What does Austria want? I mean what do you want? 37 Days II, Grey
We have a political system in Germany where power is concentrated at the top. ibid. German civil servant commentary
I will tell the Kaiser there’s been a misunderstanding. 37 Days III, King with PM & Grey
Tell me, Winston, what does it take to lead a democracy into war? ibid. Grey
Think, think, gentlemen, think of the consequences that would flow from such highmindedness. ibid. cabinet
How does an army of several million men defeat another army of several million men? ibid.
Death it seemed could never claim too many. ibid. German soldier
If the Arab nation assist England in this war that has been forced upon us by Turkey, England will guarantee that no international intervention will take place in Arabia, and we will give Arabs every assistance against foreign aggression. Lord Kitchener
Your country needs you. Lord Kitchener
You are ordered abroad as a soldier of the King to help our French comrades against the invasion of a common enemy … In this new experience you may find temptations both in wine and women. You must entirely resist both temptations, and while treating all women with perfect courtesy, you would avoid any intimacy. Do your duty bravely. Fear God. Honour the King. Lord Kitchener, The Times 19th August 1914
I don’t mind your being killed, but I object to your being taken prisoner. Lord Kitchener, to Prince of Wales
This war, like the next war, is a war to end war. Lloyd George
If people really knew [the truth], the War would be over tomorrow. But of course they don’t know and can’t know. Lloyd George
The flower of a generation. The glory of England. Chariots of Fire 1981 starring Ben Cross & Ian Charleson & Nicholas Farrell & Nigel Havers & David Burghley & John Gielgud & Lindsay Anderson & Cheryl Campbell & Alice Krige & Nigel Davenport & Patrick Magee et al, director Hugh Hudson, freshmen’s dinner
It was in 1915 the old world ended. D H Lawrence
The First World War was the most unforgettable and sublime moment in my Earthly existence. Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf
The First World War had begun – imposed on the statesmen of Europe by railway timetables. It was an unexpected climax to the railway age. A J P Taylor, The First World War, 1963
The most colossal, murderous, mismanaged butchery that has ever taken place on earth. Any writer who said otherwise lied. So the writers either wrote propaganda, shut up, or fought. Ernest Hemingway
The War was decided in the first twenty days of fighting, and all that happened afterwards consisted in battles which, however formidable and devastating, were but desperate and vain appeals against the decision of Fate. Winston Churchill
Business carried on as usual during alternations on the map of Europe. Winston Churchill, 1914
1915: He is in charge of the largest naval force in the world … Churchill tries to convince his colleagues that Britain should take on Turkey. It is, he claims, the surest and shortest route to victory … Five weeks after the failed naval attacks an invasion force of 30,000 men heads for the Turkish coast … ‘blood and bandages all over the beach … whole regiments wiped out.’ Churchill II: The Long Grass, Channel 5 2021
No commander was ever privileged to lead a finer force; no commander ever derived greater inspiration from the performance of his troops. John J Pershing
The young officers who had come back, hardened by their terrible experience and disgusted by the attitude of the younger generation to whom this experience meant just nothing, used to lecture us for our softness. Of course they could produce no argument that we were capable of understanding. They could only bark at you that war was ‘a good thing’, it ‘made you tough’, ‘kept you fit’, etc. etc. We merely sniggered at them. Ours was the one-eyed pacifism that is peculiar to sheltered countries with strong navies. George Orwell
The Carnegie Endowment Fund for Peace plotted to get the United States into World War One and to prolong it, and they said if you can get the American people into war and be afraid of their survival, they will accept a totalitarian government. G Edward Griffin, interview Alex Jones November 2009
This war is an inconceivable madness which has taken hold of Europe – It is unlike any other war that has ever been. Maud Gonne MacBride, Irish nationalist & actor, letter to W B Yeats
Ils ne passeront pas [They shall not pass]. Philippe Petain
Are you going over the top? If so be sure to first inspect our new line of velvet corduroy plush breeches. The Wipers Times, spoof advert
Three Tommies sat in the trench one day
Discussing the war in the normal way,
They talked of the mud and they talked of the Hun,
Of what was to do and what had been done,
They talked about rum.
But the point which they argued from post back to pillar
Was whether Notts County could beat Aston Villa. The Wipers Times, trench newspaper
War is nothing more than wallowing in a dirty ditch. The Wipers Times, hero, BBC 2013
They shall not return to us, the resolute, the young,
The eager and whole-hearted whom we gave:
But the men who left them thriftily to die in their own dung,
Shall they come with years and honour to the grave? Rudyard Kipling, Mesopotamia, 1917
I could not dig: I dared not rob:
Therefore I lied to please the mob.
Now all my lies are proved untrue
And I must face the men I slew.
What tale shall serve me here among
Mine angry and defrauded young? Rudyard Kipling, Epitaphs of the War: A Dead Statesman, 1919
The old Turks of the south have gone. But new enemies come from the north more fiercesome and dangerous than the old. They want to take our freedom and our language from us and crush us. Secret Serbian Manifesto 1911
We’ve been in a state of great excitement as the reservists have been called up. All the railways are guarded. Everything points to the Great War so long upon us expected. Robert Saunders, schoolteacher
Oh! We don’t want to lose you but we think you ought to go
For your King and your Country both need you so. Paul Alfred Rubens 1914 song
Keep the home-fires burning,
While your hearts are yearning. Lena Guilbert Ford, Till the Boys Come Home, 1914
June 28th 1914, Sarajevo, Bosnia: an open-touring car takes a wrong turn. Its driver tries to reverse in the narrow road. What happens in the next few seconds will cause the deaths of millions of people. Suddenly a young man steps forward, raises a pistol and fires two shots. His target is the heir to one of Europe’s oldest empires. Infamous Assassinations: Archduke Franz Ferdinand
In 1911 a Serbian army officer Colin Dragutin Dimitrijevic sets up a secret society named the Black Hand, dedicated to bringing all territories particularly Bosnia which have large Serb minorities under Serb control. ibid.
July 28th 1914: Austro-Hungary declares war on Serbia, and its forces begin to advance into the country. Faithful to its ally, Germany warns Russia that any form of mobilisation in support of Serbia will be countered by German mobilisation and war. But the Russians are not prepared to be humiliated again. ibid.
Now the rival power blocks in Europe come into play with deadly effect ... In just a week a seemingly local incident has become a world war. ibid.
What of the faith and fire within us
Men who march away
Ere the barn-cocks say
Night is growing gray,
To hazards whence no tears can win us;
What of the faith and fire within us
Men who march away! Thomas Hardy, Men Who March Away