Forgotten battlegrounds of World War One: The Balkans and Eastern Europe

A war that killed at least 15 million people began with two quick gunshots in the Balkans. The fighting of World War One began in the Balkans, and eventually saw some of its greatest bloodshed in this same region. Popular historians often talk about the assassination at Sarajevo, because it sucked in many of the other nations of the world – including, eventually, the United States. But subsequent events in the Balkans tend to be unknown among the general public, even lesser-known than the complex origins of the war that one can find there. Thus, this may be a good time to examine the events of the Balkans and Eastern Europe, and how they engulfed much of the rest of the world when those two fateful gunshots were fired there.

Sarajevo citizens reading a poster with the proclamation of the Austrian annexation in 1908

Napoleon’s 1812 invasion of Russia led to his downfall

“From the day of exchanging the ratification of the present treaties, there shall be perfect peace and amity between his majesty the emperor of the French [Napoleon], king of Italy, and his majesty the emperor of all the Russias.”

– “Treaty of Tilsit, 7 July 1807,” between Napoleon Bonaparte of France and “Alexander the First” of Russia – a treaty which was soon broken in 1812, when Napoleon invaded Russia

In 1799, Napoleon Bonaparte came to the throne of France. He was the victor of campaigns in the “French Revolutionary Wars,” and must have seemed truly “invincible.” But his world came crashing down all around him, when his forces were defeated while invading Russia in 1812. How did all of this happen? How did the most powerful man in Europe become a prisoner in St. Helena by 1815 – later to die as a prisoner in 1821? How did the Russian people rally against the French (and other invaders) in this campaign? And what do certain prior events in the Napoleonic Wars, such as Russia’s twice switching sides in that conflict, tell us about Napoleon’s invasion of Russia? In this post, I will try to answer these questions. I will show how the larger “Napoleonic Wars” turned around in this massive Russian campaign. And I will show how Napoleon’s downfall owed much to his being routed by the Russians during this invasion.

Paul the First of Russia

A review of Michael Wood’s “In the Footsteps of Alexander the Great”

“Whilst the Amphictyonic confederacy remained, that of the Achaeans, which comprehended the less important cities only, made little figure on the theatre of Greece. When the former became a victim to Macedon, the latter was spared by the policy of Philip and Alexander [the Great].”

– Alexander Hamilton and James Madison, in the Federalist Papers (Federalist No. 18)

One of the greatest conquerors in history, whose empire stretched from Greece to India …

He was one of the greatest conquerors in history, whose empire stretched from Greece to India. Before he reached age 30, Alexander the Great created a massive empire that would include much of the world, as it was known to the Mediterraneans in his time. Our best sources for his expedition include two histories, both written some centuries after the time of Alexander. One of these two historians was Greek, while the other was a Roman. But Alexander was a Macedonian. The Macedonian language no longer exists today, but it was definitely related to Greek. Some have even considered the Macedonians to be “Greeks” themselves. The host of this program sometimes seems to think so. But the Macedonians did not consider themselves to be “Greeks.” Nor did the self-identified “Greeks” consider the Macedonians to be Greeks. Nonetheless, it is true that the Macedonians spread Greek culture to a then-unprecedented extent. Nothing would spread Greek culture so widely again until the advent of the Roman Empire, which was some centuries later. I thought that it might have been helpful for the host to clarify this issue, even with a brief sentence or two. But this is actually a truly great film despite this omission.

History of the European Union

“By this Treaty, the HIGH CONTRACTING PARTIES establish among themselves a EUROPEAN UNION, hereinafter called ‘the Union’, on which the Member States confer competences to attain objectives they have in common.”

– “Treaty on European Union” (also known as the “Maastricht Treaty”), 7 February 1992 – later replaced by a modified version of the treaty in 2007

Europe was devastated by World War II …

Europe was devastated by World War II. Even in the winning countries, there was destruction from bombing by one side or the other. And in the losing countries, the devastation was (if anything) even worse. In Germany, a new “Iron Curtain” was forming, and their old capital city of Berlin was divided. Everything to the east of that Iron Curtain (except West Berlin) would be controlled by the Soviet Union, and managed exclusively for Soviet benefit. The countries to the west would have an opportunity for freedom and prosperity, but the Eastern Bloc (at this time) did not. It was in this postwar environment that the European Union’s earliest predecessors were formed.

Hamburg, Germany, after a massive Allied bombing in 1943

Forgotten battlegrounds of the World Wars: Africa, the Middle East, and Italy

“♪ We’re the D-Day Dodgers, out in Italy,

Always on the vino, always on the spree.

Eighth Army skivers and their tanks,

We go to war in ties like swanks.

For we’re the D-Day Dodgers,

In sunny Italy. ♪

♪ We landed at Salerno, a holiday with pay.

