Russia and the Origins of the First World War

by Dominic Lieven, Dominic C. Lieven

Genres: History, Russian History, Russia

225 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1983

About the author

Dominic Lieven is Professor of Russian studies at the London School of Economics and Political Science, a Fellow of the British Academy and of Trinity College, Cambridge.

Reviews

[Andreas]

I read about this book in Langdon's "The Long Debatte" and I think his summary of this book is spot on. According to Mr. Lieven Russia was more or less not at fault for the outbreak of the Great War. The reason for this is that Russia had to support the Serbs against Austria-Hungary and Russian mobilization didn't mean war. Well that's very debatable in my opinion as the only ones who were really impacted by the Serbian ambitions was Austria-Hungary and according to the treaty between Russia and France mobilization meant war. Furthermore, Austria-Hungary did not threaten Russia and did not mobilize against Russia, but Russia did and hence started to escalate a localized conflict into the Great War. Nonetheless, a book worth reading, even if I cannot follow the apologetic reasoning for Russia's minor part in causing the Great War.
On a side note, the best and really good chapter is the fourth one and I learned a lot of new stuff including but not limited to the Durnovo and Trubetskoy memorandums.

[George Hook]

Swift, sharp overview of the bureaucratic bumbling, monarchical hubris and Slavic gloom that undermined the Czarist empire as it was sucked into the War To End All Wars (as if). Docked a star because only one mention of Rasputin, so far.