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Talking about World War 1 and it's semi-forgotten history


Hanes
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Today the armistice that ended hostilities in the first world war ended, did everyone just forget about it? I'll just copy something I wrote on FB and maybe we can discuss about it.

 

Today the 11th of november at the 11th hour the armistice took effect 100 years ago, ending hostilities in the first world war. The official end of the war was on the 28th of June, 1919 when the Treaty of Versailles was signed.

A basic rundown of the events is that Gavrilo Princip, a serbian nationalist, shot Franz Ferdinand who was the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne this made Austria-Hungary very mad so they sent a ultimatum to Serbia which they almost entirely accepted except for one thing "Allow Austria-Hungarian police to investigate within Serbian territory" or something like that. So Austria-Hungary declared war on them but the Russian Empire was an ally of Serbia so they declared war on Austria-Hungary but they themselves had an ally, the German Empire, which declared war on the Russian Empire and France because they were allied with Russia and would attack anyways; Germany approached the Schlieffen plan which was invade beligum to flank France and win like it's 1870 the problem was though that Belgium didn't just let them pass and the UK was pretty mad at Germany for attacking 1.- Their ally and 2.- a neutral nation.

So we now have the fighting scene and other countries would join in like the Ottoman Empire, Bulgaria, Greece, Some african nations, later on the war Italy etc.

The war was fought in trench warfare which means that in between 2 trenches there is no mans land and both teams assume defensive positions unitl either one side, surrenders or is overrun in one of the offensives, unluckily the weather was almost always bad, just rain and rain and rain so naturally the dirt turned into mud and there was lot of puddles this attracted rats which supposedly were the size of cats and there were also mites both of these carrying diseases.

There was a truce in between the war a few in fact, those truces weren't official though they were more of a cultural thing where both sides stopped fighting because of 1.- Snow 2.- Rain 3.- It's almost christmas. Fronts stopped fighting and germans and british (and other groups but british-german truces were the most common) got out of their trenches and had fun, play football or trade cigarettes in other words, Peace. However generals started firing artillery and disrupted the peace so no more truces until next year, but they were less common and there were no truces in 1916 and onwards.

And that's it. The war saw around 20 million dead and 21 wounded. The deats are almost 50/50 civilians and soldiers.

A more detailed description of what I just said: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dHSQAEam2yc&t=41s


Yeah it's a sad event, why isn't it remembered like the 2nd one? It was culturally and politically just as important.

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While I can never be 100% on this, the reason I think most people forgot WW1 is because there's no definitive good guy. Well, then why is Vietnam remembered you might say. Aside from the fact that it is more recent, the utter mess that it was will result in it being memorable as one of the first times the U.S.'s might began to crack a bit. Back to WW1, the war was started by what we would often consider an underdog action. A man thought his country was being oppressed and saw an opportunity to strike at those in action. Sides were drawn, but most of them were due to alliances. Germany didn't fight with other nations out of a "We need to ensure that we are the only race" kinda way, they did it due to their Austro-Hungarian allies. Both sides did some incredibly terrible things, but the basically everyone who has experienced this war, who isn't a child, is dead now. WW2 still has some men kicking, and it has the advantage of being a war of mainly big events. Adolf Hitler makes for an easily hate able villain, while leaders like Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin are infamous for their actions, with Italy being basically ignored due to incompetency (or at least perceived incompetency), and we'll get to Japan. The Holocaust, D-Day, the dropping of the Atomic Bombs. These are all events that are basically ingrained in our minds as big things and looked at with excruciating detail. It also has a lot of nuance, and smaller, very interesting parts that overall make it an easy war to get into, and an fun war to study. Meanwhile, back in WW1, both sides had rational for doing what they're doing, and there are still notable figures, good ol' Rasputin comes to mind, but not as many.

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I think the main reason WW2 is more remembered is simply because there are still people alive today who lived through it. If anyone who actually lived during WW1 is still alive today, they were likely too young to remember anything about it.

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Because (at least the way I see it) talking about WW1 at length starts a conversation that probably results in "okay yeah, pretty much all of these countries are the bad guys, and continued to be awful for decades after" and just generally result in a very anti-war, possibly anti-European sentiment.

and at the end of the day, nobody from the main belligerent countries in WW1 really wants to have that convo

or maybe I'm completely wrong, I dunno

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Well, if you were listening to media coverage here and in the UK over the last few weeks this has been a constant, quite often in relation to the wearing of the poppy (which is worn as a token in remembrance of those who dies. It's kind of ended up tied into other conflicts but I'm not going to go further in case it ends up too inflammatory) and specific commemorations for the 100th anniversary. There's .

