Talk:The Great Illusion

Impossible Conclusion
Norman Angell, who won the Noble Peace Price in 1933, after Hitler´s seizure of power (Machtergreifung) in 1933, couldn´t know at that time, that Hitler would start a world wide war in 1939 or would engage in the spanish civil war after 1936. Therefore the passage: "A new edition of The Great Illusion was published in 1933; it added "the theme of collective defence."[10] Angell was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1933. He added his belief that if France, Britain, Poland, Czechoslovakia, and other countries had bound themselves together to oppose all military aggression, including that of Hitler's, and appealed to world justice for a solution to the countries' grievances, then the great mass of reasonable Germans would have stepped up and stopped Hitler from leading their country into an unwinnable war, and World War II would have been avoided." is completley nonsense after the first two sentences. I have deleted them completely.--MBelzer (talk) 23:52, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Needs background anent the book being foreknown "Europe's Optical Illusion"
What was the thinking behind brooking the wording "optical illusion"?

Irony not explored
The facts that the Great War did take place and that the book garnered the author a peace prize in '33 seem, on the surface, to need discussion with respect to each other. Kdammers (talk) 03:47, 20 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Only if there's discussion of such in a reliable source, otherwise it would be original research. Beyond My Ken (talk) 04:05, 20 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Would "NATO Review" be considered reliable enough? Consider this by Michael Ruhle:

"Nations, he argued, had become too economically interdependent to make war between them a profitable exercise. Angell’s arguments received enormous attention. As Europe’s major powers appeared to be inching ever closer to war, Angell seemed to demonstrate by way of rational economic argument why that major war would be folly.

'''Angell’s thesis was far from uncontested. Alfred Thayer Mahan, the United States’ leading thinker on maritime strategy, criticised Angell for having ignored non-quantifiable factors. He agreed with Angell about the questionable cost-benefit ratio of major wars but warned that wars did not originate just for economic reasons: “Nations are under no illusion as to the unprofitableness of war in itself; but they recognise that different views of right and wrong in international transactions may provoke collision, against which the only safeguard is armament.” Mahan agreed with Angell that the disruption of the international economic system caused by a major war would also strike back at the aggressor. Yet even this would not mean the end of war, for “... ambition, self-respect, resentment of injustice, sympathy with the oppressed, hatred of oppression” were more than enough reasons why war would not disappear.'''

“The Great Illusion” had been Angell's attempt to use rational arguments in his struggle against the widespread fatalism about an ‘inevitable’ war with Germany. Yet his powerful prose could not hide the fact that his arguments hardly amounted to more than an interesting compilation of facts and reflections. '''With respect to Anglo-German relations, Angell made too much of the cultural similarities between the two nations, underestimating their differing strategic interests. Worse, although Angell never claimed that war had become impossible, only non-profitable, he became a victim of his own journalistic penchant for hyperbole.'''

'''In the eyes of many observers, the outbreak of the First World War thoroughly discredited Angell and his followers. Economic arguments had not prevented this massive conflagration from occurring. However, the unprecedented devastation caused by that war also affirmed Angell’s thesis that war no longer made economic sense. Consequently, Angell’s attempts to deromanticise war and his plea for enlightened statecraft did not go out of fashion. He continued his struggle for international peace and détente between the major powers, and remained an international celebrity''' – by the 1930s, “The Great Illusion” had been published in six editions, and Angell had maintained a tremendous literary output. He was knighted and, in 1933, received the Nobel Peace Prize. However, the 1930s provided some hard lessons for Angell and his faith in human rationality. The growth of fascism and communism worried him. He also realised that by appeasing those who were prepared to use military force to achieve their aims, the European democracies were effectively lowering the cost of aggression.

'''Against this background, Angell’s political thought went through an important evolution. He no longer dwelled on the war-preventing power of economic interdependence. Instead, he devoted more attention to the principle of collective security''' – a system that included the potential use of force against a violator. In this way, Angell changed from being an idealistic pacifist to a realistic pacifist. He warned against Hitler’s belligerence and he supported Britain’s rearmament. In 1914, he had hastily founded a “Neutrality League” to keep Britain out of the war. At the beginning of the Second World War, by contrast, he supported his country’s cause.

Norman Angell may forever be remembered for something he never actually said: that war had become impossible. Yet, just as scholars are now considering him an early pioneer of international relations theory, Angell should also be remembered as a man who managed to acknowledge that preserving peace in a changing world means leaving outdated dogmas behind.

<<<<< some sentences omitted for brevity, and emphasis is my own >>>>>Wikkileaker (talk) 00:02, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

German edition?
Did the book ever appear in German translation, and if so, at what time? Answering this question would enable the reader to assess whether the book had any influence in Germany. -- 2003:C0:973F:5700:2D5B:9A58:4856:E487 (talk) 10:40, 3 October 2023 (UTC)