The Global First World War

This book deals with the multiple impacts of the First World War on societies
in South Europe, Latin America, Asia, and Africa, usually largely overlooked
by the historiography on the confict. Due to the lesser intensity of their
military involvement in the war (neutrals or latecomers), these countries or
regions were considered “peripheral” as a topic of research. However, in the
last two decades, the advances of global history recovered their importance
as active wartime actors and that of their experiences.
This book will reconstruct some experiences and representations of the
war that these societies built during and after the confict from the prism
of mediators between the war fought in the battlefelds and their homes, as
well as the local appropriations and resignifcations of their experiences and
testimonies.

Ana Paula Pires holds a PhD degree in History from NOVA University of
Lisbon. She is an assistant professor at the University of the Azores and
a researcher at HTC-CFE at NOVA University of Lisbon. Pires was a
postdoctoral student at Stanford University (2016–2019) and a Remarque
Fellow at the University of New York (2019). Her main topics of research
are the economic and social history of the First World War, particularly its
impact on Portugal and Africa. She is currently working on humanitarian
mobilisation in Portugal during the war. She is the author of A Grande
Guerra no Parlamento (2018), Portugal e a I Guerra Mundial, A República
e a Economia de Guerra (2011), and co-editor of Guerras del siglo XX,
Experiencias y representaciones en perspectiva global (2019) and There
came a time . . . Essays on the Great War in Africa (2018). She is Section
Editor for Portugal of 1914–1918-online. International Encyclopaedia of
the First World War.

Jan Schmidt holds a PhD degree in History of Japan from Ruhr University
Bochum and an MA degree in Medieval and Modern History as well as in
Japanese Studies from Heidelberg University. He is Associate Professor of
Japanese Studies (Modern History) in the Faculty of Arts of KU Leuven
and has worked as Lecturer in Modern History of Japan at Ruhr University
Bochum. He has published extensively on the First World War in Japan
and East Asia and became an editor for East Asia in the article section
of the 1914–1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World
War. He is the author of Nach dem Krieg ist vor dem Krieg. Medialisierte
Erfahrungen des Ersten Weltkriegs und Nachkriegsdiskurse in Japan (1914–
1919) (forthcoming, 2021) and co-editor of The East Asian Dimension of
the First World War: Global Entanglements and Japan, China and Korea,
1914–1919 (2020).

María Inés Tato holds a PhD degree in History from the University of Buenos
Aires (UBA). She is a researcher at the National Scientifc and Technical
Research Council – Argentina (CONICET) at the Institute of Argentine and
American History “Dr  Emilio Ravignani”, UBA/CONICET and founder
and coordinator of the Group of Historical War Studies (GEHiGue) at that
Institute. She is Professor at the UBA and the Master in War History – Superior
War College – Army Faculty – National Defense University (UNDEF). Her
current research area is the impact of First World War on Argentina and
the Falklands/Malvinas War. She is the author of La trinchera austral. La
sociedad argentina ante la Primera Guerra Mundial (2017) and co-editor of
Las grandes guerras del siglo XX y la comunidad española de Buenos Aires
(2015), La Gran Guerra en América Latina. Una historia conectada (2018),
Guerras del siglo XX. Experiencias y representaciones en perspectiva global
(2019) and La cuestión Malvinas en la Argentina del siglo XX. Una historia
social y cultural (2020).
Routledge Studies in First World War History
Series Editor: John Bourne
The University of Birmingham, UK

The First World War is a subject of perennial interest to historians and is often
regarded as a watershed event, marking the end of the nineteenth century
and the beginning of the ‘modern’ industrial world. The sheer scale of the
confict and massive loss of life means that it is constantly being assessed and
reassessed to examine its lasting military, political, sociological, industrial,
cultural and economic impact. Refecting the latest international scholarly
research, the Routledge Studies in First World War History series provides
a unique platform for the publication of monographs on all aspects of the
Great War. Whilst the main thrust of the series is on the military aspects of
the confict, other related areas (including cultural, visual, literary, political
and social) are also addressed. Books published are aimed primarily at a
post-graduate academic audience, furthering exciting recent interpretations
of the war, whilst still being accessible enough to appeal to a wider audience
of educated lay readers.

The Ottoman Army and the First World War

Mesut Uyar

Renegotiating First World War Memory

The British and American Legions, 1938–1946
Ashley Garber

Spain and Argentina in the First World War

Transnational Neutralities
Maximiliano Fuentes Codera

The Global First World War

African, East Asian, Latin American and Iberian Mediators
Edited by Ana Paula Pires, Jan Schmidt and María Inés Tato

For more information about this series, please visit: www.routledge.com/

history/series/WWI
The Global First World War
African, East Asian, Latin American
and Iberian Mediators

Edited by Ana Paula Pires,

Jan Schmidt and María Inés Tato
First published 2021
by Routledge
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Schmidt and María Inés Tato; individual chapters, the
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Contents

Editors and contributors ix

Acknowledgements xiii

Introduction: the global First World War and its mediators 1

ANA PAULA PIRES, MARÍA INÉS TATO, AND JAN SCHMIDT

1 Chinese workers on the Western Front and their

extraordinary artistic and personal journey 13
XU GUOQI

2 The impact of the First World War on Japan’s foreign

book market 31
MAJ HARTMANN

3 Mediating enmity: the propaganda war in Latin America,

1914–1919 49
STEFAN RINKE

4 Reporting the war in British Africa 73

ANNE SAMSON

5 Coverage of the First World War in regional Mexican press:

an analysis of El Informador in Guadalajara 92
GUILLEMETTE MARTIN

6 All about national survival: Chinese intellectuals’

understanding of war during the interwar period, 1914–1937 111
KWONG CHI MAN
viii Contents
7 Not a secondary experience: the First World War in
Japanese mass media, ministerial bureaucracy publications,
elementary schools, and department stores 135
JAN SCHMIDT

8 An Argentine reporter in the European trenches: Lieut. Col.

Emilio Kinkelin’s war chronicles 164
MARÍA INÉS TATO AND LUIS ESTEBAN DALLA FONTANA

9 Covert wars in Spain (1914–1918): belligerent agency and

local impacts 186
CAROLINA GARCÍA SANZ

10 Portuguese humanitarian eforts during the First World War 206

ANA PAULA PIRES AND RITA NUNES

Index 228
Editors and contributors

About the editors

Ana Paula Pires holds a PhD degree in History from NOVA University of
Lisbon. She is an assistant professor at the University of the Azores and a
researcher at HTC-CFE at NOVA University of Lisbon. Pires was a post-
doctoral student at Stanford University (2016–2019) and a Remarque
Fellow at the University of New York (2019). Her main topics of research
are the economic and social history of the First World War, particularly
its impact on Portugal and Africa. She is currently working on humani-
tarian mobilisation in Portugal during the war. She is the author of A
Grande Guerra no Parlamento  (2018), Portugal e a I Guerra Mundial.
A  República e a Economia de Guerra (2011), and co-editor of Guer-
ras del siglo XX. Experiencias y representaciones en perspectiva global
(2019) and There came a time . . . Essays on the Great War in Africa
(2018). She is Section Editor for Portugal of 1914–1918-Online. Interna-
tional Encyclopaedia of the First World War.
Jan Schmidt holds a PhD degree in History of Japan from Ruhr University
Bochum and an MA degree in Medieval and Modern History as well as
in Japanese Studies from Heidelberg University. He is Associate Profes-
sor of Japanese Studies (Modern History) in the Faculty of Arts of KU
Leuven and has earlier worked as Lecturer in Modern History of Japan
at Ruhr University Bochum. He has published extensively on the First
World War in Japan and East Asia and became an editor for East Asia in
the article section of the 1914–1918-online. International Encyclopedia
of the First World War. He is the author of Nach dem Krieg ist vor dem
Krieg. Medialisierte Erfahrungen des Ersten Weltkriegs und Nachkriegs-
diskurse in Japan (1914–1919) (forthcoming, 2021) and co-editor of The
East Asian Dimension of the First World War: Global Entanglements
and Japan, China and Korea, 1914–1919 (2020).
María Inés Tato holds a PhD degree in History from the University of
Buenos Aires (UBA). She is a researcher at the National Scientifc and
x Editors and contributors
Technical Research Council – Argentina (CONICET) at the Institute of
Argentine and American History “Dr  Emilio Ravignani”, UBA/CONI-
CET. She is founder and coordinator of the Group of Historical War
Studies (GEHiGue) at that institute. She is Professor at the UBA and the
Master in War History at the Superior War College of the Army Faculty –
National Defense University (UNDEF). Her current research area is the
impact of the First World War on Argentina and the Falklands/Malvinas
War. She is the author of La trinchera austral. La sociedad argentina ante
la Primera Guerra Mundial (2017) and co-editor of Las grandes guerras
del siglo XX y la comunidad española de Buenos Aires (2015), La Gran
Guerra en América Latina. Una historia conectada (2018), Guerras del
siglo XX. Experiencias y representaciones en perspectiva global (2019),
and La cuestión Malvinas en la Argentina del siglo XX. Una historia
social y cultural (2020).

About the contributors

Luis Esteban DALLA FONTANA holds a master’s degree in War History from
the Superior War College – Army Faculty – National Defense University
(UNDEF). He is currently a PhD candidate in History at the Torcuato Di
Tella University (UTDT). He is ex-Dean of the Army Faculty, Director of
the Master in War History at the Superior War College and Professor at
this institution. He co-edited Guerras del siglo XX. Experiencias y repre-
sentaciones en perspectiva global (2019) and La cuestión Malvinas en la
Argentina del siglo XX. Una historia social y cultural (2020). His line of
research focuses on the impact of the First World War on the Argentine
army and the Falklands/Malvinas War.
Carolina GARCÍA SANZ  holds a PhD degree in Contemporary History from
the University of Seville (US) and graduated with honours in BA History.
She is a professor at this university. She participates in a full range of com-
petitive pre- and postdoctoral research programmes with international
fellowships in the United Kingdom, France, and Italy. She is the section
editor of the collaborative project 1914–1918-online. International Ency-
clopedia of the First World War. Some of her publications include Shap-
ing Neutrality Throughout the First World War (co-editor, 2015) and La
Primera Guerra Mundial en el Estrecho de Gibraltar (2011). Her main
feld of specialisation is International History connected with neutrality
issues during the First World War. Currently, she is principal researcher
of a research project titled “Discourses and Representations of Ethnicity:
Politics, Identity and Confict During the XXth Century”.
Maj HARTMANN obtained her PhD in Japanese Studies from KU Leuven
in 2020. She holds a master’s degree in East Asian Studies from Ruhr-
University Bochum including a one-year research stay at Keiō University
 Editors and contributors xi
and a bachelor’s degree in Television Production from Southampton
Solent University. Her research interests are primarily related to transna-
tional history, media history, and the history of intellectual cooperation.
Funded by the Research Foundation Flanders (FWO), her PhD research
at KU Leuven focused on the role of Japanese actors in the globalisation
of intellectual property rights. In 2017, she was a visiting researcher to
Keiō University, and from 2018 to 2019 she spent one year as a visiting
researcher at Sophia University in Tōkyō.
KWONG Chi Man holds PhD and MPhil degrees from the University of Cam-
bridge and is Associate Professor at the Hong Kong Baptist University.
His research focuses on Modern Military History, Modern Chinese and
East Asian History, and British Military presence in Hong Kong. His
publications include State for the People or State for War? The Intel-
lectual Ofcers, Military Science and Military Change Before the Second
Sino-Japanese War (2017) and War and Geopolitics in Interwar Man-
churia: Zhang Zuolin and the Fengtian Clique During the Northern
Expedition (2017).
Guillemette MARTIN holds a PhD degree in Contemporary History from the
Institut des Hautes Études de l’Amérique latine (IHEAL – Université Sor-
bonne Nouvelle-Paris 3, 2013). After completing postdoctoral fellow-
ship at the Institute of Historical Research of the National Autonomous
University of Mexico (2013–2015), she is currently working as a full-
time research professor in the History Department at the Ibero-American
University in Mexico City, where she leads the research programme on
Global History. Since 2014, she is also a member of Mexico’s National
System of Researchers (SNI-CONACYT). Her primary research focuses
on a comparative analysis of local “American” identities (in Mexico,
Peru, and Canada) at the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries
and the local impacts of the First World War. She is a co-editor for La
Gran Guerra en América Latina. Una historia conectada (2018).
Rita NUNES is a PhD candidate at the NOVA University of Lisbon. Her
research interests focus on sports history, Olympics, Olympic education,
sports and war, and the Inter-Allied Games. Her publications include Os
6 de Estocolmo. A Primeira Participação Portuguesa nos Jogos Olímpi-
cos 1912 (2013). She is the Research and Project Department Director of
the Olympic Committee of Portugal, where she coordinates three interna-
tional projects funded by ERASMUS+ Sport and ERASMUS+ Youth. She
is responsible for the Olympic Historical Archive Project, the Research
Center, the Olympic Educational Program, and the organisation of the
Olympic Day and Olympic Week celebrations.
Stefan RINKE is Professor and Chair of the Department of History at the
Institute of Latin American Studies and the Friedrich-Meinecke-Institute
xii Editors and contributors
at Freie Universität Berlin. He was awarded the Premio Alzate by the
Mexican Academy of Sciences and an Einstein Research Fellowship from
the Einstein Foundation in Berlin. His research interests are focused
on the building of the world during the age of discovery, Latin Ameri-
can independence in the Atlantic context, Latin America and the First
World War, and cultural globalisation in the twentieth century. He is
the author, among other books, of Conquistadoren und Azteken. Cortés
und die Eroberung Mexikos (2019), Latin America and the First World
War (2017), and Historia de Latinoamérica. Desde las primeras culturas
hasta el presente (2015).
Anne SAMSON holds a PhD degree from Royal Holloway, University of Lon-
don. She is an independent historian specialising in British and South
African relations post-1910 and coordinator of the Great War in Africa
Association, an international online community of all interested in the
campaigns in Africa during the Great War. Her recent work has been on
the Great War in East, Central, and Southern Africa on which she has
published World War 1: The Forgotten Confict of the European Pow-
ers (2012). Her most recent book is a biography – Kitchener: the man not
the myth (2020) exploring why he was reluctant to involve Africa in the
1914–1918 war.
XU Guoqi received his PhD degree in History from Harvard University and
is Chair Professor at the University of Hong Kong. As a leading scholar of
modern China and international history, his research has always focused
on signifcant but ignored issues around China’s internationalisation and
search for new national identity and place in the world system. His books
published in English include Asia and the Great War: A Shared History
(2017); Chinese and Americans: A Shared History (2014); Strangers on
the Western Front: Chinese Workers in the Great War (2011); China and
the Great War: China’s Pursuit of a New National Identity and Inter-
nationalization (2011); and Olympic Dreams: China and Sports, 1895–
2008 (2008). He also publishes widely in Chinese.
Acknowledgements

This book originates from fruitful discussions held during the centenary of
the First World War in three workshops organised in Buenos Aires, Seville,
and Leuven, between 2017 and 2018. It benefts from the academic connec-
tions stimulated by 1914 online. International Encyclopaedia of the First
World War.
The book would not have been possible without the help of our editors
from Routledge, in particular Robert Langham, who embraced this project
with enthusiasm, right from the moment when it was only a proposal, and
Max Novick, who successfully succeeded him. Our sincere thanks are due,
also, to Anne Samson for her commitment to the volume; Anne not only
proofread all the papers but added, too, valuable critical comments and
suggestions. In compiling the index, Anne was assisted by PhD students of
history, politics and cultural sociology within Japanese Studies at the KU
Leuven Faculty of Arts: Aurel Baele, Charlotte Théa Bekkers, Stevie Poppe,
and Jorinde Wels, and Maj Hartmann, Post-doctoral researcher. Our grati-
tude to them as well.
The editors would especially like to thank the authors for their support,
patience, and efort. Without their time, knowledge, and generosity, this
volume would not have been possible.
Lisbon, Buenos Aires, and Leuven,
September 2020
Introduction
The global First World War
and its mediators
Ana Paula Pires, María Inés Tato,
and Jan Schmidt

“ ‘What do you paint, when you paint on a wall?’ ‘I paint what I see,’ said
[Diego] Rivera”.1 In November 1934, when the Museo del Palacio de Bellas
Artes opened in Mexico City, its masterpiece – “Man, Controller of the
Universe” – was a mural painted by Rivera. This artwork is not, however,
only a composition, but an event that comprises mediations,2 representing
the brutalities and destructive forces of the First World War: poison gas,
machine guns, and warplanes. Rivera’s fresco gave voice to the human expe-
rience of trauma. He was 28 years old and lived in Paris, when, in 1914, the
confict erupted in Europe. Through this painting, the Mexican artist was
able to provide an ingenious starting point for refection on how meaning,
and the realities of war are shaped, sustained, and transferred through time.
Rivera’s piece was able not only to establish a link between memory and
representation but also to show how the social representations of confict
are, more than reproductions, constructions, capable of creating a trans-
formative connection – a mediation – between the viewer and the world.3
Journalists, humanitarians, intellectuals, workers, military and diplo-
matic staf, publishers, and schoolteachers were all, when the war began,
connected through several international networks. This book embodies a
frst attempt to capture the essence of their role as mediators in societies
from Iberia, Latin America, Asia, and Africa, usually largely overlooked by
the historiography on the confict. The concept of mediation and the role of
mediators are central to capture these global interactions, as well as to pro-
vide a collective narrative, in a time marked by rupture and commonality
of experience. Mediations are, thus, analysed as sites of representation and
transformation of transnational cultural interactions which occurred during
the First World War. They allow an analysis more focused on international-
ism and, as Mark Mazower suggested, to emphasise the continuities in inter-
national relations from the late nineteenth century into the mid-twentieth.4
The book’s methodological approach fts what historian Jay Winter has
classifed as a way of understanding the First World War, “in more than
European terms and to see the confict as trans-European, transatlantic and
beyond”.5 Until recently, the study of the First World War was focused on
the major belligerents, especially Western European. As a result, countries
2 Ana Paula Pires et al.
with perceived lesser involvement in the confict or those that remained
neutral were almost disregarded. In the last decades, along with the devel-
opment and popularisation of global history, the horizons of research
expanded.6 The so-called peripheries of war began to gain prominence, as
well as their connections and exchanges with the belligerents. Thus, it began
to be noticed that these societies were also deeply afected by the totalising
tendencies of the war at diferent levels and built intense experiences and
representations of it. The book therefore contributes to the decentralisation
and de-Europeanisation of the confict, focusing on countries and regions at
the “fringes” of the narrative that the major belligerents forged.
The First World War introduced brutality and human cruelty at an unprece-
dented level: it was the frst among industrialised global powers, introducing
violence from a distance which led to dehumanised encounters engulfng
soldiers and civilians alike; horror and despair, daunted by fear, uncertainty,
and the carnage provoked by modern warfare technologies transforming
battlefelds into killing felds. However, due to the reduced intensity of their
military involvement in the war (neutrals or latecomers), these countries or
regions were considered “peripheral” as a topic of research. Despite this,
over the last two decades they have recovered their importance as wartime
participants, situated in relation to objects, materials, and landscapes.7
Following the concept developed by François Debrix, the book fore-
grounds mediation in international/cultural relations, as a “method that
makes social meanings possible”.8 However, as the chapters in this book
argue, these instruments of meaning, which took place across various social
contexts and cultural practices, were far from representing neutral processes
or actions. “Mediations” and “mediators” see and understand the impact9
from Argentina, Portugal, Spain, Mexico, South Africa, Japan, and China.
Using this methodological approach, the authors analyse the interactions
between domestic and military events, demonstrating their implications in
governmental, political, and economic orientations in times of war and the
immediate aftermath of peace.
One of the main diferences that characterise modern wars, especially
from the mid-nineteenth century, concerns the blurring, or elimination, of
boundaries between military and civilian identities. This is already discussed
in great length for what was often claimed to be the major belligerents, but
not in a coherent form for the regions discussed here. As Olivier Compag-
non and Pierre Purseigle have recently stated, being “neutral” or militarily
involved to a much lesser extent than the central warring nations did not
mean that there was no impact in other ways. In fact, they distinguished
between “belligerency” and “belligerence” (social experience of war)
and concluded that neutrals and other “peripheral” countries  – as those
addressed in this book – can be belligerent in this last sense.10
The First World War provoked a massive movement of people and cre-
ated extended “contact zones”, exposing millions of combatants and non-
combatants to new ideas, practices, and technologies, creating new spaces
 Introduction 3
of encounter between people and cultures. In a paper read before the Socio-
logical Society, on 30 November 1915, Oxford Professor Alfred Zimmern
stated that

