The passage below (scroll down the page) is a brief extract from Mark Levin's Genocidal Legacies of the Great War, in which he speaks of the First World War as "collective psychopathology." This is one of the few times I've seen an important historians speak of the First World War--or any other war--in these terms: as a manifestation of a collective form of psychopathology.

WHY IS THIS THE CASE? Why are historians so terrified to speak of warfare as a form of psychopathology? 

Please glance at the Table below, which notes that 37 million casualties occurred in the First World war. In privacy, historians--most of us--have no problem using terms like "mad" or "insane" to characterize warfare. This is particularly true when we witness cinematic depictions of warfare in films or documentaries.

We know that the First World War conveys  madness, insanity, etc. Yet we prefer not to say this.

Why is this the case?

Do we fear we will be "excommunicated" from the club of historians that supports a collective lie?

Do we want to hide the truth (even as the truth stares us in the face)?

Is it a question of cowardice? 

The First World War was not the manifestation of a "breakthrough of primitive impulses," as some would prefer to say, or even of the "breakdown" of society or civilization.

On the contrary, this monumental episode of destruction and self destruction that we call the First World War--this profound disease--arose out of civilization itself.

Best regards,

Richard Koenigsberg

PS: If there are other examples of scholars who write about warfare as a form of psychopathology, kindly provide me with bibliographic references--or even extracts of pieces of writing--by emailing rakoenigsberg1@gmail.com
 

COLLECTIVE PSYCHOPATHOLOGY (extract from Mark Levene's "Genocidal Legacies of the Great War")

Through this prism we can perhaps glean something of the way a certain phenomenon— what we might call the collective psychopathology of the Great War—catalyzed a new phase in the history of modern genocide. The fighting of total war—of effectively life-and-death struggles—meant that the leaders of the major powers were willing to cross all sorts of human rights thresholds in their efforts to defeat the enemy. Any kind of diabolical military technology or ruse was now deemed legitimate.