Marianne Is Watching: Intelligence, Counterintelligence and the Origins of the French Surveillance State by Deborah Bauer

The conclusion (“epilogue”) to this volume about the history of French intelligence from the Franco-Prussian War to the outbreak of World War I opens with a novel idea: “On July 28, 1914 in support of her ally Russia, France declared war on Germany” (255). To say the least, that an academic historian and author should misconstrue who declared war on whom in the seminal conflict of the twentieth century is concerning. If history had been as Bauer records, and not how it was when Germany declared war on France on August 3, 1914, the Versailles Treaty and the rest of the twentieth century would have been very different. In a sentence later in this volume, Bauer confuses deaths and casualties, claiming that the war resulted in “over nine million casualties” when the number of military and civilian “casualties” was 40 million (255). Unfortunately, the volume is marred by another twenty...