Mick


 * __ The comparisons and contrasts of WW1 and WW2 __**

In this essay I will be looking at factors that played a role in both roles wars and how they were both different and similar. The five main factors that played roles in both wars are the ones that I aim to compare and contrast these aspects are, social, economic, political, military and diplomatic. I believe that this is an important question to consider, as it shows how the countries evolved and developed from one war to another and looking how their methods have changed. I will I also believe that this is an important, as it may reach a new question of who benefited the most from each war.

Socially, there are many factors to look out. In terms of propaganda, Germany had a disadvantage because in both wars, as Germany acted as the aggressor. In WW1, this was shown and they invaded Belgium which was apart of the Schlieffen Plan, which saw Germany cut through neutral Belgium to attack France and then march to Russia. This act caused the British to attack as they promised to protect neutral Belgium. In WW2 Germany had the same disadvantage as acting as the aggressor because they invaded Poland, which was the first spark of the WW2, as Britain used this as a motive to declare war on Germany. In Britain during WW1, the main focus of propaganda was on the soldiers that were fighting for their country. This made it that more people would want to help in some way, it would encourage men to sign up to the army, and for the women it encouraged them to help in the war effort. The reality of war was shows through movies that used footage of the war. The most famous example being ‘The Battle of the Somme’ video, which focused on the true reality of war and the ways, in which the soldiers were fighting in. In WW2 the focus of propaganda was put on Winston Churchill, as he was the leader of Britain and a former soldier himself. Churchill was charismatic, which led to great speeches and he knew that the focus shouldn’t be on the soldiers as the general public knew what the men had to go through because of WW1. However in both wars they used posters to drive campaigns forward that pushed men to join the army and women to help in the war effort by making food. Some of the most famous slogans being “daddy what did you do in the war” aimed at men to join the army and “kitchen is the key to victory” which was aimed at the women to join the women’s land army or the white feather movement. German propaganda had its disadvantages but it did not stop Germany from making it. In WW1 the main form of propaganda was through newspapers, as it documented the war and commented on the brutality of the allied forces. However when world war two began Adolf Hitler wanted to make propaganda a key feature in on his effort to win the war. He knew the mistakes that were made in propaganda terms from WW1 and in chapter six of Mein Kampf 1. Contrasting from WW1, Hitler created a department for propaganda use only in which he made Josef Goebbels head of. From this act, it highlights the contrasting motive from WW1, as German propaganda was used in a new way, which was focused on the death of Jews and a pure Aryan race, rather than gaining territories. Hitler also contrasted from WW1 by using propaganda in the Hitler youth, and focusing it at the children was previously it was targeted at adults.

1 - “ // Did we have anything you could call propaganda? //  // I regret that I must answer in the negative. Everything that actually was done in this field was so inadequate and worn // //, from the very start that it certainly did no good and sometimes did actual harm //  .” The Hitler youth was a school program which was introduced by Hitler in order to create Nazi’s from an early age in order to have his “master race”. This is where his propaganda was utilised the best as it influenced the children from a very early age which up to this point was unheard of. It saw the children of Germany being taught how to be the perfect Nazi and also to hate the Jews. In the schools he was perceived as a god like figure, and this made sure that the children would not challenge what they were being taught. Overall this scheme was to train the children into becoming the best soldiers and best women on the home front and this also made it possible for them not to question the holocaust.

The holocaust was a huge social contrast in Germany from WW1 to WW2, because in WW1 the Germans would focus on gaining territories and killing soldiers rather than exterminating a race of people. The holocaust saw 6.6million Jews being exterminated by Nazi forces and this opened another window of propaganda against the Germans as the Jews had no military involvement in the war. This highlights the question of “did the women and children know?”. We must take into account if the German people knew about the holocaust as it would change their perception about the war, because in WW1 they believed in fighting for their country where as it’s possible that in WW2 the fought for the death of the Jews.

