Download or read book The Russian Origins of the First World War written by Sean McMeekin and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2013-05-06 with total page 345 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The catastrophe of the First World War, and the destruction, revolution, and enduring hostilities it wrought, make the issue of its origins a perennial puzzle. Since World War II, Germany has been viewed as the primary culprit. Now, in a major reinterpretation of the conflict, Sean McMeekin rejects the standard notions of the war’s beginning as either a Germano-Austrian preemptive strike or a “tragedy of miscalculation.” Instead, he proposes that the key to the outbreak of violence lies in St. Petersburg. It was Russian statesmen who unleashed the war through conscious policy decisions based on imperial ambitions in the Near East. Unlike their civilian counterparts in Berlin, who would have preferred to localize the Austro-Serbian conflict, Russian leaders desired a more general war so long as British participation was assured. The war of 1914 was launched at a propitious moment for harnessing the might of Britain and France to neutralize the German threat to Russia’s goal: partitioning the Ottoman Empire to ensure control of the Straits between the Black Sea and the Mediterranean. Nearly a century has passed since the guns fell silent on the western front. But in the lands of the former Ottoman Empire, World War I smolders still. Sunnis and Shiites, Arabs and Jews, and other regional antagonists continue fighting over the last scraps of the Ottoman inheritance. As we seek to make sense of these conflicts, McMeekin’s powerful exposé of Russia’s aims in the First World War will illuminate our understanding of the twentieth century.

Download or read book The Ottoman Endgame written by Sean McMeekin and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2016-10-04 with total page 577 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An astonishing retelling of twentieth-century history from the Ottoman perspective, delivering profound new insights into World War I and the contemporary Middle East Between 1911 and 1922, a series of wars would engulf the Ottoman Empire and its successor states, in which the central conflict, of course, is World War I—a story we think we know well. As Sean McMeekin shows us in this revelatory new history of what he calls the “wars of the Ottoman succession,” we know far less than we think. The Ottoman Endgame brings to light the entire strategic narrative that led to an unstable new order in postwar Middle East—much of which is still felt today. The Ottoman Endgame: War, Revolution, and the Making of the Modern Middle East draws from McMeekin’s years of groundbreaking research in newly opened Ottoman and Russian archives. With great storytelling flair, McMeekin makes new the epic stories we know from the Ottoman front, from Gallipoli to the exploits of Lawrence in Arabia, and introduces a vast range of new stories to Western readers. His accounts of the lead-up to World War I and the Ottoman Empire’s central role in the war itself offers an entirely new and deeper vision of the conflict. Harnessing not only Ottoman and Russian but also British, German, French, American, and Austro-Hungarian sources, the result is a truly pioneering work of scholarship that gives full justice to a multitiered war involving many belligerents. McMeekin also brilliantly reconceives our inherited Anglo-French understanding of the war’s outcome and the collapse of the empire that followed. The book chronicles the emergence of modern Turkey and the carve-up of the rest of the Ottoman Empire as it has never been told before, offering a new perspective on such issues as the ethno-religious bloodletting and forced population transfers which attended the breakup of empire, the Balfour Declaration, the toppling of the caliphate, and the partition of Iraq and Syria—bringing the contemporary consequences into clear focus. Every so often, a work of history completely reshapes our understanding of a subject of enormous historical and contemporary importance. The Ottoman Endgame is such a book, an instantly definitive and thrilling example of narrative history as high art.

Download or read book The Struggle for the Eurasian Borderlands written by Alfred J. Rieber and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2014-03-20 with total page 651 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores the Eurasian borderlands as contested 'shatter zones' which have generated some of the world's most significant conflicts. Analyzing the struggles of Habsburg, Russian, Ottoman, Iranian and Qing empires, Alfred J. Rieber surveys the period from the rise of the great multicultural, conquest empires in the late medieval/early modern period to their collapse in the early twentieth century. He charts how these empires expanded along moving, military frontiers, competing with one another in war, diplomacy and cultural practices, while the subjugated peoples of the borderlands strove to maintain their cultures and to defend their autonomy. The gradual and fragmentary adaptation of Western constitutional ideas, military reforms, cultural practices and economic penetration began to undermine these ruling ideologies and institutions, leading to the collapse of all five empires in revolution and war within little more than a decade between 1911 and 1923.

