Exam #3 Notes
History 1020
LevI book

Without Mercy: Total War

Alliances and World War
• Triple Entente
o France
o Great Britain
o Russia
o U.S. (post -1917)
• Triple Alliance
o Austria-Hungary
o Germany
o Italy (switch 1915)

Memory of the assassination
• Spark cause of war
• Bulkan region the assassination lives on primary cause for WWI

Vasa and the Magic Fish
• Story told in Balkan region to deal with psychic pain associated with war
• Teaching children to be careful what you wish for
• Be specific

The Schlieffen Plan and Plan XVII
• Who was the first to make the move?
o Germany
o Linger on in memory of WWI
• Reasons:
o Geographic
o Size of European Standing Armies (1914)
 Russia had by far the biggest standing army
• 1.2 1.3 million solders
 France
• 763,820 solders
 Germany
• 866,026 solders
• Wants to avoid two-front war
o
• France moves next

 

Poor Planning and Miscalculations
• Schlieffen Plan (Alfred von Schlieffen)
o German troops will be able to move swiftly through Belgium (6 weeks to Paris)
 Calculation of how long it will take Russia to mobilize their troops
 Need to go through France to get to Belgium
o Russia will need 6 weeks to mobilize troops (takes 3!)
o Great Britain will stay out of war
 QUICK VICTORY!
• Plan XVII (Joseph Joffre)
o Germany will not swing out too far west through Belgium
 Direct path from Germany to France
 What was France primary reason to enter war
• Aslas Lorraine
 Most direct path to France
o “Napoleonic model” of combat (offensive strategy) will secure victory
 Single minded
 Leave them vulnerable
o Élan vita (fighting spirit) will secure victory in spite of being outnumbered
 Naïve
o QUICK VICTORY!
• Both sides assumed if they took these battle plans they would get a quick victory taking weeks or months
• Both cases were incorrect in their assumption

August 4 1914
• Germany move into Belgium
• Germans should brush the channel and take France in six weeks

“Poor Little Belgium”
• Thought they could just brush through Belgium and pass though easily
• Belgian Guerrilla Tactics
o Scorched earth
o Destroy supply lines
o Fortify large towns
o Break open dikes to flood fields
o Volunteer British Expeditionary Forces (BEF) join war August 9,1914
• Great Britain does not stay out of WWI
• Decide to honor London treaty
• Send British expeditionary forces (BEF) volunteer forces
• Put in a victim role and needed defense
• Causes problems for Germany

Frances complications in war
• Red and Blue uniforms in the Age of Smokeless powder and machine guns (post 1880s)?
• “Battle of Frontiers”= 150,000 French casualties in 5 days!
• Visibility was an assets
• WWI they are a liability
• Visible to German troops
• Battle fiends were no longer smoke filled
• Machine guns post 1880s
• Impact on French troops was nothing short of tragic
• One of first fights took place (Battle of Frontiers)
• Germans were allowed to exploit that visibility made possible by French uniforms
• Adjust uniforms with how war had changed

Germany makes way through Belgium to France
New is spread that they are about to be flanked
Not in position to protect the capital
Once that’s taken its over

Taxis of the Battle of the Marne (1914)
Try to get capital
• 600 taxis
• 6,000 troops (approx.)
• 2 million total French troops at Marne River!
o Allowed for France to push Germany back
o Taxi drivers become national heroes
• BEF troops present well
• Move troops faster to the fronts
• RESULTS
o Germany pushed back
o Psychological Victory (taxis)
o Western front established
o Line where Germany was pushed back
o STALEMATE!
• For 4 years the Western Front barely changes

The Western Front by Oct/Nov 1914: Progress Measured in Yards
(475 miles from North Sea to Switzerland)

Western front life
• Trenches
• Little movement
• Static front
• Stalemate
• New technologies
New technologies of War
• Poison gas
• Machine guns
• Planes
• Tanks
o 6,000 tanks
• Going to define the experience troops will have on western front
• Not prepared to deal with
o Injuries
o Effect on warfare

A “War of Attrition”
“It is easy to be wise after the even, but I cannot help wondering why none of us realized what the modern rifle, the machine gun and the airplane would bring about. It seems so simple when judged against actual results.”
--Sir John French, BEF
Commander (fall 1914)

