it's the great British trench off!

So here's an outline of what the BBC is going to do for next year's Great War centenary. Some good bits in there, but overall you have this great, swirly mist of miscellaneous content, a bit like the first gas attack at Loos. And I'm really not looking forward to people who'd basically rather the literature was more like Storm of Steel than Goodbye to All That getting all regretful about how people simply won't follow their natural leaders into the machine guns any more.  And Jesus, people, quantity isn't the same thing as respect.

having said that, my wishlist would include items on:

the Tip and Run war in East Africa

the role the war played in the rise of Fascism, Communism or both. The Stab in the Back. 'We saw power lying in the street and picked it up'. I'm seeing Adam Curtis for this.

'what's wrong with our bloody ships?' there appears to be nothing about the Navy in this whole thing.

They all died together: the Pals battalions.

An investigation, based on recruitment/conscription records, of the actual physical state of the British male back in the glory years of the British Empire. How come we could staff entire battalions with men under 5'3''.

Well, that's just off the top of my head and I can see that none of these will necessarily Bring Us All Together. But how about you lot? 

Comments

[Chris Williams]

Jamie, I agree with your wish list. My own involves: heritage of control systems; massive British empire; death of free trade; Ludendorff was a bigger bastard than Hitler (yes, Curtis would be good); the British West Indies Regiment; triage; 'Oh what a lovely metaphor for war in general'; internal combustion engines.

After reading the BBC flyer, I would also dearly love to add a third, Zimmerwald, voice to the face-off between Ferguson ("Preserve British power by letting Europe suffer under the German boot") and Hastings ("Preserve British power by fighting war of millions"). Also, I don't think that there's enough 'Haig was not incompetent - put his name back on the poppies already' in it - I was thinking there would be more.

Reading between the lines, I think that the Pals will be in there.

[des von bladet]

All I want is an unabridged costume drama adaptation of The Good Soldier Švejk, played in the original languages.

That's not too much to ask, is it?

[ajay]

getting all regretful about how people simply won't follow their natural leaders into the machine guns any more.

This is one of the things that irritates me most about the elegiac witterings of interwar writers like F. Scott Fitzgerald; it is demonstrably not the case that 1914-18 put the Europeans off war in any meaningful way. All the nations that took heavy casualties in the First World War were quite ready to get involved in the Second, and the ones that took the heaviest casualties in WW1 were actually the ones that started WW2.

[Phil]

Zimmerwald for sure - and what led to it; the fact that whether or not to vote war credits was a live issue gets rather lost in retrospect. The impact of the War on the Left generally would be interesting - you wouldn't have to see it from Lenin's standpoint. A few years down the line, the War was pretty awful for the radical Left in the USA (Debs and points left), what with marginalisation during and Wilson's Red Scare after.

I'll be interested to see what line they steer on the Haig, er, front - nobody seems to be arguing the revisionist line very hard, but nobody seems to be doing an Alan Clark/Joan Littlewood/Blackadder 4 on it either. (This may be a good thing. Or it may just mean they're skirting controversy.) Come to think of it, it probably says something that they're not taking the opportunity to repeat that Blackadder series.

More about the impact of the war at home would be good, particularly before conscription (i.e. for most of the duration) - I'm sure the Pals will be in there somewhere, but I didn't see the phrase 'white feather' anywhere. Another group of radicals the War did no favours in the short term were the WSPU, who suspended operations for the duration - both Emmeline & Christabel Pankhurst were militantly pro-war.

the role the war played in the rise of Fascism, Communism or both

Gods yes. They were still talking about the dangers of "'19ism" in Italy 60 years later (quite a significant year in Germany also). Also, the Croix de Feu. Also also, Fuller and the tank offensive that never was (needed), and the rise of British fascism that never ensued. (What-ifs are quite respectable these days, and that would be a great one.)

