ABSTRACT
Conscription in European armies, mostly in countries where Jews were granted emancipation after 1789, marked the Jewish return to a military existence for the first time since the fall of ancient Judaea. Ancient Jewish militarism revived after 1789 in the militant spirit of nationalism set off by the Napoleonic wars. Mandatory education in emerging secular states usually involved patriotic indoctrination. Jews enthusiastic for emancipation were often zealous to prove patriotic loyalty and courage in the armies of their countries of citizenship. From the Napoleonic wars until World War II, increasingly large numbers of Jews served, in every European war. The outbreak of war in 1914 marked the end of the long epoch of Jewish pacifism. Over a million Jews served, nearly three-quarters of whom were in the opposing Russian and Austro-Hungarian armies. Emancipated Jews felt, as they rarely had in the past, a sense of identification with their countries. Traditional Judaism did not encourage military service; the modern Jewish Enlightenment (Haskalah) did. Many welcomed the perceived reduction of Jewish difference and the attenuation of their religious practices which came with army service. They hoped through loyalty and sacrifice to dispel anti-Semitic prejudice, by proving their detractors wrong.