Boredom: Where is the Glory of Combat?
• Fear of discipline not primary motivation to stay and fight
• National, familial, and/or personal honor
• Engrained social values (hard work, persistence, etc.)
• Internal struggles
• What does war mean
• Why are we here
• Wanted to prove themselves in battle
• Simple day by day battles
• Victorian values
o Help stay in war with morale of troops in trenches
o Personal honor

Rats and Fleas
“ A louse born in the morning can be a grandparent by nightfall!”
--Popular WWI comment
• Ate the food
• Ran around during the night
• People see pictures in newspaper
• Not what people want to see their solders getting into
• Almost became a sport to hunt them
• One solder created a caged bed to not allow rats to get in

The physical Impacts of Industrialized War
• Injuries difficult to treat
• New warfare brings more problems for health
• Trench problems
• Shells
• Shelling

The Birth of Chemical Warfare: poison gas (Mustard and chlorine)
• Second battle of Ypres (1915)
• (Germans release 168 tons chlorine gas)
o Canisters of gas
o 4 mile stretch of western front
• So horrible because it takes European nations a lot of time to design things to protect their solders
o Moist exposed organs
o Eyes
o Lungs
o Armpits
o Moist exposed skin
o Created kind of total war experience
o Civilian population is not geographically protected from the battle field
o Wind catch gas and blow into local villages
o Now battlefield is remained
• Canisters difficult to control
• Blow back onto your troops
• Aiming had no science
• Very unstable in ways
• Troops did not have sufficient protection
• Germany dropped a lot of money into chemical study
• France August 1914 first used chemical gas
• Germany used at level more than anyone else
• Used tear gas on eastern front
o January 1915
o Towards Russia
o Froze in midair and diffused in air

The effects of Poison gas: Severe Burns
o Primary areas affected: lungs, armpits, eyes
o No skin graphs

Effects of Poison gas: Blindness
Picture: line of troops affected by gas, blinded or almost blind

Effects of Trench Boots and Flooding
o No adequate foot gear
o Thick rubber soles
o Midcalf- bottom of knee
o Perfect boots for dry battle field, moving point a to point b
o Not good for warfare in trenches
o Needs waders
o Needs protection up to hips
o Feet that stayed wet for weeks on end

Trench Foot
o Standing in wet trenches without dry footwear
o No antibiotics until 1943!!
o Amputate feet
o Something new were not prepared to deal with

Severe Disfigurement and Early Plastic Surgery
“Oh, the beauty of men who are whole, who have straight arms and legs, whose bodies are not cruelly gashed and torn by shrapnel, whose eyes are not horror-filled, whose faces are smooth and shapely, whose mouths smile instead of grinning painfully…”
Helen Zenna Smith, Not So Quiet (1930)
Ambulance driver on the front
Female response to problems

Societies dealing with injuries you couldn’t see

The Psychological Effects of Industrialized War
“War Neurosis”/ Shell Shock
o “My nervous state, which I thought out to last not more than a fortnight, still persists more than three, or almost four, months after being evacuated, through the trembling is a less.” Case #225 (1919)
o Faking it as a way to get out of war
o Was seen as low when they would leave
o Can could be played and so tremendous
o Uncontrollable
o Now called post traumatic stress

War is not going to over quickly
Not your fathers or grandfathers war

The Christmas Truce of 1914
(Ypres, Belgium)
o Last innocence of WWI
o German soldiers decorating Christmas tree
o British soldiers prepare Christmas feast
o Brief truce between soldiers on western front
o Declared by soldiers against orders of officers
o One day lay down guns
o Sang Christmas carols across no man’s land
o Decorated Christmas trees
o Sang together and celebrated christmas

“War of illusions”
o How much longer until its over
o New years day 1915

So many deaths, so little gained
o Battle of Somme (1916)
o French/ British: 6000,000
o German: 400,000
o Territory gained: 25 sq. miles
o Battle of Passchendale (1917)
o British: 370,000
o German: 260,000
o Territory Gained: 40 sq. miles
o “Winner” was only the winner for a few days of weeks before territory was retaken

Impact of Total War
Village of Passchendale
o Before the battle…. roads, farm lands, businesses, village
o After the battle (1917)…hardly tell there was anything there, civilians targets, total war
o Problem with nations involved in WWI
o As war became more and more grim
o Troops disfigured psychologically damaged
o Hard to get troops to volunteer
o Difficult to get young people to face realities of war under new pyridine

Mobilizing A Nation for War: Great Britain
Propaganda
o “Who’s absent? Is it you?”- Uncle same type “we want you”
o “Women of Britain say go!”
o “Daddy what did you do in the Great War?”- Little girl sitting on dads lab

Mobilizing a nation for War: France
o Children- who you are fighting to protect
o Show that children can be brave enough to go fight
o What would you do as a man to do for your own country?

