0:00:06 > 0:00:08On 5th October 1915,
0:00:08 > 0:00:11my great-uncle, Lieutenant Aubrey Hastings,
0:00:11 > 0:00:14of the 7th East Surrey Regiment,
0:00:14 > 0:00:15was killed in France,
0:00:15 > 0:00:19blown to pieces in his trench, during the Battle of Loos.
0:00:21 > 0:00:25I grew up with his story, reading the unhappy letters that he wrote
0:00:25 > 0:00:27amid the poppies of the battlefield,
0:00:27 > 0:00:29along with those of a grandfather
0:00:29 > 0:00:31and another great-uncle who survived.
0:00:33 > 0:00:36But this is the first time I've visited the cemetery
0:00:36 > 0:00:40at Fouquieres-les-Bethune where Aubrey is buried,
0:00:40 > 0:00:46one of some 900,000 British Empire dead of the First World War.
0:00:48 > 0:00:51Almost everyone in this country shares such links
0:00:51 > 0:00:56with that catastrophe for our forefathers and for Europe.
0:00:58 > 0:00:59It's a funny business,
0:00:59 > 0:01:02looking down at the last resting place
0:01:02 > 0:01:04of one of my own family, whom I never met,
0:01:04 > 0:01:09who died in a struggle I've spent decades reading about.
0:01:09 > 0:01:11Its horror is not in doubt.
0:01:11 > 0:01:14But where I part company from what we might call
0:01:14 > 0:01:16"the Blackadder take on history"
0:01:16 > 0:01:18is to believe that it was also futile -
0:01:18 > 0:01:21that it didn't matter which side won.
0:01:21 > 0:01:25In the 21st century, the British people are deeply wedded to the idea
0:01:25 > 0:01:28that the Second World War was our "good" war,
0:01:28 > 0:01:30the First our "bad" one.
0:01:30 > 0:01:32But what if we'd stayed out?
0:01:32 > 0:01:35What if Germany had won?
0:01:35 > 0:01:38In my opinion, the deaths of Aubrey Hastings
0:01:38 > 0:01:43and hundred of thousands of his comrades were assuredly a great tragedy,
0:01:43 > 0:01:45but they were not for nothing.
0:01:48 > 0:01:51Many British people honour the men who fought and died
0:01:51 > 0:01:55with a mixture of sorrow and a sense of waste...
0:01:57 > 0:02:03..a belief that no cause could have justified so horrendous a sacrifice.
0:02:03 > 0:02:04BUGLE PLAYS "Last Post"
0:02:07 > 0:02:09But a hundred years after the outbreak,
0:02:09 > 0:02:14it seems time to revisit the reasons we went to war in 1914.
0:02:15 > 0:02:19I want to argue that, far from Britain having plunged
0:02:19 > 0:02:22into a bloodbath we could have stayed out of,
0:02:22 > 0:02:26our part in the First World War was tragically necessary.
0:02:47 > 0:02:52Any exploration of why Britain had to go to war in 1914
0:02:52 > 0:02:55must start on the continent of Europe.
0:02:56 > 0:03:00The spark was ignited in the Balkans on 28th June,
0:03:00 > 0:03:03when Gavrilo Princip, a Bosnian Serb,
0:03:03 > 0:03:06shot dead Archduke Franz Ferdinand,
0:03:06 > 0:03:08heir to the Austrian throne.
0:03:11 > 0:03:15The Empire's rulers immediately determined to exploit the outrage
0:03:15 > 0:03:17to justify invading neighbouring Serbia,
0:03:17 > 0:03:20where the murder weapons had come from.
0:03:21 > 0:03:24But the Russians were Serbia's close allies,
0:03:24 > 0:03:28and they made it plain they would fight to protect their fellow Slavs.
0:03:33 > 0:03:35Through July 1914,
0:03:35 > 0:03:40the great continental powers waded ever deeper into crisis.
0:03:42 > 0:03:46But from the outset, the key player was Germany.
0:03:53 > 0:03:56On 6th July, its rulers pledged the Austrians
0:03:56 > 0:03:59their unconditional support to smash Serbia,
0:03:59 > 0:04:03promising to deal with Russia and its own ally France,
0:04:03 > 0:04:05if they intervened.
0:04:07 > 0:04:08Day by day, it became plainer
0:04:08 > 0:04:12that none of the big players would back down,
0:04:12 > 0:04:16and thus began the countdown to the First World War.
0:04:20 > 0:04:23Some historians have argued that once it became clear
0:04:23 > 0:04:27that Austria and Germany were going to war with France and Russia,
0:04:27 > 0:04:31we, the British, should simply have let them get on with it, stayed out,
0:04:31 > 0:04:33that all that would have come out of a German victory
0:04:33 > 0:04:38was a fast-forwarded version of today's European Union.
0:04:38 > 0:04:39I don't buy that.
0:04:39 > 0:04:42The people who were running Germany cared nothing for democracy
0:04:42 > 0:04:44or other people's freedoms.
0:04:44 > 0:04:46Once the shooting started,
0:04:46 > 0:04:49it became plain that their war aims were little different
0:04:49 > 0:04:51from those of Hitler 35 years later,
0:04:51 > 0:04:54excepting only the Jewish genocide.
0:05:01 > 0:05:04The causes of the war are hugely complicated,
0:05:04 > 0:05:08with the death of the Archduke only setting in motion existing forces.
0:05:08 > 0:05:11No one nation deserves all the blame.
0:05:14 > 0:05:17But there's an overriding case
0:05:17 > 0:05:20that German recklessness contributed more than anything else
0:05:20 > 0:05:23to make a conflict intended to settle a local score
0:05:23 > 0:05:26escalate into a European war.
0:05:27 > 0:05:30And once the fighting and dying started,
0:05:30 > 0:05:32it became cruelly apparent
0:05:32 > 0:05:35that a Germany victory would be a disaster for Europe.
0:05:41 > 0:05:46In 1914, Germany was by far the most powerful state on the continent,
0:05:46 > 0:05:49the most advanced society in Europe.
0:05:53 > 0:05:57Industrially, it was racing ahead of its rivals in every field,
0:05:57 > 0:06:00from pharmaceuticals to automobile design.
0:06:03 > 0:06:06Socially, it pioneered a welfare state
0:06:06 > 0:06:10by creating unemployment insurance and old age pensions.
0:06:12 > 0:06:15German culture was revered across the world.
0:06:18 > 0:06:20But it became Europe's historic tragedy
0:06:20 > 0:06:23that the German system of government
0:06:23 > 0:06:26lagged generations behind everything else in the country.
0:06:28 > 0:06:29The Empire's elected parliament
0:06:29 > 0:06:31had the largest socialist party
0:06:31 > 0:06:32in Europe.
0:06:33 > 0:06:35But while the Reichstag
0:06:35 > 0:06:36dominated domestic affairs,
0:06:36 > 0:06:41it was the Kaiser, the so-called All Highest, Wilhelm II,
0:06:41 > 0:06:44who still made every key appointment
0:06:44 > 0:06:48and controlled decisions about war and peace.
0:06:51 > 0:06:55Wilhelm was a weak man who sought to masquerade as a strong one,
0:06:55 > 0:06:59chronically unstable and prone to violent mood swings.
0:06:59 > 0:07:03He wasn't at heart a warmonger as, of course, Hitler was,
0:07:03 > 0:07:05but he loved to play at soldiers.
0:07:05 > 0:07:08He offered threats and blandishments to other powers,
0:07:08 > 0:07:11which he ALWAYS got in the wrong order.
0:07:20 > 0:07:22'Professor John Rohl has spent a lifetime
0:07:22 > 0:07:25'studying and writing about the Kaiser.'
0:07:25 > 0:07:28How personally influential was Kaiser Wilhelm
0:07:28 > 0:07:31in the decision for war?
0:07:31 > 0:07:36Kaiser Wilhelm took over the reins from his father in 1888
0:07:36 > 0:07:39and inherited Bismarck's immense power himself
0:07:39 > 0:07:42when he threw Bismarck out, but not content with that,
0:07:42 > 0:07:45he then went back to an almost 18th-century notion of monarchy,
0:07:45 > 0:07:48in other words, he insisted on ruling personally.
0:07:48 > 0:07:51With the result that he appointed all ministers, all the chancellors,
0:07:51 > 0:07:54all the generals, all the admirals himself, personally,
0:07:54 > 0:07:57according to his likes and dislikes.
0:07:57 > 0:08:00He was an extremely assertive bully.
0:08:00 > 0:08:03It's an extraordinary situation that you had a socialist majority,
0:08:03 > 0:08:06violently anti militarist majority, in the Reichstag and yet,
0:08:06 > 0:08:09exercising no influence at all, really,
0:08:09 > 0:08:11over this regime and foreign policy.
0:08:11 > 0:08:17Yeah, one of the reasons, I believe, behind the German generals' decision
0:08:17 > 0:08:22to go to war around about 1914 was the rising tide of democracy at home.
