WW22+Propaganda

=Recruitment, conscription, censorship and propaganda in Britain and Germany=

**Focus questions**:
 * What were the purposes of British propaganda?
 * What were the methods used in propaganda?
 * By what means was propaganda disseminated?
 * How successful was British propaganda?

= Censorship and propaganda in Britain =

**Propaganda**
Propaganda and censorship in Britain lacked coordination initially. A number of bodies were formed which conflicted with each other, e.g., the **War Propaganda Bureau** (August 1914 under the control of Charles Masterman); and the **Neutral Press Committee**.

In February 1917, the **Department of Information** was created to centrally control propaganda.

June 1917 **National War Aims Committee**: produced propaganda to raise morale on the home front.

In February 1918, after criticism of the propaganda effort, the **Ministry of Information** was created to oversee all propaganda activities. The Minister was **Lord Beaverbrook** (owner of the London Evening Standard and the Daily Express). **Lord Northcliffe** (owner of The Times and the Daily Mail) was the director of propaganda to enemy countries.


 * Purposes of Propaganda**

Match the following purposes with the appropriate poster:
 * encourage enlistment
 * vilify the enemy
 * create sympathy for Belgium and justify Britain’s involvement in the war
 * encourage participation in wartime occupations
 * encourage women to work in war occupations
 * to preserve resources and food
 * raise money through war loans and bonds
 * encourage criticism of conchies and slackers
 * encourage American entry into the war


 * [[image:vad2.jpg]] || [[image:the_scrap_of_paper.jpg]] || [[image:take_up_the_sword_of_justice_large.jpg]] ||
 * [[image:he's_happy_and_satisfied_are_you.jpg]] || [[image:red_cross_or_iron_cross.jpg]] || [[image:The_Conscientious_Objector_at_the_Front.jpg]] ||
 * [[image:are_you_in_this.jpg]] || [[image:coal.jpg]] || [[image:war_bonds_feed_the_guns_small.jpg]] ||
 * Methods of propaganda**
 * stereotypes
 * labels
 * selective use of information
 * repetition
 * powerful words
 * use of simple messages
 * stories of atrocities, lies - e.g Belgian priests, Nurse Grace Hume. These were often made up, but they were believable because of the execution of Edith Cavell, the sinking of the Lusitania and the use of gas


 * Means of propaganda**

//**Posters**// – “How the Hun Hates”



//**Pamphlets**//
 * Pamphlets promoting the war were written by some of the best English writers (except George Bernard Shaw). In May 1915, the “Report of the Committee on Alleged German Outrages” was published, with a 320 page appendix of eyewitness testimony (these atrocities were all invented).
 * The propaganda produced by these men resulted in hundreds of thousands of men joining the British Army. Large numbers of these men were killed, including Conan Doyle’s son, Kingsley Conan Doyle. Rudyard Kipling also lost his only son as a result of this propaganda. His response was to write two poems about the War Propaganda Bureau:

Common Form (1918)

If any question why we died. Tell them, because our fathers lied.

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=4521

//**Leaflets**//

British leaflet dropped into German trenches by balloon:

World War One Document Archive http://wwi.lib.byu.edu/index.php/Propaganda_Leaflets

FOR WHAT ARE YOU FIGHTING, MICHEL?

They tell you that you are fighting for the Fatherland. Have you ever thought why you are fighting?

You are fighting to glorify Hindenburg, to enrich Krupp. You are struggling for the Kaiser, the Junkers, and the militarists....

They promise you victory and peace. You poor fools! It was promised your comrades for more than three years. They have indeed found peace, deep in the grave, but victory did not come! . ..

It is for the Fatherland.... But what is your Fatherland? Is it the Crown Prince who offered up 600,000 men at Verdun? Is it Hindenburg, who with Ludendorff is many kilometres behind the front lines making more plans to give the English more cannon fodder? Is it Krupp for whom each year of war means millions of marks? Is it the Prussian Junkers who still cry over your dead bodies for more annexations?

