But I would stress the main Allied goal of the war, of preventing a ruthless German hegemony over the whole of Europe, which in the imperial context of the time meant over most of the world. The First Day of the Somme was a perfect example. Some battles in the war were far bloodier than they need have been, and military incompetence was widespread. Incidentally, I do challenge the idea of “pointless” carnage. While Jenkins affirmed that religion might help explain the scale of killing, he added: Yesterday Thomas Kidd’s interview of Philip Jenkins, his fellow Anxious Bencher, further whetted my appetite for Jenkins’ new book on religion and World War I, The Great and Holy War. But I was mostly struck by the way Jenkins pushed back against Kidd’s statement that “ WWI is often remembered for unprecedented, but often pointless carnage, especially in the notorious experiences of trench warfare.”
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