Germany and Austria-Hungary in World War I featuring Dr. Alexander Watson

History Does You

There is the saying that, "History is written by the victors". For the Central Powers, the First World War started with high hopes for an easy victory. But those hopes soon deteriorated as Germany's attack on France failed, Austria-Hungary's armies suffered catastrophic losses, and Britain's ruthless blockade brought both nations to the brink of starvation. We examine the war from the perspective of the losers, how scholarship looks at their role in the leadup to the war, their participation, and the subsequent aftermath. The war shattered their societies, destroyed their states, and imparted a poisonous legacy of bitterness and violence that sowed the seeds for an even deadlier conflict that would follow only two decades later. To help explain, We interview Dr. Alexander Watson who is a Professor of History at the University of London specializing in conflict and identity in East-Central Europe. His latest book is The Fortress: The Great Siege of Przemysl. He is also the author of the widely acclaimed Ring of Steel: Germany and Austria-Hungary at War, 1914-1918. The book won the 2014 Wolfson History Prize, the 2014 Gilder Lehrman Prize in Military History, the Society for Military History’s 2015 Distinguished Book Award and the 2015 British Army Military Book of the Year.