War Land on the Eastern Front: Culture, National Identity, and German Occupation in World War I

by Vejas Gabriel Liulevicius

• ISBN13: 9780521023900
• ISBN10: 0521023904
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2005-10-20
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

War Land on the Eastern Front is a study of a hidden legacy of World War I: the experience of German soldiers on the Eastern front and the long-term effects of their encounter with Eastern Europe. It presents an 'anatomy of an occupation', charting the ambitions and realities of the new German military state there. Using hitherto neglected sources from both occupiers and occupied, official documents, propaganda, memoirs, and novels, it reveals how German views of the East changed during total war. New categories for viewing the East took root along with the idea of a German cultural mission in these supposed wastelands. After Germany's defeat, the Eastern front's 'lessons' were taken up by the Nazis, radicalized, and enacted when German armies returned to the East in World War II. Vejas Gabriel Liulevicius's persuasive and compelling study fills a yawning gap in the literature of the Great War.

Table of Contents

List of maps	vi
Acknowledgments	vii
List of abbreviations	viii
Introduction	1	(11)
Coming to war land	12	(42)
The military utopia	54	(35)
The movement policy	89	(24)
The Kultur program	113	(38)
The mindscape of the East	151	(25)
Crisis	176	(51)
Freikorps madness	227	(20)
The triumph of Raum	247	(31)
Conclusion	278	(4)
Select bibliography	282	(18)
Index	300