Myths about world war 1

[Arcanetrance]

[div class="excerpt"
Much of what we think we know about the 1914-18 conflict is wrong, writes historian Dan Snow.

No war in history attracts more controversy and myth than World War One.

For the soldiers who fought it was in some ways better than previous conflicts, and in some ways worse.

By setting it apart as uniquely awful we are blinding ourselves to the reality of not just WW1 but war in general. We are also in danger of belittling the experience of soldiers and civilians caught up in countless other appalling conflicts throughout history and the present day.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-25776836?ocid=socialflow_facebook_bbcnews

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

1. Only 700,000 British soldiers died?

I'd never heard it said that most participating soldiers died in the conflict, but that number is one I find appalling even though it represents about 11 percent. And twice as many French soldiers died, about 1.4 million out of 8.5 million mobilized (6 million casualties counting wounded, dead, and mia - an entire generation of Frenchmen or over 70 percent of the French participants). This year will be the one hundred year anniversary of the start of that awful war and I guess we'll be reading lots of interesting articles. Thanks for posting.

[jakeXT]

3. Did they count their colonial mercs ?

The Indian Corps in France

In August 1914, as the German Army advanced through France and Belgium, more Allied troops were desperately needed for the Western Front. The Indian Army, 161,000 strong, seemed an obvious source of trained men, and the Lahore and Meerut infantry divisions were selected for service in Europe. In October, shortly after they arrived, they were fed piecemeal into some of the fiercest fighting around Ypres. Losses were heavy. The average Indian battalion had 764 men when it landed; by early November the 47th Sikhs had only 385 men fit for duty. The fighting came as a shock to soldiers more used to colonial warfare. One man wrote home 'this is not war; it is the ending of the world

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwone/india_wwone_01.shtml

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

5. There were also Indochinese and Senegalese units that fought

from French colonies in the Far East and Africa. 100,000 Vietnamese conscripts were sent into battle. However they were counted and whether they were included in the total casualty count or not, the losses were absolutely staggering.

[Avalux]

2. Interesting. Another fun fact -

The flu pandemic of 1918 killed 50 million people. WWI killed 16 million.

[Kaleva]

4. When at local cemeteries, there's a number of people here of all ages who died in 1918