Jerry brought his bands out to cheer us on the way,

Showed us the sights and gave us tea,

We all sang songs, the beer was free.

For we’re the D-Day Dodgers,

The lads that D-Day dodged. ♪

♪ Palermo and Cassino were taken in our stride,

We didn’t go to fight there, we just went for the ride.

Anzio and Sangro are just names,

We only went to look for dames,

For we’re the D-Day Dodgers,

In sunny Italy. ♪”

– “D-Day Dodgers” (1944), to the tune of “Lili Marleen” (written in 1915, but not published until 1937) – a tongue-in-cheek Canadian song about the forgotten (and then-ongoing) campaigns in Italy

How the war against Nazi Germany began long before the 1944 invasion of France …

The war against Nazi Germany began long before the 1944 invasion of France. Listening to some popular histories of World War II, you might be tempted to suppose that the war began when the Allies launched their invasion of Normandy on June 6th, 1944. But, in fact, the war began long before the famous battles fought on this great “D-Day.” This post will focus on some of the other aspects of the war against Nazi Germany, giving details on times and places that are often ignored elsewhere. To some degree, I myself have ignored them elsewhere on this blog, because I review various documentaries with more traditional focuses. Thus, I will try to address these deficiencies in this blog post, and tell a story that has sometimes been neglected – including, to some degree, by myself.

British artillery in Kamerun, Africa, 1915 (during the First World War)

A review of Bettany Hughes’ “The Spartans”

“Athens became the seat of politeness and taste, the country of orators and philosophers. The elegance of its buildings equalled that of its language; on every side might be seen marble and canvas, animated by the hands of the most skilful artists. From Athens we derive those astonishing performances, which will serve as models to every corrupt age. The picture of Lacedæmon [a. k. a. “Sparta”] is not so highly coloured. There, the neighbouring nations used to say, ‘men were born virtuous, their native air seeming to inspire them with virtue.’ But its inhabitants have left us nothing but the memory of their heroic actions: monuments that should not count for less in our eyes than the most curious relics of Athenian marble.”

– Jean-Jacques Rousseau, “A Discourse on the Arts and Sciences” (1750), First Part

Jean-Jacques Rousseau, an eighteenth-century admirer of the Spartans

A number of people have praised the Spartans – including Rousseau, Machiavelli, and Hitler …

Many centuries after the Spartans, Jean-Jacques Rousseau once praised their culture in his “Discourse on the Arts and Sciences.” He said that the memory of Sparta's heroic actions “should not count for less in our eyes than the most curious relics of Athenian marble” (as cited above). Niccolò Machiavelli was another philosopher who praised the Spartans. (See the footnote to this blog post for the details of this.) American colonists and French revolutionaries have sometimes been among those who praised the Spartans. In modern times, some liberals have also praised Sparta for what they perceive as its “greater respect” for women’s rights. And, as the presenter of this documentary notes, Adolf Hitler also praised the Spartans, with Nazi Germany using them as a model of sorts – particularly in their use of eugenics. (See the Wikipedia page on “Laconophilia,” or the “love of Sparta,” for some of the details of this.)

Adolf Hitler, a twentieth-century admirer of the Spartans

… while Alexander Hamilton considered Sparta to be “little better than a wellregulated camp”

Ironically, Sparta was admired even by some from its arch-rival Athens, the other great superpower of Ancient Greece. The Spartans actually believed that they were creating a “utopia.” But if anything, it seems to have been closer to the other end of the spectrum – a dystopia. Alexander Hamilton wrote in the Federalist Papers that “Sparta, Athens, Rome, and Carthage were all republics; two of them, Athens and Carthage, of the commercial kind. Yet were they as often engaged in wars, offensive and defensive, as the neighboring monarchies of the same times. Sparta was little better than a wellregulated camp; and Rome was never sated of carnage and conquest.” (Source: Federalist No. 6) Thus, although he recognized Sparta as a “republic,” Hamilton considered Sparta to be “little better than a wellregulated camp” (an accurate summation). This documentary shows that the truth about Sparta is less romantic, and far less flattering, than the description offered by Rousseau. It acknowledges the rights of women in Sparta, even as it repeats tired old myths about how women actually had more rights in Sparta than they did in Athens (although I should acknowledge that they were still second-class citizens in both). But as this documentary notes, Sparta was “no feminist paradise.” It was a hellish dystopia (as mentioned earlier), with no real concept of human rights. It killed those boys that it deemed “weak,” denying them any future chance to redeem themselves for the unforgivable “crime” of weakness.

Jean-Pierre Saint-Ours’s “The Selection of Children in Sparta,” painted 1785

A review of “Byzantium: The Lost Empire” (The Learning Channel)

Also known as the “Eastern Roman Empire,” which lasted about a thousand years longer than the better-known “Western Roman Empire.”