In Britain, families knew what they were fighting for in both wars. In WW1 they were similar to German families in doing their best to aid their country, where as in WW2 they coped differently as they had the worry of their children being shipped away into the countryside and also the role that women had to undertake as well as the men. In both wars the women played a role in the wars on both sides. In Britain the women’s land army was formed and it saw women farming and making food so that the country would not fall to starvation in the blockade of Britain. A similar program was put in place in Germany but did not have the same effect as they couldn’t maintain food, and it led to the turnip winter and mass deaths. In WW2, Britain kept the same campaign of rationing and “dig for victory” which encouraged families to grow their own crops and women also worked in the munitions factories that were made in WW1, which saw them make the munitions for the army. The women were called munitionettes. Overall, in Britain they wanted to make sure that women played a major role in the war effort by keeping the same campaigns.

After both wars bankruptcy affected Germany and Britain in WW1 however in WW2 things were different. In Britain it left the country bankrupt and also gave the people a higher morale. This was shown at the end of WW1 when Lloyd George promised a soldier a home when they returned; this was named the “home for hero’s” campaign. This campaign was impossible to execute after WW1 because of Britain bankruptcy. However in Germany things were geographically different, in ww1 there was social despair among the people, but in contrast to Britain they had economic recovery. After WW2 Germany was divided, completely divided into East and West. East had been under communist rule, and was under democratic rule. The British blockade on Germany in WW1 left her weak as they planned for a short war leading to food shortages. However in WW2 they had learned from their mistakes and knew that a long war was more likely hence why the four year plan was introduced. The situation was the same in Russia in WW1 as they also suffered from starvation and lack of production in War materials. However similar to Germany, in WW2 they had a different plan, as the Five year plan was introduced and also there was a revolution in Russia. After WW1, Germany was in need of recovery and the USA helped them to do this as they introduced the Dawes plan. The Dawes plan saw the reparations of Germany being heavily reduced; the treaty also saw allied troops leaving Germany’s industrial area of the Ruhr. The Dawes plan lowered Germany’s reparation bill from 6.6billion to 2.2 billion marks. In WW2 things were similar as the USA introduced Marshal Aid which was introduced by George Marshall in 1947. He plan aimed to help rebuild Europe and not just Germany, and in the process $12,500,000,000. Britain and France were prioritised by receiving 200 million dollars each, and Germany was then the issue at hand, this shows us that the USA had a similar role to play after both wars were over.

In WW1, the USA loaned money to countries in need, and in WW2 they gave the money. In WW1 they money was based around Europe however in WW2, the main focus was on France and Britain. In WW2 the did this because they needed to keep funding the countries fighting communism, because if Britain were to fall, then the USA would be the only force left to fight against communism. In WW1 Russia was heavily damaged and weakened as there was a communist take over, and they lost major territories. The main contrast to this is that in WW2, Russia, were able to gain territories back and emerge powerful from WW2, and it saw the “iron curtain” as it saw Russia taking control of surrounding countries which were also known as “satellite states” after WW2. This contrasts from WW1 as they emerged weaker from the where as in WW2 they emerged stronger 1.

2 “ // From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an // // iron curtain //  // has descended across the Continent” – // Winston Churchill, Fulton Missouri 1946 After both wars there were major changes in the British party system. In WW1 the Liberal party that was once strong, became divided, between Lloyd George and Asquith and consequently destroyed it. After WW2, the labour party became the dominant party. This change in government sparked confusion and it led to George Dangerfield writing a book called “The strange death of liberal England”. The book was published in 1935 and it explains how the liberal party in Britain was once strong and how it came to collapse and change.

