The Effect of World War I on Civilians
World War one was a military conflict which took place between 1914 and 1918. It involved many European countries as well as America and other countries around the world. This war was one of the most violent and destructive in European history.
World War I was the first total war. Once the war began, the countries involved mobilized their entire populations and economic resources to achieve victory on the battlefield. The term home front, which was widely employed for the first time during World War I, perfectly symbolized this new concept of a war in which the civilian population behind the lines was directly and critically involved in the war effort.
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Not everyone welcomed conscription though. Fifty MP's voted against the introduction of conscription in parliament. Also those who opposed the war due to religious of political reasons were also against conscription. It would be against their will to fight so they were named conscientious objectors and nicknamed 'conchies'. Conchies had to prove they had a genuine reason for not wanting to fight and weren't just scared.
Also, in 1914 the government passed the Defence Of the Realm Act (DORA). It gave the government massive powers to control many aspects of people's daily lives, this included being able to seize any land or buildings, to control newspapers and the media and to take over any industries which were important to the war effort. Immediately after introducing DORA the government took over the coal mining industry so that the money was going towards the war rather than private owners.
In 1915, the government faced its first major problem of the war - there was a shortage of munitions. The 'munitions crisis'' as it was known as became a national scandal exposed by the Daily Mail. Due to this crisis a coalition government was formed to work together to support the war effort. This coalition included MP's from different parties. Under DORA,
World War I was a ghastly experience for the soldiers due to what they experienced during the war. Many of the Soldiers that were drafted in the war were young and fresh out of high-school. These young soldiers left their home, away from family and friends, to fight a war not knowing if they were going to return home. These young soldiers hardly had any training before being forced to fight a war and many had lost their lives. These young soldiers were finding themselves losing their youth and innocence during the war. For those who returned from the war they came back a different person. While the outside world was living carefree lives; these soldiers were living in monstrous horror.
The warfare of WWI affected society by causing crucial pain to many soldiers.Many soldiers came home limping and blind.When soldiers came home wives and children were distraught to see them in this condition. Everyone did not have hope in the United States winning this war anymore. One reason the soldiers came home blind was because of poisonous gas. The gas would slowly asphyxiate the soldiers, and the wind will blow the gas towards the villages where the civilians lived. So since the gas would spread to the villages the civilians would suffer for no reason. But, this is sort of the soldiers fault because they used this gas but it is not really their fault for the wind blowing the gas.
World War I was a global war based in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918. The Australian Imperial Force (AIF) had great involvement in the war, serving as part of the British Empire. In Australia, or the ‘Australian home front’ the war had major impact, in many aspects of the Australian society. Conscription was a social impact of WWI, ‘The Enemy Within’ was a social impact of WWI and women were a social impact of WWI.
In 1914 World War I became the first event to impact society on a global scale. No person or country experienced such mass destruction or annihilation before. The closeness of Europe’s countries pitted them against each other and strong nationalist feelings emerged in government and civilian life. The soldiers experienced the worst of the war during its duration. Most lost their innocence due to the clouded perception of war by society, the young age of the recruits, and such high intensity falling on their shoulders. All Quiet on the Western Front candidly portrayed the struggles of the Lost Generation while and after the Great war took place.
The home front is the name given to the activities of the civilians when their nation is at war. Life on the front during WW2 was A significant part of the war effort for all Americans.
Despite the massive arms stockpile that had been amassed by both sides of the conflict both sides ran short and had to drastically increase their workforce and number of hours that they worked. In Britain this was achieved by the formation of a three party coalition that has elements working to find solutions to this problem. The shortage of workers was largely due to the lack of men in the workforce as they were almost all enlisted in the army as soldiers. The deficit grew as the war went on when more and more men were conscripted and enlisted. A new workforce was needed to work in the jobs that they filled. Female workers largely filled a massive amount of these positions with a smaller number of prisoners of war doing farming work. For the first time women worked in large numbers in industrial factories, producing weapons and munitions for the men on the front lines. They often worked in difficult and dangerous conditions
World War I, also called First World War or the Great War, was the first global conflict that lasted from 1914 to 1918. Some of the people who suffered the most on WW1 were the soldiers and people who lived in the Home Front. Soldiers didn’t live a normal life, they lived in horrible conditions. It was dirty, that’s why there were many animals like rats, frogs, insects etc., that eat the soldier’s food and contaminated it, by eating contaminated food soldiers got sick that’s was one of the main reasons why soldiers died.
