The Other First World War : The Blood Soaked Russian Fronts 1914-1922, by Douglas Boyd

[phil andrade]

Downloaded onto my Kindle for £6.64, this has come as a gratifying surprise.

There’s been an array of disappointing books about this too often forgotten theatre of the Great War.  I bought this expecting to be underwhelmed, and, although I’m only one quarter of the way into it, I already feel sufficiently enthusiastic to recommend it .

The style is captivating, the content stacks up really well.

Churchill said about this titanic struggle “ In the West, the armies were too big for the land ; in the East, the land was too big for the armies.”  I paraphrase, but the impact of the words is compelling.

Some circumspection on my part about Boyd’s citation of the Russian military deaths amounting to 3.75 million, along with additional millions of wounded and nearly 4 million POWs, but I won’t labour that point. 

 

So far, pretty damned good.

 

Phil

[lostinspace]

Phil,

Thanks for the post. I guess the hardback came out in 2017 but has currently been reprinted as a paperback.  Seems pretty slim at 256 pages, as it covers not only the First World War but also the Revolution and Civil War that followed.

Just curious, considering the years involved (1914-1922), do you question that the casualties were too high or too low?

Dave

[phil andrade]

Dave,

The impression I get is that he’s a little bit lacking in his ability- or willingness- to address casualty figures with the discernment that is required.

 

For example, he alludes to Verdun and talks of a million men dying in the 1916 battle. He does it again when he refers to the Gallipoli campaign costing five hundred thousand “ lives “, even though he had cited 130,O00 deaths earlier on in the book.

The inference is clear: he tends to conflate casualties with deaths, and doesn’t bother with a more meticulous interpretation.

He varies a bit in this regard, showing a more disciplined approach elsewhere.

As for his headline citation of about 3.75 Russian million military deaths in the Great War, plus millions additional wounded and close to four million POWs, it’s hardly reconcilable with the fifteen and a half million who served in the Russian military at one time or another 1914-17.

My reckoning is a maximum of eight million casualties, of whom 2.5 million were prisoners, and two million were killed or died .

His huge estimate might well include the Civil War , which would certainly make the figure more plausible, but he doesn’t make that sufficiently clear.

That’s my moan, but I’ll reiterate that it’s a book that I’m enjoying and I still recommend it highly.

 

Phil

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[lostinspace]

Phil, 

Fair enough. I assumed he was referring to the deaths throughout the years indicated in the title, not just the years between 1914 and 1918.
It does seem that there are quite a number of authors that do associate casualty with killed. 

Dave

Edited 3 April , 2023 by lostinspace
missing word

[phil andrade]

Right now, I’m barely halfway through the book, and I’ll happily eat my words if he concludes with a more accurate analysis.

 

Phil