No, none of these is the Fatherland. You are the Fatherland.... The whole power of the Western world stands behind England and France and America! An army of ten million is being prepared; soon it will come into the battle. Have you thought of that, Michel?

//**Newspapers and Magazines**// – “Somme Punch” (//Illustrated London News// 2 July 1916) Language of newspapers was heroic, “Boy’s Own” style, full of ‘comrades’, ‘foes’, and ‘peril’.




 * Postcards** – “Für Gott, Vaterland und König”



//**Cartoons**// – “Triumph of Culture”, Punch 1914



//**Paintings**// – “36th Ulster Division on the Somme”

//**Songs**// – “Belgium Put the Kibosh on the Kaiser” media type="file" key="Mark_Sheridan_-_Belgium_Put_The_Kibosh_On_The_Kaiser.mp3" width="240" height="20"

//**Films**// – “The Battle of the Somme” media type="youtube" key="EpRc6lx_7wg?fs=1" height="385" width="480"

//**Photographs**// – Daily Mirror published a photograph on 25 July 1915 of German soldiers gloating over the spoils of Belgium. It was actually a photograph published in the Berliner Lokanzeiger on 9 June 1914 showing German officers at an equestrian competition.

//**From the Pulpit**//

Arthur Winnington-Ingram, Bishop of London, regularly preached pro-war sermons, which gained wide attention:

At first we see Belgium stabbed in the back and ravaged and then Serbia, and then the Armenian nation wiped out – 500,000 at a moderate estimate being actually killed; and then as a necessary consequence, to save the freedom of the world, to save Liberty’s own self, to save the honour of women and children, everything that is noblest in Europe, everything that loves freedom and honour, everyone that puts principle above ease, and life itself beyond mere living, are banded in a great crusade – we cannot deny it – to kill Germans: to kill them not for the sake of killing, but to save the world; to kill the good as well as the bad, to kill the young men as well as the old, to kill those who have shown kindness to our wounded as well as those fiends who crucified the Canadian sergeant, who superintended the Armenian massacres, who sank the Lusitania, and who turned the machine gun on the civilians of Aerschott and Louvain – and to kill them lest the civilisation of the world should itself be killed... As I have said a thousand times, I look upon it as a war for purity, I look upon everyone who dies in it as a martyr.

//**Censorship**// – prevented criticism of the war.


 * Success of Propaganda**


 * Recruitment propaganda allowed Britain to resist introducing conscription until 1916. The people on the home front responded to the calls to reduce waste, save food and resources, support war occupations and subscribe to war bonds.
 * The propaganda after the sinking of the Lusitania (1915) didn’t bring America into the war. It was the resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare by the Germans in Feb 1917 that achieved it.
 * One consequence of propaganda was anti-German hysteria: shops attacked, houses firebombed, German people attacked, German shepherds renamed Alsatians, Royal Family changed name – Saxe-Coburg-Gotha to Windsor and Battenburg to Mountbatten.

**Censorship**

 * In April 1915 The War Office established the Directorate of Special Intelligence to oversee all censorship. This was replaced in January 1916 by a new Directorate of Military Intelligence (MI7)
 * Soldiers letters home were censored. Soldiers were not allowed to keep war diaries.
 * Only the official war photographer and, later, accredited newspaper photographers were allowed to record the trenches and the fighting.

= Censorship and propaganda in Germany =

Propaganda

 * Anti-British Propaganda**

All things English were banned, names were changed (Hotel Westminster to Hotel Lindenhof), people were encouraged to greet each other with “Gott strafe England!” and the response was "Er strafe es!", no speaking of English language.



//**Der ist Schuld** - He is the Guilty One//



//"Haßgesang gegen England//"
 * //Oct 1914 Ernst Lissauer “Hymn of Hate”//**

Come, let us stand at the Judgment Place, An oath to swear to, face to face, An oath of bronze no wind can shake, An oath for our sons and their sons to take. Come, hear the word, repeat the word, Throughout the Fatherland make it heard. We will never forego our hate, We have all but a single hate, We love as one, we hate as one, We have one foe and one alone — ENGLAND!