0:08:22 > 0:08:24The thinking was, "Well, if we leave it too long,
0:08:24 > 0:08:28"we will not be able to get our way and do what we really need to do
0:08:28 > 0:08:32"to make Germany great, so we'd better go before that time comes."
0:08:36 > 0:08:39The most powerful institution in Wilhelm's Empire,
0:08:39 > 0:08:43and indeed in all continental Europe, was the German Army.
0:08:47 > 0:08:51The Kaiser was also eager to extend his power across the seas,
0:08:51 > 0:08:54and personally promoted the creation of a big-gun navy.
0:08:57 > 0:09:01This thoroughly alarmed the British, who feared Germany's fleet
0:09:01 > 0:09:05as a threat to their global trade routes and empire.
0:09:08 > 0:09:10As Queen Victoria's grandson,
0:09:10 > 0:09:14Wilhelm retained some respect for her people,
0:09:14 > 0:09:16but he was determined that neither he
0:09:16 > 0:09:18nor his empire should defer to them.
0:09:21 > 0:09:23It's almost as if he feels obliged
0:09:23 > 0:09:27to be more military and more masculine than any other monarch,
0:09:27 > 0:09:30perhaps because there's always the whiff of Englishness about him,
0:09:30 > 0:09:33his mother being English, he was always very keen to say,
0:09:33 > 0:09:34"No, no, I'm not English,
0:09:34 > 0:09:37"I'm Prussian, I'm extremely Prussian."
0:09:37 > 0:09:42So there's this autocratic side to him, there's extreme militarism.
0:09:42 > 0:09:44But some of it does come from England.
0:09:44 > 0:09:48For example, the love of the navy, the idea that he has a mission
0:09:48 > 0:09:51to become THE superpower in Europe, in place of Britain.
0:09:51 > 0:09:55He feels he has a right as leader of this new,
0:09:55 > 0:09:57energized Germany after unification.
0:10:00 > 0:10:04Fear of Germany's might, and of its aspirations to dominate Europe,
0:10:04 > 0:10:08prompted Russia and France to forge a close military alliance.
0:10:10 > 0:10:14Although Britain's government made no firm written commitment,
0:10:14 > 0:10:17it posted an option on supporting them in the event of war.
0:10:19 > 0:10:23Many British people recoiled from the idea of joining
0:10:23 > 0:10:25an alliance with Tsar Nicholas II,
0:10:25 > 0:10:29whose people had been Britain's enemies through the 19th century.
0:10:29 > 0:10:32But the fears of Europe's rulers
0:10:32 > 0:10:35that a general war would result from their rivalries
0:10:35 > 0:10:36caused every nation
0:10:36 > 0:10:38to huddle close to its friends.
0:10:40 > 0:10:42The Germans to the Austrians,
0:10:42 > 0:10:44the Russians to the French,
0:10:44 > 0:10:47with the British as cautious maybes.
0:10:49 > 0:10:54Germany's warlords were haunted by fears of Russia's growing might.
0:10:54 > 0:10:56Some of them were convinced
0:10:56 > 0:10:59that challenging the Tsar's armies sooner rather than later
0:10:59 > 0:11:02offered Germany the best chance of victory.
0:11:04 > 0:11:06This is one of many German memorials
0:11:06 > 0:11:10to Prussia's 19th-century military triumphs.
0:11:10 > 0:11:14Instead of perceiving big wars, as we do today,
0:11:14 > 0:11:16as universal tragedies,
0:11:16 > 0:11:20the Kaiser's generals, and sometimes Wilhelm himself,
0:11:20 > 0:11:24believed that trial by battle was an acceptable instrument of policy.
0:11:27 > 0:11:31All Germany's leaders were insecure, even paranoid,
0:11:31 > 0:11:33about threats at home from the socialists,
0:11:33 > 0:11:35abroad from Russia and France,
0:11:35 > 0:11:39probably backed in a showdown by Britain.
0:11:39 > 0:11:43In those days, not many people thought seriously about economics.
0:11:43 > 0:11:46The Kaiser and his generals counted soldiers, they failed to realise
0:11:46 > 0:11:50that their country was achieving dominance of Europe
0:11:50 > 0:11:54without firing a shot through its industrial power.
0:11:54 > 0:11:58By 1914, so many Germans had come to believe
0:11:58 > 0:12:01that a European clash in arms was inevitable
0:12:01 > 0:12:05that their fatalism contributed mightily to bringing this about.
0:12:07 > 0:12:11The Kaiser, who was almost certainly clinically unstable,
0:12:11 > 0:12:13was one of three men in Germany
0:12:13 > 0:12:17who took the key decisions which resulted in war.
0:12:17 > 0:12:20To this day, historians argue fiercely
0:12:20 > 0:12:23about which pulled the levers to precipitate disaster.
0:12:25 > 0:12:29The others were the Chancellor, Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg,
0:12:29 > 0:12:30appointed by Wilhelm,
0:12:30 > 0:12:34and General Helmuth von Moltke, head of the Army.
0:12:36 > 0:12:40The Kaiser and the Chancellor were the ones who, on 6th July,
0:12:40 > 0:12:43promised Austria Germany's support against Serbia.
0:12:44 > 0:12:46Bethmann Hollweg,
0:12:46 > 0:12:49knowing that Russia was committed to protect the Serbs,
0:12:49 > 0:12:53pressed the Austrians to hurry their invasion to pre-empt the Tsar.
0:12:55 > 0:12:59This has become known as Berlin's "blank cheque",
0:12:59 > 0:13:02keystone of the argument that Germany was most blameworthy
0:13:02 > 0:13:04for the horrors that followed.
0:13:08 > 0:13:11'Professor Sir Hew Strachan has been studying
0:13:11 > 0:13:14'and chronicling the war for over 30 years.
0:13:14 > 0:13:16'He agrees that Berlin took a huge gamble.'
0:13:17 > 0:13:20The Germans actively encouraged the Austrians
0:13:20 > 0:13:23not merely to invade Serbia, but to get on and do it
0:13:23 > 0:13:25even more quickly than they were ready to do it.
0:13:25 > 0:13:27Yes, partly because I think if they do it quickly,
0:13:27 > 0:13:30you'll get away with it - you'll be able to crush Serbia,
0:13:30 > 0:13:33there'll be a Balkan war that's over so quick that nobody will have time to intervene,
0:13:33 > 0:13:36so the presumption here is speed
0:13:36 > 0:13:40and what Berlin is doing is constantly taking best-case advice.
0:13:40 > 0:13:42You know, will Russia stay out of this war
0:13:42 > 0:13:45because they're worried there will be a revolution in Russia?
0:13:45 > 0:13:48The best answer is that, yes, they will, because there has been
0:13:48 > 0:13:51a revolution in Russia in 1905 and there might be again.
0:13:51 > 0:13:53So they work with that assumption. Whereas, in fact, of course,
0:13:53 > 0:13:56the Tsar's going to be put under tremendous pressure
0:13:56 > 0:13:57to back the south Slavs in Serbia.
0:13:57 > 0:14:02But throughout July, the one nation surely that had the power
0:14:02 > 0:14:05to stop this process, if the Germans had said to the Austrians,
0:14:05 > 0:14:08"Stop, do not invade Serbia,"
0:14:08 > 0:14:12there would have not been a general European war, would there?
0:14:12 > 0:14:14That's right, I think they had the power to say no.
0:14:14 > 0:14:17I mean, after all, the blank cheque is central
0:14:17 > 0:14:19and the blank cheque is issued by Germany,
0:14:19 > 0:14:23and Germany then seems to show remarkable insouciance
0:14:23 > 0:14:25as to how that cheque will be used, you know.
0:14:25 > 0:14:27Austria-Hungary still has to cash it,
0:14:27 > 0:14:30it's Austria-Hungary that has to initiate war.
0:14:30 > 0:14:34But absolutely, the balance then shifts to Berlin
0:14:34 > 0:14:36and if any power has the capacity to stop it, it's Berlin,
0:14:36 > 0:14:39particularly at the very end of the crisis.
0:14:40 > 0:14:43Army chief of staff, Helmuth von Moltke,
0:14:43 > 0:14:47who answered only to the Kaiser, also played a pivotal role.
0:14:49 > 0:14:53On 28th July, Wilhelm and Bethmann Hollweg
0:14:53 > 0:14:56experienced a brief panic attack.
0:14:56 > 0:14:59The looming war now looked far bigger and graver
0:14:59 > 0:15:00than they'd bargained for.
0:15:03 > 0:15:07But Moltke, on his own initiative, telegraphed the Austrians
0:15:07 > 0:15:10and urged them to hasten their attack.
0:15:10 > 0:15:12The chief of staff had long argued
0:15:12 > 0:15:15that if Germany must face a European showdown,
0:15:15 > 0:15:21it was better to have it before the Russian's big armaments expansion programme was complete.
