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Germanyâ•Žs Western Front Translations from the German Canadian Military History Volume 19 Issue 2 Article 8 2010 Germany’s Western Front Translations from the German Official History of the Great War Mark Osborne Humphries John Maker Follow this and additional works at: https://scholars.wlu.ca/cmh Part of the Military History Commons Recommended Citation Mark Osborne Humphries and John Maker "Germany’s Western Front Translations from the German Official History of the Great War." Canadian Military History 19, 2 (2010) This Feature is brought to you for free and open access by Scholars Commons @ Laurier. It has been accepted for inclusion in Canadian Military History by an authorized editor of Scholars Commons @ Laurier. For more information, please contact [email protected]. and : Germany’s Western Front Translations from the German Official History of the Great War Germany’s Western Front Translations from the German Official History of the Great War Editor’s Note: Germany’s Western Front, edited by Mark Osborne Humphries and John Maker, is a multi-volume English-language translation of Der Weltkrieg, the German official history of the First World War. Originally produced between 1925 and 1944 using classified archival records that were destroyed in the aftermath of the Second World War,Der Weltkrieg is the untold story of German experience on the Western Front. What follows in the foreword, written by Hew Strachen, to the 1915 volume of the series. Foreword in the technologies they employed, then the pace of its authors was produced a conflict that was not as quickening: the events of 1914 had static as the immobility of the trenches taken six volumes, those of 1915 by Hew Strachan which dominated the character of the three (and these are the basis for fighting suggested. It has now become this translation), and of 1916 two. axiomatic that “modern war” was Two more volumes appeared to take ar is a reactive business, a conceived and developed through the the story to November 1918. Being Wcompetition whose outcome experience of this titanic fight, and completed during the Second World is dependent not on some sort of the lessons which it bequeathed. But War, volumes 13 and 14 never gained absolute standard of excellence the military history on which such a wide circulation. Five hundred on the part of one side, but on the arguments rest continue to be lop- copies of each were reprinted in 1956, relative superiority of one side over sided. English-language historians, but they did not sell out until 1975. another. It is this relationship, the not just Britons but also Americans, Such disappointing sales were dynamic between two opponents as Australians, Canadians and New themselves indications of two each struggles to impose its will on Zealanders, have done more than phenomena. First, the Second World the other, that should be at the heart those writing in French and German War had made the study of the First of operational military history. But to deepen our understanding of the World War deeply unfashionable it rarely is. Military history, for all conduct of operations on the western throughout Europe, a trend that its massive progress in the last two front. However, their research is too only changed in Britain in 1964, or three decades, particularly in the often written from the perspective after the fiftieth anniversary of the English speaking world, remains far of one side only. It pays little or no war’s outbreak, and in Germany too national – and even nationalistic attention to the sources available not until the ninetieth anniversary – in its approach. If the serious for the Germans, for what they in 2004 – if then. Second, German study of military history as a self- tell us about German intentions, military history after 1945, in so far contained subject has a significant German reactions, or even German as it survived at all, stepped away agenda for the future, it is this – to perspectives on British or French from the operational focus embraced be comparative. efforts. by the general staff historians of For no war and no front is this T h e gap is all the more the Wilhelmine period and of injunction more important or more extraordinary as the German official which Der Weltkrieg was the final pressing than it is for the First World history of the war on land, Der manifestation. This condition still War and its western front. The cycle Weltkrieg, is not a rare set of volumes, pertains: operational military history of reaction and reaction between at least for the war up to the spring does not have the respectability in two coalitions, remarkably similar of 1917, a point it had reached with German academic circles which it has in their military organisations and volume 12, published in 1939. By now acquired in the English-speaking Published© Canadian by Scholars Military Commons History @, Laurier,Volume 2010 19, Number 2, Spring 2010, pp.71-75. 