I can see the US having less of a connection to it because they were involved in the latter half of the war and can't really say they were as much of a tide turner as they were in WW2.

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It also probably because of how it ended too. For the latter half of WW1, UK had the Easter Uprising in Ireland, while Russia had the revolution, and Germany had its socialist revolution as well, if I remember correctly. I wonder if the revolts kind of ended up being politically inconvenient events for the governments involved in war. At least in WW2, the Italians' revolt against Mussolini was seen as a stand against Fascism, which would be great  material to broadcast for the eventual victors.

In the case of Japan, they were situated away from all the main fighting, and also gained the former German colonies in the Pacific front with relatively few loss of lives, so that would be seen as non-eventful sidenote of history in relative terms. (Although Japan at Versailles afterwards was another matter.) Not to mention, it was yet another victory (out of three; and a relatively bloodless one too) for semi-modern Japan until WWII came around.

Edited by henrymidfields
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21 hours ago, henrymidfields said:

It also probably because of how it ended too. For the latter half of WW1, UK had the Easter Uprising in Ireland, while Russia had the revolution, and Germany had its socialist revolution as well, if I remember correctly. I wonder if the revolts kind of ended up being politically inconvenient events for the governments involved in war.

Well I can give an answer.

For the UK, the Easter Rising didn't have the intended impact at first, with the actual rising itself being a military failure after a week. However, in the aftermath the UK decided to execute the commanders of the rising, which pissed off most everyone in Ireland and the executions stopped at the 12th death (There's a story for each of the executions, I could go on there.). Pretty much everyone else was in prison over the next two years which didn't work out for the UK because they were in prison together and thus could plan what they'd do afterwards. After the war an election happened where a political party which had been calling for independence (the original Sinn Fein) swept Ireland and took most of the seats, who didn't sit in Westminster and made their own parliament in Ireland. After that the WoI happened and I could continue on but the point is that the Rising was inconvenient but not because of the Rising itself (hell, the Rising itself wasn't popular while it was going on).

Russia of course had two revolutions which led to them actually pulling out, so I certain would consider it inconvenient. I can't really speak in relation to Germany.

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23 hours ago, henrymidfields said:

It also probably because of how it ended too. For the latter half of WW1, UK had the Easter Uprising in Ireland, while Russia had the revolution, and Germany had its socialist revolution as well, if I remember correctly.

I know that the dissent that led to the rise of the national-socialist party in Germany during the 1930's started well before Hitler came into the political fray.  Though Germany had a smorgasbord of issues that pretty much ensured it could never sustain a war effort for very long - these issues persisting even in World War 2 when they were at the peak of their power.  About the only thing they had going for them was their ingenuity and cleverness in the methods they employed to bypass the limits of the Treaty of Versailles and the sheer magnitude of their hatred towards most of Europe and Jewish people causing them to commit shocking atrocities.

To put it simply, Germany was not big or powerful enough to ever last in a war with global super powers like Britain, Russia, and the U.S.  Though my history knowledge is a bit lacking in World War I, I have to wager that Germany was likely the most battered and beaten country involved in World War I along with France, which is also why Germany bore the brunt of the financial burden in the end.  And lo and behold, they were also horribly beaten in World War 2 as well, their capitol being reduced to a smoldering ruin and the Russians dragging the surrendering soldiers out of their hiding places among the ruins to either be executed or sent to gulags.

Honestly, Germany's kind of pathetic in the warmongering department.  They have the tactics and the weapons, but not the actual martial strength, numbers, resources, or grand strategy.  In fact, they may almost have gone too far in the weaponry department, just look at these monstrosities:

swgKWdd.pngms6ucrr.png

Look at these mortar targets - they, respectively, would've weighed 1,500 metric tonnes and 1,000 metric tonnes and stood at between 36-39 feet (or 11-12 meters) in height.  If you ever wonder what the inspiration for some outlandish fantasy tank/battleship is, just look at Germany's prototype "super heavy" tanks.  The second one in particular bears a strong resemblance to the Batomys from Valkyria Chronicles, with the ladders to climb up onto the damn thing and all those machine guns.