0:15:23 > 0:15:26At an imperial council meeting in December 1912,
0:15:26 > 0:15:28he's reliably reported as saying,
0:15:28 > 0:15:30"War, and the sooner the better."
0:15:34 > 0:15:37'Annika Mombauer is a German scholar
0:15:37 > 0:15:40'who has written a biography of the chief of staff
0:15:40 > 0:15:43'which emphasises his role in the July crisis.'
0:15:44 > 0:15:47Where did Moltke fit into the decision for war?
0:15:47 > 0:15:49Well, Moltke very much advocates war.
0:15:49 > 0:15:53He thinks that war is inevitable in the long run.
0:15:53 > 0:15:57He thinks that eventually Russia will become too strong,
0:15:57 > 0:16:00too militarily powerful for Germany to defeat her.
0:16:00 > 0:16:05And therefore, he creates an atmosphere in which war seems
0:16:05 > 0:16:08a good solution out of a perceived problem.
0:16:08 > 0:16:11One thing that seems extraordinary to us about how dysfunctional
0:16:11 > 0:16:16the German government was in July 1914 is that here you've got Moltke,
0:16:16 > 0:16:19who's supposed to be just the head of the army.
0:16:19 > 0:16:21And at a critical moment, July 28th,
0:16:21 > 0:16:25he sends a telegram to Vienna, to the Austrians,
0:16:25 > 0:16:27telling them to get on with invading Serbia,
0:16:27 > 0:16:31and it does seem an extraordinary reflection of both
0:16:31 > 0:16:35how reckless Moltke could be and of how powerful he was.
0:16:35 > 0:16:37Well, you're right, he does send that telegram,
0:16:37 > 0:16:40and in Vienna, they end up saying, "Well, who actually...?
0:16:40 > 0:16:42- "Who rules in Berlin?! - Who rules in Berlin?
0:16:42 > 0:16:45"Moltke or Bethmann?" Or was it, in fact, the Kaiser?
0:16:45 > 0:16:47So, yes, you're completely right.
0:16:47 > 0:16:51He exceeds his authority, if you like, by sending this telegram.
0:16:55 > 0:17:00Germany's leadership in July 1914 was extraordinarily reckless
0:17:00 > 0:17:04in accepting the risk that by promoting a small Balkan war,
0:17:04 > 0:17:07they would trigger a huge European one.
0:17:09 > 0:17:11When it became plain that the Russians would fight
0:17:11 > 0:17:14rather than see Serbia go under,
0:17:14 > 0:17:16the Germans refused to take the one step
0:17:16 > 0:17:19that could have prevented a general European catastrophe -
0:17:19 > 0:17:22telling the Austrians to pull back.
0:17:22 > 0:17:27Instead, they themselves prepared to mobilise against Russia.
0:17:27 > 0:17:28And that's why, I believe,
0:17:28 > 0:17:31they deserve most blame for all that followed.
0:17:35 > 0:17:36On 28th July,
0:17:36 > 0:17:38Austria declared war on Serbia
0:17:38 > 0:17:43and two days later, the Tsar ordered his army to mobilise.
0:17:45 > 0:17:49Germany then issued two ultimatums - one to Russia
0:17:49 > 0:17:52and another to France, its ally.
0:17:52 > 0:17:54Neither was expected to accept,
0:17:54 > 0:17:56and few of the Kaiser's generals wished them to.
0:17:56 > 0:18:02Berlin then set in motion its hugely ambitious war plan,
0:18:02 > 0:18:05designed to crush France before turning on Russia.
0:18:09 > 0:18:11Created almost a decade earlier
0:18:11 > 0:18:13by Moltke's predecessor,
0:18:13 > 0:18:15Count Alfred von Schlieffen,
0:18:15 > 0:18:19the plan required an invasion of France by way of its back door,
0:18:19 > 0:18:21through neutral Belgium.
0:18:22 > 0:18:24It was the German commitment
0:18:24 > 0:18:26to overrun Belgium
0:18:26 > 0:18:27which suddenly propelled Britain,
0:18:27 > 0:18:31hitherto a mere spectator of the continental drama,
0:18:31 > 0:18:33to the forefront of the stage.
0:18:34 > 0:18:37Under a treaty signed in 1839,
0:18:37 > 0:18:41this country was among the guarantors of Belgian neutrality.
0:18:43 > 0:18:45I'm one of those who still wonder
0:18:45 > 0:18:47whether Britain really would have come in
0:18:47 > 0:18:49if it hadn't been for the invasion of Belgium.
0:18:49 > 0:18:52- Moltke got this dead wrong, didn't he?- He did, he did.
0:18:52 > 0:18:53He was in an impossible situation,
0:18:53 > 0:18:56militarily speaking, or strategically speaking,
0:18:56 > 0:18:59because Germany is in a sense encircled
0:18:59 > 0:19:02by France in the west and Russia in the east
0:19:02 > 0:19:06and the only way he thinks he can win this war is by implementing
0:19:06 > 0:19:10the so-called Schlieffen Plan, and that plan can only work
0:19:10 > 0:19:14if France is defeated quickly, and that means invading Belgium.
0:19:14 > 0:19:18But interestingly, in France, the chief of staff similarly
0:19:18 > 0:19:21thinks our best chance would be to advance through Belgium.
0:19:21 > 0:19:24But the politicians, the diplomats tell him,
0:19:24 > 0:19:26"We can't do that because of Britain."
0:19:26 > 0:19:29The British told France, "On no account go into Belgium."
0:19:29 > 0:19:34Exactly, exactly. And so, had Germany also respected Belgian neutrality,
0:19:34 > 0:19:37there would have been all sorts of possibilities right at the end
0:19:37 > 0:19:42of July and early in August perhaps to come to a different outcome.
0:19:48 > 0:19:51Thus, in the first days of August 1914,
0:19:51 > 0:19:55Germany prepared to invade and crush France in a campaign of 40 days,
0:19:55 > 0:19:57before turning on Russia.
0:19:57 > 0:19:59Europe had a war.
0:19:59 > 0:20:02But must the British be in it?
0:20:02 > 0:20:03Would they fight?
0:20:10 > 0:20:14Basking in the balmy summer of 1914,
0:20:14 > 0:20:15and preoccupied
0:20:15 > 0:20:16by industrial turmoil
0:20:16 > 0:20:19and the threat of Irish civil war,
0:20:19 > 0:20:21the British people had scant
0:20:21 > 0:20:23appetite for a continental conflict.
0:20:27 > 0:20:30But Liberal Prime Minister Herbert Asquith,
0:20:30 > 0:20:33and several key cabinet colleagues, were appalled by the prospect
0:20:33 > 0:20:36of Germany achieving dominance of Europe.
0:20:36 > 0:20:39They doubted that Britain could merely remain a bystander
0:20:39 > 0:20:41while this happened.
0:20:43 > 0:20:47One such was the Foreign Secretary, Sir Edward Grey,
0:20:47 > 0:20:49who played a critical role.
0:20:57 > 0:20:59Sir Edward Grey is traditionally seen
0:20:59 > 0:21:01as a reticent English gentleman,
0:21:01 > 0:21:04whose grand passions were fly-fishing and bird-watching,
0:21:04 > 0:21:07both of which he wrote good books about.
0:21:07 > 0:21:12But more recently, he's become a focus of fierce controversy.
0:21:12 > 0:21:17Some historians claim that Grey made rash secret commitments to the French
0:21:17 > 0:21:20which dragged us unnecessarily into the war.
0:21:23 > 0:21:26For centuries, it had been a British article of faith
0:21:26 > 0:21:28that a balance of power,
0:21:28 > 0:21:31which denied absolute dominance to any one nation,
0:21:31 > 0:21:33must be maintained on the continent.
0:21:35 > 0:21:38Between 1908 and 1914,
0:21:38 > 0:21:42when Grey was not casting a fly on bright waters,
0:21:42 > 0:21:46he held secret talks with the French about British support
0:21:46 > 0:21:48in the event of a German attack.
0:21:50 > 0:21:54The Foreign Secretary was less clever and less of a statesman
0:21:54 > 0:21:55than his admirers thought.
0:21:57 > 0:22:00But the claim that he should be damned for dragging Britain
0:22:00 > 0:22:03into an unnecessary war doesn't stand up.
0:22:05 > 0:22:08I suggest that Grey was a realist about the difficulty,
0:22:08 > 0:22:13indeed impossibility, of Britain simply standing by doing nothing
0:22:13 > 0:22:16while Germany conquered Europe.
0:22:16 > 0:22:18If the French and Russians had been beaten,
0:22:18 > 0:22:22as they almost certainly would have been if Britain hadn't come in,
0:22:22 > 0:22:26who can imagine a victorious Germany allowing Britain to continue
0:22:26 > 0:22:30ruling the waves and the world's financial system
0:22:30 > 0:22:31any more than Hitler would have done
0:22:31 > 0:22:35if Churchill had tried to strike a deal with him in 1940?