71 1 Strachan - 1915 Intro.indd 71 6/14/2010 10:50:31 AM Canadian Military History, Vol. 19 [2010], Iss. 2, Art. 8 world. The British official history has historians of the Reichsarchiv, the was subordinated to the Wehrmacht. been reprinted, the German has not organisation set up in 1919 to produce It is has therefore been easy to been, despite the scarcity of volumes the German official history, were as condemn the later volumes of Der 13 and 14. thorough in their construction of the Weltkrieg as ideologically tainted. These two arguments may be operational story. The first head of But this is both to exaggerate the sufficient explanations for the neglect Reichsarchiv’s section for the collection effect of the Nazis on the writing of of the Der Weltkrieg in Germany, of documents, Theodor Jochim, the history and at the same time to but they do not apply to English- distinguished its work from that of underplay a pre-existing issue whose speaking historians. Their reasons for academic historians, contending that, roots date back not to Weimar but to not consulting it more frequently are, “The events of the war, strategy and Wilhelmine Germany. presumably, linguistic. For monoglot tactics can only be considered from a After 1933, Jochim’s goal scholars, this translation will be a neutral, purely objective perspective remained the guiding principle boon beyond measure. It has for the historians of the been fashionable to rubbish the Wehrmacht as it had been for work of the official historians those of the Reichsarchiv. Their of the First World War of all careers were formed under languages. Sir James Edmonds, the Hohenzollerns, and their whose labours on behalf of function within the army, as it Britain were not completed had been for the historians of until 1948, and who has been the Prussian general staff, was criticised by David French, Tim not only to record but also to Travers and Denis Winter, to teach. Military history enabled cite three historians with very officers of the future to learn different perspectives, presided from the examples of the past; over an enterprise which they would not do so if mistakes may not conform to current committed by their predecessors expectations of historians, but were glossed over. Der Weltkrieg which strove hard for objectivity. did not set out specifically to As Andrew Green has shown glorify the German soldier. His in Writing the Great War: Sir heroism in front-line combat James Edmonds and the Official was the subject of a separate, Histories 1915-1948 (2003), more popular series edited by this was team writing avant Georg Soldan. Schlachten des la lettre. Draft narratives were Weltkrieges covered individual compiled from the documents battles in a run of 36 much and were then circulated to the slimmer volumes, the last of surviving participants for their them published in 1930, three comments in the search for years before Hitler came to balance. Edmonds’s creation could which weighs things dispassionately power. What did affect the writing of lay much greater claim to unbiased and is independent of any ideology.” Der Weltkrieg was the course of Nazi authority than could – say – Basil The Nazis’ rise to power in 1933 foreign policy. The Reichsarchiv had Liddell Hart’s The Real War, probably would test this resolve. Volume 9, established working relationships the most widely read one-volume parts of which are included in the with the official historians of other account of the war in the English present translation, was published powers, especially Britain. But language between 1930 and 1964. in 1933, and so was the last to appear contacts with the Soviet Union, Markus Pöhlmann has produced a under the old regime. The president which had provided training areas study comparable to Green’s on the of the Reichsarchiv in that year, Hans for the Reichswehr in the late 1920s, writing of Der Weltkrieg, to which von Haeften, resisted flying the were broken after 1933, and the this foreword is heavily indebted. swastika flag over the office building. comparative input available for the Kriegsgeschichte und Geschichtspolitik: In 1934 the Reichsarchiv, which even earlier volumes began to wither. der Erste Weltkrieg. Die amtliche though staffed by former army During the Second World War itself, deutsche Militärgeschichtsschreibung officers had thus far remained an volume 14 – dealing with the events 1914-1956 (2002) shows that the independent body at least in name, of 1918 – was censored for fear of https://scholars.wlu.ca/cmh/vol19/iss2/872 2 Strachan - 1915 Intro.indd 72 6/14/2010 10:50:31 AM and : Germany’s Western Front Translations from the German Official History of the Great War upsetting Romania (Germany’s ally treaty of 1919.
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