crowning achievement of this clandestine Anglo-American intelligence alliance. Moreover, the book explicitly challenges the widely accepted notion that the Telegram’s publication in the U.S. press rallied Americans for war. Instead, it contends that the Telegram divided the public by poisoning the debate over intervention, and by failing to offer peace-minded Americans a convincing rationale for supporting the war. The book also examines the Telegram’s effect on the memory of World War I through the twentieth century and beyond.
The Zimmermann Telegram
Author: Thomas Boghardt
Publisher: Naval Institute Press
ISBN: 1612511473
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 346
Book Description
By the winter of 1916/17, World War I had reached a deadlock. While the Allies commanded greater resources and fielded more soldiers than the Central Powers, German armies had penetrated deep into Russia and France, and tenaciously held on to their conquered empire. Hoping to break the stalemate on the western front, the exhausted Allies sought to bring the neutral United States into the conflict. A golden opportunity to force American intervention seemed at hand when British naval intelligence intercepted a secret telegram detailing a German alliance offer to Mexico. In it, Berlin’s foreign secretary, Arthur Zimmermann, offered his country’s support to Mexico for re-conquering “the lost territory in Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona” in exchange for a Mexican attack on the United States, should the latter enter the war on the side of the Allies. The British handed a copy of the Telegram to the American government, which in turn leaked it to the press. On March 1, 1917, the Telegram made headline news across the United States, and five weeks later, America entered World War I. Based on an examination of virtually all available German, British, and U.S. government records, this book presents the definitive account of the Telegram and questions many traditional views on the origins, cryptanalysis, and impact of the German alliance scheme. While the Telegram has often been described as the final step in a carefully planned German strategy to gain a foothold in the western hemisphere, this book argues that the scheme was a spontaneous initiative by a minor German foreign office official, which gained traction only because of a lack of supervision and coordination at the top echelon of the German government. On the other hand, the book argues, American and British secret services had collaborated closely since 1915 to bring the United States into the war, and the Telegram’s interception and disclosure represented the crowning achievement of this clandestine Anglo-American intelligence alliance. Moreover, the book explicitly challenges the widely accepted notion that the Telegram’s publication in the U.S. press rallied Americans for war. Instead, it contends that the Telegram divided the public by poisoning the debate over intervention, and by failing to offer peace-minded Americans a convincing rationale for supporting the war. The book also examines the Telegram’s effect on the memory of World War I through the twentieth century and beyond.
Publisher: Naval Institute Press
ISBN: 1612511473
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 346
Book Description
By the winter of 1916/17, World War I had reached a deadlock. While the Allies commanded greater resources and fielded more soldiers than the Central Powers, German armies had penetrated deep into Russia and France, and tenaciously held on to their conquered empire. Hoping to break the stalemate on the western front, the exhausted Allies sought to bring the neutral United States into the conflict. A golden opportunity to force American intervention seemed at hand when British naval intelligence intercepted a secret telegram detailing a German alliance offer to Mexico. In it, Berlin’s foreign secretary, Arthur Zimmermann, offered his country’s support to Mexico for re-conquering “the lost territory in Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona” in exchange for a Mexican attack on the United States, should the latter enter the war on the side of the Allies. The British handed a copy of the Telegram to the American government, which in turn leaked it to the press. On March 1, 1917, the Telegram made headline news across the United States, and five weeks later, America entered World War I. Based on an examination of virtually all available German, British, and U.S. government records, this book presents the definitive account of the Telegram and questions many traditional views on the origins, cryptanalysis, and impact of the German alliance scheme. While the Telegram has often been described as the final step in a carefully planned German strategy to gain a foothold in the western hemisphere, this book argues that the scheme was a spontaneous initiative by a minor German foreign office official, which gained traction only because of a lack of supervision and coordination at the top echelon of the German government. On the other hand, the book argues, American and British secret services had collaborated closely since 1915 to bring the United States into the war, and the Telegram’s interception and disclosure represented the crowning achievement of this clandestine Anglo-American intelligence alliance. Moreover, the book explicitly challenges the widely accepted notion that the Telegram’s publication in the U.S. press rallied Americans for war. Instead, it contends that the Telegram divided the public by poisoning the debate over intervention, and by failing to offer peace-minded Americans a convincing rationale for supporting the war. The book also examines the Telegram’s effect on the memory of World War I through the twentieth century and beyond.