Mobilizing a nation for war: Germany
o Erich Maria Remarque (German, 1898-1970)

Women Ambulance Drivers
o 25,000 women who participated in WWI
o Went off to Western front as nurses, drivers
o No real medical training
o Deal with injuries shown
o No antibiotics
o None had right to vote

“Do your bit:” Sewing clothing and bedding for soldiers
o Blankets
o Care packages
o Clothing
o For troops
o Sign of devotion to nation
o School for blind: even someone that doesn’t have sight can contribute to national effort

Women working in ammunitions factories
o Women sacrifice in WWI
o Songs and poems written in honor
o Known as “The Canaries”
o Song sung by factories workings:
o “The guns out there are roaring fast….”
o “ The girls with Yellow Hands”
o Working with sulfur
o Gave hands yellow tint
o Point of pride
o Congratulated on streets
o Women became infertile from exposure
o 900,000 worked

NEED NOTES FROM THURSDAY

3/29
WWII: Nationalist Dreams/Nightmares

Why Fascism?
1. Operates in crisis situation: Promises quick solutions
2. Nationalistic and State- Centric
a. “The Nation above all else”
b. State acts as supervisory force to reorganize society (private public)
3. Emphasize Role of Leader (Hitler, Mussolini)

Why Hitler?
• Blame Weimar Government:
o Used world financial crisis to show ineptitude of Republican institutions of Weimar Republic (1919-1933)
• Blame Entente Powers
o Articulated deep anger about article 231 of Versailles Treaty (“war guilt clause”)
• Blame capitalism/Jews (Anti-Semitism):
o Blame Jews for financial crisis due to association with banking
o Claim Jews represent worst aspects of capitalist system
o Vision of domination by master “Aryan” Race
• Nationalist + Populist
o “The German People” (not class terms)
o New German Man and Woman can arise

• Gives Jewish people a new sense of self
• We can be born a new better stronger German people who will never again be vulnerable these kinds of problems again.
• But we can be something new and protect ourselves in the future from all these problems.
• Tap into anxiety and capitalize on them
• Programmatic in rise to power
• Man with a plan
• 5 distinct steps in his rise to power
o All legitimate
o Rise through legitimate powers
o Operated within government masterfully

Step 1: National Socialist Germany Worker’s Party (NSDAP)
• NOT socialist + NOT Marxist
• Not calling for class-based politics
• Name appeals to dispossessed/powerless
• Badges/insignia
• Flags
• Uniforms
• Newspapers
o The attack (1927)
o The Empire (1940)
o Common voice
o Common agenda
• Tremendous speaker, passionate speaker
• Able to forcefully communicate his ideas and capture peoples interest and imagination
• Work out an agenda that he will use later in his rule
• Importance of giving people powerful identity
• 1932: 800,000 party members
• Wrote: Triumph of the Will
• Own police force
• Height of unemployment- Hitler was perfectly positioning himself to help people for someone to turn to

Step 2: The Formation of a New German Coalition
• Electoral support for National Socialist German Workers’ Party (Nazis)
• 1928: 2% vote
• 1932: 33% vote
• Chancellor Hitler and General Hindenburg (1933)
• Hold your enemies close
• Given official position in German Government
• “Chancellor”
• Fear: German worker party will gain majority of positions in national assembly
• Hitler’s perspective: gone from minor to powerful in powerful position
• Working way up the ladder all through legitimate channels

Step 3: Destruction of Symbol of Weimer Legitimacy: Reichstag Fire
• The parliament
• Eliminate competitors- communists
• And where national assembly meets
• February 1933
• Hitler was able to capitalize on the chaos of this moment
• Uses as moment to eliminate the enemies or competitors of national socialist workers party