The war is being waged about ideas, and ideas will determine the set-
tlement at its close. Yet those ideas, and the words in which they are
embodied for current discussion, are often vague, confused and even
contradictory: so that diferent words are used to express the same mean-
ing, and the same word used to express several diferent meanings.11

Zimmern’s thoughts pointed to the fact that the modern world was inter-
national – a reality that he impersonated himself, being a British descendant
from German-Jewish refugees. More than ever, change was an inevitable
part of the human condition, making it impossible to debate the Great War’s
“mediations” and “mediators” without referring to the combined efects
of the mobility of people, goods, and ideas from a global transcultural
perspective.
In 1913, ffteen-year-old Bertolt Brecht in his famous “The Balkan War” –
a parable in which he was able to develop a non-Western-centric narrative –
had already questioned the supremacy of the West12 and its Eurocentric
paradigm in the interconnected society that characterised the Belle Époque.
Technology had accelerated the pace of life. Communications (terrestrial
and “voice”) had acquired a new dimension, becoming, throughout the sec-
ond half of the nineteenth century, the main instrument in the construction
of an internationalisation that involved and unleashed a wave of global and
general mutations, prompted by the same technological leap that produced
the Industrial Revolution (or rather, the two Industrial Revolutions).13 The
economic dynamism that marked these years thus reinforced the notion
of mobility, while steam and telegraph increasingly shortened the distance
between London and Buenos Aires or Beijing and the United States of Amer-
ica. As learned Europeans and educated Japanese could easily move between
Paris and London, so factory workers and feld labourers could also leave
Europe’s periphery and ofer their skills at the factories and industrial cen-
tres of the Old and New Worlds, making it possible for countries such as
France to balance their inescapable demographic inferiority. In other words,
a single global economy emerged, supported by ever-increasing intercon-
nected networks of people, capital, and goods. The growing and continuous
interdependence between the Western developed countries and the rest of
the world made visible this reality. The signing of international conventions
regulating telegraphic and postal services and also the timetables and the
distribution of trains illustrate these connections.
Economic conjecture had taken the upper hand and increased competition
between the great European powers. This process would inevitably escalate
into political rivalry, locally and at an international level. Countries such as
Germany and Great Britain fercely set out to conquer new markets, to sell
4 Ana Paula Pires et al.
and buy raw materials and manufactured products. It was this “proximity”
that enabled the governments of France and Britain to hire, between 1914
and 1918, 140,000 illiterate Chinese peasants to fght Germany in numer-
ous theatres including Europe and Africa, leading to the frst large-scale
encounter of Eastern and Western civilisations at the beginning of the twen-
tieth century.14 The journey of these men, with little understanding of inter-
national relations and who rarely had ventured beyond their village borders,
was a crucial contribution not only to the Allied war efort but mainly to
a better understanding of China and the West, as Xu Guoqi explains in
Chapter  1. Marginalised and largely forgotten participants, with no clear
ideas about China or the world, these peasants worked with American, Brit-
ish, and French military. They ended up giving shape to and mediating the
construction of a growing rapprochement between China and the West, a
clear reminder of the country’s strategic relevance in international political
afairs of the early 1910s, allowing the West to, ultimately, develop a new
perception of China in the world.15 These perceptions of the other and the
self, mostly new and strange, were expressed in the songs that men sang
and in their involvement with trench art, both universal First World War
languages. As Xu’s chapter stresses, they refected Chinese communion with
the rest of the combatants, mirroring a cross-border fow and fusion of ideas
and cultures, which contributed to making the war a shared transnational
journey.
From 1890 all European powers, the United States of America, and Japan
shared the same international currency base: the gold standard, which even-
tually determined that transactions were calculated in currencies of virtu-
ally unchangeable value. The internationalisation of the economy was not a
novel phenomenon but had acquired a diferent rhythm and intensity. The
network of transactions of goods and people had spread, bringing closer
to the centre of the world-economy remote and peripheral places; world
merchant navigation increased, between 1840 and 1870, from million 10
to 16 million tons; and the railways extended, from 200,000 kilometres in
1870, to almost one million kilometres shortly before the First World War.16
The aforementioned serves to emphasise the confdence with which,
despite the growing rush to arms, it was considered that the internationali-
sation of the economy – or the strengthening of commercial and fnancial
relations – would by itself prevent the outbreak of any confict involving the
great European powers. In contrast, there was a frm conviction that, should
a confict occur, it would, necessarily, be short-lived. The global book trade
had been expanding since the beginning of the twentieth century, beneft-
ting from the development and expansion of telegraph, telephone, and
railroad networks; like all businesses the pursuit of proft was the driving
force behind these publishing entrepreneurs.17 Printed texts started to have
a material value in Japan during the early Tokugawa period (1603–1868).
Still, it was with the Meiji period (1868–1912) that a new fervour for West-
ern writing began. Translations of foreign books, namely those produced in
 Introduction 5
Europe and the United States of America, paved the way for the develop-
ment of a mass publishing and translating industry, placing publishers at
the centre of the Meiji cultural, political, and literary movements.18 Maj
Hartmann’s chapter refects on the impact of the outbreak of the First World
War on this industry, by analysing publishers and book translations as infu-
ential mediators in shaping perceptions of the West in Japan during the war
years. The Japanese state, which was promoting modernising reformism,
saw international books as sources of knowledge, civilisation, and progress.
As Hartmann’s chapter emphasises, the Great War threatened this process
by increasing paper prices and limiting international book trade. However,
publishing entrepreneurs in Japan integrated local and global networks suc-
cessfully; their infuence on the Japanese state bureaucracy allowed, from
1914, the importation of books from Germany too.
The expansion of the telegraph represented another landmark in the
development of the press, as news was quickly transformed into commodi-
ties; with local, national, and world news almost immediately available any-
where, knowledge-gaps closed.19 It was through the press that belligerent
and neutral countries gained consciousness of the outbreak of the war. The
press contributed to shaping a “public sphere”, whose control, by govern-
ments and the military authorities, over the fow of information through
censorship and propaganda, increased after the outbreak of the hostilities.20
This “mediatisation” of the war, namely its coverage, which was refected in
the increasing number of news reports between 1914 and 1918, impacted
the understanding of the confict on two levels. In the frst place, thousands
of authors (re)wrote the news reported by war correspondents and dissemi-
nated them in particular regions or countries, serving as mediators between
the war and the local audiences. In the second place, the construction of
domestic discourse(s) indelibly marked the way aspects of the confict were
depicted and incorporated into private and public discourse(s), enabling
citizens at the home fronts and in neutral countries to construct an under-
standing of the war.
As Stefan Rinke’s chapter shows, Latin America had the largest num-
ber of the world’s neutral countries, and the news feeding magazines and
newspapers, besides being fltered, was also mediated for propaganda pur-
poses by the French, British, and Italian governments. This interest in the
European war could easily be explained by the fact that, for instance, in
the case of Argentina, 30 per cent of the country’s population consisted of
European immigrants, a number that in the capital, Buenos Aires, reached
49 per cent.21 Of most signifcant impact on Latin America, as a whole,
was the invasion of Belgium and the destruction of the country’s cultural
heritage, the Library of Leuven and the Reims Cathedral having the most
images mediated by the press.
The press was able to operate and reach audiences in both urban and
rural areas in British Africa during the First World War as Anne Samson’s
chapter makes clear. Those who were literate in the administrative language
6 Ana Paula Pires et al.
and were able to read and translate were called upon to disseminate the
news. They were the mediating agents between their own people and the
metropole. This “empowering ritual” placed a responsibility on them for
making sense of the war across diferent social contexts. The creation of
these cultural diferences led to uprisings across the African continent.
These transnational cultural interactions are also interesting when consid-
ered alongside the political discourse in newspapers published in the United
Kingdom; namely justifcation for the country involving Africa in the war
and the denunciation of German atrocities across the continent and contra-
vening the Hague Convention.
Newspapers published in small and peripheral towns, due to newswire
services were able to access and publish international news almost at the
same time as capital cities; this was an almost unprecedented level of inter-
connectedness,22 shaped by war “contact zones”. Using images and descrip-
tions of industrial destruction, mediators brought a vision of ideas, people,
and institutions to the home front from the battlefelds.23 They allowed, as
Guillemette Martin has analysed in her chapter, to reconstruct social experi-
ences and representations of the war from the prism of local appropriation
and resignifcation. It emphasises the role that mediators played between the
battlefelds and their homes and the local appropriation and resignifcation
of the experiences and testimonies of these actors. The news published by El
Informador, a local newspaper from Guadalajara, claimed it was essential
for Mexico to maintain a positive relationship with the United States of
America during the war, explaining that this was crucial for the develop-
ment of the country’s economy. In several articles, published from 1917,
journalists and news editors denounced Germany’s eforts to exacerbate the
relationship between Mexico and its northern neighbour. In contrast, jour-
nalists like Pedro Sánchez – a pseudonym – took a strong position in favour
of the Entente Cordiale. Martin’s chapter shows, through propaganda
activities, the connections between belligerents and neutrals. It questions
the traditional historiographical division between neutrals and belligerents,
especially after the entry of the United States of America into the war. Con-
tributing to an ongoing debate initiated by Maartje Abbenhuis,24 Martin
refects on neutral countries as global war actors, namely through their
involvement in propaganda activities. The impact of the war on these
“peripheries”, beyond the more obvious realm of the economy in more
subtle ways, involved the development of social and political reform, self-
representation, and national identity. Reporters paved the way for a more
dynamic analysis of their respective roles in wartime, most of all because
“it was not possible to be a ‘spectator’ in the ‘drama’ of this world war”.25
The vivid descriptions of the First World War in newspapers relied on war
correspondents’ fertile imaginations; the reporters, in their vast majority,
presenting mythologised versions of the confict, relying on never-performed
acts of heroism, to create interest in their home countries’ audiences.26 Being,
generally, excluded from the frontline as early as August 1914, to maintain
 Introduction 7
secrecy around the military operations, reporters were eager for scoops. In
the search for compelling stories, they had to overcome the constraints cre-
ated by censorship, sometimes risking their own lives.27
However, a considerable number of the early descriptions of the war in
Europe were not written by journalists, but by intellectuals, scientists, stu-
dents, or university professors who had travelled to Europe for a variety of
reasons between 1914 and 1918. In some cases, they were already there28
when the war started and – intentionally or unwittingly – became essential
observers of the political and economic changes that the war brought, pub-
lishing diaries and memoirs of the accounts they witnessed.
In other cases, this mediation was undertaken by individuals who were
sent abroad or were commissioned at home by their government bureau-
cracies or by the military to research the confict. It sometimes led to the
publication of infuential reports in their home countries. This was the case
of the Chinese civilian and military intellectuals examined by Kwong Chi
Man. They observed the myriad efects of the war on various societies and
extracted several lessons to help strengthen China’s international position
during and after the war. These learnings involved not only tactical and
technical aspects but also a new relationship between state and society. As
Kwong demonstrates, the concept of total war led to the conviction of the
need for active state intervention and national mobilisation to wage a future
war, conceived in radical racial terms.
As Jan Schmidt’s chapter shows, Japanese public intellectuals, academics,
politicians, and bureaucrats in opinion magazines throughout the war moved
from discussing the more immediate foreign policy and military dimensions
to pose deliberate and reaching questions. They considered the future of
civilisation, international and regional orders, societal changes after years
of “home front” mobilisation, science, technology, the economy, education,
and gender relations, to name a few. In addition, the war was brought to
schools and universities by teachers and academics eager to explain what it
meant to Japan and the wider world. The Ministry of Education, in turn,
set up an entire research unit which published major reports and widely dis-
tributed photo albums alongside organising photo exhibitions. At the same
time, elite consumers were introduced to the war through photo exhibitions
and eyewitness accounts in department stores and their journals.
For his part, Argentine Lieutenant Colonel Emilio Kinkelin, analysed
by María Inés Tato and Luis Esteban Dalla Fontana, was in Europe when
the war broke out. From the beginning of the confict, he became a war
correspondent for the Buenos Aires newspaper La Nación. Witnessing the
war “frst-hand”, he became a cultural mediator between Argentine society
and Europe. The distinctive profle of his chronicles derives from his being
one of the few ofcers who accompanied the German army to the frontline
and his sympathy for the German Reich. As the authors stress, due to a
lack of knowledge of the language, the infuence of German propaganda in
Argentina was limited to lawyers, doctors, and the military. The German
8 Ana Paula Pires et al.
government’s eforts led to the launching of a newspaper in Spanish, La
Unión, which aimed to reach a broader audience.29 It did not achieve that
purpose. Nevertheless, the conservative newspaper La Nación, where Kin-
kelin published his chronicles, had a national scope. Its daily circulation
reached 110,000 copies, placing it second as the most read newspaper in
Argentina. As a result, this military ofcer’s impressions disseminated to a
vast audience.
These frst-hand testimonies, and the mediations they embodied, help
us have a better understanding not only of the global world where the
1914–1918 confict erupted but, most of all, how neutrality was perceived
while simultaneously asserting neutrals as active warring agents, in public
and the polity. Consular agents and intellectuals discussed, at length, the
implications of “being neutral”, namely the real meaning and fexibility
inherent in making such a declaration. As Carolina García Sanz discusses
in her chapter, foreign consular agents in Spain understood from the start
how their national interests could transform a neutral territory into a hot-
spot. Spain considered the outbreak of the confict in 1914 as an opportu-
nity to regain lost international and European infuence, economically and
politically, grasping the essence and modernisation of the Spanish nation.30
Trade agents, relying on a foreign consular network of more than a hun-
dred vice-consulates, had, as García Sanz emphasises, privileged observa-
tion posts which allowed them to extend their countries’ (United Kingdom,
Germany, France) economic infuence in Spain. On occasion, they even
engineered sabotage plots. Diferent intelligence organisations operating in
Spanish territory played a central role in articulating the country’s relations
with the major European powers, efectively questioning its strict policy
of neutrality, thereby contributing to the discourse of Spain being a vital
nation.31
The political and diplomatic efects of the outbreak of the First World
War in Spain must be considered, including its impact on the Iberian Pen-
insula as a whole. Neutral and non-belligerent societies had to legitimatise
themselves within total war; they also had to refect on the role played by
their respective nations and build an Iberian narrative capable of sustain-
ing it. In this matter, Spanish neutrality and Portuguese non-belligerency,
until 1916, should be analysed as specifc foreign policies and within the
public debate of “decadence vs regeneration”, present in both countries
since the last decade of the nineteenth century.32 The Portuguese Republic
had not yet completed its fourth year when, on 28 June  1914, the heir
to the Austro-Hungarian throne and his wife were assassinated in Sara-
jevo. Portugal assumed itself a Western European but imperial power.
The symbiosis between metropole and colonies contribute during the war
years to strengthen the narrative of an indissoluble Portuguese overseas
colonial empire. It led to a “global” country with emigrant communi-
ties spreading from Latin America to Asia. Members of those (alleged)
“peripheral” societies were, as Ana Paula Pires and Rita Nunes’ chapter
 Introduction 9
discloses, active in supporting Portugal’s war efort, fundraising for sol-
diers, orphans, and war invalids. Such mediations show that the motiva-
tion to assist was a social and collective behaviour that the outbreak of
the First World War strengthened and that in the humanitarian feld mass
death and industrial destruction were able to foster extensive forms of
interconnectedness.
The case studies gathered in this book shed light on the global charac-
ter of the First World War. They show that despite limited or non-military
involvement in the confict, societies and states in the Iberian Peninsula,
Asia, America, and Africa experienced diverse impact. The focus on media-
tors allows us to observe the dynamic connections between belligerent
Europe and the “peripheries” of the war, the decoding and translation of
the war through local cultural prisms. Workers, publishers, intellectuals,
bureaucrats, correspondents, journalists, military ofcers, diplomats, intel-
ligence agents, and humanitarians from these various countries and regions
experienced the Great War and transferred representations of it, locally
appropriated and reconceptualised. In sum, this book contributes to a more
complex understanding of the Great War, incorporating perspectives and
experiences from its margins.