Good to see folk music in there - fingers crossed that they don't balls it up. Back at home, again, the war has a huge negative place in the folklore of folk - it was all horse-ploughing and maypoles before that, and nothing's ever been the same since (locus classicus). It'd be interesting to investigate that & see how much truth there is to it.

[guthrie]

I note this:
"It redrew the international map in a way which makes it impossible to understand recent history in the Balkans and Middle East without understanding the consequences of the Great War."

And think that would be a good thing. My memories of WW1 from school and Biggles books were basically about the western front and some Lawrence of Arabia. Reading up on it as an adult it turns out that there were entire new fronts, and a contribution to the end of the war was made by troops in Salonika who broke the Bulgarian army causing them to sue for peace which then put more pressure on the whatitsname empire. And so on.
It would be nice if they could do something about the collapse of the German high command too.

But I note they're going to employ Niall Ferguson, who is apparently an eminent historian. Great, snarking opportunities.

Or they could approach it through the massive improvements in various technologies that were undertaken/ forced on them as they struggled to find ways to break the deadlock of the trenches; that would surely allow a more balanced re-appraisal of the generals and their efforts. The importance of railways too, for funneling men to the right location on the front. Early X-ray vans.

Also given the timing, you can marry up 1944/45 with WW1 and ask what in the end of WW1 led to WW2? After all, people who served in WW1 were the ones who led in WW2, what had they learnt (or not) in the meantime?

[Marc Mulholland]

The World war and the break-up of the United Kingdom as then constituted; probably it will be left to that special interest on the other side of the Irish sea.

[chris y]

How in God's name does Niall Ferguson retain enough credibility to worm into a project like this? Hastings is a decent popular historian and Clark is a good choice, probably essential, but Ferguson is practically dribbling these days.

Which wasn't what I was going to say. Marc has said roughly what I was going to say. Also, the dominions, and the effect on their participation in the war on their relationship with Britain. Not to mention India.

[Richard J]

The World war and the break-up of the United Kingdom as then constituted; probably it will be left to that special interest on the other side of the Irish sea.

Where exactly Home Rule and the Curragh Mutiny would have ended up is an interesting counter-factual I freely admit to having approximately 0% of sufficient knowledge to speculate on.

[BenF]

He sells lots of books, Chris Y. Therefore, expertise.

[dsquared]

I'd like to see something done on the Maud Allan/"Cult of the Clitoris" case. It was a massive news story of the time (and serious historical work still needs to be done on the extent to which it might have been meant as the opening salvoes of a generals' coup against Lloyd George), but it's kind of faded away and these days only seems to be remembered by conspiracy nuts and Oscar Wilde obsessives.

[Johnf]

Basil Liddell Hart's brief fighting career, being blown to pieces on the first day of the Somme - most of his battalion being wiped out - resulting in him devising forms of warfare that did not involve so many casualties resulting in German Blitzkrieg all across Europe.

[Chris Williams]

Chancers and shysters, often linked with naval aviation. Yes. The interesting thing about the Maud Allen trial is that in Paris that kind of thing was actually going on: Bottomley wasn't completely chancing it by inventing a British version.

Um, does anyone want to (meet up and?) help me draft the pitch for this series? <-serious question. If I can't get TV, there's a chance I could attempt to regain control of 'Things We Forgot to Remember' for a WW1-themed series.

[Stephen]

Curious that amongst the beeb outlets for #Trenchfest2014 BBC Scotland doesn't seem to figure.

Given that it seems everything in these parts, and most especially within Beeb Scotia, is seen through the prism of next years referendum, I wonder if there is a perception that celebrating Scotland's role in this glorious imperial escapade might be a wee bit controversial.

(It is an article of faith amongst nationalists that proportionately more Scots died in the war than from any other country because they were seen as expendable by their colonial overlords)

It's a real shame as there are some great home front programmes waiting to be made - it was during WW1 that Clydeside turned red - mass industrial unrest Mrs Barbour's army leading rent strikes etc.