I know they were only prototypes, but they do offer quite a bit of insight into the design philosophy and general strategy for victory Germany had.  In the end, they found that lots of powerful weapons couldn't win a war, especially not for a country with dwindling resources and manpower.  To have a chance, they'd have to turn every piece of metal they had into a weapon and send every man, woman, and child to war.  Moral of the story, Germany's a weak country from a military standpoint, the only thing they're good at in that regard is production and invention, and they would always lose in a war of aggression against any of the ally powers no matter what they did.

 

Anyway, most of the forgetting is American-side because we didn't take much part in it.  We just sent in our dough boys to help relieve the European forces we sided with.

World War I was pretty frickin' terrible.  Not to diminish the atrocities that happened in the Holocaust, but chemical weapons were used a bit more liberally in the first World War.  And there was the trench warfare and messy, entangled web of political alliances.  The good thing is that because that war was so unbelievably awful, NATO countries adamantly try to avoid repeating it so we don't see things like chemical or trench warfare from them these days.

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I remembered. And my country was neutral during ww1 (we actually have a holiday in which children go from door to door to get candy on 11 november).

Whenever I think about World War 1, I think that this event was something that didn't just happen because a Bosnian student shot the crown prince but it was the result of a lot of things that played prior to it. The creation of the German empire, modern imperialism, social darwinism and the alliances. The death of Franz Ferdinand was just a good excuse to declare war.

I think that the lack of U.S. influence is something that is very important not only for the U.S.A. but also other country. Part of the reason why people feel involved in ww2 is because there are a lot of movies, series and documentaries that cover it. And many of these are American. For a very long time the U.S. was one of the few places where they had the resources to make big movies, series and documentaries, and since they were involved in ww2 it's something that many people have experiences with (direct or indirect) so it's something that will get a lot of attention (it's not like they don't make many movies about the ottoman empire just because it wasn't interesting). 

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On 11/21/2018 at 2:41 AM, Ertrick36 said:

World War I was pretty frickin' terrible.  Not to diminish the atrocities that happened in the Holocaust, but chemical weapons were used a bit more liberally in the first World War.  And there was the trench warfare and messy, entangled web of political alliances.  The good thing is that because that war was so unbelievably awful, NATO countries adamantly try to avoid repeating it so we don't see things like chemical or trench warfare from them these days.

Apparently, the Verdun area in France had intense fighting in general (and chemical weapons usage in particular) to such an extent, that many areas in/around Verdun are still off-limits/restricted today.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 20/11/2018 at 1:55 PM, LJwalhout said:

Whenever I think about World War 1, I think that this event was something that didn't just happen because a Bosnian student shot the crown prince but it was the result of a lot of things that played prior to it. The creation of the German empire, modern imperialism, social darwinism and the alliances. The death of Franz Ferdinand was just a good excuse to declare war.

Agreed. But it still wouldn't have happened with that serbian student.

On 20/11/2018 at 9:41 AM, Ertrick36 said:

Moral of the story, Germany's a weak country from a military standpoint, the only thing they're good at in that regard is production and invention, and they would always lose in a war of aggression against any of the ally powers no matter what they did.

If you're talking WWII then yes Germany had no way to secure victory.

In WWI however, the germans lost because their war style was a beatdown not HOI4 in real life, nonetheless they could have still won had Austria-Hungary's military budget been settled in 1904 I think? 10 years isn't enough for a complete reform to occur in military but when the war would start they would be able to defeat Serbia and not fail against Russia. Thus germany would be able to launch more effective assaults. Make no mistake though, those big guns were powerful and important and in WWI Germany's military was not weak.

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14 hours ago, Critical Sniper said:

Agreed. But it still wouldn't have happened with that serbian student.

I think that something else would have happened that would cause it in that case. There where a lot of alliances so that when two countries started a conflict, all countries would mobilize. War wasn't looked at the that it is today, many people saw it as some sort natural selection (basically, in war the strongest country would win and they would have the right to exist). This was due to many countries not having a huge conflict and the popularity of Social-darwism (which says that natural selection can be applied to nationalities/countries).

 

On 21-11-2018 at 6:17 PM, henrymidfields said:

Apparently, the Verdun area in France had intense fighting in general (and chemical weapons usage in particular) to such an extent, that many areas in/around Verdun are still off-limits/restricted today.

I went to that area last summer. I didn't see any of those signs but I did went to the huge mausoleum and cemetry that you see in some of the pictures. There is also a area nearby where they fought where you can walk. I made a picture of that area in case someone is curious (I made more but the post would be to large if I inserted them).