Notes
1 EB White, “I paint what I see” in New Yorker, 20 May 1933.
2 Jonathan Hay, “Interventions: The Mediating Work of Art” in Art Bulletin,
September 2007, p. 435.
3 Dena Elisabeth Eber and Arthur G Neal, Memory and Representation: Con-
structed Truths and Competing Realities (Bowling Green: Bowling Green State
University Popular Press, 2001).
4 Mark Mazower, Governing the World: The History of an Idea (London: Allen
Lane, 2012).
5 Jay Winter, “General Introduction” in The Cambridge History of the First World
War, vol. 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014), pp. 1–10.
6 Michael S. Neiberg, Fighting the Great War: A  Global History (Cambridge:
Harvard University Press, 2005); Jay Winter (ed.), The Cambridge History of
the First World War, vol. I (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014)
“Global War”; Robert Gerwarth and Erez Manela, “The Great War as a Global
War: Imperial Confict and the Reconfguration of World Order, 1911–1923” in
Diplomatic History, vol. 38, no. 4, 2014; Oliver Janz, “Einführung: Der Erste
Weltkrieg in globaler Perspektive” in Geschichte und Gesellschaft, vol. 40, no.
2, 2014; Maximilian Lakitsch; Susanne Reitmair-Juárez and Katja Seidel (eds.),
Bellicose Entanglements. 1914: The Great War as a Global War (Zurich: Lit
Verlag, 2015).
7 Sasha Handley; Rohan McWilliam and Lucy Noakes, “Introduction. Towards
New Social and Cultural Histories” in Sasha Handley; Rohan McWilliam and
Lucy Noakes (coords.), New Directions in Social and Cultural History (London/
New York: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2018), p. 13.
8 François Debrix and Cynthia Weber (eds.), Rituals of Mediation. International
Politics and Social Meaning (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2003),
p. vii.
10 Ana Paula Pires et al.
9 Dina Gusejnova, “Introduction” in Dina Gusejnova (ed.), Cosmopolitanism in
Confict. Imperial Encounters From the Seven Years War to the Cold War (Lon-
don: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018), p. 3.
10 Olivier Compagnon and Pierre Purseigle, “Geographies of Mobilization and
Territories of Belligerence During the First World War” in Annales HSS (English
Edition), vol. 71, no. 1, 2017.
11 Alfred E. Zimmern, “Nationality and Government” in Nationality and Govern-
ment with Other War-Time Essays (London: Chatto & Windus, 1918), p. 32.
12 Ronald Hayman, Brecht. A Biography (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1983),
p. 3.
13 Jürgen Osterhammel, The Transformation of the World: A Global History of the
Nineteenth Century (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2014).
14 Xu Guoqi, Strangers on the Western Front: Chinese Workers in the Great War
(Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2011), p. 1.
15 Ibid., p. 4.
16 Richard Evans, The Pursuit of Power: Europe, 1815–1914 (London: Allen Lane,
2016).
17 Vincent Trott, Publishers, Readers and the Great War: Literature and Memory
Since 1918 (New York: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2017), p. 17.
18 See in particular: Giles Richter, “Marketing the Word: Publishing Entrepreneurs
in Meiji Japan, 1870–1912” (PhD Dissertation, Columbia University, New
York, 1999).
19 Menahem Blondheim, “Telegraph: Invention and Impact” in Tim P. Vos and
Folker Hanusch (eds.), The International Encyclopedia of Journalism Studies
(London: John Wiley & Sons, 2019), p. 1.
20 Troy RE Paddock, “Introduction” in Troy RE Paddock (ed.), World War I and
Propaganda (Leiden/Boston: Brill, 2014), p. 7.
21 María Inés Tato, “Luring Neutrals. Allied and German Propaganda in Argentina
During the First World War” in Troy RE Paddock (ed.), World War I and Propa-
ganda (Leiden/Boston, Brill, 2014), p. 322.
22 Iriye Akira, Global Community. The Role of International Organizations in the
Making of the Contemporary World (Berkeley: University of California Press,
2002), p. viii.
23 Sebastian Conrad, What Is Global History? (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press, 2016), p. 9.
24 Maartje Abbenhuis, The Art of Staying Neutral: The Netherlands in the First
World War, 1914–1918 (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2006).
25 Stefan Rinke, Latin America in the First World War (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2017), p. 3.
26 Tim Luckhurst, “War Correspondents” in Ute Daniel; Peter Gatrell; Oli-
ver Janz; Heather Jones; Jennifer Keene; Alan Kramer and Bill Nasson (eds.),
1914–1918-online, International Encyclopedia of the First World War (Berlin:
Freie University, 2016).
27 Ibid.
28 See for instance the case of the American Alain Locke. Jefrey C Stewart, The
New Negro: The Life of Alain Locke (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018).
29 María Inés Tato, “Fighting for a Lost Cause? The Germanophile Newspaper
La Unión in Neutral Argentina, 1914–1918” in War in History, vol. 25, no. 4,
2018.
30 Ana Paula Pires, “The Iberian Peninsula and the First World War: Between
Neutrality and Non-Belligerency (1914–1916)” in War in History, 2020, p. 2.
See also, Maximiliano Fuentes Codera, “Ideas of Europe in Neutral Spain
(1914–1918)” in Jan Vermeiren and Matthew D’Auria (eds.), Visions and Ideas
of Europe During the First World War (London/New York: Routledge, 2019),
 Introduction 11
p. 182; José Álvarez Junco, “The Debate Over the Nation” in Nigel Townson
(ed.), Is Spain Diferent? A Comparative Look at the 19th and 20th Centuries
(Brighton: Sussex Academic Press, 2015), pp. 18–41.
31 See in particular, Carolina García Sanz, La Primera Guerra Mundial en el Estre-
cho de Gibraltar. Economía, política y relaciones internacionales (Madrid:
Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científcas/University of Seville, 2011);
Fernando García Sanz, España en la Gran Guerra. Espías, diplomáticos y traf-
cantes (Barcelona: Galaxia Gutenberg, 2014).
32 Pires, “The Iberian Peninsula and the First World War”, p. 1.

References
Abbenhuis, Maartje, The Art of Staying Neutral: The Netherlands in the First World
War, 1914–1918 (Amsterdam, the Netherlands: Amsterdam University Press,
2006).
Álvarez Junco, José, “The Debate Over the Nation” in Nigel Townson (ed.), Is Spain
Diferent? A Comparative Look at the 19th and 20th Centuries (Brighton: Sussex
Academic Press, 2015).
Akira, Iriye, Global Community. The Role of International Organizations in the
Making of the Contemporary World (Berkeley: University of California Press,
2002).
Blondheim, David S, “Menahem, Telegraph: Invention and Impact” in Vos, Tim P
and Hanusch, Folker (eds.), The International Encyclopedia of Journalism Studies
(London: John Wiley & Sons, 2019).
Compagnon, Olivier and Purseigle, Pierre, “Geographies of Mobilization and Ter-
ritories of Belligerence During the First World War” in Annales HSS, vol. 71, no.
1, 2017.
Conrad, Sebastian, What Is Global History? (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press, 2016).
Debrix, François and Weber, Cynthia (eds.), Rituals of Mediation. International
Politics and Social Meaning (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2003).
Eber, Dena Elisabeth and Neal, Arthur G, Memory and Representation: Constructed
Truths and Competing Realities (Bowling Green: Bowling Green State University
Popular Press, 2001).
Evans, Richard, The Pursuit of Power: Europe, 1815–1914 (London: Allen Lane,
2016).
Fuentes Codera, Maximiliano, “Ideas of Europe in Neutral Spain (1914–1918)” in
Vermeiren, Jan and D’Auria, Matthew (eds.), Visions and Ideas of Europe During
the First World War (London/New York: Routledge, 2019).
García Sanz, Carolina, La Primera Guerra Mundial em el Estrecho de Gibraltar.
Economía, política y relaciones internacionales (Madrid: Consejo Superior de
Investigaciones Científcas/University of Seville, 2011).
García Sanz, Fernando, España em la Gran Guerra. Espías, diplomáticos y traf-
cantes (Barcelona: Galaxia Gutenberg, 2014).
Gerwarth, Robert and Manela, Erez, “The Great War as a Global War: Imperial
Confict and the Reconfguration of World Order, 1911–1923” in Diplomatic His-
tory, vol. 38, no. 4, 2014.
Gusejnova, Dina, “Introduction” in Gusejnova, Dina (ed.), Cosmopolitanism in
Confict. Imperial Encounters from the Seven Years War to the Cold War (Lon-
don: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018).
12 Ana Paula Pires et al.
Handley, Sasha; McWilliam, Rohan and Noakes, Lucy, “Introduction. Towards
New Social and Cultural Histories” in Handley, Sasha; McWilliam, Rohan and
Noakes, Lucy (coords.), New Directions in Social and Cultural History (London/
New York: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2018).
Hay, Jonathan, “Interventions: The Mediating Work of Art” in Art Bulletin, vol.
LXXXXIX, no. 3, 2007.
Hayman, Ronald, Brecht. A Biography (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1983).
Horne, John, “End of Paradigm? The Cultural History of the Great War” in Past &
Present, vol. 242, 2019.
Janz, Oliver, “Einführung: Der Erste Weltkrieg in globaler Perspektive” in Geschichte
und Gesellschaft, vol. 40, no. 2, 2014.
Lakitsch, Maximilian; Reitmair-Juárez, Susanne and Katja, Seidel (eds.), Bellicose
Entanglements. 1914: The Great War as a Global War (Zurich: Lit Verlag, 2015).
Luckhurst, Tim, “War Correspondents” in Daniel, Ute; Gatrell, Peter; Janz, Oli-
ver; Jones, Heather; Keen, Jennifer; Kramer, Alan and Nasson, Bill (eds.), 1914
Online. International Encyclopaedia of the First World War (Berlin: Freie Univer-
sity, 2016).
Mazower, Mark, Governing the World: The History of an Idea (London: Allen
Lane, 2012).
Neiberg, Michael S, Fighting the Great War: A Global History (Cambridge: Harvard
University Press, 2005).
Osterhammel, Jürgen, The Transformation of the World: A Global History of the
Nineteenth Century (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2014).
Paddock, Troy RE, “Introduction” in Paddock, Troy RE (ed.), World War I  and
Propaganda (Leiden/Boston: Brill, 2014).
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trality and Non-Belligerency (1914–1916)” in War in History, 2020. DOI:
10.1177/0968344519882066
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1870–1912” (PhD Dissertation, Columbia University, New York, 1999).
Rinke, Stefan, Latin America in the First World War (Cambridge: Cambridge Uni-
versity Press, 2017).
Stewart, Jefrey C, The New Negro: The Life of Alain Locke (Oxford: Oxford Uni-
versity Press, 2018).
Tato, María Inès, “Luring Neutrals. Allied and German Propaganda in Argentina
During the First World War” in Paddock, Troy RE (ed.), World War I and Propa-
ganda (Leiden/Boston: Brill, 2014).
Tato, María Inés, “Fighting for a Lost Cause? The Germanophile Newspaper La
Unión in Neutral Argentina, 1914–1918” in War in History, vol. 25, no. 4, 2018.
Trott, Vincent, Publishers, Readers and the Great War: Literature and Memory
Since 1918 (New York: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2017).
White, EB, “I paint what I see” in New Yorker, 20 May 1933.
Winter, Jay, “Introduction” in Winter, Jay (ed.), The Cambridge History of the First
World War, vol. 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014).
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(Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2011).
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don: Chatto & Windus, 1918).
1 Chinese workers on the
Western Front and their
extraordinary artistic
and personal journey
XU Guoqi

During the Great War or the First World War, the Chinese wanted to be
involved to fght against Japanese aggression and to search for justice and
equality in the new world order and the family of nations. The Allied coun-
tries, especially France and Great Britain, needed human resources as the
fghting became increasingly bloody and deadly. With this background,
about 140,000 Chinese labourers, most of them illiterate peasants, trav-
elled to Europe to support the Allied war efort. These labourers were
recruited by the governments of France and Britain to help both countries
in their Great War against the Germans; later when the United States of
America joined the war, the Americans took advantage of Chinese labour
as well.
One hundred years after the end of the war, while few know of the Chi-
nese journey to France, even fewer have paid attention to their artistic foot-
prints. This chapter will shed light on the personal journey of the Chinese
as well as their artistic tastes and activities in transnational contexts. The
keywords here are “strangeness” and “shared.” After all, strangeness is a
defning feature of their personal journey, and strangeness, or the obscure,
and shared are part and parcel of the arts and, to a certain extent, an inspi-
ration for arts.

Sense of strangeness from the Chinese side

To understand the Chinese journey and their artistic activities in Europe,
we frst have to bear in mind that these workers were strangers in a strange
land. Few could read Chinese, even fewer understood Western languages or
cultures. As a matter of fact, most had never travelled beyond their villages
before they were recruited to go to Europe, the centre of so-called West-
ern civilisation. But the civilised West was mired in a terrifying war. It was
not in a position collectively to show of the cultural, intellectual, or politi-
cal triumphs of peacetime but could reveal only its ugliest, most barbarous
attributes: total mutual destruction and horrendous brutality. Nobody had
prepared the Chinese for the culture shock or taught them how to adjust
14 XU Guoqi
to this new life. Everything they saw, everything they were supposed to do
was new and strange to them. The food, the language, the customs, and the
management, all of these were a shock. There was no time or opportunity
for them to ponder, digest, and ask questions since the West needed their
labour immediately.
To these Chinese workers, their jobs in Europe were extremely strange.
While in Europe, most Chinese workers were under military manage-
ment. According to British military rule, they had to wear approved
clothing at all times, with the exception that civilian underclothing,
boots, shoes, or head-gear might be worn on or of duty. They were
managed by Western ofcers and frequently had to march to work. An
American ofcer, Norman W. Pinney of Florida, later recalled, “I often
saw these Chinese [under the British] marching along the roads to and
from labor details. They were exceptionally neat and clean and their
march discipline  .  .  . excellent. At frst, I  thought they were Chinese
troops”.1 The Chinese, and especially those under British command,
often worked in, or close to, military zones. If they broke the rules, they
would be court-martialled.
The Chinese engaged in multiple types of work. They repaired tanks
and roads, dug foundations, worked in powder factories, arsenals, acid
factories, loaded and unloaded trains and boats, manned paper factories.
The Great War in Europe was a trench war, and most Chinese working
for the British got involved in digging trenches, which occupied most of
their time and labour. Some Chinese died from bombardment. According
to one labour corps ofcer, the Chinese called bombs from German aero-
planes “German eggs”, and sometimes they saw “plenty German eggs”.
In a daylight raid, Chinese “merely stopped their work in order to gaze
better at the altitudinous Germans, and when a bit of shrapnel whizzed
to earth, the coolies would pounce on it, laughingly crying out, ‘plenty
souvenir-la’ ”.2
Besides bombs, the Chinese also faced deadly threats from gas shells.
Captain A. McCormick, an ofcer for the Chinese labour camp, wrote:

The great fear we had was not so much ordinary shell fre as gas shell
fre. Frequently large numbers of gas shells fell in close proximity to our
camp and what saved us was simply that the wind was blowing from
where our camp was situated to where the shells had fallen. I do not
wish to magnify, but I  must not minimize these troubles which were
seldom absent. . . . I can convey the best idea to my readers of how it
afected me specially who held command of a Labour Company and
whose duty it was to look after the safety of my men when I say that for
three months after that attack I never dared take my trousers of when
going to bed and I always had to have my gas mask in readiness at my
side.3
 Chinese workers on the Western Front 15
The Chinese also faced other dangers and challenges. They were often
called on to bury dead soldiers’ remains. Anyone would count this work
as gruesome, but it was especially hard on the Chinese, who believe that
touching dead bodies is extremely unlucky. The men sufered nightmares
and thought they were cursed by the dead. Imagine the psychological toll!
TS Eliot’s lines about the burial of the dead surely convey their distress:

April is the cruellest month, breeding

Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.4

Of course, Chinese ignorance of Western culture made them suspicious of

the rules and policies imposed on them. They were ofended that they had
to follow so many rules, with no room for fexibility. Thus, suspicion led
to misunderstandings. Misunderstandings led to serious problems, which
sometimes proved deadly since the French called in the military to suppress
uprisings.5
Not everything was both strange and horrifying. Occasionally some
strange but exciting events happened to the Chinese workers too. While in
Europe, for example, Chinese labourers had opportunities to watch mov-
ies and soon they came to recognise and look for Charlie Chaplin just like
the “Tommies” and “Yanks”. Another exciting and strange case deals with
their experience in accepting the British king. In late 1918, George V was
inspecting his victorious armies and needed a quiet location for luncheon
on a certain Friday. Interestingly enough, a Chinese labour company was
deemed to be a suitable venue for the king. Word of the king’s visit reached
the Chinese there only days earlier.
The Chinese naturally got excited. Some asked, “May we receive the
emperor?” Others wondered, “How shall we do it?” Somebody suggested,
“On parade, with a King’s salute, and a cheer”. There was not enough time
for the Chinese to learn how to pronounce “Hurrah”, so a secretary of
Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) decided that the Chinese word
hao or “good” would be used instead. The Chinese thus practised until
three hao’s sounded something like a British cheer. The Chinese also prac-
tised salutes with a sharp turn of the hand to the side. They were instructed,
“Don’t bring it down till the emperor returns your salute”. “What? Will
the emperor return our salute?” “Yes, of course, he will”. The cheer was to
follow the salute. “Be sure and shout with all your might”. “Won’t it startle
His Majesty?” asked one intelligent labourer. “No, he is used to it”, the
YMCA secretary answered.
In addition to practising the cheer, the men took the initiative and added
something more after their own style. They quietly pooled their francs and
sent into the nearby town (Cambrai) for bright-coloured cloth and from it
16 XU Guoqi
worked a fantastic yet pretty archway over the door to the royal mess-room.
They also erected a real Chinese triumphal arch in his honour. Chinese mot-
tos about the dawn of peace and the virtues of the king and his ministers
emblazoned the walls, and fags futtered everywhere. The best writer of the
company wrote a message of welcome in large Chinese characters, which
meant in English “All rejoice at the dawn of peace”.
On the day the king arrived, the 480 Chinese lined up from the road-
way to the mess-hut and waited with bright faces and eager eyes. The king
seemed surprised at the smart appearance of these labourers, all standing at
salute, which His Majesty smilingly acknowledged. Then the three “hao’s”
rang out, and of course, the king did not know they were shouting “Good,
good, good” to him. They shouted a Chinese welcome when His Majesty
came and sent him of with a cheer like “the sound of many waters”. The
king seemed “highly pleased and the Chinese, of course, were much elated”.
The king sent a special message to the men telling them of his pleasure at
their kind welcome and thanking them for the decorations and good wishes.
The YMCA secretary who witnessed the whole thing wrote, “Those lads
from far Cathay appreciated the king’s thoughtfulness and were delighted
that his majesty had acknowledged their salute. You may be sure that inci-
dent will be talked of in many a far-of home”. After lunch, the king had
paused on his way to the car to ask a few interested questions about the
Chinese and shook hands with their captain. After the cars had sped away
with the king, the Chinese were shocked to notice that the king’s food had
been only sandwiches. They peered at the leftover sandwiches and scarcely
believed what they saw. They tried some, and one Chinese declared “Hm!
It has a taste of King”.6
The king might soon have forgotten his involvement with Chinese work-
ers in this case, but those Chinese involved probably remembered this event
forever. Unfortunately, they did not leave any written records about their
feelings and thinking, and we can only imagine that they felt the whole epi-
sode strange and exciting.

Strangeness experienced by Westerners

The sense of strangeness cut both ways, for the Chinese themselves and for
the Westerners. If the Chinese experienced strangeness, the Westerners felt
a strong sense of strangeness regarding these strangers. Rudyard Kipling’s
“The Stranger” perhaps conveys the sense of strangeness the Chinese pre-
sented to the Westerners and vice versa. The poem deserves to be quoted
here in length:

The Stranger within my gate,

He may be true or kind,
But he does not talk my talk.
I cannot feel his mind.
 Chinese workers on the Western Front 17
I see the face and the eyes and the mouth,
But not the soul behind.7

The sense of strangeness described by Kipling here clearly was shared and
could be refected in the observation of the Westerners. ABW Fletcher, a
British ofcer with the Royal Artillery at the Rouen and Saigneville ammu-
nitions depots, was deeply impressed by the Chinese interest in European
clothing, their reaction to bullying, and by a peaceful protest march they
held after a dispute with an interpreter. He noted that most of the heavy
labour at his depot was performed by the Chinese. “They were very delight-
ful simply [sic] people, very strong, extremely good to work with if you
treated them properly”. He related that they would not stand bullying.8
Many Westerners were amused by the Chinese workers’ clothing and style.
Captain A. McCormick, in charge of one Chinese labour company, was
amazed at their appearance:

It was a sight to see them tumbling out of the train – a quaint, nonde-
script, and yet not unpicturesque [sic] rabble. About their garb, there
was no uniformity, which of course arrested the attention when one had
grown accustomed to uniformity of dress and action.

He pointed out that many of them simply wore pyjamas or underclothing.

