When I first read Barbara Tuchman's ‘The Guns of August' back while I was in college in the late 90's, I found it an entertaining and educational read. This past week I revisited the book again and am compelled to add another adjective to the list; blood-chilling. What a fool I was to be so unappreciative of history classes when I was a school kid. It was so easy to be indifferent to the dead and buried past that can no longer change...

Or so I thought. The past, as it turns out, is only ever dead when subsequent generations are immune to repeating its mistakes and missteps. I was lucky to have had a war-free childhood, but the luck comes with a price; the lack of appreciation for the horror of armed conflicts in residential setting, and therefore, the blissful willingness to be ignorant of early signs of the pro-military shift in my own society. I did wise up in time, though, and started seeking multiple news sources in early 2003 that allowed me to turn against the American invasion of Iraq before it happened (the watershed moment was watching in disbelief as General Colin Powell admitted in an interview with Tim Russert on Meet the Press that the Niger uranium evidence he presented at the UN was a forgery, and realizing that neither the St Louis Post-Dispatch nor the NY Times had covered such an antic properly).

Why should this current war in the Middle-east color my impression of Tuchman's book on an entirely different war of an entirely different scale that happened nearly a century ago? It is because you can substitute George W Bush in the place of Wilhelm II of Germany and the USA in the place of Germany, and get essentially the same story (albeit in different setting) out of it.

The Guns of August describes in dissecting details the events in 1914 that immediately led up to WW I and the first month of actual fighting on the European continent, both on the western and the eastern fronts, up to the Battle of the Marne, where the German offensive was finally checked and the whole thing turned into trench warfare of the muddiest sort (the USA didn't join the fighting until 1917 and so isn't a player in this book). This is a very well researched book that is loaded with details, covering practically all imaginable angles from various points of view. The pace is slow by necessity, yet the book remains immensely gripping. You won't just know of what events occured to bring about the first World War after reading this book, you will understand the reasons (or the lack of one) behind it as well.

The dry wit in Tuchmann's observation of the many regrettable decisions that drove the conflict to its bloody ending (which we all know, but is outside the scope of the book) makes them stick more to the mind than they would have otherwise. She covers not only the war-waging parties, but also the views of the Brittish pacifists who were against their country honoring the obligation to defend Belgium against its invader. Is Tuchman's narration biased? Well... I think she is fair... And that had the German won WW I, her writing voice would still not have to change much. You can see the reasoning of opposing parties and the ground they operated on. Just about the only real black and white portrayals in the book are on people who deserved it, I think. The incompetence of Nicholas II of Russia, who granted his superstitious wife far too much leverage on state matter, isn't something that can be justified even from the ‘family man' rationale (which you won't see any in the book). Tuchman may have sentimental feelings for some characters, but she doesn't let that get in the way of calling their actions as she sees them.

Re-reading this book again after having seen practically all the same mistakes the European leaders of 1912-14 made repeated over and over again by my own country in its 2003 invasion and its subsequent occupation of Iraq is, in a way, devastating. Given his well documented determination to disregard all reality that doesn't confirm his ideological view of what should be, I doubt that President Bush would have done anything differently had he read this book. But my deep admiration in the sensibility and brain power of Colin Powell dictates that I shall never forget that it was his credibility that sold George W Bush's war to the public. And that his decision to not resign when it became clear that he was bamboozled into presenting a known fake document as the keystone piece of evidence to make the case for war at the UN made it much harder for others to question the American administration's rational for the war in its early years. Had General Powell read this book, I would wonder if he wouldn't be haunted by a passage describing the scene in the Brussels court after the German ambassador had presented King Albert with an ultimatum that showed clear intent to breach his country's neutrality;
"Small in size and young in independence, Belgium clung more fiercely to independence for that reason. But no one in the room needed to be told what the consequences of a decision to defend it would be. Their country would be subjected to attack, their homes to destruction, their people to reprisals by a force ten times their size with no doubt of the outcome to themselves, who were in the immediate pathway of the Germans, whatever the ultimate outcome of the war. If, on the contrary, they were to yield to the German demand, they would be making Belgium an accessory to the attack on France as well as a violator of her own neutrality, besides opening her to German occupation with small likelihood that a victorious Germany would remember to withdraw. They would be occupied either way; to yield would be to lose honor too."

General Powell was a credible voice of sanity besieged in an administration full of resolute war-seekers. Did it occur to him that he would lose out either way; staying or leaving, but that only in staying aboard would he continue to provide the faltering administration with a shield that many critics were reluctant to attack even as more and more American soldiers and innocent Iraqis pay for it with their limbs and lives? I still like the man very much, but I'm glad to not have such a question looming over my head forever afterward.

But Gen. Powell isn't the only one (by a long shot) who should have much to ponder about in relating this book to the events of recent years. The atmosphere of mutual mistrust among the nations and the nation leaders' overconfidence in their ability to anticipate each other's decision isn't a phenomenon exclusive to the pre-WW I era. And I can't shake the thought of the USA-Israel relationship out of my head when I read of Germany's misplaced unconditional support of Austria, which allowed the latter to make the first really irreversible move toward a general war on the European continent when it felt that it could invade and absorb Serbia with impunity (counting on the other European powers to blink first and disregard their protective treaties).

A horrible chill ran down my spine as I read of how convinced the major players of WW I were that the conflict couldn't possibly last more than a few weeks, and how the people with enough foresight to predict the worst case scenario were marginalized. Would more Americans have been less willing to take our chief executive's propaganda at his word if they had been familiar with;
""Schoen (the German ambassador to France) admitted he had a further duty to perform and, unfolding the document he carried, read its contents, which, as he was the "soul of honor" according to Poincaré, were the cause of his embarrassment. In consequence, it read, of French acts of "organized hostility" and of air attacks on Nuremberg and Karlsruhe and of violation of Belgian neutrality by French aviators flying over Belgian territory, "the German empire considers itself in a state of war with France."
Viviani (the French Premiere) formally denied the charges which were included less to impress the French government, who would know they had not taken place, than to impress the German public at home that they were the victims of French aggression.""?

As much as I like the sound of the old adage of 'forgive and forget', I'm more inclined to forgive and remember. There are lessons that should be learned secondhandedly at the experience of others (rather than all over again in person) whenever possible. The hubris that lead to war is one of those. The Guns of August, as limited as the time of its coverage of WW I is, is one of the most readable preservation of these lessons available. The Pulitzer Prize it boasts is very well earned indeed.

My copy is a pocket book (489 pages plus extensive list of source materials) with black and white photos of many of the heads of state and generals that played key roles in the early part of WW I, and good diagrams and maps showing the movements of troops during the first month of the war.

Recommended: Yes