Monday, June 21, 2010

David Fromkin’s new book: The King and the Cowboy

David Fromkin's new book: The King and the Cowboy

"The King and the Cowboy: Theodore Roosevelt and Edward the Seventh: The Secret Partners".

Actually I think it should be "The King, the Cowboy and Autocrat" or whatever you want to call Kaiser Willie.
The book suggests that the King and the President colluded to stop the Kaiser's plans in the Moroccan crisis of 1905 and this set the stage for WW1 and hence WW2 etc.

It is very well written history and short as well so well worth reading to understand what happened in Europe at the transition from Queen Victoria into the 20th century. Goes into how Victoria and Albert tried to educate Edward and that Victoria may well have hated him. Similarly explores the strange upbringing of Willie and his personality problems. Willie was actually visiting his grandmother when she died and he loved British uniforms etc. And yet he set out to oppose Britain - even though many protest that his expansion of the German Navy was not to oppose Britain.

From this book a case is well established that Edward had much more say in policy than the subsequent Kings of England.

A very good read

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