0:22:37 > 0:22:41Nothing Grey said beforehand could have deterred the Germans,
0:22:41 > 0:22:46because they had weighed Britain's military power and discounted it.
0:22:47 > 0:22:50The little British Army seemed incapable of influencing
0:22:50 > 0:22:53a huge clash of continental hosts.
0:22:54 > 0:22:57The Royal Navy was thought irrelevant because,
0:22:57 > 0:22:59in the Kaiser's scornful words,
0:22:59 > 0:23:01"Dreadnoughts have no wheels."
0:23:05 > 0:23:09The Foreign Secretary's secret and unwritten assurances to France
0:23:09 > 0:23:12seem to me to have reflected not warmongering,
0:23:12 > 0:23:14but prudent and essential precaution.
0:23:16 > 0:23:21In July 1914, by proposing an immediate European conference,
0:23:21 > 0:23:24Grey did all that he could to avert war.
0:23:27 > 0:23:31'Sir Michael Howard is Britain's most distinguished living historian.
0:23:31 > 0:23:36'He and I have spent many hours discussing the vast puzzle of 1914
0:23:36 > 0:23:41'and, crucially, whether Britain could have done more to avert disaster.'
0:23:41 > 0:23:44Grey's proposal, which they rejected out of hand,
0:23:44 > 0:23:47to address the confrontation between Austria-Hungary
0:23:47 > 0:23:49and Serbia by having a peace conference -
0:23:49 > 0:23:51it wasn't a contemptible proposal, was it?
0:23:51 > 0:23:56No, it was an absolutely typical Grey thing to do.
0:23:56 > 0:24:00A typical sort of Liberal solution and...
0:24:00 > 0:24:03- But the Germans rejected it flatly. - The Germans rejected it flatly
0:24:03 > 0:24:05because this would have meant letting down the Austrians
0:24:05 > 0:24:07and they were not going to let down the Austrians.
0:24:07 > 0:24:11There was this sense throughout all classes in Austria,
0:24:11 > 0:24:14it is time to finish with the Serbs.
0:24:14 > 0:24:17If we don't finish with the Serbs, they will nibble us to death.
0:24:17 > 0:24:19This is the moment to strike.
0:24:19 > 0:24:24The Germans knowing this was the case were not going to bring in
0:24:24 > 0:24:28the Austrians to debate about what their future was going to be.
0:24:28 > 0:24:32So to that extent also, you could say that the Germans were
0:24:32 > 0:24:38responsible for not letting there be a peaceful settlement.
0:24:40 > 0:24:41On 2nd August,
0:24:41 > 0:24:45the Germans issued an ultimatum to King Albert of Belgium
0:24:45 > 0:24:47demanding passage for their armies.
0:24:48 > 0:24:52He flatly refused and appealed to Britain as a guarantor
0:24:52 > 0:24:54of his country's neutrality.
0:24:55 > 0:24:58Thus, it fell to Sir Edward Grey
0:24:58 > 0:25:02to convince a still reluctant British parliament
0:25:02 > 0:25:05of the necessity for Britain to join the war on the continent.
0:25:08 > 0:25:10On the afternoon of 3rd August,
0:25:10 > 0:25:13Grey delivered the most important speech of his life
0:25:13 > 0:25:15to the House of Commons.
0:25:15 > 0:25:19By now, most of the Cabinet believed that Britain must fight
0:25:19 > 0:25:22in the name of Belgium's rights.
0:25:22 > 0:25:24"Could this country," Grey demanded,
0:25:24 > 0:25:28"stand by and watch the direst crime that ever stained human history,
0:25:28 > 0:25:32"and thus become participators in the sin?"
0:25:32 > 0:25:34He added,
0:25:34 > 0:25:36"We should, I believe,
0:25:36 > 0:25:39"sacrifice our respect and good name before the world
0:25:39 > 0:25:44"and should not escape the most serious and grave consequences."
0:25:45 > 0:25:50This was one of those extraordinary parliamentary occasions that changed history.
0:25:50 > 0:25:53It persuaded much of the Liberal Party,
0:25:53 > 0:25:55hitherto bitterly hostile to intervention,
0:25:55 > 0:26:00now to support it - as the Conservative opposition already did.
0:26:01 > 0:26:04Thus, on 4th August 1914,
0:26:04 > 0:26:06after Berlin rejected an ultimatum
0:26:06 > 0:26:09demanding its withdrawal from Belgium,
0:26:09 > 0:26:12Britain declared war on Germany.
0:26:15 > 0:26:22Was Belgium the real reason that Britain went to war in 1914
0:26:22 > 0:26:24or, as some historians nowadays try to argue,
0:26:24 > 0:26:25"Oh, it was just a pretext,"
0:26:25 > 0:26:28- that the British government really wanted to fight anyway?- Yeah.
0:26:28 > 0:26:31Well, I would tend to say, "It's both and."
0:26:31 > 0:26:34There are two arguments here.
0:26:34 > 0:26:37One is the security of Belgium
0:26:37 > 0:26:41and the absence of a dominant power on the mainland of Europe
0:26:41 > 0:26:44is seen as central to Britain's strategic position.
0:26:44 > 0:26:47There can't be an equivalent of Napoleon, facing Britain across
0:26:47 > 0:26:51the Channel and dominating Britain's routes to the rest of the world.
0:26:51 > 0:26:56The second issue is - does it matter that Germany
0:26:56 > 0:26:59disregards its international obligations, enters Belgium,
0:26:59 > 0:27:02which is a neutral state, and fails to reflect
0:27:02 > 0:27:06both international law and the rights of small nations?
0:27:06 > 0:27:10And the answer is it does matter and it matters because, for Britain,
0:27:10 > 0:27:14international law and what we might now see as morality, also matters.
0:27:14 > 0:27:16But it's more fundamental than that,
0:27:16 > 0:27:20because Britain is an economic power, a trading power,
0:27:20 > 0:27:23a power that depends on its shipping,
0:27:23 > 0:27:27actually, international law is more than just a sense
0:27:27 > 0:27:29of legal, of moral, obligation.
0:27:29 > 0:27:31It's also a matter of economic necessity.
0:27:31 > 0:27:33You need to respect international law
0:27:33 > 0:27:37to make sure that Britain can continue to exercise
0:27:37 > 0:27:42the degree of leverage it does as a neutral itself.
0:27:42 > 0:27:46Well, some people say now, "Oh, it was incredibly silly for Britain
0:27:46 > 0:27:49"to get involved in this horrific experience of the First World War
0:27:49 > 0:27:52"just because the German Army marched into Belgium."
0:27:52 > 0:27:54But actually, it seems to me,
0:27:54 > 0:27:57it was a pretty good reason for going to war.
0:27:57 > 0:27:59It was an excellent reason for going to war.
0:27:59 > 0:28:02And it did something which, at the beginning of the July crisis,
0:28:02 > 0:28:05- seemed unimaginable to many, which is...- It united the British people.
0:28:05 > 0:28:09It united the British people. United the Cabinet and united the people.
0:28:16 > 0:28:20As Britain mobilised its little army in that first week of August,
0:28:20 > 0:28:24Germany's vast host was already surging into Belgium.
0:28:31 > 0:28:34Within days, the first reports appeared in the world's newspapers
0:28:34 > 0:28:39describing the extraordinarily brutal conduct of German troops
0:28:39 > 0:28:40towards the Belgian people.
0:28:43 > 0:28:47They were not merely carelessly destroying homes and villages -
0:28:47 > 0:28:49all invading armies do that.
0:28:49 > 0:28:52They were seizing and killing civilian hostages
0:28:52 > 0:28:54in scores and hundreds.
0:28:56 > 0:28:58Even before 1914,
0:28:58 > 0:29:02the Kaiser's Army had earned a reputation for exceptional brutality.
0:29:03 > 0:29:05Between 1904 and 1907,
0:29:05 > 0:29:09when the Herero and Nama tribes rebelled against German colonial
0:29:09 > 0:29:11rule in South West Africa,
0:29:11 > 0:29:14the Kaiser's soldiers killed
0:29:14 > 0:29:16or deliberately starved to death
0:29:16 > 0:29:18almost 100,000 native people.
0:29:21 > 0:29:25Wilhelm applauded and decorated the officer responsible.
0:29:27 > 0:29:30Even by the imperial standards of the day,
0:29:30 > 0:29:33this action was worse than any British excess.
0:29:38 > 0:29:42But the Herero genocide had been far away in Africa.
0:29:42 > 0:29:47In August 1914, world opinion was stunned by German savagery
0:29:47 > 0:29:49towards fellow Europeans.
0:29:51 > 0:29:56In Flanders, the destruction of the medieval university town of Louvain,
0:29:56 > 0:29:58today rebuilt from ashes,
0:29:58 > 0:30:02became a symbol of the excesses of the Kaiser's soldiers,
0:30:02 > 0:30:04endorsed by Berlin.
