The End of the Cold War on the Cold War?

Melvyn P. Leffler. A Preponderance of Power: National Security, the Truman Administration, and the Cold War .     

“Spectral,Dancing Hosts of War”: German-language Research on Sword Dancing before World War I

This article focuses on four major German and Austrian figures, from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, in the study of the history of sword dancing, and their key approaches to the field: Karl Müllenhoff, Wilhelm Mannhardt, Heinrich Schurtz, and Leopold von Schroeder. Their work drew on classical studies (Tacitus's the Germania has an apparent reference), comparative ethnography, the ideas of secret men's societies and their initiation rituals, and, underlying everything, the concept of Germanic continuity from prehistory to the present.     

Boer Propaganda During the South African War of 1899–1902

This article examines Boer propaganda on commando during the South African War by analysing how the two Boer governments and the military leadership endeavoured to inspire a citizen army and to keep the men in the field. In the South African War a commando was a Boer fighting unit, more or less the equivalent of a British regiment, and ‘on commando’ meant ‘in the field’. For the first seven months of the conflict, two important pro-Boer newspapers, De Volksstem and The Standard & Diggers' News were distributed on commando; carefully used, they exercised a significant impact on the combatants' morale. Later, in the guerrilla phase of the war, local newspapers, notably De Bazuin and De Zoutpansberg Wachter, often published under trying conditions, took their place. Furthermore, Boer officers played an important role by fanning patriotism in the ranks with their inspirational rhetoric. The Boer perception that his military and political cause was both just and noble before God was a useful propaganda tool, as were official war reports; they could, in addition to truths, include carefully selected half-truths and flagrant untruths.     

The Machines of War: Western Military Technology 1850–2000

From the standpoint of military technology, the 20th century divides between two eras. The first half of the century saw the culmination of the mechanization of armed forces that had begun midway through the previous century. During most of this period, European innovations dictated the pace and direction of change. World War II changed all that. Europeans became followers of military change driven by the arms race between the USA and the Soviet Union. Two innovations, both largely products of World War II, dominated the second half of the century but proceeded with surprisingly little interaction. One was the elaboration of nuclear arsenals and their delivery systems. The other was the radical reconstruction of conventional warfare through applied electronics, especially from the 1960s onward.     

War memorials and the commemoration of the Israeli war of independence, 1948–1956

Gershon Greenberg, The Holy Land in American Religious Thought, 1620–1948: The Symbiosis of American Religious Approaches to Scripture's Sacred Territory, Lanham, Maryland, University Press of America, 1994.

Steven Beller, Herzl, London, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1991, 161 pp.

Theodor Herzl: Briefe und Tagebucher, Briefe 1895–1898, Vol. 4, 1990, and Briefe 1898–1900, Vol. 5, 1991, Barbara Schäfer et al, eds., Frankfurt/M., Propyläen Verlag.

Jacques Kornberg, Theodar Herzl: From Assimilation to Zionism, Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 1993, 272 pp., $24.95.

Michael Berkowitz, Zionist Culture and West European Jewry before the First World War, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1993, £29.95.

Laura Zittrain-Eisenberg, My Enemy's Enemy: Lebanon in the Early Zionist Imagination, 1900–1948, Detroit, Wayne State University Press, 1994, 211 pp., $29.95.

Philip Mattar, The Mufti of Jerusalem: Al‐Hajj Amin al‐Husayni and the Palestinian National Movement, New York, Columbia University Press (Revised Edition), 1991.

Hava Eshkoli (Wagman), Silence: Mapai and the Holocaust — 1939–1942, Jerusalem, Yad Izhak Ben‐Zvi, 1994.

Yechiam Weitz, Aware but Helpless: Mapai and the Hobcaust — 1943–1945, Jerusalem, Yad Izhak Ben‐Zvi, 1994.

Jehuda Reinharz, Chaim Weizmann: The Making of a Statesman, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1993. xii, 498 pp., bibliography, index, illustrations, £32.50.

Dov Gavish, Land and Map: The Survey of Palestine, 1920–1948 (Hebrew), Jerusalem, Yad Izhak Ben‐Zvi, 1991, 297 pp.

David H. Shpiro, From Philanthropy to Activism: The Political Transformation of American Zionism in the Holocaust Years 1933–1945, New York, Pergamon Press, 1994, xxxvi + 208 pp.

Asher Susser, On Both Banks of the Jordan: A Political Biography of Wasfi al‐Tall, Frank Cass, London, 1994.

Samuel Heilman, Defenders of the Faith: Inside Ultra‐Orthodox Jewry. New York, Schocken Books, 1992, xxxi, 394 pp., $27.50.

Yosef Gorny, The State of Israel in Jewish Public Thought: The Quest for Collective Identity, New York, New York University Press, 1994, xii+279 pp.     

War and the emergence of the English parliament, 1297–1360

Although the opening of the Hundred Years' War led the kings of France and England to make similar demands upon their subjects, the effect on the monarchy and on the Estates was markedly different in the two countries. In England taxation gave parliament a central role in the medieval polity while in France it strengthened first local autonomy and then absolute monarchy. Because parliament had an inescapable obligation to grant taxation for common defence, the Commons sought to limit this to periods of open war, and to criticise and control the handling and expenditure of the tax. The character of taxation, as levied by common assent and for the common profit, likewise permitted resistance to the extension of prerogative rights and the assertion of parliament's right to grant the tax on wool. In these matters the Commons were forced into a defensive dialogue with the Crown over their obligations which educated them in political argument and the techniques of parliamentary opposition. The power to levy taxation on grounds of ‘necessity of state’ strengthened both monarchies; but in England this was subject to the assent and authority of parliament which thereby emerged as a political institution concerned with the common needs of the realm.     

Politics of Debt,War and Peace: Scandinavia 1800–1830

This article explores the dynamic relationship between war finance and economic and political developments in Scandinavia during the period 1800–1830. By comparing the organization of government debt in Denmark-Norway and Sweden, it is shown that the Danish system relied on revenues from trade and consumption, while the Swedish system was heavily influenced by internal political factors such as a divided fiscal authority. The leadership in Copenhagen was committed to maintaining existing relationships with creditors even when faced with severe fiscal constraints, while the Swedish government chose partial defaults as the politically expedient option when faced with fiscal difficulties.