   

Spoiler

20180808_152443.thumb.jpg.7851a1b4edc90d6e2958d2f1be148fc4.jpg

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14 hours ago, Critical Sniper said:

Agreed. But it still wouldn't have happened with that serbian student.

I think that something else would have happened that would cause it in that case. There where a lot of alliances so that when two countries started a conflict, all countries would mobilize. War wasn't looked at the that it is today, many people saw it as some sort natural selection (basically, in war the strongest country would win and they would have the right to exist). This was due to many countries not having a huge conflict and the popularity of Social-darwism (which says that natural selection can be applied to nationalities/countries).

 

On 21-11-2018 at 6:17 PM, henrymidfields said:

Apparently, the Verdun area in France had intense fighting in general (and chemical weapons usage in particular) to such an extent, that many areas in/around Verdun are still off-limits/restricted today.

I went to that area last summer. I didn't see any of those signs but I did went to the huge mausoleum and cemetry that you see in some of the pictures. There is also a area nearby where they fought where you can walk. I made a picture of that area in case someone is curious (I made more but the post would be to large if I inserted them).

   

Spoiler

20180808_152443.thumb.jpg.7851a1b4edc90d6e2958d2f1be148fc4.jpg

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On 12/4/2018 at 4:38 AM, LJwalhout said:

War wasn't looked at the way that it is today

Ftfy. Besides that, basically it was thought of a great way to get chicks and a great honor to die for your country (I mean sort of the same today) and also cavalry charges were hyper-cool which is true but they are inneffective.

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On 6-12-2018 at 2:53 AM, Critical Sniper said:

Besides that, basically it was thought of a great way to get chicks and a great honor to die for your country

Wait, but if your dead you can't get chicks and when you're getting chicks you didn't die for your country so they failed either way.

But being serious for a moment the part of getting attention from women because you fought in the war is quite hard when parts of your body/face are blown off or mutilated. The 1st world was one of the first moments in history that plastic surgery was used on a grand scale and for good reason. I once saw a video in which they showed images of mutilated soldiers and let's just say that they still haunt me.

Speaking of being haunted, shellshock. Could also be a reason why you could have trouble with communicating with women (or anyone for that matter). The worst part is that people didn't know what it was so there are several cases in which soldiers where executed for being 'cowards'. 

On 6-12-2018 at 2:53 AM, Critical Sniper said:

cavalry charges were hyper-cool which is true but they are inneffective.

Reminds me of the movie War Horse (which is based on a stageplay, which based on a book). Don't know the details but I remember a cavalry charge somewhere in the movie. Should rewatch the movie.

Now I have a question. What are some good WW1 movies? I've seen many good WW2 movies but barely WW1 movies.

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1 minute ago, DarthR0xas said:

World War 1, or at least that's what is was originally about.

I'm rather confused, but thanks.  This thread title is clickbait, and if it wasn't for the fact that the discussion in here looks somewhat interesting, I'd close this thread on principle.

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1 hour ago, LJwalhout said:

But being serious for a moment the part of getting attention from women because you fought in the war is quite hard when parts of your body/face are blown off or mutilated. The 1st world was one of the first moments in history that plastic surgery was used on a grand scale and for good reason. I once saw a video in which they showed images of mutilated soldiers and let's just say that they still haunt me.

Speaking of being haunted, shellshock. Could also be a reason why you could have trouble with communicating with women (or anyone for that matter). The worst part is that people didn't know what it was so there are several cases in which soldiers where executed for being 'cowards'. 

Yeah that's why I say they still had an old school mentality where they thought it was a great honor without fully understanding the dangers of modern war. Plus social darwinism? 

1 hour ago, LJwalhout said:

Reminds me of the movie War Horse (which is based on a stageplay, which based on a book). Don't know the details but I remember a cavalry charge somewhere in the movie. Should rewatch the movie.

I might watch tha- wait! I did see that once with my grandpa although only a scene, yeah I think it's where the horses are hiding on some high grass and then they rush a german camp which falls back to a forest right?

 

1 hour ago, LJwalhout said:

Now I have a question. What are some good WW1 movies? I've seen many good WW2 movies but barely WW1 movies.

I'm not sure of any. Probably just documentaries out there.

 

40 minutes ago, eclipse said:

This thread title is clickbait, and if it wasn't for the fact that the discussion in here looks somewhat interesting, I'd close this thread on principle.

Oops I'm not sure if my intention was to make it clickbait. But it's still WW1 related isn't it?

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Just now, Critical Sniper said:

Oops I'm not sure if my intention was to make it clickbait. But it's still WW1 related isn't it?