[jamie]

Yes, Bottomley and Pemberton-Billing would be a good basis for a shopw about assorted chancers, rogues and jingos: it's probably the first war where we saw real synergy develop between those trades, not to mention 'hard faced men...' etc, etc

[Chris Williams]

Stephen - there's more, and more thoughtful - stuff on Scotland in the line-up, though it might not have made that summary.

[Phil]

It is an article of faith amongst nationalists that proportionately more Scots died in the war than from any other country

Not to mention those sons of Ulster marching towards the Somme.

[ajay]

It is an article of faith amongst nationalists that proportionately more Scots died in the war than from any other country

Only true if you forget Serbia.

Um, does anyone want to (meet up and?) help me draft the pitch for this series? <-serious question. If I can't get TV, there's a chance I could attempt to regain control of 'Things We Forgot to Remember' for a WW1-themed series.

... is this a trick question YES

[ajay]

For personal reasons, I think "The Indian Army in the Great War" would be a good one. Lots of Indian troops in the trenches.

[Chris Williams]

Ajay, NO. Although it is by no means a certainty that I can make anything come of it. I'm in London a couple of days next week (though on strike for one, and thus unwilling to do work, which this is) and also will be there to meet Brett 'Airminded' Holman around the 10th.

[Dan Hardie]

Jamie:' the role the war played in the rise of Fascism, Communism or both. The Stab in the Back. 'We saw power lying in the street and picked it up'. I'm seeing Adam Curtis for this.'

No, please. That mountebank Curtis is the last person I would ask to make a programme on any serious historical topic, bar (possibly) Oliver Stone and (definitely) Michael Gove's recently-departed SpAD. I really can't think of anything worse in cultural terms than asking a clown like that to introduce the nation's bright teenagers to the topics of fascism and Communism.

I know more about twentieth century history than Adam Bloody Curtis, and I'm merely someone with a decent undergraduate degree. Also, I don't have the odd - but, for a TV producer chasing ratings, rather convenient- habit of picking up one or two pieces of previously-unseen footage and pronouncing them to be devastating evidence which completely overturns the myths peddled for decades by propagandist governments and uncritical academic historians, yadda yadda yadda.

If we're looking for serious historians of the conflict, rather than former 'That's Life' personnel entirely deficient in critical thinking abilities, there are a lot of names.

David Stevenson is the leading expert on the pre-war diplomacy and arms race, and an authority on much of what happened during the war. His '1914-1918' is the very best synthesis of the war available: I'd recommend that you read it, but it will cut into the valuable time needed for watching 'The power of nightmares' again, just to appreciate all those subtleties.

Hew Strachan is one of the leading experts, or sometimes just the leading expert, on a whole host of the war's aspects (Africa; finance; religious belief; the Western Front), though he does sometimes have trouble boiling his knowledge down to a few intelligible theses. Norman Stone is still both more knowledgeable and more incisive else about the Eastern Front, though various means, not necessarily excluding force, will have to be used to keep him from making silly observations about Britain's ingratitude to Margaret Thatcher etc. Holger Herwig has written probably the best summary on Germany's war.

Stephen: 'It is an article of faith amongst nationalists that proportionately more Scots died in the war than from any other country'.

Oh God- have the SNP, or associated semi-intellectuals, picked up that belief as well? It's not true of the Scots. Precisely the same thing is believed by many Australians, and it's not true of them either. It may actually be true of the Serbs, whose casualties were horrific (but whose descendants put that memory, and others, into service to justify the commission of some horrors of their own).

[ajay]

I've never actually heard a nationalist claiming that of the Scots. It's pretty much true of the Serbs, given that they suffered casualties equal to 16% of their total population. (The Ottoman Empire was apparently slightly higher but I am not sure whether they should be included, given that a lot of those would be Armenians killed by the Turks, and including those in the total of Ottoman war dead seems like cheating.)

