Title: Virtual History –
Alternatives and Counterfactuals
Editor: Niall Ferguson
Publisher: Penguin,
2011 (First published 1997)
ISBN: 978-0-241-95225-2
Pages: 440
Niall Ferguson is one of the most
renowned British historians. He writes regularly for newspapers and magazines
all over the world. He is a prolific author too, whose distinguishing
characteristic is the clarity of thought as exemplified in many of his works,
including The Ascent of Money (which was reviewed earlier in this blog). This book is a collection of would-have-beens
of various crucial moments in world history, described by some of the prominent
historians of today.
History is guided by critical
events like wars, revolutions, popular unrest and such cataclysmic events which
transform the policy of a government in a matter of very short time. It will
then be forced to take sides on the burning question of the day and commit
itself to the party they choose to make an ally. With hindsight, we are able to
marvel at the seemingly trivial events which contributed to swing the outcome
from one side to the other. Such hypothetical or counterfactual questions adds
a lot of contemporary interest to the flow of events which actually did take
place. It employes historians’ accumulated knowledge of facts and wise
application of timeless wisdom to think about the repercussions of some very
critical moments in history and wonder at the directions in which world history
would have proceeded, had the outcome was somehow different. The book brings to
focus several such forking moments in history like what would have happened if
the revolutionaries lost the American war of independence, how Britian would
have moved on along the route of parliamentary democracy had there been no
Oliver Cromwell to finish of Charles I, and what would have taken place if
Britain remained neutral during the First World War.
The book describes nine such
episodes, beginning with 17th century Britain, right up to late 20th
century USSR at its breakup. Every major event thought worthwhile by scholars –
European scholars, rather – is covered in arduous detail. The subject matter is
preceded by a lengthy and thoroughly off-the-track Introduction which tires the
reader prodigiously. The treatment is unusually and unnecessarily pedantic,
though written by Niall Ferguson himself. The author we gladly met in The
Ascent of Money seems transformed to the role of a sadist who delights in
the pain inflicted on hapless readers without much prior background of
historiography of the variety Ferguson extols in the Introduction. The book
should have been intended for light reading, considering the purely imaginary
nature of events, but the author tries to build a grand edifice on quicksand.
Anyone who manages to pass unscathed through the torturous 90 pages of the
Introduction deserves to be congratulated for his heroic effort. Yes, the
congratulations are due to me, as well!
Of all the counterfactuals and
alternatives handled by various authors, the most relevant and close to
readers’ minds are those related to events occurred in 20th century,
particularly the questions like what would have happened if Britain stayed out
of the First World War, if the Germans defeated Britain in the Second one, and
how things would have turned out had there been no cold war. The book presents
spine-chilling details of Nazis’ racial agenda and their social resettlement
programs in captured territories in which the racially ‘inferior’ native
population would be relegated to the ranks for providing manual labour to
German soldier-peasants who would occupy the prime land with he State’s full
power behind their backs. Education and such cultural advancements would be
denied to them. As one Nazi planner remarked, the only thing the native needs
to know is to understand the German traffic signs, lest they be overrun by
speeding vehicles. Such scenarios for an Axis victory would have eventually
doomed the fate of the whole world as Hitler’s plans were global in spirit, if
not in letter. We would be astonished to realize that the outcome of the war
depended so crucially on the decisions of some minor German tacticians which
were not taken at the right moment. It argues that had Germany invaded Britian
in May 1940, instead of September 1940, the outcome would have been entirely
different, with the British Isles completely overrun by Nazi forces.
The book is extensively
researched. Able historians who are at ease with the complicated task assigned
to them show their mettle. Historians write history, not make it. But these
historians are compelled to make some of their own history, though persistently
guided through the path by firm convictions about the inevitability of some of
the strong currents flowing across centuries, which connects disconnected
events through a common thread. The long Afterword penned by Ferguson is a
splendid attempt to incorporate all the nine counterfactuals discussed in
earlier chapters into a coherent, integrated narrative of imagined history of
the world from 1646 to 1996. The author atones for his crime committed against
the reader in Introduction with this enjoyable Afterword.
The book has several disadvantages
too. The language is terse and unappealing to general readers having no solid
background of some chapters of European and American history. The seriousness
accorded to subject matter is at variance with the title. The easy and
speculative nature of the treatment expected by most casual buyers of the book
would be cruelly belied by its structure and those readers are in for the shock
of their lives. The book follows a decidedly West-centric approach to history.
Some of the nine described episodes do not warrant the careful scrutiny they
managed to obtain. What would have happened if John F Kennedy was not assassinated
is one such trivial question. The answer is also contained in the meticulous,
but critical chapter penned by Diane Kunz – not much.
The book is recommended only for
very serious enthusiasts and lay readers may quite profitably abstain from it.
Rating: 2 Star
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