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Current Events » in reply to You & Kerry Are Living In Fantasyland

It's interesting how decent people get killed through good intentions
Gary — (archived)

I just completed John Keegan's history "The First World War". It's a fascinating book and strongly recommended. I could go on for pages about the different things that I learned from Keegan's book. What really floored me about the book was just prior to World War One (WW-i), people thought that a major war in Europe was no longer possible. The triggering event was an assasination by a Serbian nationalist of an Austrian-Hungarian nobleman. Nobody really wanted this war. Unfortunately the triggering event caused a domino effect that ultimately resulted in millions of French, German, English, Russians and Americans getting killed. The Austrian-Hungarian Empire and Serbia, ceased to exist after the war finished. Keegan mentions that had the Austrian-Hugarian emperor simply been more proactive with Serbia and not involved the other European powers, the whole war could have easily been avoided. Keegan also mentioned that World War Two (WW-II) came directly from WW-I and the Cold War (WW-III) was a direct consequence of WW-II and the Bolshevik Revolution resulting from WW-I. Another fun tidbit: When the Ottoman Empire got involved in WW-I, the Ottoman Sultan/Caliph declared "Holy War" (Jihad) against the French/British allies and commanded all Moslems to take up arms against them. Unfortunately for the Sultan, the Islamic world had grown tired of his authority and ignored his command. The Caliphate was later abolished after the Ottoman empire imploded (the victorious allies were trying to nip a future problem with Islam in the bud). Fascinating stuff.

Gary

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