“One labourer looked odd with drawers encasing his lower extremities but
almost nothing to shield his upper quarters. Most of them wore straw hats,
and one Chink had no less than three hats on his head”.9 One British soldier
wrote that the Chinese wore many diferent types of clothes and “one fellow
had a khaki English tunic, a little brown pair of trousers, a pair of gaiters,
and to top the lot, a woman’s hat!”10
Another ofcer wrote in his personal diary that “the Chinese are very
amusing” with a strange taste in clothing and kit. “One fellow wears grey
pyjamas and a top hat and his name is Monkey Joe”.11 Although clothes were
provided free of charge, some labourers would purchase worn-out overcoats
from British or French soldiers to make their appearance more impressive
and local. Some even got into the habit of wearing Swiss watches.12 One
Belgian priest discovered that Chinese labourers liked watches and rings:
“Lately I came across a Chinaman who wore a watch on each arm, he was
very proud when he saw me looking at his watches”.13
Chinese curiosity in Western society seemed to be strange to the Western-
ers. A British ofcer observed:

These Chinese are extremely interesting to observe in a town. I remember

spending an hour or so watching their antics outside a hosiers & outft-
ters in Rosendahl. They would enter the shop and purchase the most gro-
tesque head-gear you could imagine: they were as “pleased as Punch” if
they obtained a child’s sailor hat, it did not make any diference if many
18 XU Guoqi
sizes too small; others would prefer the trilby shape. You could see some
of them clad in velvet suits, others in pyjamas or pants only. A walking
stick and a cheap watch were apparently the insignia of a gentleman
among them; some of them had copied the “correct London style” –
lounge suit and bowler to match, walking stick and gloves. When it is
remembered they receive small pay comparatively, it is rather wonderful
how they obtain these things. They have the curiosity of children. I had
the experience of some of them minutely examining the lining of my
sheepskin coat – they were at times a great nuisance in this respect.14

Given the lack of understanding and stereotyped perceptions, the Brit-

ish military recognised that “Many Britishers are blufed, or frightened, or
both, by the Chinese, which the Chinese immediately detect”.15 An ofcial
notice to its ofcers in charge of the Chinese declared:

Chinese are not ignorant. They have brains and intelligence and sum up
their supervisors in a very short time. Orders and counter-orders and
unintelligent distribution of labour, due often to absence of plans, tools
and forethought, have a demoralizing efect on Chinese labourers and
induce them to regard our brains as inferior to their own, and greatly
tend to reduced efciency.16

Some Western observers read in their strange styles political messages.

A French reporter noticed that some Chinese wore uniforms decorated with
the stripes and badges of all ranks and all armies on their sleeves. They some-
times held umbrellas like British gentlemen even if the sky was clear and
the sun shining. The Chinese in Rouen sometimes seemed to behave as if
they lived in a conquered country, like Parisians who visited the country-
side, making fun of everything, or like Frenchmen in China. When the same
reporter visited a Chinese camp, he found the Chinese national fag on dis-
play. The reporter observed that the Chinese “were visibly convinced of their
superiority over all of the Westerners” and concluded, “They despise us!”17
The lack of qualifed interpreters made the situation worse. One of the
labourers’ greatest frustrations was their inability to express themselves. PE
Ogley wrote that when the Chinese talked to him, they used a bit of French,
English, and Chinese. “We couldn’t help but laugh at them”.18 Another
observer noticed, “All the coolies picked up a few phrases of English and
a word or two of French, always ending a statement with the Chinese ter-
mination ‘la.’ ”19 But they persevered with characteristic good humour. For
instance, when they visited French shops to purchase something:

[B]oth sides bursting into occasional fts of laughter over the absurdi-
ties of a monosyllabic oriental trying to express himself in French. Or
an older man you would see sitting on the corner of some humble vil-
lage doorstep with one of the little French children in his arms, the
 Chinese workers on the Western Front 19
fond grandparent looking on with smiling approval at the two children,
young and the old, both evidently enjoying themselves, but with conver-
sation mutually unintelligible. Though not an emotional race one could
sometimes catch a far of look in the Oriental’s eye as the dark-eyed,
dark-haired French child reminded him of his own dear babe across the
seas. The Chinese love their children and their homes. The two ques-
tions I was asked everywhere as soon as they found I could speak their
language were, “Which side is winning the war?” and “When are we
going back to China?”20

The Belgian priest Achiel van Walleghem kept a detailed diary that included
his observations of the Chinese. He wrote:

They are curious about everything and their behaviour is very childlike,
no better than our children of 10 or 11 years. Their favourite pastime
is to stand and gape at the shop windows, especially those of the sweet
shops and the fruit shops, and when they see something that they like
the look of, 10 of them at once go into the shop, ask the price of every-
thing, and if they decide to buy something are then very suspicious that
the shopkeeper will cheat them. But a lot of shopkeepers are tired of
their ways and make a show of being angry, and then the fellows fy out
of the shop like sparrows. Yellow in colour, with a fat nose and slanted
eyes, they wear a silly smile nearly all the time and are constantly look-
ing around them, so that it’s a wonder that with our crowded roads
none of them has yet been run over. . . . They’re not lazy and work at
least as well as our civilians and the English soldiers.21

On 8 January  1918, he noted that “some shopkeepers have started to

learn Chinese, in order to attract these men to their shops”.22
We also can argue that the Western sense of strangeness about the Chi-
nese in many cases went through a European racist perspective. The British
magazine Punch published the following:

O happy Chink! When I behold thy face.

Illumined with the all-embracing smile
Peculiar to thy celestial race
So full of mirth and yet so free from guile,
I stand amazed and let my fancy roam,
And ask myself by what mysterious lure
Thou wert induced to leave the fowery home
For Flanders, where, alas! Flowers are fewer.23

To be true, this poem is full of Western stereotype about Chinese and

racism. It is also strange and ironic that the poem even suggested that the
Chinese journey to Europe was simply a happy one. The following section
20 XU Guoqi
about Chinese artistic expressions, to a certain extent, also refects Western-
ers’ amazement and stereotypes about these Chinese.

Singing as cultural and personal expressions

Compared with Westerners, the sense of strangeness for the Chinese work-
ers in a strange land was much stronger. After all, they faced the conse-
quences of the strangeness: they had come to Europe, the centre of so-called
Western civilisation which was a killing ground.
Signifcantly, their art or artistic tastes became a vehicle for personal
expression and even representation. To their many Western observers, the
Chinese men enjoyed singing and singing seemed to go with them every-
where. Captain A. McCormick observed:

A Chink carrying water  – and singing as he jogged along  – always

struck me as being a very pleasing picture. One day I heard a Chinese
lad singing as he jogged along with a very quaint though not musical
song in a sort of minor key. I think it must have been a love-song for
the coolie had a happy yet intent and faraway look in his eyes, and
when he observed me, a shy smile crept over his face. It must be useful
for a Chinese maiden to have a little ear for music otherwise that love-
song would have fallen on unresponsive ears. It is a wonderfully nicely
adjusted thing, human nature.24

One British ofcer in a letter to his mother commented on the roar of a

song from a nearby Chinese camp.25
A Neville J. Whymant, Lieutenant of the Chinese Labour Corps (CLC),
recorded and translated many of the songs the Chinese sang while in
Europe. For him, Chinese labourers “expressed their mood in songs, thus
giving a valuable clue to the secret of his [sic] psychology”.26 They had sung
these songs from childhood and learned them from others in their home-
towns. One European ofcer commented, “There is never any room for
doubt when a coolie is singing. He seems determined that everybody within
a pretty wide radius shall be made aware of it”.27
As strangers in a strange land, Chinese labourers naturally were homesick,
and that homesickness was often refected in, and became sources of, their
songs. As they would in China, to dispel boredom or to refect their mood
on particular occasions, Chinese labourers often made up songs. The contents
might include their own inventions and references to Confucian ideas and his-
torical stories. They had brought this habit and sensibility with them to Europe.
The following song, as recorded by a British ofcer, seems to be a made-up lyric
that refects the singer’s feelings after he had received a letter from his brother:

By a stream and a hill is a little town

With narrow streets and small houses.
There are not many shops, but I have bought cakes,
 Chinese workers on the Western Front 21
And one can buy wine at the New Year.
By a stream and a hill I have a brother.
This little town is my home.28

A Western saying tells us we are what we eat. Food was another item
that often made the Chinese labourers homesick and described who they
were. The labourers, as many as any other Chinese, were obsessed with their
home cuisine. So seriously did they take food that they insisted on preparing
their own. Brigadier-General WR Ludlow wrote in his diary that he found
the Chinese labour camps he inspected “very interesting”. “I  never saw
cleaner Cook Houses or Kitchens, and the way they cook the rice, which
they principally live on, is excellent. They also have little Joss Houses and
Temples”.29 Another British commander noticed, “Their camp was spot-
lessly clean, and they were very fond of hot water when they could get it.
The cookhouse hall, made of rough wood, was scraped clean every day”.30
Given the Chinese passion for food, wartime Europe was perhaps the
worst place they could have landed. During the war, both France and Brit-
ain faced serious food shortages even for the fghting forces. One Western
soldier recorded the following incident in his diary: In spring 1917 he was in
a hospital in Estoutre. He “had to sleep on foor – rations almost nil. There
was 1 loaf between 14 of us. [I] [s]oon decided I was well enough to return
to duty”.31 Although the Chinese labourers usually had enough to eat, they
did not always have the items they wanted and had been promised; they
were not shy to complain about the rations and ask for more rice.32 One
Chinese secretary of the YMCA observed that the labourers “do always like
rice, even in France”.33 The Chinese also complained about the lack of chop-
sticks, “but after a few days they were quite used to knives and forks”.34
The Chinese’ craving for good food made its way into one of their ditties:

The wild ducks scatter, afraid.

If only I could fy as my thoughts fy,
I would have a rich supper to-night!35

Sometimes their lives and work seemed so monotonous and dull that one
of them would sing:

Thick mist now hides the sun,

And gentle dropping of pattering spots
Urges the dull day on.36

But singing could not always kill time. Occasionally, their sufering was
so intense that they fell into despair. Anyone who heard the following would
understand their frustration and desperation:

Who says there is no sorrow in this world?

Alas! Alas!
22 XU Guoqi
In the rains, the river is not controlled,
Alas! Alas!
Who says there is no sorrow in this world?37

The Chinese working under the French enjoyed more freedom, and they
also had opportunities to work side by side with French women in the fac-
tories. They were lonely and bored as this song suggests:

A crow on a far-of bough,

Outlined against the falling snow,
Is such a picture as will fnd,
An echo in my desolate heart.38

Whether they were cheerful, happy, angry, or in despair, overall the lives
of the Chinese in France were colourful and enriching. According to one
ofcer of the CLC, “A Chinese is never at a loss to know how to fll in spare
time”. They smoked, chatted, studied, or sang.39 Their songs sometimes
gave voice to their attitudes about the future:

What is tomorrow? What will it bring?

One must take thought for this.
He who looks not forth to the morrow
Meet sorrow lurking outside.40

They were also curious about the many new things they encountered in
Europe. That curiosity is refected in the following wry ditty:

What is it in the big shops?

Soy and pickles, oil and seeds
Are too cheap for these big places.
Do they sell mandarins there?41

Curiosity motivated them to learn, to observe, and to understand their

new surroundings. Again, they expressed their desire for understanding in
the following song, which clearly borrowed Confucian ideas:
Through the senses comes all knowledge;

When you see with your eyes

Do not fail to perceive with your mind.
Where deep waters are, the movement is sluggish
The profound man is slow of speech.42

The things they observed frequently made them wonder aloud about the
diferences between Chinese and Western cultures:
 Chinese workers on the Western Front 23
These strange things which barbarians have,
Have devil-bellies which make them go.
But we are a happier people,
Who do not ally ourselves with the devil.43

From the aforementioned songs, we can clearly see how the Chinese dealt
with diferent civilisations and cultures and challenges presented by the
Great War. Songs and singing thus served as artistic expression as well as
indications of their sufering and longing.

Artistic shows and trench art as cultural messages

Most Chinese labourers went to France through Canada. David Livingstone,
who accompanied some Chinese to Europe, left a detailed diary about the
Chinese journey. He wrote that on their long journey through Canada, some
Chinese might be sitting cross-legged in a dark corner beneath the upper
berth, playing perhaps a love song on the erhu, a small Chinese fddle. The
men around him would lie there listening and dreaming, or someone nearby
would sing to the strains of the fddle. Livingstone sometimes stopped to
listen for a few minutes and told them that their music was fne, a comment
that delighted the musicians. Sometimes Livingstone would take the instru-
ment and try to play, and all the Chinese in the coach would laugh at his
poor eforts. Many men would play chess on boards made of pasteboard,
but a few played on regular boards they had brought from China.
Before retiring, they would often have a small theatrical performance
down below where there would be so many gathered around that the air
grew heavy. When Livingstone and his fellow ofcers put in an appearance,
the Chinese would want them to take a seat upfront, which the ofcers
usually did, and then they would listen to the singer who was accompanied
by a musician or two and sometimes a regular Chinese band with drums,
cymbals, and futes. The singer would tell a long story, perhaps, thought
Livingstone, about some green-faced robber or pirate who ran away with
the king’s wife or something like that, singing out words as he went along
making all kinds of faces and going through the typical movements with his
arms and hands as they did on the Chinese stage. The audience would listen
attentively, and many kept their eyes on the white ofcers to see how they
liked the show. Every little while Livingstone and his fellow ofcers would
say “Very good, very good!” and the Chinese would all smile.
Livingstone got several Chinese acts for a concert held for the ofcers
one night after they had entered the war zone. It opened with a Chinese
orchestra, and the drums and brass cymbals made such a noise that the
ofcers had to stop them since any submarine in the area would surely have
been attracted. The Chinese labourers all listened attentively when the ladies
sang, or the piano was played.44
24 XU Guoqi
While in Europe, Chinese artistic talents were closely observed by West-
erners. George E Cormack, an ofcer of the CLC, observed that some
Chinese labourers passed the time and expressed themselves through under-
taking artistic projects.

The innate artistic sense of the Chinese came out when they decorated
the ground around their tents with elaborate designs picked out on a
background of sand, with ground brick, cola, lime and ochre. Those
dragon designs would have made an excellent pattern for a carpet,
and the pictures of mythological characters seemed to transplant to
Canadian soil the traditional art of China stretching back through the
centuries.45

The Chinese artistic taste enriched both their lives and that of others.
When holidays came, they would erect timbers, paint them in red and blue,
and make them into a shrine, in front of which they worshipped the spirits of
their ancestors who travelled across many oceans to respond to their rever-
ence and remembrance.46 In a letter to his wife, one Chinese labourer related
that at Dragon Festival time, the Chinese under the British got the day of.
Some Chinese organised themselves into a dance troupe (yang ge) and per-
formed for the diferent companies. Their show attracted both Chinese and
British ofcers and local people, who seemed to enjoy them very much.47
A YMCA secretary wrote that one of the labour companies included quite
a number of actors, acrobats, musicians, dancers, stilt-walkers, and what-
not, and they gave “repeated and much-appreciated performances” at the
diferent camps.48
The French military authority once even asked the Chinese labour-
ers to perform a play written by Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau.
The Chinese indeed performed it on Chinese National Day. Apparently,
many people, locals and Chinese included, showed up to watch it, but
unfortunately, the source does not mention what the play was about. On
another occasion, Chinese in Roanne took a day of to celebrate their
National Day. They set up a beautiful stage decorated with Chinese fags
and lanterns. They started the show at 7:00 a.m. with a salute to the
national fag. After musical performances, they took a group photo. Then
at noon, there was a banquet. After lunch, many games were organised.
Fireworks were set of at 7:00 p.m. Afterwards dance parties went on
until midnight. More than one thousand French locals took part in the
celebration. The cost of this event, more than ten thousand francs, was
paid for by the Chinese labourers themselves. The Chinese in Le Havre
also celebrated National Day. They used fowers to make huge display
characters that read “National Day Celebration”. A French factory owner
donated holiday lights and over 80 bottles of champagne for the occasion,
and a French ofcer provided fruit. Chinese labourers held similar events
in other places.49
 Chinese workers on the Western Front 25
Some Chinese were quite skilled at design and building. One British ofcer
wrote that his company moved to a camp where they found exceedingly
comfortable quarters that had been built by a Chinese labour company. The
mess hall had been built of bricks made of local clay and dried in the sun.
The account went on:

The interior doors and fttings were unmistakably made by the same
hands – the decorative design being remarkable. But more weird still was
the Chinese idea of camoufage. The sheds and shelters and the ammu-
nition dumps around were covered with the strangest designs. Chinese
Gods abounded, sitting under mysterious orange trees, whose branches
extended straight out from the trunks, holding each a golden orange at its
end. Dragons and other fearsome beasts were there in every colour. Suns
and moons and a perfect constellation of stars met the eye on every side.
The whole efect was a perfect riot of Chinese imagination in colour.50

The amazing artistic talents of the Chinese can also be found in their
shared involvement in trench art. As mentioned earlier, the First World War
in Europe was a trench war, and the Chinese were master trench diggers. They
also produced much of what came to be known as trench art. The First World
War was a real world war which coincided with a great development of cer-
tain art forms. The Chinese had skills, opportunities, and equipment, allow-
ing them to get involved in the trench art movement during the First World
War. One scholar has observed, “It was the experience of something new and
terrible in human history, which produced the greatest fowering of Trench
Art”. The place of the Great War in our collective historical consciousness

is unique by virtue of the paradoxes and ironies which attended the

tragic and hitherto undreamt of scale of death and maiming. . . . It is
against this background that every object which can be described as
Trench Art tells a story of the momentous experiences of its maker.51

Trench art pieces from the Chinese thus tell us a great deal about the Chi-
nese labourers’ perceptions of themselves, the war, and the world. Indeed,
the Chinese left many pieces that are both brilliant and thoughtful. More
importantly, trench art was the shared art form of all people involved in the
Great War one way or another. The fact that the Chinese made their mark in
this practice refects their communion with the rest of that world.
After the fghting ended, the Chinese remained, clearing the battlefelds
and helping to bury the dead.

During this second phase of their activities, they continued to make often
stunning and elaborate trench art for sale to local civilians, battlefeld
pilgrims and tourists, the military personnel who supervised them, and
those who were engaged in developing the Commonwealth War Graves.52
26 XU Guoqi
As Nicholas Saunders, a scholar of trench art, pointed out:

Arguably more secure in their Asian origins were trench-art shell-case

vases made by the Chinese Labour Corps. Unlike any other kind of
shell-case trench art, these objects tended not only to avoid human fg-
ures (generically Oriental or otherwise), but also any reference to the
war of which they were a part.

According to Saunders, the skills of the Chinese labourers in working

metal were “dramatically illustrated in an unusual and beautifully engraved
German shell case”. Saunders noticed that the shell case itself was manufac-
tured in a munitions factory at Karlsruhe in 1904 and was presumably fred
in the early months of the war in 1914. It seems to Saunders that almost
certainly it lay abandoned in German positions until after November 1918
when the Chinese labourers were clearing the whole battlefeld area. Saun-
ders was amazed how the Chinese cleverly fared outward and then exqui-
sitely engraved the body with an elaborate Chinese dragon fanked by a
tree adorned with budding fowers in the middle of which a singing bird is
perched. Saunders pointed out that the most unusual was “the chroming
of the fnished piece which, by removing the need ever to polish the object,
meant that the engraved designs remain as fresh today as they were when
made, probably between 1919 and 1922”.53
The Chinese developed their money-making skills along with their
trench art. Several sources suggest that some labourers made it their busi-
ness to fnd out what military units were located in the area and then
acquired the appropriate badges and buttons, which they used to decorate
trench art items. These they sold as souvenirs to those same units.54 In
early 1919, a dozen women from Dublin who volunteered to relieve male
drivers in northern France found that Chinese in the Bethune camp, a for-
mer aerodrome, used hot tools to beat out patterns on spent shell casings
they had found in the felds. These curious jewels became popular among
the Irish women.55 An American priest by the name of Joseph M. Woods
purchased four brass artillery shells fred on the Western Front and then
taken from a dump heap and decorated by a member of the CLC. They
were covered with “etched drawings of the most exquisite designs show-
ing dragons and chrysanthemums”. He often used these items to illustrate
how instruments of destruction could be turned into things of beauty.56
As one British commanding ofcer noted, “During leisure hours, they [the
Chinese] made souvenirs from scrap materials which had a ready sale”.57
Nicholas J. Saunders suggested that Chinese labourers “decorating a shell
case with an image of a bird singing in a plum blossom tree was perhaps
an exercise in nostalgia as well as a denial of the devastated landscapes
in which they had been contracted to work”.58 Saunders wrote elsewhere
that “Great War objects live on in people’s homes, in museums, and in
salesrooms, and its legacies permeate the tortuous politics of identity, via
 Chinese workers on the Western Front 27
nationalism and ethnicity, across Europe and beyond”.59 Trench art is
an important part of the Great War, which the Chinese embraced; their
contributions becoming part of the collective and shared legacy of the war
and the arts.

