	Generational Dynamics
	Forecasting America's Destiny ... and the World's

\| HOME \| WEB LOG \| COUNTRY WIKI \| COMMENT \| FORUM \| DOWNLOADS \| ABOUT \|

Generational Dynamics Web Log for 25-Dec-2010
Remembering the 1914 Christmas Truce

Web Log - December, 2010

Remembering the 1914 Christmas Truce

An almost-forgotten event in an almost-forgotten war.

One of the most remarkable occurrences in modern warfare occurred just a few months after World War I had begun.

On December 24, 1914, the German and British soldiers laid down their arms, crossed into the "No Man's Land" separating their trenches. They sang Christmas carols, played games, and shared jokes and beer with one another. They also used the time to buy their dead.

Christmas truce drawing from the London News of January 9, 1915. The drawing's caption reads, in part, "British and German soldiers arm-in-arm and exchanging headgear: a Christmas truce between opposing trenches. Drawn by A. C. Michael."

Christmas truce drawing from the London News of January 9, 1915. The drawing's caption reads, in part, "British and German soldiers arm-in-arm and exchanging headgear: a Christmas truce between opposing trenches. Drawn by A. C. Michael."

According to firstworldwar.com, hundreds and perhaps thousands of men on the Western Front experienced the informal truce. The war had begun only months earlier, and there was probably more curiosity than hatred between British and German troops. Once the soldiers began receiving Christmas presents from home, the mood in many areas became more festive than warlike.

This story illustrates how different World War I was from World War II.

From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, World War II was a generational crisis war for Western Europe, but World War I was a non-crisis war. (World War I was a generational crisis war for Eastern Europe, Russia and the Mideast.)

Can you imagine Hitler's German troops and Churchill's English troops singing Christmas carols and playing games at the beginning of World War II? That would have been impossible.

World War I is now an almost completely forgotten war in America, except for its name. Because of the similarity of names between World Wars I and II, and because Americans fought Germans in both wars, most Americans between that WW I and WW II were similar to one another.

Today there are few people, even among historians (as I've discovered), who have any idea what the Great War (WW I) was about. Most people seem to believe that WW I was the same as WW II -- some pre-Hitler Hitler-type decided to invade France and started a world war.

In fact, World War I was much more similar to our Vietnam war than it was to World War II.

World War I was very politically divisive for both America and Germany. America actually remained neutral between England and Germany for several years, and only entered the war in 1917, to much political dissent. To this day, many historians still consider America's entry in WW I to have been unwise. In a 2004 survey of historians' views on the "greatest" and "least great" presidents, the two presidents voted the "most controversial" were Bill Clinton and Woodrow Wilson. Wilson was considered controversial because he was the President who entered America into World War I, despite enormous political opposition. I have personally interviewed older men who are still absolutely furious at Wilson for getting America into that war.

Antiwar writings began appearing in both Britain and Germany. In England in 1917, Wilfred Owen, a 24-year-old soldier, wrote "Anthem for Doomed Youth":

What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
  Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
  Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons.
No mockeries for them; no prayers nor bells,
Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs,—
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
And bugles calling for them from sad shires.

What candles may be held to speed them all?
  Not in the hands of boys, but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes.
  The pallor of girls' brows shall be their pall;
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.

Ironically, Owen died in 1918 in the same week that WW I ended. The "Doomed Youth" that he described have become known as the Lost Generation, in the same generational archetype as today's Generation-X. (See "Politicians commemorate Battle of the Somme, July 1, 1916.")

World War I was just as politically divisive for Germany. Germany did not start WW I, as many people naļvely believe. WW I started in the Balkans and spread to Russia. Germany was "accidentally" forced into the war because of a long-standing treaty with Austria which obligated Germany to invade France because France was an ally of Russia. England was pulled into the war because of a previous agreement with France.

By 1918, the German people were sick of the war, and when the Americans joined the war, that was the last straw for the German people, who forced their country's leaders to capitulate. Germany's incredible capitulation, long before it was necessary, occurred because the German people were so politically angered by the war. Essentially, Germany capitulated in WW I for exactly the same reason that America capitulated in the Vietnam War -- because of enormous political opposition back home during a "generational Awakening" era.

After the war, the young German soldier Erich Maria Remarque wrote Im Westen Nichts Neues (All Quiet on the Western Front), depicting the heroic soldiers as becoming a "lost generation," following a completely pointless war.

By contrast, WW II was a crisis war for Germany (as well as England and America). That war was no "accident." Hitler planned his attack on France and England for years in advance, in secret, and Hitler kept on fighting long after it was clear that Germany would lose.

As I described in 2008 in "The gathering storm in the Caucasus," today's international situation is much more similar to the prelude to WW I than to WW II.

World War II could almost have been anticipated by someone watching the murderous Adolf Hitler. But there was no figure like Hitler in WW I, which was triggered almost by a random event. When Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated by a Serb high school student, the war in Eastern Europe was triggered. Germany was as shocked by the war as anyone, and had no desire to invade France, but was forced to by a treaty with Austria.

Today, once again, there's no figure like Hitler on the scene, and any war will be a shock to everyone. But, as in the prelude to WW I, nationalistic urges and xenophobia today are rising, and there's a huge network of interlocking treaties.

The U.S. alone has mutual defense treaties with Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Australia and New Zealand (ANZUS treaty), Israel, Europe, Iceland, and others. When these treaties were signed, after WW II, their purpose was to prevent another world war by making it too expensive for anyone to attack a country aligned with the United States.

Now, 65 years later in a new generational Crisis era, all those treaties are having the opposite effect. Few people seriously believe that any alliance with the U.S. will prevent North Korea from invading South Korea, or that such an alliance will prevent China from attacking the the disputed Senkaku Islands (called the Diaoyu Islands by the Chinese) that are currently administered by the Japanese.

Instead, the alliances with the U.S. almost guarantee that wars in many regions that might have remained regional will, instead, turn into a world war. (See my 2004 article, "Six most dangerous regions in world.")

And so, even without a new Hitler figure, a world war could be triggered today by any of a number of random events, even by a high school student who manages to assassinate some world leader. Any event like that could spiral into a regional war and then into a world war, as happened in 1914.

So, the Christmas truce of 1914 is a unique, sentimental story to think about in this holiday season, as we realize with sadness that there'll be no Christmas truces in the "clash of civilizations" world war that's just around the corner.

(Comments: For reader comments, questions and discussion, see the Remembering the 1914 Christmas Truce thread of the Generational Dynamics forum. Comments may be posted anonymously.) (25-Dec-2010) Permanent Link
Receive daily World View columns by e-mail
Donate to Generational Dynamics via PayPal

Web Log Pages

Current Web Log

Generational Dynamics Web Log for 25-Dec-2010 Remembering the 1914 Christmas Truce

Web Log Pages

Generational Dynamics Web Log for 25-Dec-2010
Remembering the 1914 Christmas Truce