Catch The Origins Of The Second World War Published By A.J.P. Taylor Textbook

a crezut că era foarte posibil ca Germania să obţină teritorii în Europa răsăriteană şi atunci va deveni din nou o Mare Putere, Aceasta se datora, parţial, credinţei sale în Lebensraum, Existau şi alte consideraţii practice, Pentru o lungă perioadă de timp, el a considerat, greşit sau nu, că îi va fi mai uşor să înfrângă Rusia sovietică decât Puterile occidentale, Întradevăr, el aproape a crezut că bolşevismul se poate prăbuşi fără război, o credinţă împărtăşită de mulţi oameni de stat occidentali, în această eventualitate, el ar fi putut obţine teritorii fără niciun fel de război.
Mai mult decât atât, nevoia de spaţiu vital putea fi uşor prezentată ca o cruciadă antibolşevică, şi astfel sar fi cucerit simpatia acelora din ţările apusene carel considerau pe Hitler ca un campion al civilizaţiei occidentale.
Oricum, Hitler nu era dogmatic în această privinţă, Na refuzat alte teritorii, dacă puteau fi preluate cu uşurinţă, După înfrângerea Franţei, el a anexat Alsacia şi Lorena, în pofida declaraţiilor anterioare cum că nu ar avea de gând să facă asta, a preluat regiunile industriale din Belgia şi nordestul Franţei, aşa cum Bethmann intenţionase so facă mai devreme.
Termenii mai degrabă vagi pe care el îi proiectase pentru pacea cu Marea Britanie în vara anuluiincludeau o garanţie pentru Imperiul Britanic, dar se pare că Hitler intenţiona să revendice Irakul şi, poate, Egiptul, ca aparţinând sferei germane.
In this book Taylor argues that Hitler's foreign policy goals were like any other contemporary German statesman's and that World War II was just as much the fault of the allies as the Germans due to their flawed diplomacy.
I think Taylor is totally wrong about Hitler, but this is a well written account and the author is on much firmer ground when discussing the general European situation after WWI and the negotiations between the Allies before.
Taylor's notion is that Hitler never meant what he said about going to war or making threats and was essentially a successful opportunist who believed that his opponents would always cave in to his demands at the last second.
This argument makes some sense when Hitler was dealing with other statesmen, but it completely falls apart in my opinion when you look at the internal situation with his own ministers and generals who took his war plans very seriously.
The most famous of these war planning sessions was probably one inwhere Hitler stated he would be ready to fight a war with Britain and France bysee the Hossbach Memorandum.
Taylor tries to explain this meeting away by suggesting that Hitler was lying to his own ministers as well as other statesmen, and the deception was all meant to get them onboard with his domestic policies such as further rearmament.
Despite his statements to the contrary, Hitler never wanted a war with Britain and France, He may have wanted a war in eastern Europe to get territory and eventually a war with the Soviet Union, but Taylor thinks even here Hitler might have accepted other concessions.
All of this is interesting, but we essentially have to believe that Taylor has insight into Hitler's

mind that is contrary to the written record to accept this argument, The author puts an emphasis on certain written sources like Mein Kampf where Hitler argues that Germany needs territory in eastern Europe, and dismisses other sources like the Hossbach memorandum where he contemplates a war with Britain and France.