Wide Spread of Arrest of Communists by Storm Troops
• Dacheu- concentration camp march 1983
• First one in Germany
• First people sent were not Jews
• Dacheu became model for all concentration camps

Step 4: In the Name of Order and Stability
• CHAOS in wake of Reichstag fire, repression of communists
• Use Fear of chaos/dissent to pass legislation to consolidate Nazi power and rid Germany of dissenters
• Enabling Act (1933-37)
o Marshall law for 4 years
o Trade unions dissolved
o Political parties dissolved
o Concentration camps for dissenters
 Ex: DACHAU (1933)
• Passed with 2/3 of Reichstag vote
• Wiping out anyone of opposition for party
• Man with a plan
• Chancellor
• No competition

Step 5: “Fuhrer of the German Reich and people”
(Death of Hindenburg, 2 August 1934)
• Hindenburg dies, Hitler finds himself in perfect position
• Hitler assumes power position in Germany
• No longer Chancellor and General
• Ties them together
• One leader of Germany
o “Fuhrer of the German Reich and People”
• Total power and full leader
• Built power through state
• Gained power and trust
• Launches phase 2 of his program
• Now he wants to recreate the German people
• New man and new woman

Appealing to the masses
• Strong people, physically and spiritually
• Consolidating power

The Aryan Family
• Recreate the German family
• Family stability and Government stability
• If society is weak the state will be weak
• Perfect family should look like
• Ideal family: Aryan
o Mythical perfect German man and woman
o Blonde hair
o Blue eyes
o Physically fit
o Man, woman, child
o Each individual had a specific role
• Goebbels
o Administer of propaganda
o To tell people and teach people what the idea is

For Women
• Propaganda told women “Get hold of pots, pans and broom and sooner you will find a groom” – Nazi Slogan
• Women out of work force gives more jobs for men
• German Mothers Cross
o Awarded August 12 in honor of birthday of Hitler’s mother
o Bronze: 4 children
o Silver: 6 children
o Gold: 8 Children
• Cross given for amount of children you have given to state
• Pronavalist- promoting motherhood
• Woman saluted during parades
• Service to nation to country to have children

Children’s Role
• Oath of Hitler Youth
• Young boys
• Made to swear an oath
• “In the presence of this blood banner which represents our Fuhrer, I swear to devote all my energies and my strength to the savior of our country, Adolf Hitler. I am willing and ready to give up my life for him, so help me God.”
• Saving longevity of young
• Raise them in the movement
• Carry ideas through lifetime

League of German Maidens
• Young girls
• Prepare young girls to become future mothers
• To fulfill duty to state
• Educated in domestic skills
• Educated in responsibility to be good wife, be good mother, have multiple children

For Men:
• Work in public sphere
• German Workers
• Rearmament + unemployment
• 1934: 2.6 million
• 1937: 500,000
• Hitler began to rearm Germany
• He was not suppose to be doing this
• Under Treaty of Versailles Germany was suppose to maintain defense power not gain power
• Not suppose to be offensive power
• Tremendous support from German people

“Strength Through Joy”
Volkswagen: “The People’s Car”
• Met certain requirements you earned points for vacations provided by state
• Earn points for family vehicle
• By providing vacations- boosting tourism

Autobahn
• “Get out there and discover your homeland”
• Your road, you use it, enjoy it, or on state sponsored trip
• Built to pass through the most beautiful scenery of Germany
• Creates jobs to complete project
• Promote tourism

Mass Spectacle (Nazi party congress at Nuremberg, 1934)
• Leni Riefenstahl (1903-2003)
o Hired to film movie
o 32 at the time
o Mountain movies- showed young women and men out in nature
o Showed celebration of Germany’s beauty, naturally and physically
o Charged of war crimes
• Triumph of the Will:
o The most controversial movie ever made?
o Quisi religious
o Defense was she had no choice
o When Hitler demands you to do something, you do it

Germany is…
Think of adjectives Hitler would want people to see to use to describe the country

Phase 3: expand
Various aspects of Hitler ideology
1. Ideas of lebensraum and Autarky
2. Vision for Germany is to expand and become imperial state
3. Economically self sufficient
4. Autarky- idea that Germany should be economically self sufficient
5. Acquiring Lebensraum- the need for “living space” for the German nation to expand
6. Recapture land lost in WWI
7. Throw out treaty of Versailles
8. Recreate Germany of Germanic people