The Roman Empire was divided into western and eastern halves more than once in its history. Sometimes, the halves reunited; but when they were divided again in 395, the separation became permanent. When Westerners discussing this period use the phrase “the Roman Empire,” they are usually talking about the western portion, which fell in the year 476. But the eastern portion didn't fall until the year 1453, and it is now known to us as the “Byzantine Empire.”

Map of the split of the Roman Empire into East and West, in AD 395

To the inhabitants of this empire, it was originally known as the “Eastern” Roman Empire. But when the Western Roman Empire fell in the fifth century, the eastern empire had now become the only “Roman Empire” still remaining. Thus, it became convenient for the people living under it to refer to these eastern territories as simply the “Roman Empire.” Why, then, do contemporary English speakers instead tend to refer to it as the “Byzantine Empire”?

A review of “Athens: The Dawn of Democracy”

“Sparta, Athens, Rome, and Carthage were all republics; two of them, Athens and Carthage, of the commercial kind. Yet were they as often engaged in wars, offensive and defensive, as the neighboring monarchies of the same times. Sparta was little better than a wellregulated camp; and Rome was never sated of carnage and conquest.”

– Alexander Hamilton, in the Federalist Papers (Federalist No. 6)

I have been learning the Ancient Greek language since 2013. The Athenian dialect of the language is the standard dialect taught in introductory classes about “Ancient Greek,” and the dialect that I’ve studied most. Thus, my education about Ancient Greece has been largely focused on Ancient Athens. But although I didn’t learn a lot of new content in this documentary, I enjoyed hearing what Bettany Hughes had to say about this familiar content. I am also a fan of her film about the Spartans, who are from a very different part of Ancient Greece. She portrays Athens more sympathetically than she does the Spartans, and this is as it should be. Nonetheless, this is a “warts and all” portrayal of Ancient Athens, which does not sugar-coat certain parts of the city’s legacy.

Athenian statesman Pericles

Reading about the trial of Socrates in the original Greek

“The unexamined life is not worth living.”

– Socrates at his trial, as recorded by Plato's “Apology”

Before beginning this project, I had just finished reading C. A. E. Luschnig's “An Introduction to Ancient Greek: A Literary Approach.” (More about that here.) I had earlier determined that after getting through this book, my first use of this (admittedly limited) proficiency would be to read all of the primary sources about the trial of Socrates in the original Greek. There aren't very many of them, I should add here, so I knew that this was a manageable task. Thus, I started doing so immediately after reading the introductory textbook about Greek.

Socrates

Behind the Iron Curtain: Occupation by the Soviet Union

"While the Wall is the most obvious and vivid demonstration of the failures of the Communist system - for all the world to see - we take no satisfaction in it; for it is, as your mayor [of West Berlin] has said, an offense not only against history but an offense against humanity, separating families, dividing husbands and wives and brothers and sisters, and dividing a people who wish to be joined together."

- American president John F. Kennedy, in his "Ich bin ein Berliner" speech (June 26, 1963)

World War II had just ended; but for parts of Eastern Europe, the nightmare was just beginning ...

During the Second World War, Eastern Europe was unfortunately caught in the crossfire between Hitler's Nazi Germany and Stalin's Soviet Russia. Conquest by either one meant certain tyranny and subjugation, but to be caught on the losing side of this struggle for the Eastern Front would mark one's country for revenge, terrible and swift. It was not known yet who would be the winner, and the two sides were so ruthless to begin with that any additional punishment from the eventual victor was a terrifying prospect for them. Perhaps partially for this, the nations of Eastern Europe decided to choose sides in this struggle, hoping to promote their interest; and some paid a heavy price for making the wrong choices in these matters. But all were doomed to suffer in one way or another, and even the ones whose alliances had actually served their interest in these years were condemned to suffer in a communist occupation later on, regardless of which side they had served at this earlier time. The eventual winner on the "Eastern Front" was, of course, Soviet Russia; and it imposed its will without any mercy on the nations that it had conquered.

Red Army raises Soviet flag in Berlin after taking the city, May 1945

Some parts of Eastern Europe were already occupied before World War II

To be clear, some of these nations were already conquered before the war started, and some had been part of the "Union of Soviet Socialist Republics" (or "USSR") since the moment of its creation in 1922. (This is the political entity that is better known today - and was known then - as the "Soviet Union.") They were thus already puppet states that had been annexed by the USSR. Others became puppet states that were made part of the Soviet Union in 1940 - after World War II had begun in Europe, but before the Soviet entry into the war in 1941. These states were annexed at this time instead. Others became puppet states much later on in the war - or even after, in some cases. Although some of these states were never actually annexed into the Soviet Union - possibly to create the illusion that the Russians were actually keeping their World War II treaty promises of non-interference - they were nonetheless controlled from Moscow as much as any of the others. These included Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, and Romania - and, for a brief time, Yugoslavia and Albania. (More on the special status of these two nations later in this post.) Together with the Soviet states, these nations were all then part of what was called the "Eastern Bloc." For these nations, the ordeal of Soviet occupation began during - and in some cases, after - World War II, and the long nightmare of "no peace" would be followed by the even longer nightmare of no freedom. It is these nations that I will focus on here, since their distance from the center of Soviet power encouraged them to attempt more revolts against the communist occupation - revolts that (unfortunately), before 1989, did not succeed.