Short conclusions
The First World War was a Great War and a shared war. Chinese experi-
ences are part of this shared journey. The Chinese labourers’ personal and
artistic trajectory during the First World War was clearly shaped and infu-
enced by the war, geopolitics, and travel between the East and the West.
Moreover, the shared journey was full of strangeness. The Westerners soon
forgot the Chinese’ contribution to the war, and the Chinese themselves
ignored their compatriots’ extraordinary journey to the West. Nobody paid
attention to them when they returned to China after the war. Their stories
got lost within China and outside until recently when we commemorated
the centenary of the Great War. The shared forgetfulness in both China
and the world itself is a strange phenomenon and deserves further study.
Truly, their personal and artistic journey belongs to both China and the
world and should be treasured as such.
To understand the impact and importance of the Chinese art forms, we
have to pay attention to the transnational nature of the war and fusions of
diferent civilisations. Without the Chinese travelling to Europe, their arts
would not have developed in the form and shape as described in this chapter.
The Chinese arts and Chinese artistic tastes refected the cross-border fows
of ideas, cultures, and labour, as well as the clash and fusions of diferent
civilisations. When we commemorate the centenary of the First World War,
we not only have to learn lessons about the great human tragedy and suf-
fering but must also pay attention to art in the wake of the war. In short,
Chinese labourers came from China, and their artistic and personal journey
belong to the world. Internationalisation and nationalism were the two sides
of the same coin in early twentieth-century China. By studying the Chinese
labourers in Europe during the war and their stories, we not only recover
a neglected chapter in Chinese history but also improve our understanding
of how this seemingly obscure episode afected both Chinese and Western
societies, as well as the modern world order.

Notes
This chapter draws on materials from my book Strangers on the Western Front:
Chinese Workers in the Great War (Harvard University Press, 2011).
1 John Fulton Lewis, China’s Great Convulsion 1894–1924: A  Dynasty Over-
thrown, Chaos and Warlords, and How the Chinese Helped the Western Allies
Win World War I (Heathsville, VA: Sun on Earth Books, 2005), p. 146.
2 Laurence Salisbury, “Chinese Coolies and the War” in The Saturday Evening
Post, 25 October 1919, p. 130.
28 XU Guoqi
3 Captain A  McCormick fles: typed draft memoir, 131–132, Imperial War
Museum, London Archives (hereafter as IWM) 02/6/1.
4 TS Eliot, The Waste Land and Other Poems (New York: Harvest Books, 1962),
p. 29.
5 Chen Sanjing; Lu Fangshang and Yang Cuihua (eds.), Ouzhan Huagong Shiliao
(Taipei: Zhongyang yanjiuyuan jindai shi yanjiusuo, 1997), pp. 380–381.
6 Henry Payne [with the Chinese Labour Corps], “John Chinaman in France:
How He Saw and Greeted King George” in The Missionary Herald, vol. 101,
no. 3, March 1919, pp. 29–30; no author, “The King and the Chinese Labour
Corps” in The British Weekly, 2 January, 1919, p. 225.
7 Rudyard Kipling, Songs from Books (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1930),
pp. 100–101.
8 ABW Fletcher, BBC Great War Series, IWM sound archives, catalogue 4102.
9 Captain A McCormick fles, 205, IWM 02/6/1.
10 PE Ogley was a private serving with the Yorkshire and Lancashire Regiment.
PE Ogley memoirs (include letters) [no date and place]: handwritten, book two:
page 26, Liddle Collection (1914–1918), Special Collections, University of Leeds
Library (hereafter as LC, Leeds), GS1200.
11 GA Willis Diary, entry of 25 June 1918, LC, Leeds: GS 1751.
12 Cheng Shih-Gung, Modern China, a Political Study (Oxford: The Clarendon
Press, 1919), p. 273.
13 Dominiek Dendooven and Piet Chielens (eds.), World War I: Five Continents in
Flanders (Tielt: Lannoo, 2008), p. 142.
14 HE Cornwall fles, typed memoir or journal and no title, p. 19, HE Cornwall
fles, IWM 06/70/1.
15 Notes on Chinese Labour, 2 August 1918, The National Archives, Kew (hereaf-
ter as TNA, Kew): WO 107/37, 2.
16 Notes on Chinese Labour, 2 August 1918, TNA, Kew: WO 107/37, 4.
17 Auguste Dupouy, “Un Camp de Chinois” in La Revue de Paris, no. 21, Novem-
ber 1919, pp. 147–162.
18 PE Ogley memoirs (include letters), 36–37, LC, Leeds, GS1200.
19 Salisbury, “Chinese Coolies and the War”, p. 130.
20 GH Cole, “With the Chinese in France”, Box  204 folder: Chinese Labor in
France reports, 1918–1919, Kautz Family YMCA Archives, University of Min-
nesota Libraries, Twin City, Minnesota (hereafter as YMCA Archives).
21 Dominiek Dendooven (ed.), 1917 – The Passchendaele Year. The British Army
in Flanders: The Diary of Achiel van Walleghem (Guido Lattré and Susan Reed,
transl.) (Brighton: EER Publishers, 2017), pp. 193–194.
22 Dominiek Dendooven, “Living Apart Together: Belgian Witness Accounts of the
Chinese Labour Corps” in Zhang Jianguo (ed.), Zhongguo laogong yu diyici
shijie dazhan (Chinese Labourers and the First World War) (Jinan: Shandong
daxue chubanshe, 2009), pp. 19–29, here p. 24.
23 Anonymous, “To a Chinese Coolie” in Punch, vol. CLVI, no. 4050, 19 Febru-
ary 1919, p. 150.
24 Captain A McCormick fles, 207–208, IWM 02/6/1.
25 HS Innes was a private serving in 14th Battalion, Royal Fusiliers on the Western
Front. HS Innes to his Mom, 14 September 1917, HS Innes letters, LC, Leeds,
GS 0833.
26 A Neville and J Whymant, “Chinese Coolie Songs” in Bulletin of the School of
Oriental Studies, University of London, vol. 1, no. 4, 1920, p. 148.
27 Ibid., p. 145.
28 Ibid., pp. 146–147.
29 Brigadier General WR Ludlow diary, entry of 27 November 1917, LC, Leeds,
GS0984.
 Chinese workers on the Western Front 29
30 Memoirs of Major RD Oliver, handwritten materials with no date and page
numbers, IWM catalogue 11235.
31 David H Doe fle, diary entry of 16 April, 1917, p. 326, IWM, catalogue 12171.
32 War diary, 15 June 1917, TNA, Kew: WO 95/83.
33 Ting Fu Tsiang, “Chinese Philosophy in France” in Asia, vol. xix, no. 7,
July 1919, p. 645.
34 SGC, “Chinese Labour in France” in The Statesman, 13 January 1917, p. 343.
35 Neville and Whymant, “Chinese Coolie Songs”, p. 149.
36 Ibid., p. 151.
37 Ibid., p. 152.
38 Ibid., p. 165.
39 Ibid., p. 145.
40 Ibid., p. 158.
41 Ibid., p. 153.
42 Ibid., p. 164.
43 Ibid., p. 149.
44 David Livingston Journal, Private Collection.
45 GE Cormack fles, War Times in Russia, 19–20, IWM 92/21/1.
46 Cheng Shih-Gung, Modern China, a Political Study, p. 273.
47 A Laborer’s letter to his wife, dated 24 June 1918, in IWM MISC 130 (1999).
48 EW Burt, “With the Chinese at Havre” in The Missionary Herald, vol. 101, no.
4, April 1919, pp. 42–43.
49 Anonymous, “Guo qing ri lu fa huagong zhi re nao” in Huagong Zazhi, no. 27,
25 October 1917, pp. 23–25.
50 Captain TC Thomas, With a Labour Company in France: The War Diary of the
58th Labour Company (Birmingham/London: Hudson and Son, no date), 51.
51 Nicholas J Saunders, Trench Art: A Brief History & Guide, 1914–1939 (Lon-
don: Leo Cooper, 2001), p. 15.
52 Nicholas J Saunders, Trench Art: Materialities and Memories of War (New York:
Berg, 2003), p. 44.
53 Ibid., p. 66.
54 Saunders, Trench Art: A Brief History & Guide, p. 30.
55 Kate Summerscale, The Queen of Whale Cay: The Eccentric Story of ‘Joe’
Carstairs, Fastest Woman on Water (London: Fourth Estate, 1997), p. 49.
56 Lewis, China’s Great Convulsion, p. 150.
57 Memoirs of Major RD Oliver, handwritten materials with no date and page
numbers, IWM catalogue 11235.
58 Nicholas Saunders and Paul Cornish, “Introduction” in Paul Cornish and Nich-
olas J Saunders (eds.), Bodies in Confict: Corporeality, Materiality and Trans-
formation (London: Routledge, 2014), p. 31.
59 Nicholas J Saunders and Paul Cornish, “Introduction” in Nicholas J Saunders
and Paul Cornish (eds.), Contested Objects: Material Memoires of the Great
War (London: Routledge, 2009), p. 2.

References
Chen Sanjing, Lu, Fangshang and Yang, Cuihua (eds.), Ouzhan Huagong shiliao
(Taipei: Zhongyang yanjiuyuan jindai shi yanjiusuo, 1997).
Cheng, Sih-Gung, Modern China, A Political Study (Oxford: The Clarendon Press,
1919).
Dendooven, Dominiek (ed.), 1917 – The Passchendaele Year. The British Army in
Flanders: The Diary of Achiel van Walleghem (Guido Lattré and Susan Reed,
transl.) (Brighton: EER Publishers, 2017).
30 XU Guoqi
Dendooven, Dominiek, “Living Apart Together: Belgian Witness Accounts of the
Chinese Labour Corps” in Jianguo, Zhang (ed.), Zhongguo laogong yu diyici shi-
jie dazhan (Chinese Labourers and the First World War) (Jinan: Shandong daxue
chubanshe, 2009), pp. 19–29.
Dendooven, Dominiek and Chielens, Piet (eds.), World War I: Five Continents in
Flanders (Tielt: Lannoo, 2008).
Eliot, TS, The Waste Land and Other Poems (New York: Harvest Books, 1962).
Kipling, Rudyard, Songs from Books (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1930).
Lewis, John Fulton, China’s Great Convulsion 1894–1924: A Dynasty Overthrown,
Chaos and Warlords, and How the Chinese Helped the Western Allies Win World
War I (Heathsville, VA: Sun on Earth Books, 2005).
Saunders, Nicholas J, Trench Art: A Brief History & Guide, 1914–1939 (London:
Leo Cooper, 2001).
Saunders, Nicholas J, Trench Art: Materialities and Memories of War (New York:
Berg, 2003).
Saunders, Nicholas J and Cornish, Paul, “Introduction” in Saunders, Nicholas J
and Cornish, Paul (eds), Contested Objects: Material Memoires of the Great War
(London: Routledge, 2009).
Saunders, Nicholas J and Cornish, Paul, “Introduction” in Cornish, Paul and Saun-
ders, Nicholas J (eds.), Bodies in Confict: Corporeality, Materiality and Transfor-
mation (London: Routledge, 2014).
Summerscale, Kate, The Queen of Whale Cay: The Eccentric Story of ‘Joe’ Carstairs,
Fastest Woman on Water (London: Fourth Estate, 1997).
Thomas, Captain TC, With a Labour Company in France: The War Diary of the
58th Labour Company (Birmingham/London: Hudson and Son, no date).
Xu, Guoqi, Strangers on the Western Front: Chinese Workers in the Great War
(Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2011).
2 The impact of the First World
War on Japan’s foreign book
market
Maj Hartmann

The outbreak of the First World War in 1914 had huge consequences for
the foreign book trade and impacted publishing industries across the globe.1
Among the afected regions were Japan and its publishing entrepreneurs
who over the previous decades had turned the import and translations of
foreign works into a thriving new business.
From the mid-1900s, the global book trade had been expanding along-
side the rapid technological developments which opened up new forms of
communication through the invention of the telegraph and the telephone,
as well as faster ways of travel with the locomotive or steamship that con-
nected the world in unprecedented ways. Amid all the developments and
time of rapid acceleration and change during the latter half of the nineteenth
century, the Meiji government (1868–1912) began promoting European
and American technologies and culture, including books and translations
of foreign works. At least since the early Tokugawa period (1603–1868),
printed texts were seen as commercial goods that were bought and sold
and had a material value.2 The publishers were organised into booksellers’
guilds which protected their members’ works from piracy and controlled
the observance of censorship regulations imposed by the state.3 Even though
printing had remained limited, by the time of the Meiji Restoration (1868),
Japan already had a highly developed and capital-driven print culture.4 The
Restoration brought with it not only the technological advances from tradi-
tional xylography to movable-type technology and rotary cylinder presses,
which greatly facilitated and sped up the printing process, the political and
social changes also created a new thirst for foreign news and Western educa-
tion which resulted in the Tokugawa bakufu5 beginning to translate Western
newspapers into Japanese.6
In the decades following the Meiji Restoration and the accompanying
large increase in book publications, magazines, and newspaper circulation,
a new generation of publishing entrepreneurs came on the scene, ready to
turn people’s growing interest for Western writing into proft by importing
and selling Western literature. Both the Sino-Japanese War of 1894–1895
and the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905 stimulated an unprecedented
demand for news among the masses and further contributed to the
32 Maj Hartmann
development of a mass publishing industry throughout the latter part of the
Meiji and early part of the Taishō period (1912–1926).7 By the end of the
Meiji period, the literacy rate had climbed to 90 per cent and the replace-
ment of primarily opinion-orientated with general-interest magazines led
to printed works being read across social lines, with the publication and
translation of Western works remaining high in demand.8
The outbreak of the First World War interrupted the existing business of
the publishers to a point where not only the book trade itself, but also the
readership and society in general were impacted. This chapter looks at the
difculties Japan’s publishing entrepreneurs faced in light of the global war
and argues that it was precisely the challenges experienced that led to new
forms of communication and interaction between the publishing business
and the state. The established networks demonstrate the increasing impact
that publishers with access to foreign works, which promised to contribute
to the country’s development, had on state policies. With a brief phase of
interruption, the joint efort of publishers and ministerial bureaucrats con-
tributed to keeping the book trade intact over the course of the war and
marked a starting point for a new form of cooperation mutually beneftting
both groups of actors in the following decade.

The business with foreign books

It did not take long after the start of the First World War for the events
in Europe to impact on the Japanese publishing industry. A  decrease in
paper imports caused an extreme rise in paper prices which threatened the
livelihood of many publishers, including those engaged with foreign publi-
cations. The latter included both the translation business and the importa-
tion of literature – written primarily in German, English, or French. As a
result of the high paper prices that afected the entire industry, the num-
ber of translations between 1914 and 1918 as recorded in the 100-Year
History of Japanese Publishing shows a decrease from 283 translations a
year in 1914 to 116 in 1915 to only 60 in 1916.9 Japan’s largest publish-
ing association, the Tōkyō Booksellers and Publishers’ Association (Tōkyō
Shosekishō Kumiai), which had been founded in 1887 “to act as a media-
tor between the publishers and the state as well as society in order to pro-
mote culture”, thereupon enacted a price increase of books which was
decided at a board meeting of the association on 5 February 1916.10 Fur-
thermore, the association laid down the rules of fxed book prices which
were to be decided by the association’s members.11 Despite this provision,
the situation around the rising paper prices continued to worsen, so that
in early 1917 a committee of several diferent publishers’ associations was
established and in a joint efort addressed a petition to the House of Repre-
sentatives to assist in the matter. When this remained unsuccessful, Tōkyō’s
publishers sought the cooperation of two more associations from Ōsaka
and wrote another petition to the House of Representatives. Thereafter,
 Impact on Japan’s foreign book market 33
several ministers, including the Minister of Agriculture and Commerce,
and the head of the Home Ministry’s Book Division, Horikiri Zenjirō
(1884–1979), visited the publishers to get a clearer idea of the situation.
Equally difcult circumstances had developed regarding uncontrolled
increases in rice prices. Being convinced of the gravity of the situation for
the Japanese public, the government responded by enforcing a Profteering
Control Ordinance (Bōri torishimari rei)12 on 1 September  1917 aiming
to limit the uncontrolled increase of proft and keep traders from holding
back commodities in order to make excessive profts.13 The introduction of
the usury law, to which the publishers had contributed with their persistent
petitioning, proved efective when in 1917 the number of translations rose
again to 113 a year.14
While the entire industry was struggling with the paper import shortages,
those publishers engaged in the foreign book trade or more specifcally in
the import of Western magazines and books were additionally challenged by
the war.15 Universities and other research institutions, as well as bookstores,
individual publishers, and publishing houses with a thematic focus on West-
ern works were used to placing large orders of scientifc books with foreign
publishing houses or literary agents. At the forefront of the Japanese book
import industry was the publishing house Maruzen. It had been co-founded
by the reform philosopher Fukuzawa Yukichi (1835–1901) in 1869 and
quickly became renowned for its imports and translations of Western litera-
ture and books on enlightenment.16
Since 1900, Maruzen was led by publisher Oyaizu Kaname17 (1844–
1922), who was simultaneously the president of the Tōkyō Booksellers’ and
Publishers’ Association.18 Born in 1844 as the oldest son of a vassal to the
Okazaki feudal domain in Mikawa province in today’s Aichi Prefecture,
Oyaizu was schooled amongst others at the Kaiseijo, a school for Western
learning established by the Edo bakufu in 1863 which ofered lectures in
Western geography, natural as well as military sciences and history, with
another main focus on the teaching of English, French, and German. By the
time the Boshin War broke out in 1868, Oyaizu had mastered the English
language with excellent results and through his education had opened his
own window to the West. After the war, Oyaizu enrolled in the Daigaku
Nankō, a forerunner of the Tōkyō Imperial University and from there trans-
ferred to Fukuzawa Yukichi’s private Keiō Academy.19 After a brief career
as an English teacher at the English School of Yanagawa, in January 1873,
Oyaizu decided to join the publishing house Yokohama Maruya Shōsha
(since 1880 Maruzen Shōsha, henceforth Maruzen).20 For Oyaizu, this pub-
lishing house provided an ideal platform to combine his gift for the English
language with Meiji Japan’s rapidly expanding trade business. His skills as
a young publisher were quickly recognised, as in 1877 he was promoted to
lead the Ōsaka branch ofce. Five years later, he was put in charge of the
Tōkyō head ofce where he devoted himself entirely to the import of works
from Europe and the United States of America.21
34 Maj Hartmann
Since its founding in the early Meiji period, Maruzen had supplied many
state schools as well as the ministries with Western scientifc works in new
technology, medicine, army, law, politics, and economics, and when the war
broke out in Europe, Oyaizu had no intention of stopping his imports from
Europe. For example, on 8 December  1915, Oyaizu ordered 220 copies
of William Cunningham’s Modern Civilization in Some of Its Economic
Aspects from UK bookseller Allen & Unwin with the stated intention “for
the class use from the beginning of April”.22 Further orders were placed
throughout the war with UK bookseller Asher & Co.23 In comparison with
importing British or French books, the ongoing importation of German
books, which made up a majority of the orders from abroad, was more
complicated.