0:30:06 > 0:30:10Professor John Horne has exhaustively researched
0:30:10 > 0:30:12and catalogued the German Army's actions
0:30:12 > 0:30:15in Berlin and France during 1914.
0:30:17 > 0:30:21John, we are here, in the university library at Louvain,
0:30:21 > 0:30:22what happened here?
0:30:22 > 0:30:27Well, on 25th August, there was the sound of fighting -
0:30:27 > 0:30:32German soldiers shooting at what they claimed was a civilian insurrection.
0:30:32 > 0:30:34Round about 11 o'clock in the evening,
0:30:34 > 0:30:38this beautiful university library was broken into by the German soldiers
0:30:38 > 0:30:40and deliberately set fire.
0:30:40 > 0:30:45One young Jesuit, Father Dupierreux, had written in his notebook
0:30:45 > 0:30:47that he thought the Germans, in burning down the library,
0:30:47 > 0:30:49had done something as barbaric
0:30:49 > 0:30:53as the destruction of the library of Alexandria in antiquity.
0:30:53 > 0:30:57This was seized by German soldiers and he was summarily executed.
0:30:57 > 0:30:59And by the 29th or the 30th,
0:30:59 > 0:31:03you have to imagine Louvain as an almost empty town.
0:31:03 > 0:31:06The population that hadn't been deported gradually straggled back in
0:31:06 > 0:31:10to find between 1,500 and 2,000 buildings destroyed,
0:31:10 > 0:31:15and well over 240 of their own townspeople had been killed.
0:31:15 > 0:31:18All armies in all wars can behave very badly.
0:31:18 > 0:31:22What seems different about what happened in Belgium in 1914
0:31:22 > 0:31:25was that it wasn't just the question of the odd soldiers
0:31:25 > 0:31:27brutally murdering a few civilians,
0:31:27 > 0:31:30they were systematically shooting them in scores
0:31:30 > 0:31:33- and sometimes in hundreds as hostages.- You are quite right.
0:31:33 > 0:31:37What we've just described in Louvain was a terrible incident
0:31:37 > 0:31:39and it immediately grabbed the international headlines.
0:31:39 > 0:31:42But it was typical of something that happened across the whole
0:31:42 > 0:31:46invasion front, in Belgium and also in eastern France.
0:31:46 > 0:31:49And it wasn't the worst case in terms of the death rate.
0:31:49 > 0:31:51Dinant was destroyed as a town
0:31:51 > 0:31:54and 674 of its inhabitants executed two days before...
0:31:54 > 0:31:57- In cold blood?- In cold blood.
0:32:03 > 0:32:05In the first weeks of the war,
0:32:05 > 0:32:10nearly 6,500 civilians were executed by German troops
0:32:10 > 0:32:11in Belgium and France.
0:32:12 > 0:32:17Berlin claimed that they were merely exacting legitimate reprisals
0:32:17 > 0:32:21for resistance by civilians, so-called franc-tireurs,
0:32:21 > 0:32:23'but John Horne rejects this.'
0:32:23 > 0:32:26You found no evidence at all of franc-tireurs activity, did you,
0:32:26 > 0:32:28of guerrilla activity against the Germans?
0:32:28 > 0:32:31None, it was... er, apart from the odd
0:32:31 > 0:32:32very isolated incident,
0:32:32 > 0:32:34but nothing which justified the German accusations,
0:32:34 > 0:32:37which was that there had been what they called a "Volkskrieg",
0:32:37 > 0:32:39a people's war, a mass uprising.
0:32:39 > 0:32:43And the Kaiser, already by 9th August, only a week into the war,
0:32:43 > 0:32:47is accusing the King of the Belgians of fermenting such an uprising.
0:32:47 > 0:32:48It didn't happen.
0:32:48 > 0:32:52But it was the institutional response of the German generals
0:32:52 > 0:32:54and right up to the Kaiser that seems striking.
0:32:54 > 0:32:58And it does seem to say something about the character of the regime.
0:32:58 > 0:32:59That's right.
0:32:59 > 0:33:03Because, very quickly, what starts out as panics
0:33:03 > 0:33:06and localised responses by German soldiers
0:33:06 > 0:33:10is immediately endorsed by the whole German command structure.
0:33:10 > 0:33:15And then what swings into play is a series of very brutal reprisals,
0:33:15 > 0:33:18which are justified in terms of German military doctrine
0:33:18 > 0:33:21as to what you do when you're faced with civilian uprising.
0:33:23 > 0:33:28For years, apologists for Germany claimed that the Belgian atrocities
0:33:28 > 0:33:30were figments of Allied propaganda.
0:33:31 > 0:33:34Some of the stories that made headlines in 1914,
0:33:34 > 0:33:37for instance, claims that thousands of babies
0:33:37 > 0:33:40were maimed by German soldiers, were indeed fabrications.
0:33:43 > 0:33:45But a big truth persists -
0:33:45 > 0:33:48the German Army behaved with systemic barbarity
0:33:48 > 0:33:51during its advance across Belgium and France.
0:33:52 > 0:33:56Its actions persuaded many hitherto doubting British people
0:33:56 > 0:33:58that they had chosen the right side
0:33:58 > 0:34:01in the ghastly conflict that was unfolding.
0:34:03 > 0:34:06Some historians today claim that the British government's decision
0:34:06 > 0:34:11to go to war in defence of Belgium's neutrality was simply a fig leaf,
0:34:11 > 0:34:13a pretence, when really, it was all simply
0:34:13 > 0:34:16about supporting the French against the Germans.
0:34:16 > 0:34:18I'd put it a bit differently.
0:34:18 > 0:34:22Yes, it's true that some key ministers wanted to fight anyway,
0:34:22 > 0:34:24but Belgium provided a tipping point -
0:34:24 > 0:34:28all sorts of British people who cared nothing for Serbia or Russia
0:34:28 > 0:34:31could easily get their minds around the notion
0:34:31 > 0:34:34that it was outrageous that the most powerful army in Europe
0:34:34 > 0:34:37proposed to crush beneath its boots a small state
0:34:37 > 0:34:40simply to serve the convenience of the Schlieffen Plan.
0:34:41 > 0:34:45And wasn't that indeed a decent and honourable reason
0:34:45 > 0:34:46for Britain to go to war?
0:34:49 > 0:34:52'Had Germany been victorious on the continent,
0:34:52 > 0:34:57'Britain would have found itself in a desperate and lonely predicament.'
0:34:57 > 0:35:00If the Germans had won, and now I hypothesise, there would have
0:35:00 > 0:35:03been an Anglo-German war within a matter of years.
0:35:03 > 0:35:08The fear in Britain was that a power which unified the continent
0:35:08 > 0:35:10would then be in a position
0:35:10 > 0:35:12to challenge Britain's command of the sea.
0:35:12 > 0:35:14If she commanded, challenged,
0:35:14 > 0:35:17and successfully overturned Britain's command of the sea,
0:35:17 > 0:35:20not only would we no longer have an empire,
0:35:20 > 0:35:24we would be at the mercy of whoever commanded the whole of Europe.
0:35:24 > 0:35:27That was what the British feared. That was what...
0:35:27 > 0:35:29- And they were right to fear it? - And they were right to fear it,
0:35:29 > 0:35:32because there was a substantial element in Germany,
0:35:32 > 0:35:34led by the Kaiser,
0:35:34 > 0:35:38whose one objective was to challenge Britain as a world power,
0:35:38 > 0:35:42to build a great navy which could then defeat the British
0:35:42 > 0:35:47and Germany would then become a world power at the expense of the British.
0:35:47 > 0:35:49So if the Germans had won the war,
0:35:49 > 0:35:53I see no way in which they would not have used their dominance of Europe
0:35:53 > 0:35:55to bring the British down.
0:35:55 > 0:35:59So we would not have avoided a war, we would only have postponed one.
0:36:06 > 0:36:08By early September,
0:36:08 > 0:36:11the German Army had swept through Belgium and into France.
0:36:11 > 0:36:15With Berlin believing that its victory was imminent,
0:36:15 > 0:36:17Chancellor Bethmann Hollweg drew up a list
0:36:17 > 0:36:20of his country's demands at the peace talks.
0:36:20 > 0:36:26They included seizing large swathes of land from both France and Russia,
0:36:26 > 0:36:32annexing Luxembourg, making Belgium and Holland vassal states.
0:36:32 > 0:36:36The September Plan, as it became known, was designed to secure
0:36:36 > 0:36:40Germany's absolute political and economic control of Europe.
0:36:42 > 0:36:44But in the second week of September,
0:36:44 > 0:36:48the French Army achieved a historic victory in the Battle of the Marne,
0:36:48 > 0:36:51driving back the Germans from the gates of Paris.
0:36:53 > 0:36:56What followed, in the autumn of 1914,
0:36:56 > 0:37:00finally wrecked Germany's dream of swift victory.
0:37:05 > 0:37:09It also witnessed the first big and seriously bloody battle
0:37:09 > 0:37:11of the war for the British.
