The Shadows of Total War
Europe, East Asia, and the United States, 1919-1939
Published on 18. January 2009
Book
Paperback/Softback
380 pages
978-0-521-10039-7 (ISBN)
Description
The period between the two world wars of the twentieth century was one of the most challenging in the history of war. In anticipation of another conflict, military planners and civilian thinkers struggled after 1918 with the painful implications of World War I. Given its scope, the wholesale mobilisation of civilian populations and the targets of civilians via blockades and strategic bombing, many observers regarded this titanic conflict as a 'total war'. They also concluded that any future conflict would bear the same hallmarks; and they planned accordingly. The essays in this collection, the fourth in a series on the problem of total war, examine the inter-war period. They explore the consequences of World War I, the intellectual efforts to analyse this conflict's military significance, the attempts to plan for another general war and several episodes in the 1930s that portended the war that erupted in 1939.
Reviews / Votes
"[An] illuminating essay collection..." German Studies Review "The Shadows of Total War: Europe, East Asia, and the United States, 1919-1939 makes a significant contribution to historical scholarship and will prove useful to academic readers as well as educated lay readers interested in the subject of total war and the question of whether its time has finally passed." History "...a very good book, full of new ideas and unusual knowledge, as well as admirable summaries of current historiography..." Military History "...this volume is a useful and carefully-produced contribution to the contemporary literature on the aftermath of large-scale war... The editors have done a fine job of maintaining a high standard of syntactical, grammatical, and orthographical quality, and both they and the GHI [German Historical Institute] are to be commended for their industry, through which a large community of their colleagues may now profit." H-German (H-Net)More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Cambridge
United Kingdom
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Product notice
Paperback (trade)
Illustrations
Worked examples or Exercises
Dimensions
Height: 229 mm
Width: 152 mm
Thickness: 22 mm
Weight
616 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-521-10039-7 (9780521100397)
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Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Roger Chickering | Stig Forster
The Shadows of Total War
Europe, East Asia, and the United States, 1919-1939
E-Book
12/2004
1st Edition
Cambridge University Press
€38.49
Available for download
Persons
Content
Contributors; Introduction Roger Chickering and Stig Forster; Part I. Reflections on the Inter-war Period: 1. The politics of war and peace in the 1920s and 1930s Gerhard L. Weinberg; 2. War and society in the 1920s and 1930s Hew Strachan; 3. Plans, weapons, doctrines: the strategic cultures of interwar Europe Dennis E. Showalter; Part II. Legacies of the Great War: 4. Religious socialism, peace pacifism: the case of Paul Tillich Hartmut Lehmann; 5. No more peace: the militarisation of politics James M. Diehl; 6. The war's returns: disabled veterans in Britain and Germany, 1914-39 Deborah Cohen; 7. The impact of total war on the practice of British psychiatry Edgar Jones and Simon Wessely; Part III. Visions of the Next War: 8. Sore loser: Ludendorff's total war Roger Chickering; 9. Strangelove, or how Ernst Juenger learned to love total war Thomas Rohkraemer; 10. Shadows of total war in French and British military journals, 1918-39 Timo Baumann and Daniel Marc Segesser; 11. Yesterday's battles and future war: the German official military history, 1918-39 Markus Poehlmann; 12. 'The study of the distant past is futile': American reflections on new military frontiers Bernd Greiner; Part IV. Projections and Practice: 13. 'Not by law but by sentiment': Great Britain and imperial defense, 1918-39 Benedikt Stuchtey; 14. 'Blitzkrieg' or total war? War preparations in Nazi Germany Wilhelm Deist; 15. The Condor Legion: an instrument of total war? Klaus A. Maier; 16. Stalinism as total social war Hans-Heinrich Nolte; 17. Total colonial warfare: Ethiopia Giulia Brogini Kuenzi; 18. Japan's wartime empire in China Louise Young; Index.