HIS242H1 Chapter 3: HIS242_Paxton_Ch3.docx
Document Summary
August 1914: more than 5million young men enlist without opposition. Popular animosities already enflamed: fanned by propaganda, nationalist intellectuals. Each government excels at portraying the other side as the aggressor. London: german shops damaged, german music dropped from orchestra programs, german sauerkraut renamed liberty cabbage , stories of belgian atrocities/execution of edith cavell (oct 1915) fuel animosity against germany. Germany: defence of german kultur against sly, mercantile english and decadent. France: defense of humanitarian liberty against the prussians. Austria-hungary: all ethnic groups rally enthusiastically against russia. Russia: summer 1914: near state of revolution, war is declared. Bourgeois: feeling of release from bourgeois restraints. Every european conflict since 1815 lasts but a few weeks. Belief that long war is impossible in an age when the existence of the nation is founded upon the uninterrupted continuation of trade and industry . Paul leroy-beaulieu calculates that war cannot last more than 6 months (math)