Book imports and the “Trading with the Enemy Act”

In August  1914, the UK government announced “The Trading with the
Enemy Act”, which banned trade with any persons living in enemy territory.
At this point, trade via neutral countries remained unafected, as did activi-
ties with persons or companies based in Great Britain acting under British
law who conducted business with companies in enemy territory.24 As histo-
rian Morohashi Eiichi has demonstrated, the war between diferent states,
on the one hand, and people’s individual businesses including the publishing
business, on the other hand, were at the beginning of the war perceived as
separate things.25 Yet, as an ally of Britain, Japanese publishers decided to
henceforth order a large number of German books and periodicals via the
Netherlands from the bookseller Martinus Nijhof in order not to violate
British law.26 By doing so, the publishers avoided any direct negative impact
of the “Trading with the Enemy Act” of 1914.
The situation became increasingly difcult in March 1915 with the UK
government’s proclamation of an extension to their previous Act as a reac-
tion to Germany’s frst declaration of unrestricted submarine warfare. The
Navy was commanded to henceforth stop all goods going in and out of Ger-
many. Prior to the First World War, the confscation of neutral trade goods
and neutral ships had only been recognised by International Law if they
included dangerous or forbidden goods from a belligerent power as stated
in the 1856 Treaty of Paris and the 1909 London Declaration concerning
the Laws of Naval War.27 The UK government ignored these proclamations
by starting to confscate all goods leaving Germany. However, until the end
of 1915, the trade of German goods via neutral countries had still been pos-
sible. While the French government at this point already forbade any kind of
business with enemy subjects in connection with the trade partner’s nation-
ality, the British government still allowed trade depending on where the
trade partner lived. In December 1915, Britain changed its rules under pres-
sure from the French government and the public and on 23 December 1915
announced “The Trading with the Enemy (Extension of Powers) Act 1915”
 Impact on Japan’s foreign book market 35
which prohibited persons in the United Kingdom from trading with any
person in foreign countries who either was of enemy nationality or believed
to be associated with the enemy in any way.28 The Act was amended once
again in February 1916 with a Statutory List which included the names of
all companies and persons in diferent countries who were blacklisted and
thereby regarded as illegal trade partners.29
As soon as the publishers in Japan realised the impact of the March 1915
anti-German proclamation when their books and magazines were not deliv-
ered, publisher Oyaizu Kaname, on 11 September 1915, petitioned Prime
Minister Ōkuma Shigenobu, who was also Foreign Minister,30 to complain
that even the import of German goods via neutral countries had become
close to impossible and the hitherto easiest way of payment in UK currency
a lot more difcult. The curtailment of books from Germany thus impacted
not only the Japanese publishers at quite an early stage in the war due to the
increasing lack of paper, but with Maruzen having been the main supplier
of academic and other non-fction works from the West, the general public
was also afected as books for schools and ministries could no longer be
imported.
When asked about his personal experiences of the First World War, the
philosopher Miki Kiyoshi stated that he did not recall the war having any
particular psychological infuence on him. This, he believed, not only applied
to him, but to many other young people at the time as well. However, one
experience that did impact Miki was the importation of German books.

There was also the argument that Japanese scholarship would decline
if German books were unavailable due to the war. Some scholars
expressed so publicly which became a fairly serious problem, but I think
most scholars thought that way in their hearts. In any case, the only
direct impact of World War I was the lack of German books.31

Considering the direct impact of the import embargo on educational insti-

tutions, Oyaizu found himself under a lot of pressure, not only fnancially
but also because he could not process his clients’ orders. In his petition, he
wrote that books should be treated diferently from general goods in that
they were the source of knowledge from abroad. In this time of war, he fur-
ther elaborated, the exchange of knowledge was even more important and
therefore, the importation of publicly known works that would not pose a
danger to the nation should be allowed.32
This was not the frst time Oyaizu reached out to the ministerial bureau-
crats to make a case for the publishing industry. A similar argument had
been used almost two decades earlier when he petitioned concerning the
government’s plans to accede to the so-called Berne Convention for the Pro-
tection of Literary and Artistic Works, a multilateral copyright treaty that
had been established by mainly European nations in 1886. Japan’s ratifca-
tion of this international copyright treaty in 1899 had prevented publishers
36 Maj Hartmann
specialised in the importation and translation of foreign works from access-
ing the free sources of other member states of the Berne Convention, includ-
ing many of the European dominant literature export nations of the time
like France, England, and Germany. At the time, Oyaizu, in the name of the
Tōkyō Booksellers and Publishers’ Association, addressed numerous writ-
ten opinions and petitions to the Tōkyō Chamber of Commerce as well as
directly to the Home Ministry. He argued that Japan had only developed
as fast as it had over the past 30–40 years since the opening of the country
due to the importation of knowledge from Western countries and that the
planned adherence to the treaty would “hinder the spread and development
of general knowledge” (bun’un no hattatsu shinpo o gai suru) as well as the
circulation of new academic theories made available through translations of
research excerpts.33 He argued that Japanese publishers had used the knowl-
edge they gained for the purpose of “civilizational progress” (bun’un no
hattatsu) in Japan as well as for diplomatic purposes, an area which was
under threat if the Japanese government joined the international treaty.34
The immediate impact of Oyaizu’s petitions was the establishment of a
mutual investigation committee between members of the industry and min-
isterial bureaucrats enquiring into and discussing the publisher’s concerns.
What Oyaizu’s petitions of the late 1890s and during the First World War
had in common was the “development” of Japan. It was hoped that this
argument would spark an interest among the ministerial bureaucrats who
wanted to introduce to Japan the newest technologies and knowledge of
the West. Even though progress of the country was of concern to publish-
ing entrepreneurs like Oyaizu schooled in Western learning and who had a
sincere interest in modernising Japan to be on par with the European states,
it can be assumed that his primary interest lay in the proft he gained from
translating and importing foreign works; a feld of business that he saw
endangered, previously by the government’s plans to accede to the interna-
tional copyright treaty and now by the developments brought about by the
war.
Oyaizu’s petition to Ōkuma Shigenobu in 1915 would be one of the last
actions of the 72-year-old publisher as president of Maruzen. He was suc-
ceeded by Nakamura Shigehisa35 in 1916. Ōkuma Shigenobu reacted to
Oyaizu’s petition within three days by asking the Japanese ambassador to
Britain, Inoue Katsunosuke (1861–1929), to consult with the representa-
tives of the Yokohama Specie Bank (Yokohama Shōkin Ginkō)36 regard-
ing the transfer of money in connection with German book imports. The
matter was then passed on to the Vice-Minister of Finance within less than
a month to start negotiations regarding the fnancial aspects of importing
German publications. However, the Finance Ministry found itself in an
unprecedented situation, and the publishers were left in the dark. It took
until 24 January 1916 for Inoue Katsunosuke to receive a reply from the
British Foreign Ofce regarding the possibility of importing German books
under the condition that they were of a “philosophical, scientifc, technical
 Impact on Japan’s foreign book market 37
or educational character only”.37 If institutions in Japan wished to make
use of this facility, a special permit would be needed for which the British
government frst requested the submission of a list of books including the
number of cases, total value and the port of shipment.38
Oyaizu’s petition had thus helped create a way for Japanese publishers
wishing to import books from enemy territory to circumvent the “Trading
with the Enemy Extension Act” of 1915. Maruzen thereupon made a formal
application to the Japanese Foreign Ofce in which it referred to the licences
that British booksellers Asher  & Co, Henry Sotheran  & Co, and others
had been issued by the British Ministry of Trade. The application read that
these publishers had been permitted to obtain German books, which is why
Maruzen hoped it would be granted a licence “on similar conditions”.39

Defcits in the existing information networks

Even though a small window of opportunity had opened up for Maruzen
and other publishing houses like Kanehara and Nankōdō, which specialised
in medical science publications and were likewise waiting for shipments of
German books, the receipt of updated information regarding their trade
intentions continued to pose a real challenge.40 This lack of information
had, on the one hand, to do with the fact that the Japanese government
itself was under a lot of pressure from the British government and was not
able to simply approve the direct transfer of goods between the publish-
ing houses and the foreign trade partners. On 5 February 1916, the British
Under-Secretary of State at the Foreign Ofce, Maurice de Bunsen, wrote
to Inoue Katsunosuke, reminding him that the Japanese government ought
to exercise “a careful check on the applications presented eliminating all
those in respect of works which are not urgently required or of a character
to justify an exemption in their favour being made”, as the British gov-
ernment under no circumstances wanted to encourage the German export
trade.41 A preselection of the companies and books to be imported thus had
to be made before an ofcial application for an import permit. In fact, in
pre-1945 Japan, it was generally still difcult for private organisations or
businesses to directly receive any trade-related information from abroad.42
In order to facilitate communication, networks for the collection of infor-
mation were established at foreign institutions with the help of the Japa-
nese government. These collection points included small- and medium-sized
industrialists, lobby associations, ministries, embassies, regional communi-
ties, and the various Chambers of Commerce that were all linked to each
other. The data was then not simply passed on to the citizens, but was col-
lected by the government at the request of the Japanese institutions.43 How-
ever, while the Great War and the efects of the British government’s import
embargo of German goods played an important part in the considerations
of the Tōkyō Chamber of Commerce, the difculties experienced by the
publishing houses Maruzen, Kanehara, and Nankōdō might have been too
38 Maj Hartmann
minor for the Chamber to deal with. The result was that the publishers had
to turn to other channels to receive updated information which itself was
not easy to obtain.44
The limited trade-related information that did fnd its way to govern-
ment institutions was rarely passed to the publishing houses, as can be seen
in the communication around a notifcation concerning “Cautions to Be
Taken against Trading with the Enemy” proclaimed by the British Board of
Trade in 1916.45 On 27 June 1916, British Foreign Ofce Assistant Under-
Secretary of State Eyre A. Crowe (1864–1925) passed on this notifcation
together with a letter to the Director of the Bureau of Commercial Afairs in
the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Afairs. They advised foreign newspapers
in Japan to henceforth take precautions regarding their dealings with frms
in neutral countries, as there had been incidents of neutral countries making
themselves agents for the supply of enemy goods. Crowe added that he had
not sent this notice to the Japanese papers because,

I thought that perhaps they would not quite understand the applicabil-
ity of it, and the necessity for caution, as the notice is one which was
really issued for the beneft of people in the United Kingdom.46

While Japanese newspapers in comparison with their foreign newspaper

colleagues were originally not targeted as part of the government’s caution-
ary advice, publishing houses as trade actors were not even on the radar,
leaving the publishers in the dark about the newest trade-related develop-
ments in Europe.
The information regarding the necessary caution in trading with neutral
countries reached the publishers only in February  1917 when the British
Embassy in Tōkyō contacted the newly appointed Foreign Minister Motono
Ichirō (1862–1918), stating that it had been “found necessary to take meas-
ures to prevent publications from being utilized, as has frequently been the
case in the past, to convey secret information to neutral countries”.47 Pub-
lishers were now asked to provide not only the title of the required books
but also the purpose of usage.
The lack of an established information network with regard to import-
related uncertainties and the confusion of whom to approach concerning
these matters also showed in the direct communication between Maruzen
and diferent government institutions. On 14 September 1916, a little over a
year since Oyaizu Kaname had originally contacted Prime Minister Ōkuma
Shigenobu with his petition to facilitate the importation of books from
Europe, British Vice-Consul GH Phipps48 wrote to Maruzen:

In my letter of May 22nd last, I informed you that the question of the

importation into Japan by your frm of certain German scientifc works
was being referred to His Britannic Majesty’s Secretary of State for For-
eign Afairs. A reply has now been received from the latter to the efect
 Impact on Japan’s foreign book market 39
that the proper channel for your application is the Imperial Japanese
Foreign Ofce and the Japanese Embassy in London. As you stated in
your letter of May 31st that you had already sent in your application to
the Foreign Ofce in Tokyo, I have no doubt but that you will receive a
reply in due course.49

However, information travelled slowly and matters were additionally

impeded by the frequent change of personnel in the diferent ministries. In
October 1916, the publishers received support from the head of the Tōkyō
Imperial University and Japan’s frst professor of physics, Yamakawa Kenjirō
(1854–1931), who took the initiative to write to Vice Foreign Minister Shi-
dehara Kijūrō (1872–1951) asking the Foreign Ministry, in the name of his
university, to negotiate with the British government so that in the future
magazines and books addressed to employees of his university would be
delivered without being confscated.50

The resumption of book imports

The beginning of 1917 fnally saw some changes for publishers still waiting
for their shipments of German books and magazines via the Netherlands.
Maruzen alone had ordered a total of 635 German newspapers and maga-
zines in 1916 from Martinus Nijhof which had still not been shipped for
fear of them being confscated by the British government.51 On 21 Febru-
ary  1917, the British Consul-General in Yokoyama was informed by the
British Commercial Attaché that as a result of the Paris Economic Confer-
ence, held from 14 June 1916, development of intermediary trade between
Great Britain and Japan was to be facilitated. The British government thus
decided to compile a list “of the more important frms in Japan which”
were “already buying British goods or may wish to buy them, or which”
were “exporting goods to the United Kingdom”.52 In preparation for the
Paris Economic Conference, Maruzen had already been placed on a list of
non-enemy British and Japanese frms which could function as substitutes
for those frms named on the statutory list. The publishing house was listed
and thus recommended in the “Booksellers” section.53
Maruzen’s president Nakamura Shigehisa wrote several more petitions to
the Trade Department of the Japanese Foreign Ministry asking the bureau-
crats to mediate until eventually in July 1917 a reply came from the British
Foreign Ofce. The desire of Maruzen to obtain a permit to import, from
the Netherlands, a consignment of German periodicals had been granted by
the UK government on condition that the books were “sent directly from
Holland to Japan and are not brought to the United Kingdom for tran-
shipment”.54 While some of the confscated parcels were untraceably lost, a
shipment of 1,300 packets of books and magazines ordered in 1916 from
Germany via Holland reached Maruzen in 1918.55 Other orders which had
been placed during the war had to be cancelled as the educational institutions
40 Maj Hartmann
that needed them as class texts had no more use for the books due to the
extended lapse of time since the orders were placed.56
The mutual wartime efort between politicians and ministerial bureau-
crats, like Ōkuma Shigenobu and Katō Takaaki, private publishers like
Oyaizu Kaname and his successors, and also academics like Yamakawa
Kenjirō, in maintaining international cooperation in the book trade in gen-
eral heralded the trend of the following decade where traditional diplomacy
conducted by a small privileged class of people gave way to an increasingly
internationally orientated politics that incorporated the opinion of the citi-
zens.57 Despite the fact that the war was coming to its end by the time that
Maruzen received a permit to continue importing German books, the per-
sistency of individual publishers and their success in being able to continue
importing books despite international state policies hindering them shows
their increasing importance and infuence in political decision-making.

Post-war developments
Throughout the following years, bureaucrats increasingly reached out to
the private sector for assistance. By the end of the war, the new reading
middle class had frmly established itself in society which resulted in the
establishment of more than 300 new publishing houses between 1920 and
1929 alone.58 The large output of literary works in combination with the
emergence of mass media including radio and the expansion and improved
technology of flm brought the world and its intellectual workers closer than
ever. Consequently, cooperation between state and non-state actors further
expanded with ministerial bureaucrats becoming even more dependent on
the input and cooperation of private industry.
Among the administrative changes brought about by the end of the war
was, for example, the establishment and activities of a Police Training Centre
(Keisatsu Kōshūjo) that was announced in Imperial Edict 155 in May 1918
heralding a new post-war order in Japan.59 The Centre’s establishment was
ordered by Home Minister Gotō Shinpei (1857–1929) and was a direct
response to the happenings and outcomes of the war with new potential
dangers including social movements, communism, bolshevism, and social-
ism entering the country  – oftentimes via the road of publications  – and
the inability of the state to keep itself updated and informed on the rapidly
changing and increasingly international world around them.60 The aim of
the Centre was to school a number of selected bureaucrats from, amongst
others, the Home Ministry and its Police Department (Keiho-kyoku) as
well as the Foreign Ministry in diferent felds that were adapted over the
course of the decade.61 The police lectures constituted an attempt by the
state bureaucrats to keep control over the post-war changes by strengthen-
ing cooperation between higher civil servants and citizens of the private
sector.62 By the end of the decade, the Police Training Centre’s list of invited
 Impact on Japan’s foreign book market 41
expert speakers included high-ranking publishers who schooled the ministe-
rial bureaucrats on diferent areas related to publishing.63
In addition to the Police Training Centre, the decade saw an increase in
the cooperation between publishers and ministerial bureaucrats in preparing
for an international revision conference of the Berne Convention in 1928.
In preparation for the conference, the bureaucrats in charge commissioned
extensive studies with the help of the publishing industry which they used to
compile their ofcial report that was shared with the copyright community.
The importance of the publishers’ opinion on state policymaking thus did
not decrease after the First World War, but rather continued to strengthen
in the interwar years.

Conclusion
A closer look at the Japanese publishing entrepreneurs involved with for-
eign book trade during the First World War reveals the political impact they
had on a national and international level. United through their publishers’
associations, they made use of diferent channels including petitions, writ-
ten opinions, and private consultations to bring forward their specifc needs
and wishes to the political decision-makers. The fndings here suggest that
the ministerial bureaucrats displayed a high level of response to the requests
and wishes of the publishing industry. The publishers thus made themselves,
and their plans to continue book imports and translations, heard in the
ministerial ofces and lastly – and in close cooperation with the ministerial
bureaucrats – managed to succeed in receiving support not only from the
Japanese state but also from the international community.
The role of the ministerial bureaucrats in these processes was likewise
signifcant, in that they ensured the concerns of the publishers reached the
correct contact persons within the government. Political historian Shimizu
Yuichirō wrote about late Meiji and Taishō Japanese bureaucrats who
combined diferent structures in order to cope with their task to modernise
Japan. According to Shimizu, these structures included “control and par-
ticipation, competition and cooperation, general and private intentions”.64
With regard to the continuity of the book trade during the First World War,
the bureaucrats did exactly that: they were in control, but at the same time
began to participate at the level of the publishers or sought the participation
of the publishers, as Japan, on its way to be recognised as one of the “Five
Great Powers”, was relying on book imports from abroad.
Previous studies on the First World War have neglected the networks that
were established between publishers involved with foreign publications and
the ministerial bureaucrats who were dependent on the work of the pub-
lishers and in charge of handling their concerns in order to get access to
foreign knowledge. A better understanding of these networks contributes to
bringing to light the cooperation and forums of exchange that were set up
42 Maj Hartmann
between publishers and the state in the following decade, and that – as this
chapter has shown – were in reality built upon structures that had been laid
much earlier.