First, ask yourself "what do I want this topic to be about?"  Then, change the topic title accordingly.  If the system doesn't let you, then please tell me what you want to change it to, and I'll take care of it.

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  • Hanes changed the title to Talking about World War 1 and it's semi-forgotten history
6 minutes ago, eclipse said:

First, ask yourself "what do I want this topic to be about?"  Then, change the topic title accordingly.  If the system doesn't let you, then please tell me what you want to change it to, and I'll take care of it.

Is that better?

 

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1 hour ago, Critical Sniper said:

Yeah that's why I say they still had an old school mentality where they thought it was a great honor without fully understanding the dangers of modern war. Plus social darwinism? 

Yes, and the fact that not many people had experienced war. Germany & France had the French-German war which was in 1870-1871 (43 years), England had the Second Boer war (12 years). I don't know the details about Austria-Hungary, Russia and the Ottoman Empire but I remember that there was some fighting in the Balkan like a few years years prior to WW1 and that the Ottoman empire was slowly dying from the inside so there were constantly wars there (Even during ww1) and you could make a whole thread on it's own about that (Armenian genocide comes to mind). Russia had a civil-war and I know nothing about Austria-Hungary. Most recruits are young people so they are even less likely to have experienced war.

Also most people where analphabetic so few wrote about their experiences in the war. The government was the only one who told stories about war.

 Social Darwinism truly is an ideology that perplexes me. You would think that Darwin started it but he didn't. I remember reading that he once said that by allowing his teachings to influence society we would lose our most distinctive quality, empathy. Another person who is known for social darwinism is Friedich Nietzsche with his master/slave moral (master moral is basically someone who does anything to reach his goals and mostly thinks about himself while slave moral is a reaction on master moral that demonizes these aspects and tells you to be kind, remember that this is the quick version and that you should read about it yourself before judging). But his philosophy was altered heavily by his sister after his death to look social darwinistic because she supported it (Nietzsche actual point of view is hard to know because he constantly changed opinion and became crazy at the end of his life). And her ideology eventually led to National Socialism which is something that Nietzsche would almost certainly oppose (he hated Germany).

Social darwinism was just a term that was thrown around and while it had some basic ideas it was never fleshed out, and nobody wanted anything to do with it after ww2 so now we are teached that it was this ideology that led to ww1 (it is the equivalent of what we nowadays call populism).

1 hour ago, Critical Sniper said:

I might watch tha- wait! I did see that once with my grandpa although only a scene, yeah I think it's where the horses are hiding on some high grass and then they rush a german camp which falls back to a forest right?

I don't remember. I only saw the beginning. Should watch it entirely.

1 hour ago, Critical Sniper said:

I'm not sure of any. Probably just documentaries out there.

Could watch some of those. Most war-documentaries are in public domain so they're easy to find. 

I hope that anyone understands all of this.

Edited by LJwalhout
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2 hours ago, LJwalhout said:

Germany & France had the French-German war which was in 1870-1871

Franco-Prussian war* We have to remember that a century and a half before Europe was a bigger mess than the balkan countries' diplomatic relationships with one another is today and it was even more so 2 and a half centuries ago with the Holy hot Mess of states.

2 hours ago, LJwalhout said:

Social darwinism was just a term that was thrown around and while it had some basic ideas it was never fleshed out, and nobody wanted anything to do with it after ww2 so now we are teached that it was this ideology that led to ww1 (it is the equivalent of what we nowadays call populism).

Oooooh so that's what populism is, damn Europe definitely teaches history differently because I never heard of such a thing as social darwinism until you just put it everywhere in this thread, , I had heard of populism but I never understood it because it was just taught as "Alright guys this is some ideology called populism and it affected many things including Mexico, talking about Mexico let's just talk of it's presence there in the 20th century where only one president made it relevant pretty much after both world wars when it wasn't even that important anymore".

EDIT: Notice how when you quoted me I said social darwinism with a question mark because I literally just learnt what it meant.

2 hours ago, LJwalhout said:

I don't remember. I only saw the beginning. Should watch it entirely.

I didn't see it all either just that scene so sorry for spoiling that to you :(

2 hours ago, LJwalhout said:

Could watch some of those. Most war-documentaries are in public domain so they're easy to find. 

Documentaries are so damn boring I can never watch them, even thoughI love history I always need a plate of food to keep me entertained otherwise I'm constantly checking the bar to see when the video ends and I just leave with the same general ideas I had before starting the documentary. Also what do you mean by Public domain?

