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Date: Tue, 9 Jun 2009 01:33:01 -0500
Message-ID: <25890ca0906082333g4d3c8738nac03dcc3fe647e62@mail.gmail.com>
From: radek szulga <rsszulga@gmail.com>
To: Wikipedia statistics <folks@wikipedometer.net>
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	Content preview: Fergusson is actually fairly typical of a certain
	strand
	of a British Historians (more generally, Briton) who tends to be
	instinctively pro-German with the complementarity of being anti-French.
	Sometime that gets them into weird places. The most extreme example
	here
	is David Irving, though I don't wish to imply in any way that Fergusson
	and Irving are in the same league - if you think it's a continuum then
	Irving is at one end point of it and Fergusson's slightly off center.
	AP
	Taylor had some of that too though it was mixed up with his leftism in
	a
	weird way, whereas most of the Fergusson types are straight up Tories.
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	Content preview:  Fergusson is actually fairly typical of a certain strand
	of a British Historians (more generally, Briton) who tends to be
	instinctively pro-German with the complementarity of being anti-French.
	Sometime that gets them into weird places. The most extreme example here
	is David Irving, though I don't wish to imply in any way that Fergusson
	and Irving are in the same league - if you think it's a continuum then
	Irving is at one end point of it and Fergusson's slightly off center. AP
	Taylor had some of that too though it was mixed up with his leftism in a
	weird way, whereas most of the Fergusson types are straight up Tories.
	[...] 
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Fergusson is actually fairly typical of a certain strand of a British
Historians (more generally, Briton) who tends to be instinctively
pro-German with the complementarity of being anti-French. Sometime
that gets them into weird places. The most extreme example here is
David Irving, though I don't wish to imply in any way that Fergusson
and Irving are in the same league - if you think it's a continuum then
Irving is at one end point of it and Fergusson's slightly off center.
AP Taylor had some of that too though it was mixed up with his leftism
in a weird way, whereas most of the Fergusson types are straight up
Tories.

I actually really liked the Pity of War and I thought Fergusson had a
pretty convincing argument that, at least from the pov of the Western
European powers + Russia it was an entirely stupid, unnecessary, and
pointless war which screwed it up for all of them. I think a lot of
Central and Eastern Europeans look at it a bit differently because
that's the one event that allowed them to get rid of "imperial"
governments of Russia, Prussia and Austria. And Ottomans too. But
actually that particular war can be considered as both tremendously
stupid and at the same time as the opportunity that a lot of nations
were waiting for. We made the best out of a horrible situation. Except
the Soviets of course who made the horribler out of a horrible
situation.

Another British dude that falls pretty squarely into this category was
John Maynard Keynes. He was, in the same way, instinctively
pro-German, mostly because he was instinctively anti-French, but that
didn't change the fact that he was right about the fact that a lot of
the Treaty of Versailles, particularly the resulting economic policies
were tremendously misguided.

Basically as long as those folks stick to Western European
history/politics they might (and often do) have a lot of interesting
and insightful things to say. But the intellectual level drops of
discontinuously once they move a little bit east.

I've actually met Fergusson at a seminar + dinner afterward once and
he was a nice, funny, guy.

Radek

2009/6/7 Molobo Molobo <molobus@gmail.com>:
> "I didn't know he ventured in depth in things other than 19th century and
> current times. Never heard him talking about Eastern Europe for 2 sentenc=
es
> at a row."
>
> Read the section:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niall_Ferguson#World_War_I
>
> Fergusson position in regards to WW1 is very pro-imperial-that it would be
> better for=A0 German Empire to continue to exist. To me this seems the
> standard Western-european centrism and belief that "those Central and
> Eastern Europeans" deserve to be "kept in check" so often encountered in
> western literature and thought. He blames WW2 atrocities and XX century w=
ars
> on fall of Empires, and you are correct-I also never heard him say a word
> about the atrocities of Empires their subjects were exposed to, nor about
> German plans against Eastern Europe.
> I often encountered Fergusson among idols of German nationalists on inter=
net
> btw.
>
>
> 2009/6/8 Dorin Cheptea <dorin.cheptea@gmail.com>
>>>
>>> I respect very much Nail Fergusson
>>> Funny you mention Nail Fergusson-I oppose the man. Not many people know,
>>> but he deep down he has a very antipolish beliefs
>>
>> This is news to me.
>>
>>>
>>> and supports the view that it was better for German Empire to win WW1.
>>> Being an somewhat hobbyist of WW1 topics, I know much=A0 about German w=
ar
>>> plans and they were in essence trying to create an African colonies in
>>> center of Europe with Germans as the "white man".
>>> For samples see:
>>>
>>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_Border_Strip
>>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schrecklichkeit
>>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Destruction_of_Kalisz
>>>
>>> As far as I know Fergusson never mentions those things or German plans =
in
>>> his WW1 books and articles.
>>>
>>
>> I know Fergusson from his portrayal of the Britsh Empire and the
>> (sometimes luck of) parallelism between that and the USA. Also I appreci=
ate
>> his thorough understanding of current politics and even economics. I did=
n't
>> know he ventured in depth in things other than 19th century and current
>> times. Never heard him talking about Eastern Europe for 2 sentences at a
>> row.
>> Dorin
>>
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