Teachers’ favourite Michael Gove today struck out against the “left-wing myths” surrounding the First World War. In a comment piece written for the Daily Mail, Gove champions the renaissance of history in Coalition Britain. At last, he cries, good historians have begun to tell the truth about this patriotic nation’s glorious past. Despite the efforts of bad historians – namely one Cambridge Don, Richard J Evans – who insist on exploring the many reasons why the war happened, and even suggesting, Thatcher forgive us, that it ought never to have happened at all.
“The First World War may have been a uniquely horrific war,” he wrote, “but it was also plainly a just war.”
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