V. R. Berghahn

5492. Germany and the Approach of War in 1914 Second Edition, by V. R. Berghahn (read 7 Aug 2017) The author is a German-born professor who is now at Columbia. His account of the lead-up to war shows that there were leading people--particularly the military-- who wanted war in 1914 because they thought Germany could win at that time and that if war came later the chance of Germany winning would be less. I have read much on this subject and this book reconfirmed my belief that Germany could show more have prevented World War One but deliberately chose not to. How stupid a choice it made we all now know. show less

Berghahn squeezes an amazing amount of information and analysis into the relatively few pages that constitute this book. The period of late nineteenth century through World War I is one of the best-documented, most written about in all of history. Nevertheless, Berhahn manages to clarify and explicate elements that others have missed or at least manages to bring them together in easily accessible ways.