Border changes in the Eastern Bloc, from 1938 to 1948

A review of “The Greeks: Crucible of Civilization” (PBS Empires)

"Had the Greeks, says the Abbe Milot, been as wise as they were courageous, they would have been admonished by experience of the necessity of a closer union, and would have availed themselves of the peace which followed their success against the Persian arms, to establish such a reformation. Instead of this obvious policy, Athens and Sparta, inflated with the victories and the glory they had acquired, became first rivals and then enemies; and did each other infinitely more mischief than they had suffered from Xerxes. Their mutual jealousies, fears, hatreds, and injuries ended in the celebrated Peloponnesian war; which itself ended in the ruin and slavery of the Athenians who had begun it."

- Alexander Hamilton and James Madison, in the Federalist Papers (Federalist No. 18)

So I once read a book history of Ancient Greece, and I've even been learning the Ancient Greek language since 2013 (as some of you already know). I'm almost done reading my intro textbook on the subject, actually, and so I've spent many hours studying this topic over these past few years. (Update, 2017: I actually finished the intro textbook recently.) Nonetheless, I actually learned a lot from this three-hour TV program on this topic; since it is well-researched, well-presented, and it interviews the experts. I've gotten pretty deep into their culture already through these language exploits, but I nonetheless learned much from this documentary, and not just because it shows pictures of the actual places and artifacts from the time. (Although it does do plenty of that, and supplements my reading with the visuals.)

Temple of Olympian Zeus in Athens

So how did I learn something from this, you might be asking? What was it that was so new to me that my textbooks hadn't shown me this information before? Why was it that I learned something from a medium that is usually brief, and occasionally superficial?

Greek statesman Cleisthenes

The Marshall Plan: Helping the poor, keeping the peace, and stopping the communists

"If we aim deliberately at the impoverishment of Central Europe, vengeance, I dare predict, will not limp. Nothing can then delay for very long that final civil war between the forces of Reaction and the despairing convulsions of Revolution, before which the horrors of the late German war will fade into nothing, and which will destroy, whoever is victor, the civilization and the progress of our generation."

- John Maynard Keynes, in "The Economic Consequences of the Peace" (1919), Chapter VII, Section 1

There was never a "Marshall Plan" after World War One (like there should have been) ...

It might seem strange to begin a post about the Marshall Plan this way, but the end of the First World War a generation earlier was so poorly handled that a second war became necessary twenty years later, to finish the work of the first. Why did the second war happen? The debate is long and complicated, but there are two themes that often come up as explanations. One is the failure to obtain an unconditional surrender from the Germans, and change their system of government enough to make a second war less likely. The other is the imposition of reparations, or the plan to force Germany to pay for the damages that it had caused. This angered the Germans enough that they went to war again a generation later, largely as revenge for the impoverishment caused by the reparations.

Germans demonstrate against Treaty of Versailles, Reichstag 1919

... but there was a "Marshall Plan" after World War Two, and it may have kept the peace

No one will ever know for sure, but I think that it could have been prevented - that rebuilding Germany, instead of punishing it, would have been a better way to prevent a second war. In short, what they needed was a Marshall Plan; and the Marshall Plan following World War II (which was the plan to provide economic assistance, to rebuild postwar Europe) may have been a large part of the reason that the peace with Germany was kept after the war was over. The Allied troops did what they had to do to stop Germany; but after the war, the best thing they could have done for their countries was to turn their former enemies into friends, and win the hearts of the people so that they would not be likely to invade their neighbors again. They had won the war - now they needed to win the peace, and the Marshall Plan was a large portion of the reason why the peace has lasted as long as it has.

Devastation of postwar Berlin, June 1945

Reflections on learning about history of Ancient Greece

"The history of the ancient Greeks is one of the most improbable success stories in world history. A small people inhabiting a country poor in resources and divided into hundreds of squabbling mini-states created one of the world's most remarkable cultures."

- Preface to "A Brief History of Ancient Greece: Politics, Society, and Culture" (2nd edition, 2009), page xv

So I recently finished reading a textbook about the history of Ancient Greece. (I've still got a long way to go in my book about the Ancient Greek language, but I've just finished my book about their history.) Fascinating stuff - I'm glad I invested the time in learning it.