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A review by socraticgadfly
To End All Wars: A Story of Loyalty and Rebellion, 1914-1918 by Adam Hochschild
5.0
A unique telling of World War I in Great Britain.
I knew that Bertrand Russell had been arrested as a conscientious objector, but knew little else about the movement in Britain in general. This book gives excellent insight into how strong the movement was, considering the degree of opprobrium it faced.
Hochschild starts well in advance of the war, so as to set up the social background for this, including disputes over the "rightness" of actions in the Boer War, the suffragette movement in Britain, its splintering, along with trade unionism's splintering, over the war, and more.
Two most fascinating takeaways? Sir John French's sister was one of Britain's leading pacifists.
And .. in 1915 ... war on a full year ... Britain was so desperate for high-quality optics, primarily for binoculars, and knew that Zeiss was "it," for that, had British reps meet German counterparts in Switzerland and work out a deal, in exchange for rubber for Germany from British colonies. Most papers have been destroyed, so we don't know how long this lasted.
World War II trade by American companies with Germany, for the first few months of the war, has been documented. But, I had never heard anything about this before.
I knew that Bertrand Russell had been arrested as a conscientious objector, but knew little else about the movement in Britain in general. This book gives excellent insight into how strong the movement was, considering the degree of opprobrium it faced.
Hochschild starts well in advance of the war, so as to set up the social background for this, including disputes over the "rightness" of actions in the Boer War, the suffragette movement in Britain, its splintering, along with trade unionism's splintering, over the war, and more.
Two most fascinating takeaways? Sir John French's sister was one of Britain's leading pacifists.
And .. in 1915 ... war on a full year ... Britain was so desperate for high-quality optics, primarily for binoculars, and knew that Zeiss was "it," for that, had British reps meet German counterparts in Switzerland and work out a deal, in exchange for rubber for Germany from British colonies. Most papers have been destroyed, so we don't know how long this lasted.
World War II trade by American companies with Germany, for the first few months of the war, has been documented. But, I had never heard anything about this before.