REVIEWS 76I subtitleis 'Scenes from the BalkanWars',which he goes on to lump together in one 'Third BalkanWar', even though they involved only bits and pieces of the formerYugoslavia. It took me some time to discover the 'nails'. They come from the poem by Tomaz Salamun thatis one of the epigraphs,but I found anotherone, by Tim O'Brien, more revealing for the historian if not for the poet: 'In a true war story nothing is ever absolutely true'. The components of this true story are, for the most part, provided by ex-Yugoslav intellectuals who expatiate endlessly into the night with the help of alcohol and tobacco, categorically, arrogantly, cynically, with more similaritiesbetween them than they would care to admit. None can, however, beat the Italiandiplomatfrom the Council of Europe who, for the benefit of the Bosnians, describesBosnia as 'a dream situationforcountriesattemptingto reformtheireducational system'(p. 357), or the author, anxious to help a Belgraderwho wants to go to the US and who can count to ten in English -'I taughthim the word shit,which on his tongue cameoutsheet' (p. 371). This is a Rebecca Westtype of travelogue.As BlackLambandGrey Falcon did forthe firstYugoslaviabeforeit was blown up, so OnlytheNailsRemain attempts to do for the second afterit had blown itselfapart.It is often illuminating,and it is often pretentious. Occasionally it gets things a bit wrong (there is an amusing confusion on page 1I2 between Vaclav Klaus and Klaus Kinkel). In due time it will be a source of sorts. Department ofHistory STEVAN K. PAVLOWITCH University ofSouthampton M,drzecki, Wlodzimierz. J\fiemiecka intenwencja militarnana Ukrainiew I9I8 roku. Wydawnictwo DiG, Warsaw, 2000. 330 pp. Maps. Tables. Notes. Bibliography. Index. Price unknown. THIS recent study by a member of the Institute of History of the Polish Academy of Sciences (PAN) offers a new view of the I9I8 German military intervention in Ukraine based on extensive archival research in Germany and Ukraine. It includes printed primary and secondary sources in Ukrainian, German, Russian, English and Polish. The book focuses on several important issues that have not yet been systematically dealt with in historical literature on the basis of primary research. First, it analyses the organization and functioning of German military structures in Ukraine. Second, it examines the relationship between Germans and the Ukrainian state apparatus in the centre and in the provinces during the rule of both the Central Rada, or Council, and the Hetmanate. Third, it reviews the attitudes of various social groups in Ukraine towards the Germans and the political factions collaborating with them. Finally, it assesses relations between Germans and Austro-Hungarians in their common political and military work in Ukraine. Through analysis of these issues, M,drzecki aims to establish whether German intervention in Ukraine was helpful from the viewpoint of Ukrainian national interests and concludes that, in the short term, German military 762 SEER, 79, 4, 200I intervention was rather a hindrance. On the one hand, Ukrainian national activists were compromised in the eyes of the majority of the inhabitants of Ukraine for inviting, and collaborating with, a foreign and, until recently, hostile power. People realized that, even though the Germans supportedthe new Ukrainian state, their principal interest was political and economic domination. On the other hand, however, the year i9I8 was not lost for the Ukrainian cause. The period of artificialstabilization, provided by German troops, showed that the Ukrainian national movement had at its disposal substantialcadresable to develop long-term strategiesof action. The uprising of November I9I8 proved, in addition, that in certain circumstances this movement was able to elicit substantialpopular support. Most importantly, the German military intervention put Ukraine permanently on the international agenda. Ever since then, the Ukrainian question has been viewed as an internationalissueratherthan merely as a Russianinternalproblem. Based on extensive research,Mfdrzecki presentssome interestingfactsthat are perhaps not widely known. For instance, the first contact between the Ukrainian Central Rada and the Germans took place at Brest-Litovskin December 1I97. The Radahad proclaimed Ukraine to be an independent state within a federal Russia soon afterthe Bolshevikcoupd'etatin November 1917. Consequently, its delegation to the armistice negotiations with the Central Powers merely intended to represent the Ukrainian point of view within the all-Russian delegation. The...