History :attention all

[alex_revell]

I found this going through my clippings file the other day. I think we should all take heed.
Extract from Back to the Front by Stephen O’Shea


Page 119. ‘Professional historians find hindsight unjust, even distasteful; I believe it to be a necessary weapon to fight against the apologists of mayhem. Scholars quite rightly point out the exaggerations of popular rumour and the paranoid imaginings of the mistreated - no, hundreds of men were not shot as a result of the Chemin des Dames mutinies, as was once commonly believed. But as these overblown bubbles of oral transmission get punctured, sometimes the emphasis gets shifted. The hunt for inaccuracy become paramount, and in redressing a minor libel the original enormity gets lost. No, Haig did not bungle everything, completely, all the time, but – lest we forget – he did sent hundreds of thousands unnecessarily to their death on two occasions. The men who routinely referred to him as ‘the butcher’ are all dead and gone now, yet his statue still stands in London’s Whitehall. Haig and Joffre and their ilk died not on some hopeless, hellish battlefield but of old age, in their beds, and their memory, while fading, is still honoured in some quarters. We have forgotten how heinous a lesson about the military mind they inadvertently taught the world.The twentieth century’s opening event, the murder of millions through incompetence, has become acknowledged, and the perpetrators unpunished in our vision of the past. A little less intellectual charity toward them is in order, even if that means using the disreputable narrative tool of hindsight. The reluctance to put one’s life in the hands of the military, an ancestral reflex made universal by the Great War, should never be allowed to weaken’.

[Craig]

Watch out, sir - keep an open eye to your right!

[stephen]

Thank you for the excellent commentary. If I may expound...

With a few notable exceptions, historical revisionism is the process by which one bias is replaced with another.

Not forgetting, of course, that despite the military incompetance on all sides - Day 1 of the Somme, the German human waves at Langemark, Nivelle's offensive, etc., etc., it was the politicians who started it, and could not reach a peace deal before November 1918. I believe that Lloyd George, for example, was so distrustful of the military that he refused Haig reinforcements prior to the German Spring Offensive in 1918, and that in the last six months of the war simply refused to believe Haig when the latter insisted the thing could be over by the end of the year: Lloyd George, apparently, was keener to plan the campaigns for 1919 and 1920 than to give Haig the means to finish it in 1918. Given the conditions prevailing on the Western Front, the war was a very painful learning curve throughout. If Haig and Joffre were incompetant, then so also, I think, were French, von Moltke, Ludendorff, Hindenburg, Foch, Petain, and all the Russian, Italian, and Austrian generals. I would recommend anyone to read To Win A War by John Terraine, or The Great War Generals on the Western Front by Robin Neillands. Both books are very illuminating.

Yes, hindsight is a wonderful thing. But despite that I, for one, would far prefer to put my life in the hands of the military than in the hands of a politician.

Bob

With reference to the use of the term "military mind" in the context provided: The characteristics of stubborness, lack of imagination, self-righteousness, self-seeking, incompetence, and gross stupidity are not limited only to persons who rise to the top in military organizations. While the consequences are certainly magnified if such a person rises in time of war to command of a vast military force, one might with equal sureness cite examples of the same characteristics in political minds, business minds, ecclesiastical minds, or minds in any public position. It seems to me that the problem is more basic, more a matter of the national culture/attitudes which permit people with such characteristics to rise to the top in any field without their being promptly removed when identified. As it applies to Haig, the English public and political structure seem to have been deprived of their good judgement and freedom of action by their own wartime propaganda...to remove Haig was simply unthink- able (publicly at least). Surely the elected politicians of the time bear responsibility equally with Haig for the horrendous loss of life stemming from his military actions: by failing to remove Haig from command and by failing to attempt to devise an early peaceful end to the war they are at least equally damned.

[mike_baram]

"stubborness, lack of imagination, self-righteousness, self-seeking, incompetence, and gross stupidity are not limited "
Absolutamente correcto. Just look at what politicians, armed with the same dangerous weapons, can do to an economy.
The only difference is that after the politicos have finished bungling things up, you're still alive so they can find other ways to bleed you.

[Barrett]

Thank you, Alex, for sharing that eloquent passage with us. I am in complete agreement, and would only add the following:
There's very little difference today between the choice of trusting the military or the politicians. For many years now the senior star wearers ARE politicians--that's how they get to the top. Their allegiance time and again--in the US armed forces and probably in most others--is to their careers and fellow star wearers. In my lifetime (52 years) exactly two members of the joint chiefs resigned in protest over ANYTHING. Some people deride the concept of "the military mind" but many of us on this forum have seen it up close, and it is not a thing of beauty. All too often it's characterized by self preservation rather than self sacrifice and hypocrisy rather than leadership. On a large scale, consider the 9-year Vietnam War; on a somewhat smaller scale, consider the 9-year Tailhook witch hunt.
Every man or woman contemplating a military career really-really needs to see "Paths of Glory."

To make my point more plainly: there is no difference people whose characters are flawed, whether they be military, politicians, businessmen, clergymen, or you name your category. Advising people to beware of a career in the military is better put by advising them to beware of all flawed associates and organizations with defective folk in positions of power. It ain't just the military who can screw up your
life and mind, so like the refs tell boxers at the
beginning of every prizefight, "Protect yourself
at all times".

true enough-- models, journalists, photographers, and copy editors can all deal with very similar problems. and these people arguably influence the way hundreds of thousands of people think about themselves and the people around them. and I know for a fact that some of these people are every bit as foolish, depraved, and ruthless as some of the people mentioned on this post, and frequently more so! having finished 7 months of working at a daycare (with some 50 or 60 kids) I can tell you all that it starts far earlier than any of us would like to believe.

totoro man: I salute you. I have neither the
skills nor the courage to even contemplate 7 months of working at a daycare.