by Sean Gabb
We missed a fine chance, back in 1918, to round up everyone responsible, from the King down, and to machine gun them all to death. Our present ruling class, I hope, would not be so lucky.
THE BATTLE OF BLENHEIM
by: Robert Southey (1774-1843)
IT was a summer evening,
Old Kaspar’s work was done,
And he before his cottage door
Was sitting in the sun,
And by him sported on the green
His little grandchild Wilhelmine.
She saw her brother Peterkin
Roll something large and round
Which he beside the rivulet
In playing there had found;
He came to ask what he had found,
That was so large, and smooth, and round.
Old Kaspar took it from the boy,
Who stood expectant by;
And then the old man shook his head,
And with a natural sigh,
“‘Tis some poor fellow’s skull,” said he,
“Who fell in the great victory.
“I find them in the garden,
For there’s many here about;
And often when I go to plough,
The ploughshare turns them out!
For many thousand men,” said he,
“Were slain in that great victory.”
“Now tell us what ’twas all about,”
Young Peterkin, he cries;
And little Wilhelmine looks up
With wonder-waiting eyes;
“Now tell us all about the war,
And what they fought each other for.”
“It was the English,” Kaspar cried,
“Who put the French to rout;
But what they fought each other for
I could not well make out;
But everybody said,” quoth he,
“That ’twas a famous victory.
“My father lived at Blenheim then,
Yon little stream hard by;
They burnt his dwelling to the ground,
And he was forced to fly;
So with his wife and child he fled,
Nor had he where to rest his head.
“With fire and sword the country round
Was wasted far and wide,
And many a childing mother then,
And new-born baby died;
But things like that, you know, must be
At every famous victory.
“They said it was a shocking sight
After the field was won;
For many thousand bodies here
Lay rotting in the sun;
But things like that, you know, must be
After a famous victory.
“Great praise the Duke of Marlbro’ won,
And our good Prince Eugene.”
“Why, ’twas a very wicked thing!”
Said little Wilhelmine.
“Nay … nay … my little girl,” quoth he,
“It was a famous victory.”
“And everybody praised the Duke
Who this great fight did win.”
“But what good came of it at last?”
Quoth little Peterkin.
“Why, that I cannot tell,” said he,
“But ’twas a famous victory.”
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yes, but don’t forget today is not remembrance sunday. nov 11th is a continental commemoration.
I think that, with all due respect, Sean is a little harsh on the British Ruling Class in 1918. The people to machine-gun to death would have been the continental-global-imperialist General-Staffs and foreign-ministry-apparatchiks of Prussia, Russia, France and Austria. Anong other fascist-imperialist-powers of the time, Holland had the good sense, as did Spain, to stay neutral. Bethmann-Hollweg I would have excluded from this punishment, for he saw the Writing on the Wall long before the others, and got scragged for his pains when even the Kaiser gave in supinely to his marine-warlords who brought the final destruction on Europe.
This was of course a failure of liberalism to contain continental pre-capitalist-barbarians, before it was too late.
Seems to me that part of the problem was a very common one in human nature, the Sunk Cost Fallacy. Every combatant initially expected an easy win. When that failed to materialise, it was every combatant’s best strategy to end the war. But so many men had already been lost, it had to continue so they had not “died in vain”.
But also, it was a last gasp of a political strategy; that of vast armies and plunder; that had served mankind since the dawn of civilisation. Liberalism had already been explaining since the 18th century that peaceful trade is always a better strategy, and for the first time in history had proved that scientifically to be the case. But old habits die hard.
Most people in fact still haven’t taken that lesson to heart. The pessimisitic side of myself fears that there is one last, great conflagration due to come before we finally learn the lesson. Government is still clinging to the old way; in fact is currently regressing rather than progressing. The EU for instance dreams of being a mighty old empire with a mighty old army; the belief in massive power blocs as a prerequisite to success is still as strong now as it was for the Romans or the Hittites.
I am ultimately a Utopian. I believe that the eventual future will be truly wonderful. But I fear a very rocky path still to come before our descendants get there.
So the British ruling class were to blame for Germany attempting to conquer Europe then?
The First World War was the result of Germany militarism attempting to subdue Europe into a Greater German Reich. The British response may well have been characterised by inefficiency and stupidity but it was as response to and defence against aggression by a dictatorial power.
(BTW, the blog is suggesting American spellings.)
It is hard to find any one side that was to more to blame than any other for the Great War. As for the American spellings, I didn’t even know we had a spell checker.
No, the moral equivalence cop out just won’t do.
The war would not have happened without German militaristic expansionism. The Germans were saturated in cod ideas of pseudo darwinistic conflict between nations and their destiny of dominating Europe.
You just have to read some of the letters and diaries written by ordinary Germans at the time to realise quite how deeply rooted this dangerous nonsense was.
And I’ve never experienced a spell checker here before and it appears to have been turned off again. A bit odd.
I didn’t know we had one! I’ll tell Michael.
“Dreadnaught” by Robert K Massie is good on the facts of Imperial Germany’s aspirations to be a world military power, based on the Prussian model of conquest in Europe.
Thank you DD, Just found an interview with R Massie about his book. http://www.booknotes.org/Watch/24896-1/Robert+Massie.aspx
Of course, Prussian miltarism arose largely as a response to Napoleonic imperlalism. Let’s not forget that England and Prussia were the allies at Waterloo.