Arming the Western Front: War, Business and the State in Britain 1900-1920

ISBN-13: 9780815366836 / Angielski / Miękka / 2017

Roger Lloyd-Jones; M. J. Lewis

Opis

The First World War was above all a war of logistics. Whilst the conflict will forever be remembered for the mud and slaughter of the Western Front, it was a war won on the factory floor as much as the battlefield. Examining the war from an industrial perspective, this book provides an overview of the British industrial-military complex between 1900 and 1920 and how it responded to the many challenges it faced in these two decades. The authors chart the British industry's response to the needs and pressures generated by the war, and outlines the successes and failures along the way.

Spis treści

Contents: Introduction; The road to war: the Edwardian economy, military preparedness, and war planning; The pre-war procurement system: the War Office, the Admiralty, and the private armaments producers; ’Business as usual’ and the challenges of war; The rise of the engineer’s war and the origins of the Ministry of Munitions; The Ministry of Munitions and industrial warfare; Producing for the industrial battlefield: the Ministry of Munitions and the Somme; Oh what a costly war: managing and paying for industrial warfare; Coping with crisis: the war economy in 1917; The intractable problem of manpower: the western front and the home front in transition; The transition to a peace economy and the challenge of reconstruction, 1918-1920; Conclusion; Bibliography; Index.

O autorze

Dr Myrddin John Lewis and Professor Roger Lloyd-Jones teach at Sheffield Hallam University, UK.