Carla Beswick
@carlajbeswickCarla Beswick's Podcasts
2 podcasts
Imperial Paranoia: The Boer War’s Unlocked Door
In 1905, the Russian Empire suffered a staggering naval defeat against Japan that shattered the myth of European military invincibility. This investigation examines how Kaiser Wilhelm II’s pursuit of a place in the sun and Britain’s pyrrhic victory in the Boer War transformed institutional insecurity into a massive continental arms race. The shift from the diplomatic Concert of Europe to polarized military alliances revealed that colonial expansion acted as a temporary safety valve for violence before the Balkan contagion finally ignited. Russia’s refusal to back down over Serbian independence in 1914, unlike their retreat in 1908, turned a regional dispute into a global catastrophe.
The Great War: A Gunboat at Agadir and the Scrap of Paper
Between 1908 and 1913, European military spending surged by 50 percent as the naval arms race between Britain and Germany rendered existing fleets obsolete. This investigation examines the collapse of the Triple Entente and Central Powers' diplomacy, from the 1911 Agadir Crisis in Morocco to the 1914 assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo. The 1839 Treaty of London transformed a regional Balkan friction into a global catastrophe, forcing Britain to defend Belgian neutrality against the German Schlieffen Plan. Intercepted intelligence like the 1917 Zimmermann Telegram and the 1918 Treaty of Brest-Litovsk revealed how shifting alliances and internal revolutions finally dictated ...