Another problem with Taylor's views is that Hitler clearly planned for a war with the west from almost the beginning of his regime, He tried to make Germany as selfsufficient as possible by increasing production of Synthetic Oil and increasing output in the Agricultural sector, This really only makes sense if he thought Germany would be cut off by another British blockade in the future like it had been during WWI, Hitler also constructed fortifications on the french border, informed his ministers and generals that he was willing to fight Britain and France over the Czech crisis in, and repeatedly told his allies the Italians that they would fight the western powers together and dominate Europe.
Taylor thinks this was all deception or misdirection on Hitler's part, but I think it demonstrates that Hitler saw a war with the western powers as a strong possibility, whether he wanted it or not.
My own view is that Hitler was always willing to accept a war with the western powers if they decided to oppose his territorial revisionism and was not terribly concerned about avoiding conflict with them in the long run.
Taylor gets far too close to "normalizing" Hitler when he states that his goals were like any other German statesman of the time, For me, it is ludicrous to suggest that leaders like Stresemann, Schliecher, Papen, or Brüning would have risked a World War to resolve Germany's territorial claims in eastern Europe.
It is well known that even Stresemann wanted to see Poland destroyed, but it took a special sort of hubris to accept a World War in exchange for this,.History
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In this book, Taylor details the leadup to the Second World War, He claims that he is just doing history and that no one could know how WWII could be avoided, However, he contends that Hitler didn't really want a larger war, and that poor diplomacy led to it, Taylor is, as is now wellknown, correct about Hitler's lack of concrete planning, as well as his surprise at getting himself into a war with Britain, But Taylor displays naivete indeed concerning Hitler's proclamations, as if the man weren't a pathological liar, He was. Therefore, much of the book suffers from a "plausible or mild bias or ignorance," my descriptor forin the Truth category, A scant dusting of uncommon facts upps it to,.

Of minor note, Taylor was also:
wrong about the Soviet threat
wrong about every snippet of economics he tried to comment upon and no wonder, if he thinks John Maynard Keynes "enlightened" instead of the father of a irreconcilably stupid economic school of thought
constantly saying "there is no way to know" this or that fact, when modern works have answered these questions.
Taylor's book was published in, Taylor writes with an unusual sense of humor, but his account of the events that led to the Second World War is extremely flawed, In spite of his lack of resources especially from the Soviet perspective, he makes too many unreasonable assumptions and explains away too many inconvenient truths with no more than a wave of his hand.
Still, altogether a very enjoyable read, I particularly enjoyed Taylor's unabashed disdain for all parties in this conflict, and especially the sarcasm with which he addresses the various and plentiful blunders of European statesmen in the postVersailles era.


Taylor is commended for writing a revolutionary revisionist history of the origins of the Second World War, He gets an unfortunate multitude of facts wrong, though this is undoubtedly at least in part because he was writing in, a time when he would be infamous for being so dismissive of Hitler as an 'average' statesman this was before the era of frequent megalomaniac leaders and a time when he would have lacked access to innumerable sources that we now have as a result of the declassification process and the temporary opening of the Soviet archives in the lates and earlys.
I understand what Taylor was trying to do, and I know he did it to the best of his ability in, But I haven't been convinced and while his theory that war inwas an accident is interesting to entertain though matters little practically, since accident or not it happened, his theory that Hitler was a rational statesman and not an infamous gambler with an ego problem seems utterly unfounded.
А. J. P. Taylor има неповторим стил на писане и за мен е загадка как все още не е преведен на български. Тази книга и шедьовърът му "The Struggle for Mastery in Europe" са вечни класики в жанра дипломатическа история на XIX и XX век, Днес четем с интерес това, което Тейлър ни казва за причините и пътят към войната за "Данциг" която ще се превърне едва покъсно в "световна"война с интерес и така да се каже open mind. В годините, когато излиза тази книга обачете, тезите, заложени в нея, са били третирани като краен ревизионизъм и дори се стига дотам авторът да бъде дамгосван като адвокат на нацизма. Историята обаче, както дебело подчертава Тейлър, не ни дава прости истини. Не Хитлер, сам и по своя воля, започва война с Франция и Англия, която покъсно се разраства вълнообразно и обхваща почти целия свят. Да, той, със своите ексцентричност и хазартно поведение, допринася много, но в никакъв случай не би бил способен самостоятелно да движи колелата на международната политика. На тяхното движение влияят още много други сили, които в крайна сметка се оказват не помалко "отговорни" за Втората световна война. .