Richard M. Watt (1930–2015)

Brilliant vivid and clarifying. The period is badly familiar to me; I've read for example Macmillan's Peacemakers, a whole book on the Versailles conference, so we all know what a messs that was.. But this brings Versailles and the events in Germany together. I hadn't realised how the Weimar Republic was really just a facade, near to a failed state; the Army still held a veto on practical everything and beyond them were the Freikorps, almost literally a loose cannon, efficient killers, answering only to themselves. Wilson gets a fair hatchet job, how strange to think of a professor being President of the U.S; a classic democrat in theory, inflexible bully in practice. I'd also not realised how the war more or less continued in the East, the Freikorps again. The naive greed of the Poles also features, leading to their fate in WW2. Hitler just sewed all these things up which were on their way; if it hadn't been him someone else would cercainlyhave done the job.… (plus d'informations)

After reading and enjoying Dare Call It Treason, Watt's excellent history of the French mutinies in World War I, I put this book on my list, and liked it even more. The Kings Depart is a broad ranging, fascinating, well-written, highly readable account of an important period in history that I knew little about, despite having read a lot about the first and second world wars. What more would you want in a history book?

If you want to understand how the first world war led to the second, consider this book required reading.

Watt's Bitter Glory: Poland & Its Fate 1918-1939 is next on my list.… (plus d'informations)

1112 Dare Call It Treason, by Richard M. Watt (read 18 Apr 1971) This is an account of the French Army mutinies in 1917. It is a fascinating book, altho it really does not tell too much about the actual mutinies. In fact, apparently the mutinies were not as massive as one sometimes hears--altho they certainly were bad enough and might have caused France's defeat if the Germans had known and acted. This book sketches--rather unoriginally--France from 1870 on, dwells on the French losses up to the time of Nivelle's offensive in 1917, and then tells of the May and June 1917 mutinies, and Petain's method of dealing with them. Then the author sketches Clemenceau's ascent to power. He became premier on Nov 20, 1917. He speedily became a dictator, and undoubtedly helped tremendously to win the war. He died in Paris on Nov 24, 1929, at age 88.… (plus d'informations)