2 hours ago, LJwalhout said:

I hope that anyone understands all of this.

I could change the title to "Critical Sniper and LJwalhout's public PMs about WW1 and you can join the discussion!"

Being more serious though, WW1 definitely is a hard to understand topic, basically everthing that John D Ruddy says holds true: WW1's start is a mess of alliances, it's sides are equal (mostly) in strength and morality and the ending is quite "anti-climatic". All of this being a contrast to WW2, which has an easy to follow start with a big bad inavsion and with the goody side and the baddy side being clearly evident and ending quite literally with a bang!

Although history itself is already a complicated topic to talk about, understand and explain in most scenarios.

EDIT2: Now that I think about it, I really only know about American and European history, I know a bit of Africa but no Asia. I wonder for how many people this is the case.


Finally there is this comment I really liked on a WW1 video which I think you should check out, search for the name "Márton Köves" with CTRL + F on this video and read his comment on Austria-Hungary since I definitely think it's worth reading. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aC5Xo6rleZM&t=262s.

Edited by Critical Sniper
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7 minutes ago, Critical Sniper said:

Oooooh so that's what populism is, damn Europe definitely teaches history differently because I never heard of such a thing as social darwinism until you just put it everywhere, I had heard of populism but I never understood it because it was just "Ok guys look this is some ideology called populism and it affected many things but also Mexico, talking about Mexico let's just only talk about it's presence there".

Populism isn't something that we learn much about on school. It's a term that I often use when talking about politics with my friends. It's also a term that the left likes to use when talking about the right. It's something we say about parties that are only build on a trend like 50+ but don't have any well defined goals/motives. Social darwism is the same because everyone knows the basics, but it really doesn't have any depth/idealogy beyond, strong people/countries are good and weak people/countries are bad. 

Funny that you bring up Mexico because I remember reading something that Germany once send a telegram called the Zimmermann telegram to Mexico and asked them to attack the USA in exchance for german support (which they couldn't offer because they were losing a war) and that they may keep parts of the USA. Some Americans that liked Brittany caught it and used it as proof that Germany was trying to provoke them.

19 minutes ago, Critical Sniper said:

Documentaries are so damn boring I can never watch them despite of how much I love history I always need a plate of food to keep me entertained otherwise I'm constantly checking the bar to see when the video ends and I just leave with the same general ideas.

It depends but more often then not they are background noise when I'm doing something else (never when I'm learning because laws are often more boring). But they are excellent if you want to sound smart because most documentaries use quotes extensively and people for some reason think you are smart when you mimic what other people said instead of thinking something new to say. But yes, I make sure that I have something to eat and drink while watching.

41 minutes ago, Critical Sniper said:

I could change the title to "Critical Sniper and LJwalhout's public PMs about WW1 and you can join the discussion!"

At least it wouldn't misleading

47 minutes ago, Critical Sniper said:

Being more serious, WW1 definitely is a hard to understand topic, basically everthing that John D Ruddy says holds true: WW1's start is a mess of alliances, it's sides are equal (mostly) in strength and morality and the ending is quite "undramatic", all of this being a contrast to WW2, which is easy to see the start with, one side is clearly evil and the other side is clearly good and it ends with a boom as well.

It's certainly a difficult topic because of how nobody actually won. In all the countries there were protests against the war and at the end nobody was motivated to continue. At the end the allied forces claimed they won, but what did they win and at what cost. Like you said, in ww2 they had a reason to fight and it was easier to define a good side, even though they allied forces also did some nasty things like the bombing of Dresden. WW1 mostly started because Wilhelm II wanted to show his family that he was also important. And at the end of the conflict he was in exile (in the Netherlands), Franz Joseph was dead and Austria Hungary was also dying, The Russian royal family was executed by there own people and Russia became the very thing he feared the most. The only royal family that was unharmed was the British Royal family. And Wilhelm II? He spend the rest of his live cutting down trees in his castle near Doorn (I should probably visit Doorn soon or later).

 

1 hour ago, Critical Sniper said:

Although history itself is already a complicated thing to explain and it's general traits and...it's such a messy novel which is why I love it so much, one thing doesn't happen for no reason but well getting sidetracked there.

History is almost like a 3d puzzle with parts that are all linked to each and come together to create something which is also a part which also results into something etc. I mean I started talking about ww1 but then I started talking about different things that are linked to it and if I don't watch out I start talking about something else.

 

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