Just Finished Reading: The Vanquished – Why the First World War Failed to End, 1917-1923 by Robert Gerwarth (FP: 2016)

For those who had been there and had been fortunate enough to leave again it was known as the most dangerous place on Earth – Eastern Europe between 1917 and 1923. Whilst the victorious Powers of France, England and the USA returned to a state close enough to normal (or at least what passed for normal after 5 years of bloody conflict) those on the losing side as well as Italy with its “mutilated victory” descended into an era of political strife, uncertainty and civil war. With the great land Empires torn apart under the principle of ‘self-determination’ (largely undefined or even undefinable) the recently created and largely artificial new ‘nations’ attempted to solidify around a single ethnicity, culture or religion in a definable, defendable and rationale space – whilst often in direct conflict with their neigbours doing exactly the same thing. A few countries were relatively lucky with a historically agreed (and agreeable) border and a simple ethnic mix. Others, substantially less lucky, had borders than no army could defend and an ethnic mix so complex and so deeply historical that the locals themselves could not answer the simplest questions posed to them in plebiscites arranged in Paris. Families, neighbours, friends were torn asunder depending on church affiliation, accent or traditional dress. Before the ink was dry and the dust had time to settle the fighting started and before long the fighting was over something more than where a line was drawn on a map but who a people were and what kind of future – if any – they had in the new reality. Then it got nasty. Very nasty.

Across Russia revolution turned to Civil War, in Germany governments tottered on the edge of dissolution as Left fought Right in street battles and targeted political assassinations, in the Balkans where it all started a wave of ethnic ‘cleansing’ sept across the region resulting in mass expulsions and mass starvation. Further East in the remnants of the collapsing Ottoman Empire whilst the French and the British carved up vast areas to satisfy their imperial ambitions (and ignored by the anti-imperialist Americans) new forces arose to challenge the western narrative assumptions and began to fight back first against the victorious allies and then against the invading Greeks ending in the massacres of Smyrna as allied warships stood at anchor and did precisely nothing. The smug assertion that the war had ended in November 1918 was not even a sick joke to those in the East. They had forgotten how to laugh long before the war to end wars supposedly came to an end with a meaningless armistice ignored everywhere outside of the victorious powers. As the fighting rumbled on and countless lives were lost in massacre, famine, plague and political assassination the ground was being laid for an even greater conflict to come. One where the revolution stated in St Petersburg would engulf the world, were Germany would be vindicated and gain her rightful place in the world, where Italy would finally be given the empire and respect they deserved and where Japan would no longer be looked upon as inferior, foreign and sub-human.

Told with devastating frankness and with few punches pulled this is an eye-opening account of how the First World War most certainly did NOT end for the majority of Europeans (and beyond) in 1918 something I for one naively believed until fairly recently. The armistice may have stopped western armies fighting the central powers but it most certainly did not stop the fighting and destruction over huge tracks of land. It was not until a series of treaties signed in 1922 and 1923 that much of the fighting stopped simply because by then most of the survivors had, at least temporarily, managed to acquire most of what they wanted. A series of open sores across the world would need to be addressed by the new League of Nations once stability had been achieved which it had by 1926. Now, if only the nascent economic growth could be maintained for the next 10 years the world might have a chance to recover from its greatest calamity….. Whilst only 267 pages long this is still a heavy book (though by no means heavy going). I did feel more than once that I was wading through rivers of blood rather through words on a page but I guess that was the point. Vast in geographical scope it gives you an invaluable look at the disaster of World War One and why a mere 20 years later the world slipped into the Second World War. Unmissable for anyone interested in the end of one war, the beginning of the next and the often ignored turbulence in-between…. and for those who want more there’s a very impressive 62 page bibliography! Highly recommended to all 20th Century history buffs.