Notes
1 Mary Hammond and Shafquat Towheed, Publishing in the First World War:
Essays in Book History (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007).
2 Edward Mack, Manufacturing Modern Japanese Literature: Publishing, Prizes,
and the Ascription of Literary Value (Durham: Duke University Press, 2010),
p. 35.
3 Ibid., p. 37.
4 Ibid., p.  19; Peter Kornicki, The Book in Japan: A  Cultural History from the
Beginnings to the Nineteenth Century (Leiden: Brill, 1998).
5 Japan’s feudal military government between 1600 and 1868.
6 Giles Richter, “Marketing the Word: Publishing Entrepreneurs in Meiji Japan,
1870–1912” (PhD dissertation, Colombia University, New York, 1999), p. 67;
Mack, Manufacturing Modern Japanese Literature, p. 32.
7 Giles Richter, “Entrepreneurship and Culture: The Hakubunkan Publishing
Empire in Meiji Japan” in Helen Hardacre (ed.), New Directions in the Study of
Meiji Japan (Leiden: Brill, 1997), p. 591.
8 Regine Mathias, “Reading for Culture” in Senri Ethnological Studies, vol. 28,
1990, p. 114; Mack, Manufacturing Modern Japanese Literature, p. 18; see also
the debate between Peter Kornicki and Richard Rubinger regarding the problems
that arise with defning literacy in early modern Japan: Peter Kornicki, “Literacy
Revisited: Some Refections on Richard Rubinger’s Findings” in Monumenta
Nipponica, vol. 56, no. 3, Autumn 2003, pp. 381–295; Richard Rubinger, “Who
Can’t Read and Write? Illiteracy in Meiji Japan” in Monumenta Nipponica, vol.
55, no. 2, Summer 2000, pp. 163–198.
9 Nihon Shoseki Shuppan Kyōkai (ed.), Nihon shuppan 100nenshi nenpyō (A
100-Year History Chronology of Japan’s Publishing) (Tōkyō: Nihon Shoseki
Shuppan Kyōkai, 1968), pp. 302, 308, 316.
10 Tōkyō Shosekishō Kumiai (ed.), Tōkyō Shosekishō Kumiai 50nenshi (50  Year
History of the Tōkyō Booksellers and Publishers’ Association) (Tōkyō: Tōkyō
Shosekishō Kumiai, 1937), p. 1.
11 Ōkubo Hisao, Shuppan, shosekishō jinbutsu jōhō taikan: Shōwa shoki (Infor-
mation Overview of People Engaged in Publishing and Bookselling) (Kanazawa:
Kanazawa Bunpokaku, 2008; Reprint of Nihon Shuppan Taikan (Overview of
Japanese Publishing) (Tōkyō: Shuppan Taimususha, 1930), pp.  33–34; Tōkyō
Shosekishō Kumiai, Tōkyō Shosekishō Kumiai 50nenshi, pp. 149–150.
12 Bōri torishimari rei, Ordinance No.20/1917, issued by the Teraguchi govern-
ment. On the anti-profteering legislation, see also Morohashi Eiichi, “Daiichiji
sekai taisen to zeizaisei seisaku: sōryokusen ni okeru senji ritokusei no dōnyū to
sono igi” (The First World War and Fiscal Policy: The Introduction and Signif-
cance of the Wartime Capital Gains Tax in Total War) in Shigaku Zasshi, vol.
125, no. 8, 2016, pp. 1395–1419.
13 Ōkubo Hisao (ed.), Senzen Tōkyō-Ōsaka shuppan gyōshi dai-1kan (Prewar His-
tory of the Tōkyō-Ōsaka Publishing Industry vol. 1) (Kanazawa: Kanazawa Bun-
pokaku, 2008), pp. 49–50, 77.
14 Nihon Shoseki Shuppan Kyōkai, Nihon shuppan 100nenshi nenpyō, pp.  302,
308, 316.
15 Japan’s book trade from the Meiji Restoration until the end of the First World
War was mainly a one-sided importation of books. There were, however, some
 Impact on Japan’s foreign book market 43
exceptions of two-sided interactivity in the exchange of written works that
existed prior to the First World War in the government and education sectors.
The Science Faculty of the Tōkyō Imperial University for example was itself
engaged in a regular exchange with foreign universities, libraries, and research
institutes. The trade deals consisted of the university sending its Journal of the
College of Science to the foreign institutions in exchange for receiving recently
published dissertations, journals, or books from their counterparts. When the
war broke out in 1914, the book exchange with German research institutions
came to an abrupt halt, which afected the exchange of the latest research results
among the diferent educational institutions until the relationships were taken
up again in the early 1920s. Gaimushō Bunka Jigyōbu (ed.), Kokusai bunka
kōryū no genjō to tenbō (Current State and Prospects of International Cultural
Exchange) (Tōkyō: Ōkurashō Insatsukyoku, 1972), p.  8; Gaimushō Gaikō
Shiryōkan (Diplomatic Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Afairs, henceforth
GGS), “Tōkyō teikoku daigaku rigakubu shuppan gakujutsu kenkyū hōkoku to
gaikoku sho gakkai no shuppanbutsu to kōkanhō dōgaku sōchō yori mōshide
no ken” (Regarding the Proposal of the Rector of the Tōkyō Imperial University
Concerning the Methods of Exchange of Scientifc Research Reports between the
Tōkyō Imperial University’s Faculty of Science and the Publications of Foreign
Academic Associations) in Tosho kōkan kankei zakken dai-4 kan (Various Mat-
ters Regarding the Exchange of Publications, vol. 4), April–August, 1923, Ajia
Rekishi Shiryō Sentā (Japan Centre for Asian Historical Records, URL: www.
jacar.go.jp, henceforth: JACAR, Ref: B13080883100, 0486–0512.
16 Yoshiko Tomizawa, ed., Oyaizu Kaname tsuien (Following the Life of Oyaizu
Kaname) (Tōkyō: Tomizawa Yoshiko, 1978), p. 6.
17 The two most detailed of the few existing bibliographic sources on Oyaizu Kan-
ame include Tomizawa, Oyaizu Kaname tsuien, as well as a publication in com-
memoration of the deceased Oyaizu Kaname published by the Tōkyō Shoseki
Kabushikigaisha, a publishing house where Oyaizu had held active functions in
the managing board from the time of its establishment in 1903: Tōkyō Shoseki
Kabushikigaisha (ed.), Bukkō yakuin nami kōrōsha tsuitō kinen (Commemora-
tion of Deceased Ofcers and Distinguished Persons) (Tōkyō: Tōkyō Shoseki,
1931).
18 Tōkyō Shosekishō Kumiai, Tōkyō Shosekishō Kumiai 50nenshi, p. 1.
19 Tōkyō Shoseki Kabushikigaisha, Bukkō yakuin nami kōrōsha tsuitō kinen,
p. 14.
20 Maruzen published a detailed company history on the occasion of its 100-year
history. See Maruzen kabushiki-gaisha (ed.), Maruzen 100nenshi: Nihon kin-
daika no ayumi to tomo ni 1–3 (The 100 Year History of Maruzen: With the
Progress of Japan’s Modernisation) (Tōkyō: Maruzen, 1980/1981). A brief his-
toric timeline of Maruzen’s development is available in English online: “About
Us: History”, Maruzen-Yushodo, accessed 23 September 2019, https://yushodo.
maruzen.co.jp/corp/en/aboutus/history.html.
21 Fujii Shōtō, “Oyaizu Kaname-shi” (Oyaizu Kaname) in Shin Nihon, vol. 6, no.
11, November 1913, p. 39.
22 Letter from Maruzen Company to Allen & Unwin, 8 December 1915, Collection
of George Allen & Unwin Ltd.: Correspondence fles AU FSC 20/129 (accession
number MS 3282), University of Reading, The Archive of British Publishing and
Printing Reading Sources.
23 Letter from Asher & Co to Maruzen, in Ōshū sensō no keizai bōeki ni oyobosu
eikyō hōkoku zakken – Eikoku seifu ni oite yūbinbutsu ōshū ikken (Report on
the Impact of the Great War on Economic and Trade Matters – A Case of the
British State Post Ofce), 20 April  1916, GGS, JACAR, Ref. B11100547500,
0058.
44 Maj Hartmann
24 John McDermot, “Trading with the Enemy: British Business and the Law
During the First World War” in Canadian Journal of History, vol. 32, no. 2,
August 1997, pp. 204–205.
25 Morohashi Eiichi, “Daiichiji sekai taisen ki no taiteki torihiki kinshi seisaku to
Nihon” (Japan and the Trading with the Enemy Policy During the First World
War) in Kokusai Buki Iten-shi, vol. 4 (History of Global Arms Transfer, vol. 4),
July 2017, p. 118.
26 A collection of sources from publisher Martinus Nijhof can be found at the
Community Archive in Den Haag (Haags Gemeentearchief). Unfortunately,
research at the archive revealed that there are no remaining documents for the
years between 1908 and 1926.
27 Morohashi, “Daiichiji sekai taisen ki no taiteki torihiki kinshi seisaku”, p. 119,
cited after Kazuhito Kentarō, “Dentōteki kokusaihō ni okeru tekisen, tekika
hōkaku no seitōka konkyo (2 kan)” (The Justifcation Grounds in Traditional
International Law for Seizing Enemy Ships and Goods) in Ōsaka Hōgaku, vol.
64, no. 5, 2015, pp. 1119–1160.
28 Lassa Oppenheim, International Law – A Treatise, vol. 1 – Peace (New York:
Longmans, Green and Co., 1920), p. 122; Eiichi, “Daiichiji sekai taisen ki no
taiteki torihiki kinshi seisaku”, p. 119.
29 Frauke Lachenmann and Rüdiger Wolfrum (eds.), The Law of Armed Confict
and the Use of Force – The Max Planck Encyclopedia of Public International
Law (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017), p. 1221.
30 Ōkuma Shigenobu entered his second term as Prime Minister in April 1914 with
Katō Takaaki, the chief proponent of the Twenty-One Demands, as his Foreign
Minister. Since the beginning of the First World War, Katō had excluded the
genrō from his foreign policymaking which led to continuous confict with the
latter who tried to evict him from cabinet. When in March 1915, Katō’s party,
the Rikken Dōshikai, won the elections, Katō was certain of his personal victory
and support by the majority of the Diet to create his own cabinet as future prime
minister. Based upon the political calculation  – as it turned out wrong –that
as head of the frst party in the Diet the genrō would have to nominate him as
the successor of Ōkuma, Katō consequently resigned from cabinet to establish
some distance between himself and the existent cabinet. This decision resulted in
Ōkuma having to temporarily take on the position as Foreign Minister in addi-
tion to being Prime Minister between August and October 1915. Frederick R.
Dickinson, War and National Reinvention – Japan in the Great War, 1914–1919
(Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999), pp. 84–116.
31 Yamamuro Shin’ichi, Fukugō sensō to sōryokusen no dansō – Nihon ni totte no
daiichiji sekai taisen (Faultline Between Complex and Total War – World War
I from the Perspective of Japan) (Kyōto: Jinbun Shoin, 2011).
32 “Chinjōsho: Doitsu koku no shuppanbutsu (shoseki oyobi zasshi rui) yu’nyū
ni kan suru ken” (Petition: Matters Concerning the Import of German Publica-
tions (Books and Magazines)), in Ōshū sensō no keizai bōeki ni oyobosu eikyō
hōkoku zakken  – Eikoku seifu ni oite yūbinbutsu ōshū ikken (Report on the
Impact of the Great War on Economic and Trade Matters – A Case of the Brit-
ish State Post Ofce), 11 September 1915, GGS, JACAR, Ref. B11100547500,
0016–0017.
33 Ibid., p. 86.
34 Ibid.
35 Life dates unknown.
36 The Yokohama Specie Bank was a semi-state owned Japanese foreign trade bank
that existed from 1880 until 1947 when it was reorganised under SCAP into the
Tōkyō Ginkō.
 Impact on Japan’s foreign book market 45
37 Letter from British Foreign Ofce to Japanese Ambassador Inoue Katsunosuke,
in Ōshū sensō no keizai bōeki ni oyobosu eikyō hōkoku zakken – Eikoku seifu
ni oite yūbinbutsu ōshū ikken (Report on the Impact of the Great War on Eco-
nomic and Trade Matters  – A  Case of the British State Post Ofce), 24 Janu-
ary 1916, GGS, JACAR, Ref. B11100547600, 0151.
38 Ibid.
39 Letter from the British Embassy Tōkyō to Foreign Trade Ofce, in Foreign Ofce
and Foreign and Commonwealth Ofce: Embassy and Consulates, Japan: Gen-
eral Correspondence, 7 June 1916, The National Archives (TNA): Foreign Ofce
FO 262/1236.
40 Book order lists from various publishing houses, in Ōshū sensō no keizai bōeki
ni oyobosu eikyō hōkoku zakken – Eikoku seifu ni oite yūbinbutsu ōshū ikken
(Report on the Impact of the Great War on Economic and Trade Matters  –
A Case of Postal Seizure by the British Government), May 1916, GGS, JACAR,
Ref. B11100547700.
41 Letter from UK Under-Secretary of State of the British Foreign Ofce Maurice
de Bunsen, in Ōshū sensō no keizai bōeki ni oyobosu eikyō hōkoku zakken –
Eikoku seifu ni oite yūbinbutsu ōshū ikken (idem.), February  5, 1916, GGS,
JACAR, Ref. B11100547600, 0149.
42 Matsumoto Takanori (ed.), Senzenki Nihon no bōeki to soshikikan kankei  –
jōhō, chōsei, kyōchō (Pre-war Japan’s Trade and Inter-Organisational Rela-
tions: Information, Regulation, and Cooperation) (Tōkyō: Shinhyōron, 1996),
pp. 31–32.
43 Ibid., pp. 31–32.
44 The Tōkyō Chambers of Commerce, until 1890 active via its two predecessors,
the Chambers of Commercial Law (Shōhō Kaigisho) and the Tōkyō Association
of Commerce and Industry (Tōkyō Shōkōkai), was frst established in 1878 in
the cities of Tōkyō, Ōsaka, and Kanda with the goal to develop and promote
trade and industry. Over the next four years new chambers emerged all over the
country and by 1882, the number had risen from 3 to 36. The chambers were
the frst economic organisations of their kind in Japan and served as a forum for
communication and interaction between its members with the aim of facilitating
confict resolution. Another main strength of the chambers was their ability to
exert pressure on the ministries and on political decisions in the form of peti-
tions. While they received fnancial aid from the state, the founding of the cham-
bers had not been the result of an ordinance “from above”, but had derived from
the initiative of infuential merchants and industrialists. Matsumoto, Senzenki
Nihon no bōeki to soshikikan kankei, pp. 276–278.
45 “Taiteki tsūshō ni kan suru Eikoku seifu kōkoku” (Announcement by the Brit-
ish Government Concerning Enemy Trade), in Ōshū sensō no keizai bōeki ni
oyobosu eikyō hōkoku zakken  – Eikokujin to no tsūshō kinshi ni kan suru
ken dai-2kan (Report on the Impact of the Great War on Economic and Trade
Matters – Matters Concerning the Prohibition of Trade with Enemy Nationals,
vol. 2), 27 June 1916, GGS, JACAR, Ref. B11100279800, 0270.
46 Ibid.
47 Letter from British Embassy Tōkyō to Foreign Minister Motono Ichirō, in Ōshū
sensō no keizai bōeki ni oyobosu eikyō hōkoku zakken – Eikoku seifu ni oite
yūbinbutsu ōshū ikken (Report on the Impact of the Great War on Economic
and Trade Matters – A Case of the British State Post Ofce), 17 February 1917,
GGS, JACAR, Ref. B11100547800, 0349–0350.
48 Life dates unknown.
49 Letter from British Vice-Consul to Maruzen, in Ōshū sensō no keizai bōeki ni
oyobosu eikyō hōkoku zakken  – Eikoku seifu ni oite yūbinbutsu ōshū ikken
46 Maj Hartmann
(idem.), (received) 14 September  1916, GGS, JACAR, Ref. B11100547600,
0145.
50 Letter from Yamakawa Kenjirō to Shidehara Kijūrō, in Ōshū sensō no keizai
bōeki ni oyobosu eikyō hōkoku zakken – Eikoku seifu ni oite yūbinbutsu ōshū
ikken (Report on the Impact of the Great War on Economic and Trade Matters –
A Case of the British State Post Ofce), 12 October 1916, GGS, JACAR, Ref.
B11100547600, 0185.
51 “Seigansho: Eikoku seifu kaijō yu’nyū kyokashō shinsei no ken” (Pledge: On the
British Government Lifting Applications for Import Licenses), in Ōshū sensō no
keizai bōeki ni oyobosu eikyō hōkoku zakken – Eikoku seifu ni oite yūbinbutsu
ōshū ikken (idem.), 30 April  1917, GGS, JACAR, Ref. B11100547900,
0390–0391.
52 Letter from the Ofce of Commercial Attaché to UK Embassy, c/o British
Consulate-General Yokohama, in Ōshū sensō no keizai bōeki ni oyobosu eikyō
hōkoku zakken – Eikoku seifu ni oite yūbinbutsu ōshū ikken (idem.), 21 Febru-
ary 1917, GGS, JACAR, Ref. B11100547800, 0357.
53 Letter from the British Embassy Tōkyō to Foreign Trade Ofce, in Foreign Ofce
and Foreign and Commonwealth Ofce: Embassy and Consulates, Japan: Gen-
eral Correspondence, 9 June 1916, TNA: Foreign Ofce, FO 262/1236.
54 Letter from the Foreign Ofce to Viscount Sutemi Chanda, in Ōshū sensō no
keizai bōeki ni oyobosu eikyō hōkoku zakken – Eikoku seifu ni oite yūbinbutsu
ōshū ikken (Report on the Impact of the Great War on Economic and Trade
Matters – A Case of the British State Post Ofce), 24 July 1917, GGS, JACAR,
Ref. B11100547900, 0460.
55 Letter from Maruzen to British Consulate General, in Foreign Ofce and Foreign
and Commonwealth Ofce: Embassy and Consulates, Japan: General Corre-
spondence, 4 October 1918, TNA: Foreign Ofce, FO 262/1342.
56 Letter from Maruzen to Allen and Unwin, 18 May 1918, Collection of George
Allen & Unwin Ltd.: Correspondence fles AU FSC 23/149 (accession number
MS 3282), University of Reading, The Archive of British Publishing and Printing
Reading Sources.
57 Morishima Morito, “Kokumin gaikō no kichō” (The Basic Idea Behind National
Diplomacy) in Kokusai Chishiki, vol. 6, no. 6, June 1926, pp. 16–17.
58 Furuya Natsuko, “Postwar Publishing Trends in Japan” in The Library Quar-
terly: Information, Community, Policy, vol. 32, no. 3, July 1962, p. 208.
59 “Keisatsukan renshūjo” (Training Institute for Police Bureaucrats) in Kōbun ruiju
dai-42hen (Collection of Ofcial Documents, 42nd Edition), 1918, Kokuritsu
Kobunshokan (National Archives of Japan), JACAR, Ref. A13100285900, 5.
60 Naiseishi Kenkyūkai (ed.), “Tsuchiya Shōzō shi danwa sokkiroku” (Steno-
graphic Record of Conversations with Tsuchiya Shōzō) in Naiseishi kenkyū
shiryō 59–60 (Tōkyō: Naiseishi Kenkyūkai, 1967), pp. 15–17.
61 The concept of ofering special police-related lectures to Home and Foreign Min-
istry bureaucrats was not a completely new phenomenon. There had already
been a number of systematic lectures given to policemen between 1885 and 1889
and between 1904 and 1909 that, however, had only been implemented for a
couple of years for administrative reasons. “Keisatsukan renshūjo”, JACAR,
Ref. A13100285900, 3–4.
62 See, for example, Sheldon Garon’s depiction of the impact of various civil activ-
ists on the government’s social management programme: Sheldon Garon, Mold-
ing Japanese Minds  – The State in Everyday Life (Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press, 1997).
63 “Keisatsu kōshūjo shusai shuppan kōshūkai (Ishizawa jimukan)” (Police Train-
ing Session in Publishing Sponsored by the Police Training Centre (Secretary
 Impact on Japan’s foreign book market 47
Ishizawa)) in Honpō tainai keihatsu kankei zakken – kōen kankei – honshōin
kōen kankei dai-1kan (Various Matters Relating to Japan’s Domestic Enlight-
enment  – Regarding Lectures  – Regarding Lectures of This Ministry, vol. 1),
September 1928: JACAR, Ref. B02030903900.
64 Shimizu Yuichirō, Kindai Nihon no kanryō (The Bureaucrats of Modern Japan)
(Tōkyō: Chūō kōron shinsha, 2013), p. 335.