0:37:13 > 0:37:16In October, the British Expeditionary Force
0:37:16 > 0:37:20marched towards the old Belgian cloth town of Ypres -
0:37:20 > 0:37:25Wipers, as millions of British soldiers came to know it.
0:37:25 > 0:37:27They arrived there just in time to
0:37:27 > 0:37:29clash head-on with a massive enemy
0:37:29 > 0:37:32offensive - the last great German effort
0:37:32 > 0:37:35to win the war by Christmas.
0:37:35 > 0:37:39What took place in the five weeks of battle around Ypres
0:37:39 > 0:37:42set the pattern for the vision of the First World War
0:37:42 > 0:37:45which has been etched into our national culture ever since.
0:37:52 > 0:37:55Former soldier Clive Harris today guides visitors
0:37:55 > 0:37:58to the battlefields of the First World War,
0:37:58 > 0:38:01and especially those around Ypres.
0:38:02 > 0:38:06'He's brought me to Polygon Wood, one of the most famous,
0:38:06 > 0:38:11'or notorious, landmarks of the desperate struggle in 1914.'
0:38:11 > 0:38:16It's right at the edge of the Menin Road, which runs back towards Ypres,
0:38:16 > 0:38:18which is about five, six kilometres behind us now.
0:38:18 > 0:38:21It sits right at the centre of the battlefield as well,
0:38:21 > 0:38:24so from the moment the Germans attack us on 18th October,
0:38:24 > 0:38:27right through to the last knockings of first Ypres on 11th November,
0:38:27 > 0:38:31this wood here and the two woods just to the rear of us,
0:38:31 > 0:38:32were key as part of the battles.
0:38:32 > 0:38:35This is where the Germans made their last huge push of 1914
0:38:35 > 0:38:37to try to win the war before Christmas?
0:38:37 > 0:38:39They did, yeah. They now realise
0:38:39 > 0:38:41that they needed to knock us out of the war
0:38:41 > 0:38:44and by doing so, they needed to capture the Channel ports.
0:38:44 > 0:38:46And therefore, they moved away from the von Schlieffen Plan
0:38:46 > 0:38:50to a degree and the capture of Ypres, this is the last thing...
0:38:50 > 0:38:52other side of Ypres, there is no defences.
0:38:52 > 0:38:53It was our last chance -
0:38:53 > 0:38:55there is nothing behind us, but the Channel ports.
0:38:55 > 0:38:59- And there were battles all over the shop, small battles all over the wood.- There were, yeah.
0:38:59 > 0:39:02We tend to think that the British line would be a continual line
0:39:02 > 0:39:05when, in fact, it was more a series of outposts and, quite often,
0:39:05 > 0:39:09units found themselves isolated and having to make small unit charges
0:39:09 > 0:39:13into Germans as opposed to a larger cohesive defence.
0:39:15 > 0:39:17Here, in western Belgium, the war of manoeuvre
0:39:17 > 0:39:20ranging across thousands of square miles that had been waged
0:39:20 > 0:39:23through the late summer of 1914,
0:39:23 > 0:39:26gave way to a stalemate across the Western Front.
0:39:31 > 0:39:33The technology of defence and destruction,
0:39:33 > 0:39:36artillery and machine guns had achieved a dominance
0:39:36 > 0:39:39which confounded the generals of both sides.
0:39:42 > 0:39:46At Ypres, cavalrymen saw their horses almost for the last time,
0:39:46 > 0:39:50before being obliged to join a death grapple on foot.
0:39:54 > 0:39:56Well, we are here, this is the site
0:39:56 > 0:39:57of the Horse Guards memorial
0:39:57 > 0:40:00and it marks an area where the Horse Guards
0:40:00 > 0:40:03fight as infantry pretty much on this spot, we are just on the...
0:40:03 > 0:40:05So they came charging up, dismounted...
0:40:05 > 0:40:07Yeah, initially by horseback.
0:40:07 > 0:40:10This actual spot is where one of the machine gun positions...
0:40:10 > 0:40:12cos it gives us a great arc of fire over the advancing enemy.
0:40:12 > 0:40:15But what seems important here, Clive, it wasn't just
0:40:15 > 0:40:18that the British threw back the German Army,
0:40:18 > 0:40:21it was also that the whole character of the war changed
0:40:21 > 0:40:25for all the armies, that here was where they first came to terms
0:40:25 > 0:40:29with what everybody now understands as the full horror of the Great War, wasn't it?
0:40:29 > 0:40:32Yeah, trench warfare, and this is the end of that war of movement
0:40:32 > 0:40:35that starts in the August, all the way down to the Marne,
0:40:35 > 0:40:36all the way back again,
0:40:36 > 0:40:38and it's here that we start to dig, dig, dig.
0:40:38 > 0:40:40So, yeah, we are on the spot where it changes.
0:40:40 > 0:40:42- And when it started to rain...- Yeah.
0:40:42 > 0:40:44..they weren't in the earth, they were in the mud.
0:40:44 > 0:40:47Yeah, and you have to learn to cope with things such as trench foot
0:40:47 > 0:40:49and how to get around that,
0:40:49 > 0:40:52and reinforce your trenches to withstand bombardments.
0:40:52 > 0:40:55We're no longer going to see the artillery now in front
0:40:55 > 0:40:58of the infantry firing as field guns. They're going to be behind the lines,
0:40:58 > 0:41:01or, certainly, in sunken lanes and that sort of thing.
0:41:01 > 0:41:03And nobody dared show his head above the parapet?
0:41:03 > 0:41:06No, we go subterranean from now on, that's right.
0:41:06 > 0:41:09Any movement by day would have been suicidal, yeah.
0:41:12 > 0:41:14But the British paid a devastating price
0:41:14 > 0:41:16for their narrow victory at Ypres.
0:41:18 > 0:41:2356,000 British soldiers were killed or wounded in a month.
0:41:24 > 0:41:28The old professional British Army was largely destroyed.
0:41:33 > 0:41:36Thereafter, it would be civilian
0:41:36 > 0:41:38volunteers and, later, conscripts
0:41:38 > 0:41:41who accounted for the overwhelming majority
0:41:41 > 0:41:44of the six million British soldiers who eventually served.
0:41:52 > 0:41:55But however terrible the sacrifice,
0:41:55 > 0:41:59it seems mistaken to imagine that there was ever an easy means
0:41:59 > 0:42:01by which the war could have been ended.
0:42:11 > 0:42:14BLACKADDER CLIP: 'Gentlemen, our long wait is nearly at an end.
0:42:14 > 0:42:17'Tomorrow morning, General Insanity Melchett invites you'
0:42:17 > 0:42:19to a mass slaughter.
0:42:19 > 0:42:20We are going over the top!
0:42:20 > 0:42:23Well, huzzah and hurrah!
0:42:23 > 0:42:27The hugely successful Blackadder series epitomises the enduring
0:42:27 > 0:42:29popular view of the First World War
0:42:29 > 0:42:34that the British Army fell victim to idiot commanders
0:42:34 > 0:42:36devoid of brains or courage.
0:42:37 > 0:42:40Well, best of luck to you all. Sorry I can't be with you,
0:42:40 > 0:42:43but obviously there's no place at the front for an old general
0:42:43 > 0:42:45with a dicky heart and a wooden bladder. Well...
0:42:45 > 0:42:49'Chuff, chuff, then. See you all in Berlin for coffee and cakes.'
0:42:50 > 0:42:52Most of the war's commanders
0:42:52 > 0:42:56really were pretty unlovable and unimaginative men.
0:42:56 > 0:43:01But once the most powerful industrial states in Europe were locked in strife,
0:43:01 > 0:43:07it seems wrong to imagine that even a Wellington or Napoleon could have found an easy road to victory.
0:43:07 > 0:43:10George Orwell wrote, a generation later,
0:43:10 > 0:43:13that the only way to end a war quickly is to lose it.
0:43:13 > 0:43:15He was right.
0:43:16 > 0:43:21The trench stalemate on the Western Front posed intractable problems
0:43:21 > 0:43:25which no commander proved able to solve.
0:43:25 > 0:43:28Generals needed to be able to control their forces by telephone
0:43:28 > 0:43:31and could only do so from behind the front
0:43:31 > 0:43:33rather than at the head of their troops,
0:43:33 > 0:43:35as on history's battlefields.
0:43:37 > 0:43:40But the price of long-distance command was to create
0:43:40 > 0:43:43a divide between the top brass in their chateaux
0:43:43 > 0:43:47and their men, calf-deep in mud,
0:43:47 > 0:43:50which has made an enduring and bitter impact
0:43:50 > 0:43:52on posterity's view of the war.
0:43:56 > 0:43:58In the summer of 1918,
0:43:58 > 0:44:02Allied forces finally broke the stalemate on the Western Front,
0:44:02 > 0:44:05and pushed east across France with the British Army
0:44:05 > 0:44:09taking more prisoners than all their Allied partners put together.
