
Iron and Blood
A Military History of the German-Speaking Peoples Since 1500
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Narrated by:
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Rory Alexander
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By:
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Peter H. Wilson
About this listen
German military history is typically viewed as an inexorable march to the rise of Prussia and the two world wars, the road paved by militarism and the result a specifically German way of war. Peter Wilson challenges this narrative. Looking beyond Prussia to German-speaking Europe across the last five centuries, Wilson finds little unique or preordained in German militarism or warfighting.
Iron and Blood takes as its starting point the consolidation of the Holy Roman Empire, which created new mechanisms for raising troops but also for resolving disputes diplomatically. The primary aggressor in Central Europe was not Prussia but the Austrian Habsburg monarchy, yet Austria's strength owed much to its ability to secure allies. Prussia, meanwhile, invested in militarization but maintained a part-time army well into the nineteenth century. Alongside Switzerland, which relied on traditional militia, both states exemplify the longstanding civilian element within German military power.
Only after Prussia's unexpected victory over France in 1871 did Germans and outsiders come to believe in a German gift for warfare. It took two world wars to expose the fallacy of German military genius. Yet even today, Wilson argues, Germany's strategic position is misunderstood.
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Story
This audiobook provides a clear and informative guide to the twists and turns of German history from the early Middle Ages to the present day. The multifaceted, problematic history of the German lands has furnished a wide range of debates and differences of interpretation. Mary Fulbrook provides a crisp synthesis of a vast array of historical material and explores the interrelationships between social, political, and cultural factors in the light of scholarly controversies.
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Thoughtful, very informative, excellent narration
- By Joanna S. on 07-21-19
By: Mary Fulbrook
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Germany
- A Nation in Its Time: Before, During, and After Nationalism, 1500-2000
- By: Helmut Walser Smith
- Narrated by: Paul Woodson
- Length: 20 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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For nearly a century, historians have depicted Germany as a rabidly nationalist land, born in a sea of aggression. Not so, says Helmut Walser Smith, who, in this groundbreaking 500-year history, challenges traditional perceptions of Germany's conflicted past, revealing a nation far more thematically complicated than 20th-century historians have imagined.
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interesting but unbalanced and somewhat biased
- By Joseph Sullivan on 11-10-21
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Fall of Civilizations
- Stories of Greatness and Decline
- By: Paul Cooper
- Narrated by: Paul Cooper
- Length: 19 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Across the centuries, we journey from the great empires of Mesopotamia to those of Khmer and Vijayanagara in Asia and Songhai in West Africa; from Byzantium to the Maya, Inca and Aztecs of Central America; from Roman Britain to Rapa Nui. With meticulous research, breathtaking insight and dazzling, empathic storytelling, historian and novelist Paul Cooper evokes the majesty and jeopardy of these ancient civilizations, and asks what it might have felt like for a person alive at the time to witness the end of their world.
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Great audiobook
- By EquineBallet on 08-03-24
By: Paul Cooper
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Streams of Gold, Rivers of Blood
- The Rise and Fall of Byzantium, 955 A.D. to the First Crusade
- By: Anthony Kaldellis
- Narrated by: Nigel Patterson
- Length: 15 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
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In the second half of the tenth century, Byzantium embarked on a series of spectacular conquests. By the early eleventh century, the empire was the most powerful state in the Mediterranean. Yet this imperial project came to a crashing collapse fifty years later, when political disunity, fiscal mismanagement, and defeat at the hands of the Seljuks and the Normans brought an end to Byzantine hegemony. By 1081, Byzantium's very existence was threatened.
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Very Detailed but Tedious
- By Amazon Customer on 09-06-24
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Bismarck
- The Man and the Statesman
- By: A.J.P. Taylor
- Narrated by: Nigel Patterson
- Length: 9 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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In this compelling biography, historian A. J. P. Taylor reevaluates Bismarck's motives and methods, focusing on the chancellor's rise to power in the 1860s and his removal from office in 1890.
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Good, but read a primer first
- By Paolo Menuez on 06-12-18
By: A.J.P. Taylor
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The Franco-Prussian War
- 1870-71
- By: Stephen Badsey
- Narrated by: Ric Jerrom
- Length: 4 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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The Franco-Prussian War started in 1870 when Otto von Bismarck engineered a war with the French Second Empire under Napoleon III, as part of his plan to unite Prussia with the southern German states as a new Germany. Stephen Badsey examines the build-up, battles, and impact of the war, which was an overwhelming Prussian victory with massive consequences.
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The War that set up WWI and WWII
- By Tim McGreer on 03-21-23
By: Stephen Badsey
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The Napoleonic Wars
- By: Alexander Mikaberidze
- Narrated by: Steven Crossley
- Length: 35 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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The Napoleonic Wars saw fighting on an unprecedented scale in Europe and the Americas. It took the wealth of the British Empire, combined with the might of the continental armies, almost two decades to bring down one of the world's greatest military leaders and the empire that he had created. Napoleon's ultimate defeat was to determine the history of Europe for almost 100 years. From the frozen wastelands of Russia, through the brutal fighting in the Peninsula to the blood-soaked battlefield of Waterloo, this book tells the story of the dramatic rise and fall of the Napoleonic Empire.
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No description of battles
- By John Gaston on 01-15-21
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Imperial Germany and War, 1871-1918
- Modern War Studies
- By: Daniel J. Hughes, Richard L. DiNardo
- Narrated by: Nigel Patterson
- Length: 21 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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Written by two of the world's leading authorities on the subject, Imperial Germany and War, 1871-1918 examines the most essential components of the imperial German military system, with an emphasis on such foundational areas as theory, doctrine, institutional structures, training, and the officer corps. In the period between 1871 and 1918, rapid technological development demanded considerable adaptation and change in military doctrine and planning.
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Very well researched
- By Jeff Wise on 04-27-20
By: Daniel J. Hughes, and others
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The Burgundians
- A Vanished Empire: A History of 1111 Years and One Day
- By: Bart van Loo, Nancy Forest-Flier - translator
- Narrated by: Nigel Patterson
- Length: 21 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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At the end of the fifteenth century, Burgundy was extinguished as an independent state. It had been a fabulously wealthy, turbulent region situated between France and Germany, with close links to the English kingdom. Torn apart by the dynastic struggles of early modern Europe, this extraordinary realm vanished from the map. But it became the cradle of what we now know as the Low Countries, modern Belgium and the Netherlands. This is the story of a thousand years, a must-listen narrative history of ambitious aristocrats, family dysfunction, treachery, savage battles, luxury, and madness.
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Extraordinary story, expertly told and skillfully narrated
- By Daniel Vergara on 03-01-24
By: Bart van Loo, and others
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History of Germany
- A Captivating Guide to German History, Starting from 1871 through the First World War, Weimar Republic, and World War II to the Present
- By: Captivating History
- Narrated by: Jason Zenobia
- Length: 7 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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Germany is one of the richest and most influential countries in the world, which is amazing when you consider that the nation is only about the size of the US states of Oregon and Washington combined. It’s even more astounding when you consider that at the end of World War II, every major German city (and many minor ones) had been flattened by the Allied bombing campaign. Still more amazing is that the country has gone from international pariah and home of the Holocaust to one of the most well-regarded and humanitarian nations on Earth.
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Action Reaction
- By Kiaf on 04-20-25
Comprehensive military history of Germany, Switzerland and Austria.
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Attention to detail in the pre-20th century chapters
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A lot if details!
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Difficult listen for amateur historians
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Learned a lot
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Great background book
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Awesome
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Interesting but messy
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Superb narration
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incredibly detailed
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