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"Both scholars and students will be most grateful to Szabo for having provided them with a compact and well-written summary of the present state of knowledge."
Michael Hochedlinger, Austrian State Archives
Product Description
In this pioneering new work, based on a thorough re-reading of primary sources and new research in the Austrian State Archives, Franz Szabo presents a fascinating reassessment of the continental war.
Professor Szabo challenges the well-established myth that the Seven Years War was won through the military skill and tenacity of the King of Prussia, often styled Frederick “the Great”. Instead he argues that Prussia did not win, but merely survived the Seven Years War and did so despite and not because of the actions and decisions of its king.
With balanced attention to all the major participants and to all conflict zones on the European continent, the book describes the strategies and tactics of the military leaders on all sides, analyzes the major battles of the war and illuminates the diplomatic, political and financial aspects of the conflict.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
9 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
I very much enjoyed this new history of a much covered war. Szabo adds tremendously to the body of work in English by taking a negative view of Old Fritz; although this may annoy some (and not persuade others)it has the useful effect of seeing matters from the side of the Austrian Coalition. Seen in this way campaigns that I thought I knew suddenly become less certain, I now see the opportunities not taken and the risks of the opportunities that were taken. The author pays proper attention to diplomacy and the difficulties of supply and funding. Indeed, if the Prussians are no longer seen as a clockwork army crushing the lackeys of Emperors their ability to fund and raise armies to make good the losses caused by Friedrich's risk-prone strategies is made more clear. Amateurs study strategy, professionals study logistics.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
It is hard to find accounts of the Seven Years War in Europe (English-speaking writers in particular seem to be far more interested in what was happening in the colonies) and those that exist seem to be centred on the doings of Frederick the Great and prone to some degree of adulation. It is refreshing to read an account that tries to cover all military developments on all European fronts, and that casts more of a critical eye on the campaigns of the Prussian king. Szabo perhaps goes a bit too far in the opposite direction in that he rarely misses a chance to denigrate Frederick, but he paints a compelling picture of a man who, while capable of tactical genius (Rossbach and Leuthen), was capable also of egregious errors that could have terrible consequences (as at Kunersdorf), and whose response to these mistakes was all too often a rather histrionic flirtation with suicide and/or an attempt to pin the blame on others.
One aspect of the war that comes out very plainly in Szabo's account is the total inability of the Allies to get it together. The French seemed to be largely ineffective and unable to make headway against the Anglo-Hanoverian army guarding Prussia's western flank. Mistrust between Russia and Austria meant that they very rarely co-operated in anything like a meaningful way, and in fact having overrun East Prussia the Russians seemed to spend a great deal of each campaigning season marching rather unenthusuastically from and to their winter quarters in faraway Poland. This often left Frederick free to face an Austrian army commanded by able but cautious leaders who were reluctant to risk much in the face of the man who had beaten them so often in the past.
Thus, while Frederick emerges as the most energetic and effective war leader that either side produced, one has to say that he never faced a resolute, organised and tactically capable foe - how would he have fared against a Marlborough, a Eugene or a Maurice de Saxe? After Kunersdorf he fully expected an Allied advance upon Berlin that he would have been hard-pressed to prevent, but fortunately the Russians did not press home their advantage. Bearing in mind this unexpected good fortune, and the other 'miracle' of the House of Brandenburg occasioned by the death of the Tsarina Elisabeth in 1762, Szabo's contention that Prussia' survival as a great power was due more to luck than the talents of her king seems to carry a great deal of worth.
Szabo's book is a thorough and thought-provoking account of the war that seems to have attracted mixed reviews and perhaps has antagonised some by refusing to follow the usual hagiographic line when dealing with the campaigns of Frederick. I enjoyed it and would recommend it to anyone seeking to understand the course of the Seven Years War in Europe.
One aspect of the war that comes out very plainly in Szabo's account is the total inability of the Allies to get it together. The French seemed to be largely ineffective and unable to make headway against the Anglo-Hanoverian army guarding Prussia's western flank. Mistrust between Russia and Austria meant that they very rarely co-operated in anything like a meaningful way, and in fact having overrun East Prussia the Russians seemed to spend a great deal of each campaigning season marching rather unenthusuastically from and to their winter quarters in faraway Poland. This often left Frederick free to face an Austrian army commanded by able but cautious leaders who were reluctant to risk much in the face of the man who had beaten them so often in the past.
Thus, while Frederick emerges as the most energetic and effective war leader that either side produced, one has to say that he never faced a resolute, organised and tactically capable foe - how would he have fared against a Marlborough, a Eugene or a Maurice de Saxe? After Kunersdorf he fully expected an Allied advance upon Berlin that he would have been hard-pressed to prevent, but fortunately the Russians did not press home their advantage. Bearing in mind this unexpected good fortune, and the other 'miracle' of the House of Brandenburg occasioned by the death of the Tsarina Elisabeth in 1762, Szabo's contention that Prussia' survival as a great power was due more to luck than the talents of her king seems to carry a great deal of worth.
Szabo's book is a thorough and thought-provoking account of the war that seems to have attracted mixed reviews and perhaps has antagonised some by refusing to follow the usual hagiographic line when dealing with the campaigns of Frederick. I enjoyed it and would recommend it to anyone seeking to understand the course of the Seven Years War in Europe.
1 of 11 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
this book sheeds new light on a war which rightly should be called the first world war.it also highlights who fought the war effectively and who didnt worth the read.Fredrick the Great
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