Download or read book The Library World written by and published by . This book was released on 1927 with total page 618 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Landings at Suvla Bay 1915 written by Michael J. Mortlock and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2015-03-21 with total page 251 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This work is an extensive analysis of the 1915 British landing at Suvla Bay, one of the most mismanaged and ineffective operations of World War I. Chapters examine the events that led to the landings on the Gallipoli peninsula, provide a comprehensive report on the landings themselves, and analyze the events and decisions contributing to their failure. Appendices provide first-hand accounts of the landings from period news articles, military documents and personal correspondence.

Download or read book Bulletin of the New York Public Library written by New York Public Library and published by . This book was released on 1928 with total page 954 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Includes its Report, 1896-19 .

Download or read book Researching World War I written by Robin Higham and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2003-12-30 with total page 493 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: World War I was the greatest cataclysm Europe had ever known, directly involving 61 million troops from 16 nations. Yet the history of the war and the reasons it started and spread so rapidly were vastly more complex than the players realized. Written by highly respected authorities, this book discusses the literature on all aspects of the war, making it an excellent starting point for anyone seeking guidance to the immense, and often daunting, body of World War I literature. The struggle mobilized manpower from home, troops from the colonies abroad, and—in most countries-women as well as men. Governments increasingly intervened in everyday life. New weapons and organizational structures were developed. Yet the history of the war and the reasons it started and spread so rapidly were vastly more complex than the players realized. Written by highly respected authorities, this book discusses the literature on all aspects of the war. Dennis Showalter's opening chapter covers the controversial issue of the war's origins—a complex subject that has been much debated by historians. Ensuing chapters consider the literature on each of the participating countries. The broader subjects of the war at sea and the war in the air are also covered. Daniel Beaver's final chapter discusses the mobilization of industry and the new military technology. This book is an excellent starting point for anyone seeking guidance to the immense, and often daunting, body of World War I literature.

Download or read book July 1914 written by Sean McMeekin and published by Basic Books. This book was released on 2014-04-29 with total page 482 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When a Serbian-backed assassin gunned down Archduke Franz Ferdinand in late June 1914, the world seemed unmoved. Even Ferdinand's own uncle, Franz Josef I, was notably ambivalent about the death of the Hapsburg heir, saying simply, "It is God's will." Certainly, there was nothing to suggest that the episode would lead to conflict -- much less a world war of such massive and horrific proportions that it would fundamentally reshape the course of human events. As acclaimed historian Sean McMeekin reveals in July 1914, World War I might have been avoided entirely had it not been for a small group of statesmen who, in the month after the assassination, plotted to use Ferdinand's murder as the trigger for a long-awaited showdown in Europe. The primary culprits, moreover, have long escaped blame. While most accounts of the war's outbreak place the bulk of responsibility on German and Austro-Hungarian militarism, McMeekin draws on surprising new evidence from archives across Europe to show that the worst offenders were actually to be found in Russia and France, whose belligerence and duplicity ensured that war was inevitable. Whether they plotted for war or rode the whirlwind nearly blind, each of the men involved -- from Austrian Foreign Minister Leopold von Berchtold and German Chancellor Bethmann Hollweg to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Sazonov and French president Raymond Poincaré- sought to capitalize on the fallout from Ferdinand's murder, unwittingly leading Europe toward the greatest cataclysm it had ever seen. A revolutionary account of the genesis of World War I, July 1914 tells the gripping story of Europe's countdown to war from the bloody opening act on June 28th to Britain's final plunge on August 4th, showing how a single month -- and a handful of men -- changed the course of the twentieth century.

