Category: World War 1

WWI military history book – “Pershing’s Tankers” (The University Press of Kentucky, 2018) – Lawrence Kaplan interview

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Lawrence Kaplan is a military historian who has worked for the US Army and has written numerous books on the subject. Today we spoke about his latest book on the American tank corps during WWI.

1:51 – Larry Kaplan talks about how he got into studying the American tank corps in WWI. He found a number of reports associated with the tank corps that hadn’t been discovered before or had been forgotten. Patton was one of the officers involved with the tank corps.

6:30 – Larry talks about the early development of the US Army tank corps. The French and the British helped the US in this effort. But not a lot was written about this history. Tanks were used for only 7 weeks at the end of the war.

11:20 – George Patton became the commander of the two tank battalions that were to be used in the war.

14:00 – Many of the records of these early tank battalions ended up missing. Larry found them among US Army Field Artillery records.

21:00 – Larry also collected newspaper accounts that were basically the letters home that some tank officers had sent home. He also made some extensive Congressional testimony on the WWI tank corps in WWI readable in a narrative form.

29:30 – Larry talks about what happened to the tank corps after WWI.

31:50 – Larry talks about a scandalous event that occurred during Patton’s time in WWI.

38:48 – The presence of American tanks helped US Army morale and hurt German morale.

39:39 – Larry summarizes how the end of the war went.

53:39 – Larry talks about how the tanks were moved around the theater of war. He also addresses problems with tank maintenance during combat. He gets into how an American officer named Brain was trying to develop requirements for an American-built tank.

58:30 – Larry will be publishing a translated and edited version of a Russian female soldier’s novel about serving in WWI.

For more “Military History Inside Out” please follow me on Facebook at warscholar, on twitter at Warscholar, on youtube at warscholar1945 and on Instagram @crisalvarezswarscholar

Guests: Lawrence Kaplan

Host: Cris Alvarez

Tags: military, history, military history, conflict, war, interview, non-fiction book, world war one, WWI, tank corps, armored warfare, George Patton, French, british, Germans

20th century military history book – “The Palgrave Handbook of Artistic and Cultural Responses to War since 1914” (Palgrave Macmillan, 2018) – Margaret Baguley and Martin Kirby interview

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Martin Kirby and Margaret Baguley are two of three Australian academics who have been editing a new book exploring how war since 1914 has been represented in the arts in Australasia, the US, and in the British Isles. I spoke with Margaret and Martin about the book.

1:45 – Martin and Margaret talk about how they got into studying WWI and military history. Martin talks about how the movie Zulu affected him.

5:16 – Margaret talks about how she grew up in a small town and how important ANZAC day was to her community.

10:28 – Martin walks about the book. It started as a look at Australian art but expanded to include other national experiences. It covers the US, the British Isles, and Australasia. They look at official art, movies, photos, poets, and may other artistic responses to conflict and war.

24:45 – Margaret and Martin talk about what artworks commemorate, attack war, or are neutral about war.

33:45 – Martin and Margaret talk about art aimed at children and how they discuss it in their book. They also touch on the part of the book that look at games and digital technology that deal with military history.

53:13 – Margaret was surprised at finding out details of how official war art was created. She was also disturbed to learn that among their artist peers, war artists were sometimes thought of as having sold out.

For more “Military History Inside Out” please follow me on Facebook at warscholar, on twitter at Warscholar, on youtube at warscholar1945 and on Instagram @crisalvarezswarscholar

Guests: Margaret Baguley and Martin Kirby

Host: Cris Alvarez

Tags: military, history, military history, conflict, war, interview, non-fiction book, Zulu War, WWI, WWII, Australia, US, UK, art, combat art

World War I history book – “German Submarine Warfare in World War I” (Rowman & Littlefield, 2017) – Lawrence Sondhaus interview

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Dr. Lawrence Sondhaus is Professor of History at the University of Indianapolis. He has written numerous books about Naval warfare and about WWI with a focus on the Central Powers. I was able to interview him about his most recent book on German submarine warfare in WWI.

1:27 – Dr. Sondhaus talks about how he got into history writing about it. He was a child of the 60s. He had a particular interest in the Central Powers in WWI since he has a Croatian heritage.

3:39 – Dr. Sondhaus was asked to write a book on the Eastern Front in WWI but he suggested a book on German submarine warfare. He tends to study WWI from the perspective of the Central Powers which is uncommon among English writers on WWI.

5:20 – The Central Powers tended to take the lead in WWI with the Allies reacting and so WWI histories should focus on the Central Powers. He also focused on the German politics behind the war.

8:00 – Germans felt the U-boat blockade of Britain was equivalent to the British surface blockade of Germany. The Americans and the UK didn’t accept this. Also, German U-boat warfare in WWI was not as cruel as that of WWII. German U-boats applied cruiser rules.

11:20 – One German U-boat captain captured a number of merchantmen who became POWs for the duration of the war. However, submarines could not generally hold prisoners or tow them to land.

14:10 – Many German U-boat commanders felt they needed to be chivalrous. It was difficult for them to engage in unrestricted warfare because they were unable to be cruel. This was different from WWII.

16:13 – The Lusitania was not the main reason the US entered the war. It was shocking because of the number of people that died but the US took a long time afterwards to enter the war. It took many decades afterwards for the British to admit that the Lusitania was carrying munitions.

20:45 – When measuring cost to gain, the German WWI submarine was the most effective among the three great submarine warfare campaigns.

25:20 – Both sides used gas, submarines, bombed civilians, and other cruel methods, but the Germans are always the first ones to raise the stakes. This makes their image worse after they lose the war.

28:30 – Germans could not believe that their army did some of the cruel things they were accused of but it turned out they had. Germans were unified in support of the war once the Russians mobilized for war. Dr. Sondhaus highlights the feelings of one German politician, Erzberger, who worried that unrestricted submarine warfare would bring the US into the war. German opinion began to drift towards a negotiated peace during the war.

37:00 – Germany came close to winning the war but the Allied convoy system helped stop German success. The US and UK then used the convoy system in WWII.

41:05 – Dr. Sondhaus used British wreck divers maps to help do his research.

48:46 – The Germans suddenly lost their advantage in sinking ships in August 1918. Up until then they were doing well in this regard. But unrestricted warfare alone was not going to win the war for Germany.

49:57 – Dr. Sondhaus came across amazing stories of survival during submarine accidents and mishaps. There were sad stories about U-boat commanders trying to save enemy sailors.

55:02 – A lot of British historians don’t value US involvement in the war as important as other British efforts. This book adds weight to the importance of American involvement in the war.

1:00:25 – German WWI U-boat commanders went on to very interesting and different things after the war.

For more “Military History Inside Out” please follow me on Facebook at warscholar, on twitter at Warscholar, on youtube at warscholar1945 and on Instagram @crisalvarezswarscholar

Guests: Dr. Lawrence Sondhaus

Host: Cris Alvarez

Tags: military, history, military history, conflict, war, interview, non-fiction book, Germany, WWI, world war one, submarine, Britain, UK, U-boats, Italy