Hitler’s Expansionist Vision
“We National Socialists turn our gaze toward the land to the east...if we speak of soil in Europe today, we can primarily have in mind only Russia and her vassal border states.”
• Mein Kampf (1925)

Lebensraum: “Room to live”
• German state reconstituted to include Rheinland, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland
• Lost German patrimony
• Attempt to acquire them
• 4 steps

Nazi Repudiation of the Versailles Treaty
• Versailles Treaty (1919)
o No Submarines, aircraft, or tanks
o Volunteer army (limit 100,000 men)
• German Rearmament (1935)
o Luftwaffe (German Air Force)
o Military draft=550,000 troops

4 steps- very cautiously
Take one piece then wait to see the reaction is before moving on to the second piece

Step/Test 1: Rhineland
• Remilitarization of the Rhineland (March 7,1936)
• France and Great Britain: Condemnation but NO ACTION
• Victory goes to Hitler
• Acquires an Allie
• The Rome-Berlin Axis (November 1936)
o Idea, Mussolini is also fascist
o Acquired someone to help when it comes to capture Russia

Step/Test 2: Austria
• Nazi Annexation of Austria (March 13, 1938)
• France and Great Britain: Condemnation but NO ACTION

Step/Test 3: Nazis invade Sudetenland (Czechoslovakia)
• September 15, 1938
• France and Great Britain: call for conference to discuss!
• Takes place in Munich

3/31
WWII: Nationalist Dreams/ Nightmares
#1: National Socialist Germany Worker’s Party (NSDAP)
#2: became chancellor
Keeping your enemies close
#3: Fire: ritestag fire
Uses to eliminate competition- communists
National assembly
#4: Enabling act
Eliminate enemies- target all other political parties, unions
#5: Hindenburg dies and he combines roles of president and chancellor
Fear of German right and people

All legitimate
Propaganda
All important for his popularity
Distinct plan for area to live, and economical success

The Munich Conference (September 1938)
1. Germans permitted to occupy the Sudetenland
a. Home to 2.5 million ethnic Germans
2. Confirmed Hitler’s perception that Western democracies “weak”
3. Paved way for German occupation of rest of Czechoslovakia (March 1939)
a. Czechs refer to as “Munich Betrayal”
4. HITLER EVEN MORE CONVINCED OF HIS “INFALLIBILITY”!
Chamberlain after Munich conference returns to Great Britain celebrating it has a victory for peace
“My good friends for the second time in our history a British prime minister has came back from Germany with Peace! We’ve been victorious in receiving peace.”

Why Appeasement?
* DEF: “Policy of accepting the imposed conditions of an aggressor in lieu of armed resistance.”
1. Deep-seated fear of war among people who had lived through World War I
2. Fear of communism (Hitler better than Stalin)
Greater than the fear of Hitler at Munich
3. Belief that Hitler would honor his promise to only incorporate German-speaking people

#4 Step is Poland:
Goes to nemesis Stalin and creates a pact

Nazi-Soviet Pact (23 August 1939)
* Why did the USSR sign a non-aggression pact with the Nazis?
1. Poland nearby but USSR not prepared for war (buy time)
2. Secret clause within treaty (not known until 1991!
• USSR + Germany will divide Eastern Europe into two “spheres of influence”
o USSR: Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Eastern Poland
o Germany: Lithuania, Western Poland
Test #4: Invading Poland
The Final Straw: The Nazis invade Poland (September 1, 1939)
France + Great Britain: Declaration of War (September 3, 1939)

WWI and WWII Compared
WWI
• Who started it? Why fighting?
• War of attrition (little movement, no major campaigns, heavy shelling)
• Ground war primarily (trenches)
• Few medical technologies
• Total war
• Civilian targets limited
WWII
• Aggressor is clear: Germany
• Major Campaigns, tremendous territorial expansion, global
• Fought on air and sea, “blitzkrieg”
• Penicillin & new medicines
• Total war
• Civilian targets common
• Genocide= extreme proportions
o 72% European Jewish populations massacred (especially Polish)
WWII: “Lightening War”
• “Blitzkrieg
1. Panzer Divisions
a. 300 tanks
b. Troops
c. Supplies
d. Self sufficient
e.
2. Air support (Luftwaffe)
3. Regular infantry units