Absolute Destruction
Author: Isabel V. Hull
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 080146708X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 399
Book Description
In a book that is at once a major contribution to modern European history and a cautionary tale for today, Isabel V. Hull argues that the routines and practices of the Imperial German Army, unchecked by effective civilian institutions, increasingly sought the absolute destruction of its enemies as the only guarantee of the nation's security. So deeply embedded were the assumptions and procedures of this distinctively German military culture that the Army, in its drive to annihilate the enemy military, did not shrink from the utter destruction of civilian property and lives. Carried to its extreme, the logic of "military necessity" found real security only in extremities of destruction, in the "silence of the graveyard."Hull begins with a dramatic account, based on fresh archival work, of the German Army's slide from administrative murder to genocide in German Southwest Africa (1904–7). The author then moves back to 1870 and the war that inaugurated the Imperial era in German history, and analyzes the genesis and nature of this specifically German military culture and its operations in colonial warfare. In the First World War the routines perfected in the colonies were visited upon European populations. Hull focuses on one set of cases (Belgium and northern France) in which the transition to total destruction was checked (if barely) and on another (Armenia) in which "military necessity" caused Germany to accept its ally's genocidal policies even after these became militarily counterproductive. She then turns to the Endkampf (1918), the German General Staff's plan to achieve victory in the Great War even if the homeland were destroyed in the process—a seemingly insane campaign that completes the logic of this deeply institutionalized set of military routines and practices. Hull concludes by speculating on the role of this distinctive military culture in National Socialism's military and racial policies.Absolute Destruction has serious implications for the nature of warmaking in any modern power. At its heart is a warning about the blindness of bureaucratic routines, especially when those bureaucracies command the instruments of mass death.
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 080146708X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 399
Book Description
In a book that is at once a major contribution to modern European history and a cautionary tale for today, Isabel V. Hull argues that the routines and practices of the Imperial German Army, unchecked by effective civilian institutions, increasingly sought the absolute destruction of its enemies as the only guarantee of the nation's security. So deeply embedded were the assumptions and procedures of this distinctively German military culture that the Army, in its drive to annihilate the enemy military, did not shrink from the utter destruction of civilian property and lives. Carried to its extreme, the logic of "military necessity" found real security only in extremities of destruction, in the "silence of the graveyard."Hull begins with a dramatic account, based on fresh archival work, of the German Army's slide from administrative murder to genocide in German Southwest Africa (1904–7). The author then moves back to 1870 and the war that inaugurated the Imperial era in German history, and analyzes the genesis and nature of this specifically German military culture and its operations in colonial warfare. In the First World War the routines perfected in the colonies were visited upon European populations. Hull focuses on one set of cases (Belgium and northern France) in which the transition to total destruction was checked (if barely) and on another (Armenia) in which "military necessity" caused Germany to accept its ally's genocidal policies even after these became militarily counterproductive. She then turns to the Endkampf (1918), the German General Staff's plan to achieve victory in the Great War even if the homeland were destroyed in the process—a seemingly insane campaign that completes the logic of this deeply institutionalized set of military routines and practices. Hull concludes by speculating on the role of this distinctive military culture in National Socialism's military and racial policies.Absolute Destruction has serious implications for the nature of warmaking in any modern power. At its heart is a warning about the blindness of bureaucratic routines, especially when those bureaucracies command the instruments of mass death.
Catalogue of the War Office Library
Author: Great Britain. War Office. Library
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Great Britain
Languages : en
Pages : 1446
Book Description
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Great Britain
Languages : en
Pages : 1446
Book Description
The Government and Administration of Germany
Author: Frederick Frank Blachly
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 800
Book Description
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 800
Book Description
Great War, Total War
Author: Roger Chickering
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521773522
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 544
Book Description
World War I was the first large-scale industrialized military conflict, and it led to the concept of total war. The essays in this volume analyze the experience of the war in light of this concept's implications, in particular the erosion of distinctions between the military and civilian spheres.
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521773522
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 544
Book Description
World War I was the first large-scale industrialized military conflict, and it led to the concept of total war. The essays in this volume analyze the experience of the war in light of this concept's implications, in particular the erosion of distinctions between the military and civilian spheres.
The Library Catalogs of the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace, Stanford University
Author: Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : International relations
Languages : en
Pages : 884
Book Description
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : International relations
Languages : en
Pages : 884
Book Description
Total Warfare and Compulsory Labor
Author: Robert B. Armeson
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 9401510717
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 165
Book Description
During the latter half of the nineteenth century tremendous economic, technological, and scientific developments took place in Western Europe as states shifted from predominantly agricultural to pre dominantly industrial economies. As a result of these changes, the nature of warfare altered. The First World War was not simply a struggle between the armed forces of belligerent nations. It was a total war which Ultimately involved all the forces in the nations on a scale and with an intensity which mankind had never before experienced. Total warfare demanded the entire strength of the nation. In Germany the transition to total warfare began earliest and went furthest. Even there it was born not in the early days of the fighting, but only after the conflict extended beyond the period originally antici pated. By mid-I916, the struggle had turned essentially into a battle of material, and it became apparent that its economic and technical aspects were more important than the purely military. An ever greater production of war-essential goods became the paramount need. Germany's armed forces had grown to an unprecedented size, but each man in the military service represented at the same time an increase in the need for supplies and a decrease in the productive labor force. The crux of the problem was the manpower shortage.
