This is

is CBS Eye on the World.

Here's John Bachelor.

Nick Loy, a reader in military and imperial history at King's College London.

His new book, The Western Front, is comprehensively the story of the Great War,

looking at the War in Belgium and France, the war that we think of as trench warfare.

This is the battle between allies and adversaries in Europe. The start started the 20th century that cursed the 20th century

because its lack of resolution and the players in this battle, 1914 to 1918, become the predicate for the much more damaging

to the Earth War, called the Second War in the 1930s and 40s.

Everything here foreshadows the catastrophe of the 20th century,

which we still bear.

Nick, a very good evening to you. Thank you for this and congratulations. I want to begin with a conversation about how you approach this as a scholar.

What you discovered in your researches in the German, the French, the American, and the British

archives and others, parts of the empire, all participated, the colonies of Canada and Australia.

The French Empire participated as well the colonial troops.

What you discovered in your researches and how it is that you approach this, what your ambition was as an narrative historian.

Good evening to you, Nick.

Good evening.

Thank you for having me. You know, this was a big book. It was a big project that I took on and I'd written a few books about the Western front, different battles. I'd written a book on Pashondale. I'd written about the last stages of the war on the Western front.

And then I thought I needed to do something bigger and more comprehensive and you know I stumbled upon the idea that I was going to do a history of the entire

front so you know we're going to talk about you know they didn't this entire theater of war in France and Belgium between 1914 and 1918.

And again, I'd looked at it in snippets and snapshots really and I thought I need to do the whole thing.

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