Another tranche of useful First World War links that I’ve come across in the last few days (this may happen quite a few times over the next few months);
John Newsinger writes in Socialist Worker on a history of war and nationalism. “The war was a clash of empires. Both the British and the German ruling classes were prepared for any number of dead and maimed to advance their imperial interests. And there was a lot of money to be made out of the conflict. This year we will see a cascade of patriotic froth surrounding the anniversary. David Cameron and his pals have decided to turn the centenary of the slaughter into an opportunity for a celebration of Britishness.”
The Guardian has a project for people to share their stories, memories and pictures.
A nice piece on the way the German people have changed the way they see the war. “In the minds of Europhobes and Spitfire reactionaries everywhere, we are still fighting the long great war. When it comes to Conservative politicians and the populist British media, we are still lions being fed unhistorical nonsense by donkeys.”
A descendant of Archduke Ferdinand asks us not to blame him for the war. I never did really, he didn’t ask to be assassinated – bt the arguments of the piece are good on how the war began I think.
A teacher, John Westmoreland, pulls open the way that the war is taught in schools. In particular he looks at whether the soldiers’ experiences of the war can be used for “patriotic” ends. “It is impossible to tell the soldiers’ story without recalling that the war was ended by protest against war. In Russia and Germany there was revolution. Central to those revolutions was opposition to war, imperialism and the system that ordered it. Soldiers across Europe turned their guns on their officers. I hope the apologists will include the British troops in this largely untold story. There were mutinies in the British army in Flanders, and when the government pledged arms and troops to fight against the Bolsheviks in Russia there was a ‘Hands off Russia’ campaign involving soldiers and sailors and this included a march to Downing Street. British troops sent to fight the Reds at Murmansk mutinied and some went over to the Bolsheviks.”
Buzzfeed is not my favourite kind of site, but it can be difficult to avoid. Here they have a series of 18 photos of the forgotten (Australian) ‘indigenous’ soldiers of the war. A very good photoset.