Total Cost of War
...hard work. The poster shows that at that time women were a strong force behind wars. They were the ones who had to work on and on, in order to produce more goods and in that way help their troops. For President Roosevelt, war was not only the task of fighting, but it was also the task of producing and advancing. For him the way to achieve such superiority was through hard work and large sacrifices. People had to work day and night to produce weapons; they had to put their lives on “hold” for the sake of their country. Roosevelt knew that war cost a lot of money, and he urged the people to give up luxuries in the name of war . This serves to demonstrate the importance and degree of involvement of civilian help and their resources in total war. All aspects of human life are affected and all goals and aspirations are concentrated on the war. In another article entitled “German Radio Broadcast”, we get the perspective from the German side. Germany was among the countries that suffered the most in the total war. Germany’s Reichsmarschal Hermann Goering’s credo was: “…work, work, fighting and work, and again fighting and work.” Germany, similar to the United States for had to work very hard to stay in the war. People did not have anything in their lives, except working and fighting. They also were urged to limit their use of electricity and many other “luxuries” of that time. In the example of these two states we can see that general economy such as production of non - military goods, was in decline. By and large, the only products people were making were for military purposes -- ammunition, transportation, army equipment. Most natural and human resources were concentrated on the making of war related products. War created great needs for weapons, and that resulted in the arms races. Another important factor of total war appeared – accumulation of different kinds of weaponry. New types of machine guns were invented, which were more efficient. As a result, fast development and improvement of weaponry caused enormous casualties of people and made total war even more destructive: “…rifles, grenades, explosive artillery shells…barbed wire and mines made frontal assault ruinous in casualties.” By the end of the WWI, the British invented a new kind of the air power, which was called “strategic bombing”, which is the new offensive strategies that would bomb the enemy home front inhabitants and factories . This concept was enormously important as it helped to destroy enemy home war support more effectively. However bombers would attack civilian areas of the enemy’s home front and kill many innocent people. That is one of the factors that makes total war different from any other, that is the high degree of involvement of civilian populations such as we saw above in the economic example. The movement and blurring of the front lines also brings the war from the battlefields right into the homes of the participants. One of the examples of extreme civilian casualties of strategic bombing can be seen when four Japanese cities were bombed, including Tokyo: “fifteen square miles of Tokyo’s most densely populated area were burned to the ground”. Thousands of innocent civilian people were killed. But the attack that shocked the world came with destruction of parts of two cities – Hiroshima and Nagasaki. These attacks killed one hundred thousand people. The attack was conducted using atomic bombing, something that was invented during WWII. The aim of these attacks was to put psychological pressure on Japan, by killing civilians. Now war began to show its human face. The human factor is enormously important when talking about negative effects of total war. As mentioned earlier, the French Revolution introduced civilian forces into the war. People, not only the authorities began to fight each other. Prior to the French Revolution civilians were not a significant part of warfare. During the Revolution and after it, civilians became a most important part of the war -- they were fighting over their ideas, beliefs and rights. Even stronger involvement of people was shown after the French Revolution, during the Napoleon Era, when people were fighting not only for their beliefs, but also for the beliefs of their country. According to Carl von Clausewitz: “Since Bonaparte, then, war again became the concern of the people as a whole, took on an entirely different character”. As time progressed and with the emergence of new different kinds of weapons, more and more people were dying for the sake of loyalty, bravery, ideas, patriotism. People were so enthusiastic about victory for their country that nothing could stop them. Due to greater involvement of people in the war, confllicts lasted longer than they did before. According to Sir Douglas Haig: “the stage of the conflict has rarely lasted more than a few days, and has often been competed in a few hours. When armies of millions are engaged…it will inevitably be long”. As we see today, not only does war cost enormous amounts of money, but it also takes lives of many, many people. Haig also points out that the greater the war the greater the number of casualties is going to be. Casualties in each of the participating countries were enormous. Britain’s loss was about three million people. French lost approximately two million of their best men. Published figures for Italy’s killed and wounded were about one million and four hundred thousand people. The total German losses were about six and a half million people. The price to be paid for war was very high. Personal and political differences were put aside during the period of fighting the common enemy. People of different countries were organized more than ever. They behaved as one and were fighting as united as it could possibly get. Everyone was involved at the front and away from the front. People wanted to defend their country so passionately—they: “fought as they newer fought before in masses...” War was very hard on those who fought at the front. It had great psychological and physical consequences for the soldiers on both sides. In the excerpt from “All Quiet on the Western Front” we get the picture of what war was like on the battlefront. To the people, war became a storm that was unleashed. It became something that destroyed everything in its way. It dealt destruction to entire cities and killed thousands of people. Erich Remarque also indicates what war does to soldiers – it turns them into wild beasts. While fighting, men can turn into someone who is ready to kill everyone. No matter that they are human, what matters is that they are on the other side of the front. With war, soldiers stopped treating each other as human beings and saw each other only as enemies. Psychological and emotional pressure on young, twenty year old soldiers was enormous. They had to kill, which was something some of them have never done in their lives. Moreover, war killed many talented people: “…millions of young writers and young artists are dead.” That resulted in intellectual crisis in many countries that participated. Intellectuals believed that literature and art were close to death. Paul Valery points out that although culture, art and science existed, they all served war. War used all of the aesthetic resources people used to cure their souls and to be happy. With war, everything was gone. Almost all of the things people had were uncertain; people could no longer rely on anything. A most destructive effect on people’s lives was the ruin of almost everything normal in their lives. Nations were consumed with destroyed cities, loss of lives and of aesthetic pleasures. They were almost destroyed when hit by realization of what was destroyed. People did not know what was coming next and that was the most frightening experience. Paul Valery describes his generation as an unfortunate generation which saw great and frightful events that left great and lasting impressions on their lives. War touched every single person living at that time by taking something away from them. The one thing that war caused in each person was a destruction of their spirit. “Their spirit was cruelly stricken” War had done its cruelest impact – killed the spirit of whole nations. People were destroyed, devastated and did not know what to do next. One of the most important political consequences of total war was the democratization process. Clausewitz points to the role of the French revolution that changed the role of people and their views on war: “war …has become the business of people”. Clauswitz shows that as people are becoming more involved in the political process, they will also be more involved in its military aspects and therefore its wars, contributing to the totality of war. Democratization may be the result of total war, as people will play larger roles in making decisions, but it may also be that democratization may contribute to the spread of war to all aspects of human life, precisely because of higher involvement of people. Another impact of total war is that it forces people to redefine the concept of war and what it meant for them. Probably the strongest impact of total war on world politics was that people realized what total war was, a terrible force...