>On 25 Dec 2010, at 19:04, Geoffrey Heard wrote:
>
>>It was the last Feudal family dispute -- the sovereigns of all the
>>principal nations when the war started were cousins. Of course,
>>underlying that was the treasure generated by power over less
>>developed lands that could be sucked dry.
>>
>
>This should clinch you the Us and Them Chair of modern history at
>Mel Gibson University.
>
>You are overlooking the role of jingoism among the masses. Italy
>went to war in 1915 largely as the result of popular demand, not
>least from (the until then socialist) Benito Mussolini.
>
>T
>
>seen in the Economist:
>
>
>>In the spring of 1854, as the Crimean fighting began in earnest, an
>>Anglican cleric declared that Russian Orthodoxy was as "impure,
>>demoralising, and intolerant as popery itself". What could be more
>>natural, then, than to team up with Islam and popery to cleanse
>>that terrible impurity? A French newspaper, meanwhile, gave warning
>>that the Russians represented a special menace to all Catholics
>>because "they hope to convert us to their heresy".
Lovely stuff, T, but my explanation was shorter! :D
Not forgetting that the C of E clergy were catspaws (and often
younger brothers of) the aristocracy.
And let's not forget that other Crimean war in 1919 -- Australian
troops, sick of the bloodshed, climbed on to ships expecting to go
home ... but found themselves in the Crimea fighting for the White
Russians. Gawd.
Cheers, geoff
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