0:44:12 > 0:44:15The Germans, exhausted and demoralised,
0:44:15 > 0:44:17fell back in growing disarray
0:44:17 > 0:44:21until an armistice was signed on 11th November.
0:44:26 > 0:44:28Around ten million combatants,
0:44:28 > 0:44:33900,000 of them from the British Empire, had lost their lives.
0:44:41 > 0:44:46Two months after the shooting stopped, the victorious Allies
0:44:46 > 0:44:50convened a peace conference at the Palace of Versailles outside Paris.
0:44:52 > 0:44:54Their task was enormous,
0:44:54 > 0:44:57their purposes the most ambitious in history.
0:44:59 > 0:45:03The Versailles summit has often since been branded a failure
0:45:03 > 0:45:07which condemned Europe to a further generation of strife.
0:45:09 > 0:45:11Prime Minister Lloyd George,
0:45:11 > 0:45:14French premier Georges Clemenceau
0:45:14 > 0:45:17and American President Woodrow Wilson led the negotiations,
0:45:17 > 0:45:21involving delegations from many other interested nations,
0:45:21 > 0:45:27which lasted for six months, between January and June 1919.
0:45:29 > 0:45:32Their intention was to produce a treaty
0:45:32 > 0:45:34that would not only reshape Europe,
0:45:34 > 0:45:38but also ensure that there could never again be a great war,
0:45:38 > 0:45:42by disarming the Germans and making them pay the costs of the conflict.
0:45:45 > 0:45:49Historian Margaret MacMillan is the author of the most compelling
0:45:49 > 0:45:52and vivid modern narrative of what happened at Versailles.
0:45:54 > 0:45:59What was at stake for the Allied powers at Versailles?
0:45:59 > 0:46:01I think they had two things they had to think about.
0:46:01 > 0:46:03They were deeply concerned about the state of Europe,
0:46:03 > 0:46:05and indeed their own countries included.
0:46:05 > 0:46:07There was real fear of revolution
0:46:07 > 0:46:10and they were worried that the situation might deteriorate.
0:46:10 > 0:46:12What was also at stake, of course, is they were democracies
0:46:12 > 0:46:15and they had to think of their publics and the publics
0:46:15 > 0:46:17had been led to believe and had been kept going in the war
0:46:17 > 0:46:19by the promise that it was going to make a much better world.
0:46:19 > 0:46:23And so what they had to try to do is create a better world...
0:46:23 > 0:46:25- Incredibly ambitious objectives. - It was very ambitious,
0:46:25 > 0:46:28but then, of course, the First World War is so unusual
0:46:28 > 0:46:30compared to earlier wars, because it was so exhausting,
0:46:30 > 0:46:33that you couldn't just say at the end of it, "Well, that's it, done.
0:46:33 > 0:46:37"We'll make a few border changes and we'll go back to normal." You couldn't go back to normal.
0:46:37 > 0:46:40I seem to remember that the Germans eventually paid less
0:46:40 > 0:46:44than they had made the French pay after they beat the French in 1871.
0:46:44 > 0:46:46What the Allies couldn't say to their own people was,
0:46:46 > 0:46:50"Look, there's no way Germany can pay what really we need to rebuild,"
0:46:50 > 0:46:53because their own people had suffered so much,
0:46:53 > 0:46:57and so they had to put a bill in, but they did was they fudged it.
0:46:57 > 0:47:00They divided the total reparations bill up,
0:47:00 > 0:47:01so the Germans only paid a fraction.
0:47:01 > 0:47:03Once they paid the fraction, they'd pay the rest,
0:47:03 > 0:47:05which of course the Germans never wanted to do.
0:47:05 > 0:47:08The Allies really failed afterwards
0:47:08 > 0:47:10to convince their own peoples
0:47:10 > 0:47:12that their cause had been just, didn't they?
0:47:12 > 0:47:15Well, I suppose the problem with the First World War
0:47:15 > 0:47:18is that the expectations are so high, the promises are so great
0:47:18 > 0:47:21and all sort of promises, as we know, are made during the war
0:47:21 > 0:47:22to try and keep people in the war,
0:47:22 > 0:47:26but there's no way that all those promises can be cashed in after the war is over.
0:47:27 > 0:47:30Abuse fell upon the Versailles Treaty
0:47:30 > 0:47:34almost before ink was dry on the signatures.
0:47:34 > 0:47:36The economist John Maynard Keynes,
0:47:36 > 0:47:39one of the British treasury delegation,
0:47:39 > 0:47:42published a scathing broadside entitled
0:47:42 > 0:47:45The Economic Consequences Of The Peace.
0:47:45 > 0:47:48A strong German sympathiser,
0:47:48 > 0:47:51Keynes made a case that the terms imposed upon Germany
0:47:51 > 0:47:56were both morally unjust and economically foolish.
0:47:56 > 0:47:59How influential was Maynard Keynes in his book
0:47:59 > 0:48:01The Economic Consequences Of The Peace,
0:48:01 > 0:48:03which absolutely damned Versailles?
0:48:03 > 0:48:06It was very influential. I mean, he wrote it very quickly,
0:48:06 > 0:48:07it became a bestseller immediately
0:48:07 > 0:48:09and it's been in print ever since.
0:48:09 > 0:48:10And it's a brilliant polemic,
0:48:10 > 0:48:11it's not fair.
0:48:11 > 0:48:14He paints this picture of these greedy, selfish,
0:48:14 > 0:48:18hard-hearted cynical men dividing up Europe, punishing Germany,
0:48:18 > 0:48:20and they are just making a complete mess of it.
0:48:20 > 0:48:23I think that also he represents a whole generation of younger people
0:48:23 > 0:48:25who had supported the war believing
0:48:25 > 0:48:27that the world was going to be a better place
0:48:27 > 0:48:30and when they saw it wasn't going to be, they reacted
0:48:30 > 0:48:33and blamed the people who were trying to make peace for everything.
0:48:33 > 0:48:36I would have thought one of the huge unfairnesses of Keynes' book
0:48:36 > 0:48:38is he never set it in the context of saying,
0:48:38 > 0:48:43"All right, even if the Allies have made a fumbled, bungled peace,
0:48:43 > 0:48:46"if the Germans had won and the if the Germans had been making the peace,
0:48:46 > 0:48:49"it would have been a vastly crueller and worse one for Europe."
0:48:49 > 0:48:52I think there's plenty of evidence that what the German High Command...
0:48:52 > 0:48:55and they were basically in control of Germany by this point. By 1918,
0:48:55 > 0:48:57you have a military dictatorship in Germany
0:48:57 > 0:49:00and what they were planning were pretty extensive annexations
0:49:00 > 0:49:02of other people's lands in the west
0:49:02 > 0:49:05and in the east, they were planning to extend their influence.
0:49:05 > 0:49:07In the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk,
0:49:07 > 0:49:09they had forced the Bolsheviks, who were desperate,
0:49:09 > 0:49:11to give over whatever gold they had left,
0:49:11 > 0:49:12they'd set up an independent Ukraine.
0:49:12 > 0:49:15I mean, the evidence is, unless they had a complete change of heart,
0:49:15 > 0:49:17it would have been a very harsh peace.
0:49:17 > 0:49:22Today, an awful lot of people have come to feel a real guilt
0:49:22 > 0:49:24about the Treaty of Versailles.
0:49:24 > 0:49:26"Oh, it was an unfair treaty to Germany,
0:49:26 > 0:49:29"that it contributed to the rise of Hitler, it got it wrong."
0:49:29 > 0:49:31Was it the harsh vindictive treaty they claim?
0:49:31 > 0:49:35The trouble with the treaty, I think, is that it appeared to be harsher
0:49:35 > 0:49:38than it actually was and, of course, it was all about implementation
0:49:38 > 0:49:39and in the end, most of those clauses
0:49:39 > 0:49:42which limited German power and forced Germany to pay reparations
0:49:42 > 0:49:44were not really implemented fully.
0:49:44 > 0:49:47And so I think there's a perception of the treaty as very harsh.
0:49:47 > 0:49:50My question always is - what would you have done otherwise?
0:49:50 > 0:49:53How would you have treated Germany if you felt it had caused the war
0:49:53 > 0:49:56and caused this catastrophe for Europe, what would you have done?
0:49:56 > 0:49:58Wouldn't you have tried to limit its power?
0:49:59 > 0:50:03Because Versailles failed to deliver a lasting peace,
0:50:03 > 0:50:06it has become unjustly blamed for the fact
0:50:06 > 0:50:09that a Second World War had to be fought.
0:50:10 > 0:50:15In truth, so many violent forces and crises shook Europe
0:50:15 > 0:50:20between 1919 and 1939 that it seems absurd to blame the peacemakers
0:50:20 > 0:50:23for having failed in their grand purposes.
0:50:27 > 0:50:29In the decade following Versailles,
0:50:29 > 0:50:32all Europe groaned under the burden
0:50:32 > 0:50:34of paying the bills for the past conflict.