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 9401510717
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 165
Book Description
During the latter half of the nineteenth century tremendous economic, technological, and scientific developments took place in Western Europe as states shifted from predominantly agricultural to pre dominantly industrial economies. As a result of these changes, the nature of warfare altered. The First World War was not simply a struggle between the armed forces of belligerent nations. It was a total war which Ultimately involved all the forces in the nations on a scale and with an intensity which mankind had never before experienced. Total warfare demanded the entire strength of the nation. In Germany the transition to total warfare began earliest and went furthest. Even there it was born not in the early days of the fighting, but only after the conflict extended beyond the period originally antici pated. By mid-I916, the struggle had turned essentially into a battle of material, and it became apparent that its economic and technical aspects were more important than the purely military. An ever greater production of war-essential goods became the paramount need. Germany's armed forces had grown to an unprecedented size, but each man in the military service represented at the same time an increase in the need for supplies and a decrease in the productive labor force. The crux of the problem was the manpower shortage.
Major Controversies of Contemporary History
Author: Jacques De Launay
Publisher: Elsevier
ISBN: 1483164519
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 344
Book Description
Major Controversies of Contemporary History provides a detailed analysis of all published sources concerning the major controversies of contemporary history. This book presents the various works dealing with contemporary history covering the period 1914 to 1945. Organized into three parts encompassing 13 chapters, this book begins with an overview of the complicity of the Serbian government in the Sarajevo outrage on June 28, 1914. This text then discusses the Austro–Hungarian declaration of war on Serbia, taking into account the risk of Russian intervention. Other chapters consider the significant role that the Russian chief of general staff plays in the decision to announce general mobilizations. This book discusses as well the nature of the plans for a preventive war during the period 1933–1934. The final chapter deals with the Potsdam Conference in 1945, wherein the agenda includes the drafting of the peace treaty, the occupation of Germany, and the political organization of liberated Europe. This book is a valuable resource for historians and students.
Publisher: Elsevier
ISBN: 1483164519
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 344
Book Description
Major Controversies of Contemporary History provides a detailed analysis of all published sources concerning the major controversies of contemporary history. This book presents the various works dealing with contemporary history covering the period 1914 to 1945. Organized into three parts encompassing 13 chapters, this book begins with an overview of the complicity of the Serbian government in the Sarajevo outrage on June 28, 1914. This text then discusses the Austro–Hungarian declaration of war on Serbia, taking into account the risk of Russian intervention. Other chapters consider the significant role that the Russian chief of general staff plays in the decision to announce general mobilizations. This book discusses as well the nature of the plans for a preventive war during the period 1933–1934. The final chapter deals with the Potsdam Conference in 1945, wherein the agenda includes the drafting of the peace treaty, the occupation of Germany, and the political organization of liberated Europe. This book is a valuable resource for historians and students.
"Medicine on a Grand Scale"
Author: Ian F. McNeely
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Liberalism
Languages : en
Pages : 126
Book Description
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Liberalism
Languages : en
Pages : 126
Book Description
Germany's Drive to the West (Drang Nach Westen)
Author: Hans W. Gatzke
Publisher: JHU Press
ISBN: 1421431947
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 355
Book Description
Originally published in 1950. Hans Gatzke analyzes Germany's ambitions to expand westward during World War I. Germany's wartime plans for expansion to the west had important repercussions at home and abroad. Gatzke proceeds chronologically, starting with the German political parties' outlining of their war aims. Gatzke claims that a combination of interests, including those of industrialists, pan-Germans, the parties of the Right, and the Supreme Command was responsible for the stubborn propagation of Germany's large war aims, which condemned the German people to remain at war until the bitter end. Each of these forces had its own particular reasons for wanting to hold out for far-reaching territorial gains, yet one aim that most of them had in common was ensuring, through a successful peace settlement, the continuation of the existing order, to their own advantage and to the political and economic detriment of the majority of the German people.
Publisher: JHU Press
ISBN: 1421431947
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 355
Book Description
Originally published in 1950. Hans Gatzke analyzes Germany's ambitions to expand westward during World War I. Germany's wartime plans for expansion to the west had important repercussions at home and abroad. Gatzke proceeds chronologically, starting with the German political parties' outlining of their war aims. Gatzke claims that a combination of interests, including those of industrialists, pan-Germans, the parties of the Right, and the Supreme Command was responsible for the stubborn propagation of Germany's large war aims, which condemned the German people to remain at war until the bitter end. Each of these forces had its own particular reasons for wanting to hold out for far-reaching territorial gains, yet one aim that most of them had in common was ensuring, through a successful peace settlement, the continuation of the existing order, to their own advantage and to the political and economic detriment of the majority of the German people.