dropbear123 t1_j4xa0pj wrote on January 18, 2023 at 10:19 PM

Managed to get 2 finished but the second one took me longer than I thought it would The Last Emperor of Mexico: A Disaster in the New World by Edward Shawcross (both reviews copied and pasted)

>4.5/5 rounding down for goodreads (but I was close to rounding up to 5/5) . Read most of it over the course of one day.

>Napoleon III, Emperor of the French, using the oppurtunity of the American Civil War in the 1860s (so the US was distracted and couldn't intervene to enforce its Monroe Doctrine) and the excuse of Mexico's foreign debts installed Archduke Maximillian Habsburg as emperor of Mexico in order to counter the USA's expansion and growing influence. The book covers the process that led to Maximillian becoming emperor, his rule, the war with the republican former government forces and the fairly rapid decline of his empire before his execution by Mexican firing squad.

>The author argues that the plan failed for a range of reasons. In terms of Maximillian himself he had a tendancy to fuss about things like pagentry or royal tours of his lands, rather than important things like economic reform. Additionally he was a genuine liberal reformer, but could never compete with his opponents in terms of promise and policies but did alienate his conservative monarchy supporting base by trying to. But the entire scheme to make Maximillian emperor was also reliant on foreign support, mainly French and it was very expensive to them. Once the American Civil War was over the European powers didn't want to risk provoking the USA so cut off the supply of money and volunteers to Maximillian.

>The book is very enjoyable to read. No prior knowledge of Mexican history needed, I don't have any. Overall I'd recommend it.

Just finished today Russia: Revolution and Civil War 1917-1921 by Antony Beevor which I recently bought and had also been suggested to me on one of the previous threads.

>4/5

>Good, straightfoward-ish (considering the complexity of the topic) mostly military history of the Russian Revolution and Civil War. Jumps straight into 1917 and the Feburary Revolution, so if you want the longer background with things like the Russo-Japanese War or the 1905 Revolution then look elsewhere as they are not mentioned much (maybe Figes' A People Betrayed or S.A Smith's Russia in Revolution). It is especially good for the on the ground accounts from all sides and from the various foreigners in Russia as part of the Allied Intervention, which makes the book great at showing the chaos of the time period. The book is also strong on the atrocities, brutality and suffering inflicted by both sides, with quite a lot of detail on that and the various methods used (degloving of hands, mass executions, putting people on slowly sinking barges etc). There is a decent amount on the mistakes and human error (early naivity, arrogance, inability to offer compromise to the distinct nationalities and peasants etc) that caused the Whites to fail. The book mostly ends with the end of the Polish-Soviet War and the fall of White Crimea, but there is a brief final chapter on the peasant revolts after that and the Kronstadt Uprising.

>While the book is well written I do feel there is something, but I can't think of what exactly, that is missing that stops the book from being great instead of just good. Maybe some more in-depth political analysis.

nola_throwaway53826 t1_j5lamnp wrote on January 23, 2023 at 8:32 PM

I'll second that recommendation for The Last Emperor of Mexico. Was a good book covering the events of a little known event in Mexican history and did a good job at it.

Mexico has a pretty interesting, messed up, and bloody history. From the war of independence from Spain, where they have a succession of presidents and dictators who get overthrown and executed on a somewhat regular basis. One of the heroes of the war of independence declares himself emperor, gets overthrown, and put before a firing squad. Other presidents get executed by their opposition, like Guerrero who is hanged.

You've got the US meddling in affairs and spurring revolution in Texas and eventually warring with Mexico and taking a good chunk of territory. Look up the books So Far From God by John Eisenhower for a good American perspective and A Glorious Defeat by Timothy Henderson for the Mexican side. After that is civil war where the liberal opposition wins, and then the conservatives get European intervention for the second Mexican Empire.

Porfirio Diaz gets power for 35 years after all this and has relative stability, but he does rule with absolute authority, and caters to the elite of the country and soliciting massive foreign investment. What's kind of ridiculous is that he triggers the Mexican revolution thanks to the Creelman interview, where he tells an American journalist he will not run for reelection. That gets everyone excited and getting political parties going, until Diaz changes his mind. That causes everything to boil over into revolution.

It's interesting stuff.