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An American soldier describes the smell of gunpowder and blood in the trenches.

A veteran remembers the boom of shells exploding in battle.

A lieutenant tells of fighting both poison gas and mud.

A nurse writes of tending the wounded only to send them back to the front.

These are stories from World War One, which began 100 years ago this year. At the time, some people called it “the war to end all wars” because they were convinced it would eliminate warfare from human experience.

A century later, we know better.

The World War, also called “The Great War,” devastated much of Europe, killed more than 10 million people, ended empires, gave birth to new nations, sparked conflicts from France to Persia, from Russia to the Pacific islands, and created the conditions leading to World War II a generation later

Yet it settled nothing, and many of the conflicts from Europe to the Middle East and beyond still simmer to this day.

This website will provide a richly detailed picture of the events of the war through the blog ” Catastrophe of War” written by Mike Shuster.

In the future we hope to expand the website to include contributions from other writers.
 
Thank you for your interest.