Nazi Expansion in Europe
• Denmark (March-April 1940)
• Norway (Mary-April 1940)
• Netherlands (March-April 1940)
• Belgium (March-April 1940)
• France (May-June 1940)

Frances’ Maginot Line
• By building border fortification
• Idea to buy time hold of an invading army
• Allow three weeks it would take to mobilize
• 3 billion French building line
• Once Nazi’s pushed through they are able to move quickly down through France
• Move so quickly that they split allies forces into two

Dunkirk Evacuation (1940)
• 220,000 allied troops evacuated (most British)
• Marine ships and private boats used
• Evacuated
• Morale booster
• Everyday worker come and rescue stranded troops
• Nazi’s pushed through France
• Goal is to take Paris
• Schlieffen plan
• Take Paris in 6 weeks
• Hitler is able to achieve that goal in bout 6 weeks
• Major success

Vichy France (2 June 1940-1944)
Marshal Henri Pétain (1856-1951)

Nazi Aspirations for the Domination of Great Britain
• ‘The Battle of France is over. I expect the battle of Britain is about to begin.” – Winston Churchill (June 18 1940)
• “Operation Sealion”

Battle of Britain (June-September! (40)
Royal Air Force

Winston Church hill and British Victory (September 1940)

Delayed Nazi Invasion of USSR: “Operation Barbarossa” (June 22, 1941)
• 1,800-Mile Front
• Start in March- avoid the winter
• Napoleon learned lesson before
• Looses time and doesn’t get to start until June

Winter’s Victory
• Machinery freezes
• Soviets operating on home turf
• Knowing the territory
• Establish them in good offensive capacity
• Germans had summer uniforms
• Soviets had winter and special camouflage white coats which made it hard for them to be seen

German Defeat at Stalingrad (February 1943)
“It is probably no overstatement to say that the Russian campaign has been won in the pace of two weeks.” – overconfident German General (1941)
Entire German Sixth Army lost=200,000 men
1.5 million total casualties

Japanese Expansion in the Pacific
• Watching the Philippines
• Strategic interests were
• Acquired from Spain
• Holding station
• Opening for us to mark its in the pacific
• Don’t expect for Japan to hit us where they do
o Hawaii

Pearl Harbor: “A day that will live in infamy”
(December 7, 1941)

Galvanizing American Public Support for war
• United states government needs propaganda campaign
• In order to do so: harness power of film
• Modern medium for communicating to public
• Hire man name Frank Capra to create film that will be response to frank of the will
• Use animation as way to tell story
• Recognize was done by Disney
• Title of films: “Why we fight”
• Purpose to tell American audience why we need to get into this war
• Push population to identify with British people

Why should we fight?

“Until the Axis powers surrender Unconditionally”
Axis Powers:
• Germany
• Italy
• Japan
Allied Powers:
• U.s. Great Britain

4/7/11
Night and Fog
Part of antifascist justice and liberty
Arrested in the Alps
Arrest 13 Dec 1943
Alfizch
26 February 1944
They’re until the 12 of January 1945
How does he survive?
Scarlett fever
Medical facility
Pull survivors out of camp to hide evidence
They’re when soviets liberate the camp
Survived by getting sick
During winter gets job and works in laboratory
Degree in chemistry
Indoor during winter
Better clothing
Food
Survive winters when a lot of people would die from exposure
Going on in lab?
Experimentations for disease related research,
Major purpose: rubber
Rubber plant at the camp
Use prisoners for work as slave labor force
To make rubber for them to sell
Zero rubber is produced
Work and Freedom meant nothing in that camp
How did other people survive?
Theft
Matter of survival in the camp
Clean them to keep sense of being a human
Try to take care of hygiene
For dignity and pride
Don’t give up all hope
Black market
Trade goods and trinkets
Cigarettes, food,
Highly risky and illegal
Undercurrents of resistance
Forced political groups
Positions of authority

Survival methods
Whatever it takes for you to maintain any sanity
Prostitutes
Grey zone
Even after camp is liberated
How do you reestablish right and wrong?
Committed suicide
Authored 5 other books after camps were liberated