Download or read book Library World written by and published by . This book was released on 1927 with total page 614 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book New Library World written by and published by . This book was released on 1928 with total page 318 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Russia Under the Last Tsar written by Theofanis G. Stavrou and published by U of Minnesota Press. This book was released on 1969-04 with total page 287 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The reign of Russia?s last tsar, Nicholas II, from 1894 to 1917, constitutes a period of continuing controversy among historians. Interesting in its own right, it is also a time of great importance to an understanding of the cataclysmic events which follo.

Download or read book Reputation and International Politics written by Jonathan Mercer and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2018-09-05 with total page 252 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: By approaching an important foreign policy issue from a new angle, Jonathan Mercer comes to a startling, controversial discovery: a nation's reputation is not worth fighting for. He presents the most comprehensive examination to date of what defines a reputation, when it is likely to emerge in international politics, and with what consequences. Mercer examines reputation formation in a series of crises before World War I. He tests competing arguments, one from deterrence theory, the other from social psychology, to see which better predicts and explains how reputations form. Extending his findings to address recent crises such as the Gulf War, he also considers how culture, gender, and nuclear weapons affect reputation. Throughout history, wars have been fought in the name of reputation. Mercer rebuts this politically powerful argument, shows that reputations form differently than we thought, and offers policy advice to decision-makers.

Download or read book The Russian Revolution written by Sean McMeekin and published by Basic Books. This book was released on 2017-05-30 with total page 496 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From an award-winning scholar comes this definitive, single-volume history that illuminates the tensions and transformations of the Russian Revolution. ​ In The Russian Revolution, acclaimed historian Sean McMeekin traces the events which ended Romanov rule, ushered the Bolsheviks into power, and introduced Communism to the world. Between 1917 and 1922, Russia underwent a complete and irreversible transformation. Taking advantage of the collapse of the Tsarist regime in the middle of World War I, the Bolsheviks staged a hostile takeover of the Russian Imperial Army, promoting mutinies and mass desertions of men in order to fulfill Lenin's program of turning the "imperialist war" into civil war. By the time the Bolsheviks had snuffed out the last resistance five years later, over 20 million people had died, and the Russian economy had collapsed so completely that Communism had to be temporarily abandoned. Still, Bolshevik rule was secure, owing to the new regime's monopoly on force, enabled by illicit arms deals signed with capitalist neighbors such as Germany and Sweden who sought to benefit-politically and economically-from the revolutionary chaos in Russia. Drawing on scores of previously untapped files from Russian archives and a range of other repositories in Europe, Turkey, and the United States, McMeekin delivers exciting, groundbreaking research about this turbulent era. The first comprehensive history of these momentous events in two decades, The Russian Revolution combines cutting-edge scholarship and a fast-paced narrative to shed new light on one of the most significant turning points of the twentieth century.

Download or read book Fateful years written by Sergei Dmitrievich Sazonov and published by . This book was released on 1928 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Fateful Years 1909 1916 written by Sergeĭ Dmitrievich Sazonov and published by London : Cape. This book was released on 1928 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book On the Path to Genocide written by Deborah Mayersen and published by Berghahn Books. This book was released on 2014-04-01 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why did the Armenian genocide erupt in Turkey in 1915, only seven years after the Armenian minority achieved civil equality for the first time in the history of the Ottoman Empire? How can we explain the Rwandan genocide occurring in 1994, after decades of relative peace and even cooperation between the Hutu majority and the Tutsi minority? Addressing the question of how the risk of genocide develops over time, On the Path to Genocide contributes to a better understand why genocide occurs when it does. It provides a comprehensive and comparative historical analysis of the factors that led to the 1915 Armenian genocide and the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, using fresh sources and perspectives that yield new insights into the history of the Armenian and Rwandan peoples. Finally, it also presents new research into constraints that inhibit genocide, and how they can be utilized to attempt the prevention of genocide in the future.

Download or read book Empires of the Sand written by Efraim Karsh and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2001-04-02 with total page 454 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The authors "show how the Hashemites played a decisive role in shaping present Middle Eastern boundaries and in hastening the collapse of Ottoman rule."--Jacket.