0:50:36 > 0:50:39Britain was almost bankrupt, and the moral and political regeneration
0:50:39 > 0:50:43which Prime Minister Lloyd George had repeatedly promised
0:50:43 > 0:50:45failed to happen.
0:50:47 > 0:50:50Many men came back from the Army to find their old jobs
0:50:50 > 0:50:52taken by civilians, often women.
0:50:54 > 0:50:58Whereas, in 1945, veterans returned to a country
0:50:58 > 0:51:02run by a Labour government committed to creating a welfare state,
0:51:02 > 0:51:06after 1918, the old gang remained in charge
0:51:06 > 0:51:09of an unreformed British society.
0:51:12 > 0:51:16Those who had fought felt that they had been sold a false bill of goods.
0:51:21 > 0:51:23My own grandfather,
0:51:23 > 0:51:28a writer who won a Military Cross as a gunner officer in France,
0:51:28 > 0:51:31became one of those who, within a few years of the Armistice,
0:51:31 > 0:51:34asked himself what it had all been for.
0:51:36 > 0:51:41Here's an essay my grandfather wrote for a literary magazine in 1923,
0:51:41 > 0:51:43after meeting a group of fellow veterans
0:51:43 > 0:51:45who had served with him in France.
0:51:45 > 0:51:47They now felt, he said,
0:51:47 > 0:51:50"That they had gone not as 'heroes'
0:51:50 > 0:51:54"but on a fool's errand to fight in a war that was not worth fighting.
0:51:54 > 0:51:58"They had endured the unsightly, dirty life of the battlefields
0:51:58 > 0:52:01"with a cheery and modest sense of merit,
0:52:01 > 0:52:06"with a belief that they were making some contribution to a good cause.
0:52:06 > 0:52:11"But now, it transpired, this had been a stupid article of faith,
0:52:11 > 0:52:13"which was exploded."
0:52:17 > 0:52:21My grandfather and his kind felt themselves
0:52:21 > 0:52:23"strangers in a strange land",
0:52:23 > 0:52:26divided by the horrendous trench experience
0:52:26 > 0:52:29from those at home who knew almost nothing about it.
0:52:33 > 0:52:35The poets of the Western Front,
0:52:35 > 0:52:39such men as Wilfred Owen, Robert Graves, Siegfried Sassoon,
0:52:39 > 0:52:45vividly described its horrors and the sense of military futility
0:52:45 > 0:52:49in a fashion that later generations have found irresistible.
0:52:50 > 0:52:54Here was the world's worst wound
0:52:54 > 0:52:56And here with pride
0:52:56 > 0:52:58'Their name liveth for evermore'
0:52:58 > 0:53:00The Gateway claims
0:53:00 > 0:53:03Was ever immolation so belied
0:53:03 > 0:53:08As these intolerably nameless names?
0:53:08 > 0:53:11Well might the Dead who struggled in the slime
0:53:11 > 0:53:15Rise and deride this sepulchre of crime.
0:53:22 > 0:53:25But Sassoon and his kind never addressed the huge question
0:53:25 > 0:53:29of how on earth Britain could have escaped from the war
0:53:29 > 0:53:31except by conceding defeat.
0:53:33 > 0:53:35It's a weird British thing
0:53:35 > 0:53:39that while we are hugely proud that our forefathers fought Hitler,
0:53:39 > 0:53:42we seem almost ashamed that they fought the Kaiser.
0:53:46 > 0:53:50How has the overwhelming perception developed in Britain
0:53:50 > 0:53:53over the last hundred years that there was nothing worth
0:53:53 > 0:53:56fighting about in the First World War?
0:53:56 > 0:54:03Well, the interesting point is not so much that, after the war,
0:54:03 > 0:54:06opinion changed or opinion veered
0:54:06 > 0:54:10to the point when you said, "That was a bad war,
0:54:10 > 0:54:12"it was badly conducted, it was a waste of time,
0:54:12 > 0:54:15"a waste of blood and it should never have happened."
0:54:15 > 0:54:19Nobody thought that in 1918,
0:54:19 > 0:54:22I think nobody thought that for another ten years,
0:54:22 > 0:54:24until about 1928...
0:54:24 > 0:54:27- The poets did.- The poets did, but the interesting thing
0:54:27 > 0:54:30is whether people would have been interested and affected
0:54:30 > 0:54:32by what the poets wrote.
0:54:32 > 0:54:38They became expressive of a public opinion in 1928,
0:54:38 > 0:54:40they weren't expressive in 1918.
0:54:40 > 0:54:43By the end of the 1920s,
0:54:43 > 0:54:46there's this worldwide slump.
0:54:46 > 0:54:49Total catastrophic unemployment everywhere,
0:54:49 > 0:54:51especially in Germany.
0:54:51 > 0:54:57The situation seemed to be far worse in 1928 than it had been in 1914
0:54:57 > 0:55:02and by 1933 or so, it has become generally accepted
0:55:02 > 0:55:06that the war is an unnecessary war that had been bungled, etc, etc.
0:55:06 > 0:55:11So I think that what was very, very important was not so much the fact
0:55:11 > 0:55:15that the war had been terribly expensive and bloody
0:55:15 > 0:55:16and the losses were awful,
0:55:16 > 0:55:20it was that nothing seemed to have come out of it of any good.
0:55:23 > 0:55:27Europe's descent into the turmoil and privations of the 1930s
0:55:27 > 0:55:33caused many people to view the Great War as bungled, the peace shambolic.
0:55:33 > 0:55:38Some perversely blamed the victors for the rise of Hitler and Nazism.
0:55:40 > 0:55:42While many people today
0:55:42 > 0:55:45still think of the First World War as a "bad" war,
0:55:45 > 0:55:49the Second has come to be seen, by contrast,
0:55:49 > 0:55:52as a virtuous crusade against the Nazi architects of genocide.
0:55:55 > 0:55:59Nobody went to war in 1939 to stop the Germans massacring the Jews.
0:55:59 > 0:56:01I mean, sad though it may be to say that,
0:56:01 > 0:56:04partly because, of course, the serious massacres hadn't yet begun,
0:56:04 > 0:56:08but, principally, because Germany might be doing awful things,
0:56:08 > 0:56:12Nazi Germany, domestically, but in those days, nobody saw that
0:56:12 > 0:56:16as an obligation to go to war in the way in which we would today.
0:56:16 > 0:56:21So, in some respects, both wars break out for similar reasons -
0:56:21 > 0:56:24great power rivalries and the concerns of the balance
0:56:24 > 0:56:27of power within Europe, and what is happening within Eastern Europe.
0:56:27 > 0:56:31They are remarkably similar in their causation and it is perverse
0:56:31 > 0:56:34that we have clothed the Second World War as the good war
0:56:34 > 0:56:36and the First World War as the bad war.
0:56:36 > 0:56:40And, of course, we have not remained sufficiently,
0:56:40 > 0:56:41I'm talking we, as British now,
0:56:41 > 0:56:44have not remained sufficiently independent-minded
0:56:44 > 0:56:46or sufficiently historically aware
0:56:46 > 0:56:49to put these things in our own and a proper context.
0:56:58 > 0:57:03No sane person believes that Britain wanted a war in 1914.
0:57:03 > 0:57:07All the great powers bear some responsibility for the carnage,
0:57:07 > 0:57:11but the Germans seem to deserve most, because they refused
0:57:11 > 0:57:14to use their almost indisputable ability to prevent it.
0:57:16 > 0:57:19They failed to see that nothing they hoped to get out of the war
0:57:19 > 0:57:23could justify its horrendous prospective risk and actual cost.
0:57:26 > 0:57:30Britain emerged from the First World War with little to show
0:57:30 > 0:57:35save a few worthless colonies and a host of public memorials.
0:57:35 > 0:57:38But the right questions to ask about the conflict
0:57:38 > 0:57:42and the nation's sacrifice today are whether we could justly
0:57:42 > 0:57:45or sensibly have stayed out of it.
0:57:45 > 0:57:51And what would have befallen Europe if the Kaiser's Germany had won?
0:57:55 > 0:57:59I'm imagining Whitehall as it was on 4th August -
0:57:59 > 0:58:02jammed with expectant people about to be swept away
0:58:02 > 0:58:05by the most dreadful cataclysm in European history.
0:58:06 > 0:58:11Nobody in their right mind would suggest making the centenary of 1914
0:58:11 > 0:58:14an occasion for celebration.
0:58:14 > 0:58:17But we should have the courage to tell our children and grandchildren
0:58:17 > 0:58:22that the wartime generation did not fight and die for nothing,
0:58:22 > 0:58:25that if their enemies had prevailed,
0:58:25 > 0:58:28Europe would have paid an even more terrible forfeit.
0:58:40 > 0:58:46To explore further the story of how the world went to war in 1914,
0:58:46 > 0:58:52go to bbc.co.uk/ww1.