Politically in Germany, both wars saw the country being torn apart into the two major ruling types, democracy and dictatorship. In WW1 Germany leans towards a dictatorship in the short term, but the country fell to a dictatorship during WW2 as Hitler rose to power. In WW2 the country was geographically divided into a democracy in West Germany, and communist dictatorship in the East. Germany also suffered a political vacuumed after both wars as in WW1 the Kaiser fled to Holland which allowed the Weimar republic to be formed and during WW2 Germany lost her Nazi government at the fall of Berlin and Hitler killing himself. After WW2 Germany German was also subject to war trials, which was not heard of in WW1. These trials saw the Nazi’s being trialled for “war crimes” which meant that wars in the future would have to be fought in a new manner. The most famous example of these trials being the Nuremburg war trials. In both wars, the advancement in technology led to greater weapons being developed and decided the nature of any conflict. During WW1, stagnation resulted from a lack of understanding of how to deploy and fight against new technologies, a quote that illustrated this is “fighting machine guns with the breasts of brave young men” which was said by Churchill. In WW2 Germany had a better understanding in how to advance in military technology, and it saw Hitler becoming the master of new technology, rather than WW1 when Germany was the servant. In WW2 Germany developed such weapons as V1 doodlebugs, V2 rockets. The British also made new technological advancements, this was shown on a British operation to break a German town, and it saw the development of the “bouncing bomb” which was made by Barnes Wallis. The bomb was able to skip along the water and reach a destination on the water, and this was important, not only for being a new weapon from WW1, but it was also a more accurate solution to blowing the dam up, as they previously tried to blow the dam up from dropping bombs from the sky. More innovations were being made from a boat front, when the Enigma machine was developed. The Enigma machine was developed to break enemy codes at sea in order to protect convoy ships. The introduction of planes was also put to use in WW2 first time on both sides for the use of battle. In WW1 the planes were mainly used for reconnaissance missions, whereas in WW2 the planes were used to fight and they made it that the planes were able to drop bombs over towns, the main example being the bombing of London known as the blitz and the tactics of Hitler known as “//Lightning warfare”// or Blitzkrieg. The wars also saw both major countries of Britain and Germany using convoy systems which had been developed by Britain. In WW1 they were used in a part of a defensive strategy where as in WW2 they were used in an offensive strategy. The USA had also developed new weapons, and these would change the way in which wars are fought and it also changed the world of science as they were a huge advancement in technology. The atomic bomb and Hydrogen was developed after the Japanese attack on peal harbour and it was the cause for the Japanese for pulling out of the war, as they used these bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In contrast to WW1, a weapon such as this one was not possible to be developed as the technology was not yet available. However machine guns and rocket launchers were developed during WW2.

The Einsatzgruppen was a group of new German soldiers that had the only job of killing Jews and Slavs during the battle of Stalingrad. In WW1 there would not have been a unit such as this as now in WW2 the Germans were fighting an ethnic war rather than a political war, these units made the it clear that the Germans had a new war objective, this was largely down to the threat of communism. In both wars, Britain mobilized there colonies in a defensive strategy so that they could protect the empire. In WW1 they didn’t want anyone from the colonies to fight, as they were not treated with respect and German colonies were broken up and named mandates and shared among the winners. In WW2, they knew that colonies were important in the war and they were treated better, and after the war the colonies gained independence, an example of this is India breaking away from Britain, and Algeria from France. Both wars saw international organizations emerge to prevent war and example of this is the League of Nations, and the United nations. Diplomatically the UN was much stronger than the league after WW2 – e.g. military sanctions feasible. The USA became a member (as was USSR), which made the UN more powerful as they were two super powers. Economically there were other international organizations too this shows the change in the USSR from WW1 to WW2 and also the development of a new international system that didn’t develop in WW1 – ECSC led to the EE, which led to the EU based around the idea that economic utility was just more important if not more so than a military alliance. Militarily NATO and WARSAW pact, showed a clear divide between eastern and western Europe.

In conclusion I believe that the counties that have the countries involved have developed from the mistakes that they have made from the wars allowing them to become more knowledgeable. I also believe that from WW1 it was allowed them to create things for possible future situations, such as the atomic bomb, which has now led on to the nuclear bomb. After the wars it was also made that women were allowed to vote and also work permanently and overall improving women’s rights. After WW2 it saw countries such as Russia become much stronger rather than WW1 when they were much weaker. I also believe that by looking at this question we are able to see how the countries now live today because of the past decisions that were made in WW1 and WW2.