Rating: 
Summary: Good read, but needed to be Guns of 1870 to November 1914
Review: A bit curious that I enjoyed Tuchman's "The First Salute" more than this book, as Salute is generally considered her weakest, and August her strongest. I felt a bit disarmed because I do not have a good understanding of the previous war (1870). Also, the book ended a bit abruptly rather than continue into the beginning of the French reversal and trench warfare that would ensue. A good read, but I needed more to put a cap on it. I feel like I only got half the story. Tuchman has a way of digging into a person, and getting to the nut of their situation, their crisis, and how they chose to resolve it. What I enjoy most is that she often leaves the "why" question to the reader, which is appropriate because no one save the characters themselves really knows the why. Still, she neatly frames the entire issue, and then tosses the why in front of you, giving you pause that continues even after you have finished the book. A nice habit of hers. She also seems to have a keen insight into the issues that plague a commander in the field (also in Salute), the intangible factors that most authors and readers ignore. The meddle that some of the Generals she wrote about showed is impressive, and Tuchman has a talent for presenting that in a very human way; refreshing in the glare of "Action" films and books where officers are shown as uncaring army drivers. I recommend the book, but suggest a review of 19th century European history first. Even an hour's worth of review will prove very useful prior to reading this pup. It's a shame Barb didn't do it herself (as she did in Salute) and include it as a foreward. "A Distant Mirror" covers an entire century. That should be enough to keep me happy. I'll think I'll read that one next.
Rating: 
Summary: Readable as ever
Review: Like she always did Barbara Tuchman again succeeds in bringing history alive. Combined with craftmanship that's all a reader really wants
Rating:
Summary: Excellent
Review: This is a book full of detail, but never ever boring. My only recommendation besides "read it now" would be that the reader already have some minimal background about the start of WWI or military philosophy/strategy. Otherwise, it can get overwhelming trying to figure out who some of these people (e.g., Clausewitz) are. Nevertheless, an excellent read!
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Summary: This book saved the world from nuclear war...
Review: ...because President had read it and learned lessons of history which he applied during during the Cuban Missile crisis--he did not want to make like mistakesl.
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Summary: Very well written, novel like description-future classic.
Review: Although it sometimes seemed a bit of a chore when I was reading it, I look back on it as an excellent book! It really portrayed the dependence of the outcome of the war on that series of battles leading up to the first Marne. The best part was definetly the description of the battles at Tannenberg.
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Summary: Essential World War I Reading.
Review: Excellent book. Essential reading.
Rating:
Summary: The Unnecessary War
Review: Initially referred to as 'The Great War' and then later as 'World War I', I have concluded that the 1914-1918 War should be called 'The Unnecessary War' after reading "The Guns of August". Mrs. Tuchman is clearly one of the most talented authors to ever put pen to paper. She takes the events that most history text books have reduced to boring drivel and makes them very real and very relevant to modern times. Mrs. Tuchman's accounts of German inflexibility and Allied complacency lead one to the inescapable conclusion that not only was the war entirely avoidable, but once started needn't have been nearly as long and bloody as it turned out to be: The German refusal to halt war preparations once they began simply because it was too inconvenient. The French failing to anticipate the German sweep around their left flank. The naive Belgian insistence on nuetrality even in the face of imminent attack. The British refusal to commit enough troops to make a real difference. The failure to update tactics to match the new technology on all sides, but particularly the Allied side. It all adds up to a colossal failure of both political and military leadership that would ultimately cost millions of lives. One other effect of this book on my thinking is that I felt much less sympathy for the Allies than I had before reading it. The arrogance and incompetence of the French in particular make it very difficult to feel sorry for them. I now question whether this was a war in which the U.S. should ever have become involved. After all, our entry was instrumental in the defeat of Germany and the subsequent Versailles Treaty. As we all know, the seeds of the Second World War were sown with that ill conceived document. At the very least, this book will make you think critically about the monumental events of the time. It is most enlightening and, I must say, as entertaining as any fiction novel I have ever read. This book is a must for all well informed citizens of any country.
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Summary: An excellent account of the first days of the war.
Review: As the world now seems to find itself in a rather peaceful period with the United States and Europe prospering and with the threat of Communism vanquished with the fall of the Soviet Empire, it would seem that the book "The Guns of August" would be of no real importance. This would constitute an absolute absurdity. The lessons of Bosnia have taught us that the Balkans may well ignite the next horrorific European war. The current crisis in Kosovo explicitly states this. "The Guns of August" provides an excellent account of the days leading up to the war and the early days of the first European disaster of the 20th century.
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Summary: This is an exceptional historical read.
Review: The Guns of August is the fourth Barbara Tuchman book I have read and is a masterwork of historical writing. I learned in school that the Archduke Ferdinand was shot in Sarajevo and then all these countries went to war because they had secret treaties. Tuchman tells the real story from the opening chapter of the Funeral of Edward VII (with the array of kings and princes, such as have never been assembled since) through the incredible stupidity of the war planners (on all sides of the conflict) to the final days of the first month of the war. The personal and political and familial and military relationships are so clearly defined that the scenes described take on a vivid life. This is an excllent book, a great undertaking that has awakened me to the fact that war itself made a drastic and horrible turn in 1914 from which the world has not yet recovered. There had always been horror associated with war, despite the language of honor, but the technology changed and the tactics that made the massacre of civilians a shocking event that resonated around the world are now accepted procedures for all combatants, including US troops. The well of melancholy that lies beneath the military history is almost underplayed in Tuchman's treatise. But it is there and painfully real - we have yet to withdraw from the savagery that once humans could not imagine. This book is as relevant today as it was when it was written and as the story was when it happened.
Rating:
Summary: Scholarly, well-written, interesting
Review: Focusing on the period immediately prior to the beginning of World War I, Ms. Tuchman has written an engrossing account of the events and characters which combined to propel the world into a bloody, disasterous, and wasteful conflict. The people who participated in these events -- from Kaiser Wilhelm and his adviser the odious Holstein, to Winston Churchill, Woodrow Wilson, and many less well-known individuals -- reveal themselves in excerpts from personal diaries as well as in published reports and state papers. The events themselves, leading as they did to the most horrible and all-encompassing war the world had known up to that point, are related in such a way as to make the reader keep turning the pages to find out what happens next. But one of the most interesting results of reading about this time period, is noticing how incidents which occurred in the early part of the 20th century resonate even now in news reports from Eastern Europe (Bosnia, Serbia, Greece and Turkey) and North Africa (Algeria, Egypt, and Ethiopia). At the time I read this book, I knew very little about World War I, and the book prompted me to go on and read more about that era. Ms. Tuchman's carefully researched book is a classic, and belongs on every discerning reader's bookshelf.
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