EPISODE 4

The failure of the German peace initiative of December 1916 made it impossible for Chancellor Bethmann Hollweg to resist pressure from the army and the navy to adopt unrestricted U-boat warfare. On 31 January 1917, the Kaiser finally announced that Germany would sink all shipping, neutral as well as belligerent, without warning. Professor Sir Hew Strachan examines how German belligerence finally brought the US into the First World War.

PRESENTERSir Hew Strachan is Professor of International Relations at the University of St Andrews, an Emeritus Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford and a Life Fellow of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. He was formerly Chichele Professor of the History of War, University of Oxford (2002-2015) and Director of the Oxford Programme on the Changing Character of War (2003-2012). He is a Trustee of the Imperial War Museum, and a Commonwealth War Graves Commissioner.

CREDITSMusic - James Holmes on piano | Producer - Catriona Oliphant | Recorded at Essential Music | A ChromeRadio Production 2017 | With thanks to the Rothermere Foundation

#History #WW1