Men, as young as the age of twelve, fought to protect their land and liberty. The tolls it took out on each country involved were tremendous. Empires were ripped apart and absorbed into neighboring countries, others were crushed with devastating numbers of casualties. World War I consumed the mental, physical, and emotional states of all human beings during the early 1900’s as a total war..
World War I changed the course of history, and in many ways the effects of this war are still being felt even to this day. It was one of the bloodiest events the world ever saw with over 31 million soldiers killed, wounded or disfigured. In Europe many of the Europeans believe that this war altered the makeup of war itself and called it by another name, the Great War. The war was not only fought between soldiers of the Allied forces and the Great Powers, but civilians were also beginning to be targeted to a large extent for the first time. Bombing of cities with the use of artillery and aircraft, the use of unrestricted submarine warfare to sink unarmed merchant or passenger ships, and the introduction of chemical weapons on a mass scale
The Great War involved most of the adult population either 'head on' or discretely. On average, 6 million men served in Britain's armed forces during the course of the war. Many millions of innocent civilians had their lives affects to the overall changes, both economic and social that the war caused or added to. The impact of the war varied greatly between the different regions of the sommunity. There were many differences and considerations ; these being gender and social class, so it is had to dinstinguish and measure the war's exact impact on people's attitudes, beliefs and values.
The effect that World War I had upon civilians was devastating. WWI was a war that affected civilians on an unprecedented scale. Civilians became a military target.
In today’s digital age, development of new technology and weapons are at an alarming rate, hence arises the need to stay ahead of advancements in order to properly defend the nation, as well as coalition forces and allies. In this period of warfare, the number one threat comes in the form of air breathing and ballistic missiles. During World War II, this threat was present, but was not thought to be prevalent.
A nation is a conglomerate of people bonded by the same culture, history, and motives. A government exists to further the prosperity of the state in which it was installed. In a nation with such a diverse and assorted population, constantly expanding due to immigration, complications are bound to arise: loyalty to different lands, various cultural differences, diverging aspirations. The United States has excelled in all facets of society due to this diversity; but, it is not exempt from the drawbacks which such diversity entails. Such a young country, founded on immigration, can be easily divided when global conflict becomes apparent. People are suddenly more aware of their heritage, their connections to the home of their ancestors. The motives of the population which originally brought them together to form a nation are promptly pulling them apart. How can a government act according to the motives of its people when the people have diverging motives? A government will have to choose the will of one community over that of another. More often than not, this can lead to the isolation and persecution of the neglected party in order to safe-guard the actions of the government. Neighbors are turned against each other,
The First World War of 1914-1918, also known as the Great War, was the first total war in history. What began as a European struggle over the balance of power between the triple alliance of France, Britain and Russia on one side and the central powers of Germany and Austria-Hungary on the other, soon became a global conflict that involved the imperial powers of Europe, their colonies and lands such as the Ottoman Empire, Japan and the United States. Although the sheer number of countries involved in the conflict is enough to describe the First World War as a mass war, what makes it total is the fact that it was waged not only against the enemy’s armies, but also against the civilian
“Our men are being put into the hottest fighting and are being sacrificed in harebrained ventures like Bullecourt and Passchendaele …and there is no one in War Cabinet to lift a voice in protest…so Australian interests are suffering badly and Australia is not getting anything like the recognition it deserves.” So wrote General, later Sir, John Monash to his wife on October the 18th 1917.