Disputing disaster A sextet on the Great War

Anderson (emer., Univ. of California, Los Angeles) has written a singular interpretation of the causes of WW I through the eyes of six historians: from France (Pierre Renouvin), Italy (Luigi Albertini), Germany (Fritz Fischer), the UK (Keith Wilson), Australia (Christopher Clark), and the US (Paul Schroeder). Renouvin (1893--1974) asserted that Germany started the war by invading Belgium. Albertini (1871--1941) firmly supported Italy breaking the Triple Alliance (1882) and entering the war with the Allies. Fischer (1908--99) provoked controversy in West Germany when he declared Germany responsible for igniting WW I as part of the Schlieffen Plan (1892). Wilson (1944--2008) also firmly believed Germany started WW I. Clark (1960--), who famously wrote The Sleepwalkers (CH, Jan'14, 51-2877), believed Austria-Hungary and Serbia deserved greater responsibility. Schroeder (1927--2020) concentrated on European diplomacy from the Quadruple Alliance (1815) to the war's advent and felt that Metternich bore major responsibility for failed alliances that caused major uproars in Europe, leading to the Triple Alliance vs. the Entente. Anderson intermingles historical facts with arguments from the historians mentioned and incorporates internal debates on the war's historiography among other historians of their age. Ultimately, in July 1914, the major powers were more interested in defending and expanding their empires than in keeping the general peace. Summing Up: Recommended. Graduate students, faculty, and professionals. --Andrew Mark Mayer, emeritus, College of Staten Island/CUNY

An examination of the many approaches historians have taken to understanding the origins of the First World War. As British historian Anderson notes, thousands on thousands of books have been devoted to World War I. Yet only a small number concern the history of history--historiography, that is. Anderson considers six major historians whose work even well-read students of the Great War may not know. While many historians have viewed the war as inevitable, others as the result of a chain of errors, Anderson's sextet took a far more nuanced view and delivered far more intriguing interpretations of events. Some suggested, for instance, a causal chain that traces the war to England's arrangement with Russia that the czar could do much as he pleased in Central Asia as long as Russia left British India, the keystone of its empire, alone. In the view of conservative American historian Paul Schroeder, the war was at least in part due to the major European powers' undisguised desire to bring down the Habsburg Empire: "No actor in the system gave any thought to what the consequences of the deletion of Austro-Hungary from it were likely to be," Anderson writes. "Sensing this, Austro-Hungary rebelled against the system, only to bring itself down with the system." And it took plenty of lives down with it: Italian journalist and historian Luigi Albertini examined the reluctance of Italy, initially an ally of Germany and Austro-Hungary, to join in the war, only to do so 10 months after the outbreak in order to take part in the spoils; the result, thanks to the blusteringly inept chief of staff Luigi Cadorna, was the slaughter of the Italian army at Caporetto, "the most ignominious single defeat of any belligerent in the First World War." Provocative exploration of overlooked causes of a war that may or may not have been a historical inevitability. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.