You we will hate with a lasting hate, We will never forego our hate, Hate by water and hate by land, Hate of the head and hate of the hand, Hate of the hammer and hate of the crown, Hate of seventy millions choking down. We love as one, we hate as one, We have one foe and one alone-- ENGLAND!




 * To justify German invasion of Belgium and France**

In defence against a totally unjustified attack, I have been forced to draw the sword... With pure conscience concerning the cause of this war, I am certain of the justice of our cause before God. The defence of the Fatherland, forced on us by the enemy challenge, will demand sacrifice of blood and treasure.

//Kaiser Wilhelm, August 1914//


 * Propaganda was **not as well organised** as in Britain.
 * Under the control of the Military through the German War News (Deutsche Kriegsnachrichten)
 * Newspaper proprietors were excluded unlike in Britain, though newspapers were still very pro-war: //Simplissimus//, a satirical magazine, and //Hambuger Fremdenblatt//.
 * Atrocity stories were published.
 * Propaganda was **not as effective** as Britain, often poorly targeted using images which didn’t connect with the common people: St George poster 1915 (below)

//**German**//: Gibst du ein Scherflein noch so klein in Gott soll dir’s gesegnet sein
 * //English//**: If you give a mite still so small, in God you shall be blessed for it




 * Had difficulty influencing international opinion**.

**Manifesto of the Ninety-Three German Intellectuals to the Civilised World, 1914**

As representatives of German Science and Art, we hereby protest to the civilized world against the lies and calumnies with which our enemies are endeavoring to stain the honor of Germany in her hard struggle for existence—in a struggle that has been forced on her.

The iron mouth of events has proved the untruth of the fictitious German defeats; consequently misrepresentation and calumny are all the more eagerly at work. As heralds of truth we raise our voices against these.

It is not true that Germany is guilty of having caused this war. Neither the people, the Government, nor the "Kaiser" wanted war....

It is not true that we trespassed in neutral Belgium. It has been proved that France and England had resolved on such a trespass, and it has likewise been proved that Belgium had agreed to their doing so. It would have been suicide on our part not to have been beforehand. (this seems mistranslated - must mean 'reacted at this time' or similar?)

It is not true that the life and property of even a single Belgian citizen was injured by our soldiers without the bitterest defense having made it necessary....

It is not true that our troops treated Louvain brutally. Furious inhabitants having treacherously fallen upon them in their quarters, our troops with aching hearts were obliged to fire a part of the town, as punishment. The greatest part of Louvain has been preserved....

It is not true that our warfare pays no respects to international laws. It knows no undisciplined cruelty. But in the east, the earth is saturated with the blood of women and children unmercifully butchered by the wild Russian troops, and in the west, dumdum bullets mutilate the breasts of our soldiers....

It is not true that the combat against our so-called militarism is not a combat against our civilization, as our enemies hypocritically pretend it is. Were it not for German militarism, German civilization would long since have been extirpated....

We cannot wrest the poisonous weapon—the lie—out of the hands of our enemies. All we can do is proclaim to all the world, that our enemies are giving false witness against us....

Have faith in us! Believe, that we shall carry on this war to the end as a civilized nation, to whom the legacy of a Goethe, a Beethoven, and a Kant, is just as sacred as its own hearths and homes.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto_of_the_Ninety-Three

In this way, the fresh German army, heady with its cake-walk through ineptly defended Belgium, committed initial abuses that were to haunt it ever after. The events in Belgium were terrible, and Germany was the over-whelming victor, but Moltke's 'brutal advance' actually represented a disaster for Germany, in regard to propaganda and the Allied waging of the newspaper war.

http://www.haverford.edu/engl/english354/GreatWar/Belgium/schreck.html

**Censorship**
Censorship was very strong in Germany. The Germans were not told about
 * military losses and casualties
 * desertions
 * peace demonstrations in Berlin in Dec 1915
 * international peace efforts: Stockholm Peace Conference 1917; Papal Peace Note 1917
 * International Socialist Conferences in London and Kienthal, Switzerland