The BBC says "Scotland provided more men in proportion to population than any other part of Britain, and lost more men than any other country participating in the conflict with the exception of Turkey and Serbia, whose death-toll was exacerbated by disease" which seems a bit odd given that a lot of Scots soldiers would have died of disease too (more than died of Germans, anyway). What the BBC probably means by "disease" is "deliberate atrocity".

And 26% of Scots who enlisted died, which was significantly higher than the figure for the other Allied nations - even for France.

[Stephen]

I've never actually heard a nationalist claiming that of the Scots

Oh,they do. My knowledge is WW1 is very limited.. but my experience of the custom and practice of contemporary Scottish nationalism is extensive and wearying, including most recently(for business not pleasure)a four day immersion at SNP Conference at Perth.

In fairness most mean soldiers rather all war deaths (although I've encountered those who will even argue this patent absurdity)and when they say that Scots casualties were the highest what they really mean is "higher than England"

I've read that this is accounted for not so much that Scots were deemed more expendable than Mancunians or the 4th Worcestershire rifles or whoever but that more Scots joined up early and more Scots regiments were infantry than specialist like artillery etc and so liable to higher casualties.

I've no idea whether either of these propositions can be stood up - but I'm also aware that I'm in the presence of grown ups who know things .. are these plausible explanations?

[ajay]

I've read that this is accounted for not so much that Scots were deemed more expendable than Mancunians or the 4th Worcestershire rifles or whoever but that more Scots joined up early and more Scots regiments were infantry than specialist like artillery etc and so liable to higher casualties.

I've no idea whether either of these propositions can be stood up - but I'm also aware that I'm in the presence of grown ups who know things .. are these plausible explanations?

The 26% figure I gave is 26% of enlisted men being killed - so higher rates of enlistment wouldn't have affected that, though a tendency to go into the infantry rather than combat support and service arms would.

I've no idea whether the artillery, engineers etc. tended not to recruit from Scotland, and off the top of my head I can't think of a reason why they would - lots of miners in Scotland, after all, used to digging things; lots of industrial workers used to handling machinery; historically fairly high literacy rates, which is good for support troops. Didn't mean it didn't happen of course.

Higher enlistment rates would of course have led to higher casualty rates, and Scotland seems to have had a higher rate of volunteering for the Territorial Force at least - 5% of the eligible male population in 1914-15, against 3.4% in the UK as a whole.

[alle]

I think there should be at least a small documentary on the life and times of Tirpitz the Pig.

[Richard J]

I've read that this is accounted for not so much that Scots were deemed more expendable than Mancunians or the 4th Worcestershire rifles or whoever but that more Scots joined up early and more Scots regiments were infantry than specialist like artillery etc and so liable to higher casualties.

That certainly, I understand, explains the ANZAC casualty rate; they relied on the UK supply chain.

[Alex]

Also, artillery and engineer regiments aren't identifiable as Scottish by their title. You'd need actual data.

[Alex]

There's probably a good TV documentary about the monarchy and the Great War, because the monarchy was entirely redesigned as a result of it. It changed its name, invented a different role for itself, and started doing things like calling giant investitures in Glasgow football grounds to confer newly-introduced honours on distinguished model workers.

Speaking of changing your name from Battenberg to Mountbatten or SCG to Windsor, I want one about how really remarkable numbers of people had family ties to Germany and just edited it out of their past.

[nick s]

How in God's name does Niall Ferguson retain enough credibility to worm into a project like this?

Credibility doesn't count, meedja friends does. Fergie's hobby-horse about 1914 marks the point at which he stopped being a historian.

Hislop's four-parter on Great War memorials from 2005 would have made a good fit there, but it's not an exhausted topic, and better than Who Do You Think You Are?, at least.

I want one about how really remarkable numbers of people had family ties to Germany and just edited it out of their past.

Once the US entered the war, its German-language press (which was substantial in the flat middle of the country) pretty much went kaput. The effects in the UK were, I'd imagine, more subtle but not less significant.