#58 - The Guns of August - Barbara W. Tuchman

Title:  The Guns of August

Author:  Barbara W. Tuchman

Genre:   Non-fiction 940.4144

Read by:  John Lee

Originally Published:   1962

Publisher/Date:  Tantor Media 2011

Dates listened to:   8/15/17 – 9/10/17

CDs/Hours: 15/19

IBSN:  978-1-4526-0140-3

This book can be perceived as heavy and therefore, swallowed, in small portions or you can consume it over a longer period like the amount of time in which it actually takes place.  Yes – the month of August is primarily what Tuchman writes about in her narrative of the beginning of World War I.  I like the way it begins, actually in 1910 with the death of King Edward VII of England where all his relatives gather who are also world monarchs.  It sets the stage for how and why WWI began.

Tuchman does a great job.  She explains that long before the war began and wanting to improve upon wars of the past, Field Marshall Alfred Schlieffen had written his plan, in part, based upon his knowledge of how Hannibal conducted his war efforts.   We don’t know if it was a good plan to begin with or just poorly executed.  In any event, communications were critical and not having reached the electronic age decisions had to be made regardless of what a commander originally instructed his men to do.  When you had five armies, as Germany did, it was difficult to communicate with each commander in a timely manner who sometimes took matters into their own hands.

When Russia entered the war some three weeks after Germany, France and England did, they were without the wherewithal to feed their troops.  Needless to say, this added to low morale.  Each country seemed to have a problem in some way in poorly fighting this war.  Within a month, the Battle of the Marne found Germany defeated which was the ultimate fate of this huge country as those four weeks in August stretched into four years.  

Since this book was recommended by Tom Nissley of A Readers Book of Days I quote "It only added to the aura surrounding Tuchman's breakthrough history of the first, error-filled month of the First World War that soon after it was published John F. Kennedy gave copies of the book to his aides and told his brother, Bobby, "I am not going to follow a course which will allow anyone to write a comparable book about this time [called] the Missles of October."