Letters: Nostalgia must not cloud war debate

Richard Norton-Taylor is too kind to David Cameron and his acolytes when saying that the “government seems to be frightened by the prospect of people asking questions” (First world war abridged, 13 August). Bluntly, the government’s programme of acts to remind us of 1914 is designed as a con trick to blind us to the reality, as Christopher Clark has pointed out, of a “world drifting back towards 1914”. That is to say, a world where governments can make war as they please, comforting themselves in the knowledge that when drones do the dirty work they are seemingly free from the liability that “our boys” will be killed. The ploy is to make 2014 a year of carefully measured militaristic glorification, bolstered by the gullibility of those local and family historians who provide the stories of heroism and “band of brothers” nostalgia that neatly camouflages the fact that the 887,000 British dead did not sacrifice themselves, but were sacrificed. This distinction is what Cameron wants to conceal.
Paul Anderton
Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire

• To suggest, as Andrew Murrison does, that the public would be less engaged with the big questions of causation and consequences of the first world war and prefer instead a focus on the local and “intimate level” is patronising and disingenuous. Healthy public debate and introspection over the monumental folly of the war to end all wars ought to be an integral component of next year’s centenary commemorations.

Why not encourage the public to engage in “historiographical” debates too important to be left to professional historians and politicians more concerned with the xenophobic propaganda of the belligerent nations? What about the “refuseniks” and the stories of protest as well as patriotism? Bertrand Russell was a lover of truth who renounced the war but was also a man tortured by patriotism and love of England to desire the defeat of Germany “as ardently as any retired colonel”. Russell and many protesters courageously pointed out how there was “no great principle” at stake, “no great human purpose … involved on either side … The English and French say they are fighting in defence of democracy but … do not wish their words to be heard in Petrograd or Calcutta”. Precisely.
Ron Noon
Liverpool

• How did Richard Norton-Taylor manage to write 800 words on the topic without mentioning either the kaiser or the invasion of neutral Belgium? What compelling evidence does he or Christopher Clark offer that the kaiser and imperial Germany’s leaders never “actually wanted war”? Why does he describe Sir Edward Grey as “incoherent and hesitant”? There are extensive published diplomatic and military documents about the lead-up to the war that tend to show that Grey behaved honourably and consistently, and tried to prevent war. Several European countries had deranged and dishonest leaders willing to play games with people’s lives. At every step, Grey had to persuade cabinet colleagues about courses of action rather than make the decisions himself.
Peter Brooker
West Wickham, Kent

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