there were air raids over britain and shellings of coastal towns by the german navy.hings were darkening and changing. poison gas had been used -- lethal poison gas had been used for the first time on the battlefield. in washington, we had president wilson, very much a lonely grieving man. he is lost his wife of many years in august of 1914. throughout the rest of 1914, he was deeply troubled. but by may he is head over heels was deeply troubled. but by may he is head over heels in love with a woman named edith. a 40-something widow in washington d.c. it is not clear yet whether she is going to fall in love with him back. he is writing passionate love letters to her by the dozens at this point. this is the context, war and passion. brian: you start out by saying this -- "i first started reading about the lusitania on a whim." erik: when i look for the next idea, it is always a difficult time. a good friend of mine coined a term to describe it, she says that is when i am in the dark country of no ideas. when i am in that country, i always try to just read. if something

there were air raids over britain and shellings of coastal towns by the german navy.hings were darkening and changing. lethal poison gas had been used for the first time on the battlefield. in washington, we had president wilson, very much a lonely grieving man. he had lost his wife of many

not just by civilianss but by the people who commanded the submarines by the british navy by the german navyy really understood what a submarine was capable of. >> brown: so the other side is the people, right. so there is the large the woodrow wilson winston churchill the first lord. admirality. >> yeah. >> brown: but then the minicharacters, smaller significance. just as an example one that grabbed me is charles lawyer yet boston bookseller. >> right. >> brown: why him as a way in to tell your story? >> you know i wanted to have passengers we could sort of hold hands with through the entire voyage. and charles lauriet left one of the most detailed accounts of any of the passengers. when i say one of the accounts, i mean he left multiple traces of his story and the historic records from testimony, a book he wrote and an amazing filing with the mixed claims commission after the war. so there was a lot of rich detail. but also what i really liked about him was just the fact that in that era the golden age of books and book collecting, and so forth that a book collector could be famous and rec

german army big u.s. army, air force's, and strong navy there used to be during the height of the cold war, that deterrentffect? a year ago, 14 months ago nobody knew that president pin was going to illegally occupy crimea or get involved in eastern ukraine. we knew there were extremists, but did not know there was the high sio that was going to take over syria and do what they are doing. we did not know there would be this terrible thing that would require a massive international response. the three biggest things that occupied the national security international security radar were not on that radar certain months ago. i do not want to criticize anyone for making drawdown decisions that probably did make sense a few years back. the army does not do that in a backound. there is the same kind of budget. wewe are looking at sequestration that is going to be crushing in its effect of the capabity of all the services,s, if it goes into effect by the end of this year. ii mean, money for structure modernization. if that happens, it will be very difficult to increase anything in europe. our civilian leadership

and germane's one of his strategies was a naval blockade and he argued that the navy should also be attacking. the problem was they were convoy eating all of these merchant ships. they were also accompanying the army. they were never able to totally blockade the south. even weeks before the end of the war, a third of the ships were getting through. you know, the british had about 75% of their lighter craft over here in 1776. small cruising ships. even they were often ineffective in trying to out run these very small -- three much like being modern day drug trade in the caribbean. these ships from virginia and places where the captains knew they had been trading in these areas. they could basically outline the british navy. and a topic i would love to see developed much more, the militia at sea. they did huge damage to british trade and were coming to one of the governments in the caribbean. they were like gnats and fleas. they were everywhere intercepting people and capturing people going from one island to another. [applause] >> this is really what it is all about. we love bringing these pro

tendencies and then the timeline german newspaper pau's star claims of a summary of the plane's cockpit voice recorder you see here this is not been released by investigators but the navyet here on of that voice recorder the capital say for god's sake open the door was the third team as the pilot for is leading the cockpit or a left the door to the bathroom the pores of the plane's wing can be heard scribbling the mountainside 397 taking off and rest years questioning the four quarters of the co- pilot said in find out more about his mental state. >> reporter: sunshine and mild temperatures warmup the preconditions this afternoon and a cool down over the next couple days was a bizarre and easter weekend forecast all was details coming up after this break,. >> george: if you getting carried north on vest erode in for trouble this morning in the northbound lane will be shut down of a fearless hero reservoir of the seven truck that was involved in a crash some reports have it overturned and i do know a still part of its load and thus not only blocking the northbound lanes of vesco also affecting the south lawn right as well wasnt was this will be cleared up arrive in the