References
Dickinson, Frederick R, War and National Reinvention – Japan in the Great War,
1914–1919 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999).
Fujii, Shōtō, “Oyaizu Kaname-shi” (Oyaizu Kaname) in Shin Nihon, vol. 6, no. 11,
November 1913, p. 39.
Furuya, Natsuko, “Postwar Publishing Trends in Japan” in The Library Quarterly:
Information, Community, Policy, vol. 32, no. 3, July 1962, pp. 208–222.
Gaimushō, Bunka Jigyōbu (ed.), Kokusai bunka kōryū no genjō to tenbō (Current
State and Prospects of International Cultural Exchange) (Tōkyō: Ōkurashō Insat-
sukyoku, 1972).
Garon, Sheldon, Molding Japanese Minds – The State in Everyday Life (Princeton,
NJ: Princeton University Press, 1997).
Hammond, Mary and Towheed, Shafquat, Publishing in the First World War: Essays
in Book History (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007).
Kornicki, Peter, The Book in Japan: A Cultural History from the Beginnings to the
Nineteenth Century (Leiden: Brill, 1998).
Kornicki, Peter, “Literacy Revisited: Some Refections on Richard Rubinger’s Find-
ings” in Monumenta Nipponica, vol. 56, no. 3, Autumn 2003, pp. 295–381.
Lachenmann, Frauke and Wolfrum, Rüdiger (eds.), The Law of Armed Confict and
the Use of Force  – The Max Planck Encyclopedia of Public International Law
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017).
Mack, Edward, Manufacturing Modern Japanese Literature: Publishing, Prizes, and
the Ascription of Literary Value (Durham: Duke University Press, 2010).
Mathias, Regine, “Reading for Culture” in Senri Ethnological Studies, vol. 28,
1990, pp. 110–126.
Matsumoto, Takanori (ed.), Senzenki Nihon no bōeki to soshikikan kankei – jōhō,
chōsei, kyōchō (Pre-war Japan’s Trade and Inter-Organizational Relations: Infor-
mation, Regulation, and Cooperation) (Tōkyō: Shinhyōron, 1996).
Maruzen Kabushiki-gaisha (ed.), Maruzen 100nenshi: Nihon kindaika no ayumi to
tomo ni 1–3 (The 100-year history of Maruzen: with the Progress of Japan’s Mod-
ernisation) (Tōkyō: Maruzen, 1980/1981).
McDermot, John, “Trading with the Enemy: British Business and the Law During
the First World War” in Canadian Journal of History, vol. 32, no. 2, August 1997,
pp. 201–219.
Morishima, Morito, “Kokumin gaikō no kichō” (The Basic Idea Behind National
Diplomacy) in Kokusai Chishiki, vol. 6, no. 6, June 1926, pp. 16–17.
Morohashi, Eiichi, “Daiichiji sekai taisen to zeizaisei seisaku: sōryokusen ni okeru
senji ritokusei no dōnyū to sono igi” (The First World War and Fiscal Policy: The
Introduction and Signifcance of the Wartime Capital Gains Tax in Total War) in
Shigaku Zasshi, vol. 125, no. 8, 2016, pp. 1395–1419.
48 Maj Hartmann
Morohashi, Eiichi, “Daiichiji sekai taisen ki no taiteki torihiki kinshi seisaku to
Nihon” (How Did Japan Introduce Policies for Regulating Trade with the Enemy
During the First World War?) in Kokusai Buki Iten-shi (History of Global Arms
Transfer), vol. 4, July 2017, pp. 117–140.
Naiseishi Kenkyūkai (ed.), “Tsuchiya Shōzō shi danwa sokkiroku” (Stenographic
Record of Conversations with Tsuchiya Shōzō) in Naiseishi kenkyū shiryō (Tōkyō:
Naiseishi Kenkyūkai, 1967) pp. 59–60.
Nihon Shoseki Shuppan Kyōkai (ed.), Nihon shuppan 100nenshi nenpyō (A 100-
Year History Chronology of Japan’s Publishing) (Tōkyō: Nihon Shoseki Shuppan
Kyōkai, 1968).
Ōkubo, Hisao (ed.), Senzen Tōkyō-Ōsaka shuppan gyōshi dai-1kan (Prewar His-
tory of the Tōkyō-Ōsaka Publishing Industry vol. 1) (Kanazawa: Kanazawa
Bunpokaku, 2008); Reprint of Tōkyō Shuppan Kyōkai. Tōkyō Shuppan Kyōkai
15nenshi (15 Year History of the Tōkyō Publishers Association) (Tōkyō: Shuppan
Kyōkai Jimusho, 1929).
Ōkubo, Hisao, Shuppan  – Shosekishō jinbutsu jōhō taikan: Shōwa shoki (Infor-
mation Overview of People Engaged in Publishing and Bookselling) (Kanazawa:
Kanazawa Bunpokaku, 2008); Reprint of Nihon Shuppan Taikan (Overview of
Japanese Publishing) (Tōkyō: Shuppan Taimususha, 1930).
Oppenheim, Lassa, International Law – A Treatise, vol. 1 – Peace (New York: Long-
mans, Green and Co, 1920).
Richter, Giles, “Entrepreneurship and Culture: The Hakubunkan Publishing Empire
in Meiji Japan” in Hardacre, Helen (ed.), New Directions in the Study of Meiji
Japan (Leiden: Brill, 1997), pp. 590–602.
Richter, Giles, “Marketing the Word: Publishing Entrepreneurs in Meiji Japan,
1870–1912” (PhD Dissertation, Colombia University, New York, 1999).
Rubinger, Richard, “Who Can’t Read and Write? Illiteracy in Meiji Japan” in Monu-
menta Nipponica, vol. 55, no. 2, Summer 2000, pp. 163–198.
Shimizu, Yuichirō, Kindai Nihon no kanryō (The Bureaucrats of Modern Japan)
(Tōkyō: Chūō kōron shinsha, 2013).
Tōkyō Shoseki Kabushikigaisha (ed.), Bukkō yakuin nami kōrōsha tsuitō kinen
(Commemoration of Deceased Ofcers and Distinguished Persons) (Tōkyō: Tōkyō
Shoseki, 1931).
Tōkyō Shosekishō Kumiai (ed.), Tōkyō Shosekishō Kumiai 50nen shi (50  Year
History of the Tōkyō Booksellers and Publishers’ Association) (Tōkyō: Tōkyō
Shosekishō Kumiai, 1937).
Yamamuro, Shin’ichi, Fukugō sensō to sōryokusen no dansō – Nihon ni totte no
Daiichiji Sekai Taisen (Faultline Between Complex and Total War – World War
I from the Perspective of Japan) (Kyōto: Jinbun Shoin, 2011).
Yoshiko, Tomizawa (ed.), Oyaizu Kaname tsuien (Following the Life of Oyaizu Kan-
ame) (Tōkyō: Tomizawa Yoshiko, 1978).
3 Mediating enmity
The propaganda war in Latin
America, 1914–1919
Stefan Rinke

The twentieth century had already begun in the Americas with a propagan-
distic drumbeat in the form of the Spanish-American War of 1898–1899.
The First World War, however, brought with it an even more radical escala-
tion of propaganda as a dimension of warfare.1 Among the opposing camps,
the totality of the war resulted in the creation of propaganda machines. The
aim was to justify to the home front, as well as outwardly to other belli-
gerents and especially to the neutrals, casualties running into the millions.2
On the two American continents, the propaganda war occurred precisely
because they contained the largest number of the world’s neutral countries.
Although the Europeans were concerned primarily with infuencing the pub-
lic in the United States of America, the new world power, Latin America,
also came into focus. It was not exactly a fair fght, however. The Allies
had open access to the communication links, whereas the German cable
was severed at the start. German foreign propaganda may have had a lot
of catching up to do, but it nonetheless knew how to take the fght to the
enemy.3 During this period, discussion of propaganda typifed public media
throughout Latin America.
Initially, the Latin American commentators and their media outlets wanted
to stay out of the confict, just as the governments wanted to keep out of the
diplomatic struggles and businesses hoped to be spared from the economic
war. “Why should we work ourselves up about the czar or the emperor,
these tragic playthings in the hands of fate? Who can say precisely who’s
to blame?” asked the editors of the Argentine cultural magazine Nosotros,
the socialists Alfredo A Bianchi and Roberto F Giusti in August 1914. At
that particular moment, they concluded, no one could justifably wish for
any one nation’s victory, since none of them could claim to be civilisation’s
sole arbiter.4 Indeed, the Chilean ambassador in Paris warned the press that
it should avoid partisanship, fearing that the Europeans would react sensit-
ively to any opinions expressed on the war.5 Yet, after the outbreak of war,
it would soon prove very difcult to maintain such reticence because of the
nature of the warfare and the intensity of the propaganda.6
A large portion of the elites who dominated the media landscape in Latin
America shared a love for France, a country which not only had great
50 Stefan Rinke
economic infuence in the region but was also an important cultural touch-
stone. French propaganda, therefore, had a distinct advantage when the war
broke out. In addition, French foreign cultural and press policy had been
extremely active in Latin America before 1914.7
The French Foreign Ministry and the General Staf also became actively
involved in propaganda. They published books and pamphlets and distrib-
uted them across Latin America. The visual dimension of photos and flms
grew in importance. Before the war, French suppliers dominated the Latin
American flm markets, which the propagandists could easily build on. The
weekly newsreels distributed by Pathé, which were presented before feature
flms, found a growing audience in the region. Eyewitnesses reported that
audiences often responded very emotionally to the screenings.8 However,
the ability to exert direct infuence on the press remained decisive. Along
with the daily newspapers of the French-speaking minority, propaganda
focused on Latin American newspapers.9 It further beneftted from the tra-
ditionally strong presence of the Havas intelligence service, which over time
included radio transmissions broadcast from stations on the Eifel Tower
and in Lyon.10
The activities of the other Allies were similarly organised, although the
work of the British was particularly signifcant. British propaganda, too,
put an emphasis on swaying the press, to the extent that due to the infuence
its intelligence service had on the market, the country was able to force the
printing of certain pro-British messages. Wherever there was a large enclave
of British traders, there were English-language newspapers. Italian propa-
ganda, which played a particularly important role in Argentina and Bra-
zil, leaned heavily on French propaganda and was widely disseminated.11
Over the course of the war, the Allies developed some common propaganda
strategies.
In line with the historically familiar opposition in Latin America between
civilisation and barbarism, Allied propaganda portrayed the war against
Germany as a confict of basic principles. In this case, the Allied civilisa-
tion allegedly faced a seemingly perverse German “culture” that had to
be defeated.12 According to the founder of the Radical Party of Argentina,
Francisco Antonio Barroetaveña, France’s battle with Germany resembled
Athens’ struggle against Sparta.13 This was a common theme that Latin
American intellectuals readily adopted and perpetuated.14 Indeed, the
Colombian poet Eduardo Carrasquilla Mallarino, who resided in Argen-
tina, published his poem “Canto de Guerra” from Paris in September 1914.
It speaks about the struggle of the “Latin genius” who, led by the brave
Gallic rooster, fought honourably, whereas the “satanic forces” of the “Ger-
manic hordes” did not even restrain their destructive rage before women
and children.15
For Francophile Latin Americans, there was no doubt, not least because
of the idea of Latinity, that their own civilisation was intimately connected
to France. Shortly after the outbreak of war, in a speech to the Brazilian
 Mediating enmity 51
Chamber of Deputies, delegate Irineu Machado invoked the “French blood”
that pulsated in Brazilian veins. A victory for France, Machado remarked,
was synonymous with a victory “of our race”.16 In 1916, the famous
poet and politician José de Medeiros e Albuquerque concluded: “Brazil is
undoubtedly the most French of the republics of Latin America”. In Peru,
senator Mariano H. Cornejo recognised parallels between France’s struggle
and Peru’s own history, for Peru had also lost some of its territory to an
“imperialist aggressor”, specifcally, Chile.17
For countless pro-French thinkers in Latin America, commitment to the
“race latine”, from the outbreak of war, went hand in hand with the idea of
a clash with the “Germanic” or “Teutonic race”. The ideal conjured here of
two brothers-in-arms logically culminated in a call to revoke the country’s
neutrality and to stand side by side with France, its Latin brother, in battle.18
Many educated Latin Americans had experienced France for themselves
and fallen in love with it. Paris was the centre of existence for many of these
poets and writers; it was the place where they penned their avowals of soli-
darity. They included, for instance, the Peruvian writer-brothers Francisco
and Ventura García Calderón and the Chilean Alberto Mackenna, who also
lived in Paris.19 Often, they acted as war correspondents – like the Argentine
journalist Roberto Payró, who wrote for La Nación and Caras y Caretas –
and profoundly shaped public opinion back in their home countries.20 The
most infuential eyewitness, heard throughout Latin America, was undoubtedly
Rodó, who travelled to Europe as a correspondent for Caras y Caretas in
1916 and died in Palermo on 1 May 1917.21 It is hardly surprising, therefore,
that French observers had the impression that Latin America was more or
less of one mind when it came to supporting France’s war efort.
In fact, Francophile publications could be found throughout much of
Latin America. The propaganda from Paris consequently beneftted from
especially fertile soil. French heroism and sacrifce were not only celebrated
in the media, but also at public gatherings and rallies.22 The Uruguayan
government even declared 14 July  1915 to be a federal holiday. In most
Latin American cities, the French national holiday served as an occasion
for making declarations of solidarity.23 Compagnon has identifed three key
aspects of Latin American Francophilia during this period: frst, the idea
that France and its revolution was the origin of all freedoms; second, the
idea that France was the root of literature and the arts; and, third, the cult
of the French capital, Paris.24
Regarding the attitudes of Latin Americans towards the other Allies, this
conspicuous Francophilia had no equivalent. The British Minister in Rio de
Janeiro remarked in 1915 that while the Latin Americans respected England’s
commitment to the freedom of small nations, they held no great afection for
the country.25 The sentiment towards Belgium – the “country of martyrs” –
represented an exception.26 The small country’s defensive struggle had been
widely hailed as heroic, and in many Latin American countries there were
calls for donations and solidarity rallies.27 The strong sympathy towards
52 Stefan Rinke
Belgium was due not least to the parallels Latin Americans recognised with
their own situation in the international system. The attack on Belgium was
also an attack on the principle of neutrality; it was an attack by a major
power on a small, weaker country. This was a constellation which Latin
Americans, who faced USA imperialism in their own hemisphere, knew all
too well. What befell tiny Belgium, the Argentine intellectual Manuel Ugarte
argued, could just as easily happen to the Latin Americans.28
Belgium’s fate became a prime weapon in the propaganda arsenal used
against the German Reich. In 1915, the well-known Colombian writer
Santiago Pérez Triana published an English-language essay entitled “Why
a Spanish American should not be Pro-German”. He responded to the
question raised in his title by making reference to the tragedy of Belgium,
which was a “shame for the whole human race”.29 Pérez Triana meant here
not only the German invasion itself, but also German war crimes, which
were promptly reported in Latin America in considerable detail. The cor-
respondents widely documented the destruction of villages and towns, and
especially cultural treasures like the Library of Leuven or the Cathedral of
Reims, at times even with photos, permitting Latin American readers to get
a good handle on the events.30 Even impartial commentators assessed the
German actions as a betrayal of Germany’s cultural heritage, while others
spoke of a “violation of divine law”.31
Reports of German massacres and atrocities in which Catholic priests,
women, and children were killed, and, later, that Belgian civilians were
forced to work in Germany, elicited even greater disgust. Indignation was
sparked, above all, by the subjective and emotional representations of eye-
witnesses to the Germans’ atrocities.32 The distribution of this news was not
limited to the urban press, it was also disseminated in the Río de la Plata
region via the very popular dime-store magazines, which carried popular
literature, poems, songs, and news and often read aloud in public places.
A good example of such a publication was the magazine published in Rosa-
rio in 1914 called Los horrores de la guerra (The horrors of war), with
contributions such as “La vergüenza del ejército alemán” (The shame of
the German army) and many succinct reports on documented and invented
German atrocities alike.33 Attitudes seemed to be changing even in a tradi-
tionally pro-German country like Chile.34
In view of the presented facts, it was not difcult for the Allies’ anti-
German propaganda to gain ground. It reached a highpoint with the
announcement of the sinking of the Lusitania, which was condemned as a
terrorist act by more than just anti-German observers.35 A growing number
of Latin American elites interpreted the individual war crimes of the German
troops as having been systematic in nature, which allegedly stemmed from
the Germans’ inherently cruel character.36 When Machado said in his speech
in early September 1914 that “Germany ofended civilisation and human-
ity”, he meant that the German people alone were to blame for the war.37
This statement came close to accusing Germans of barbarism, of portraying
 Mediating enmity 53
them – as Pedro Sayé, the Paraguayan correspondent for La Tribuna, had
done – as the epitome of modern barbarians.38
The Allies utilised this equation of Germany with the heart of barbarism
as an essential element of their propaganda in the Americas and encountered
many sympathetic listeners.39 But how could barbarism, which had been
traditionally located in the colonies or semi-colonies with their “coloured”
populations according to racist European discourse, now suddenly exist in
the centre of civilisation among the “whites”, who, according to the com-
mon view, were clearly responsible for the world’s greatest cultural achieve-
ments? To resolve this dilemma and explain the discrepancy, commentators
made a distinction between Germany and Prussia. A  commentary in the
Jornal do Commercio from August 1914 opined that the war was a product
of the Prussian spirit that held sway in Germany and encouraged greater
brutality and aggression. The land of Goethe and Heine had been “Prus-
sianised;” this was the source of all evil.40
The Nicaraguan writer and diplomat Santiago Arguello clarifed how this
Prussian barbarism was diferent from traditional barbarism.41 The com-
mentator of Jornal had already referred to the German Reich as a “modern-
barbaric” empire. He later went one step further by speaking of a “wise
barbarism” (barbaria sábia), of a kind of barbarism that would multiply by
means of a highly cultivated, but cold and soulless (natural) science. Accord-
ing to critics, this attitude became dangerous when it was combined with a
supremacy claim derived from the Nietzschean superman (Übermensch).42
According to Allied propaganda, Prussian–German barbarism found its
most characteristic expression in a militarism that was coupled with blind
obedience. This argument, too, was generally accepted in Latin America.
For the tacticians behind the Allied propaganda, German Kaiser Wilhelm
II was the personifcation of German barbarism. Biting satires and mischiev-
ous caricatures abounded not only in the decidedly propagandistic leafets
but also in the Latin-American press. El Zorro, for example, brought out a
comic book series entitled “Guillermo el macanudo” (“Wilhelm, the splen-
did”), which made the emperor a target of ridicule.43 Many anti-German
observers argued that the struggle of the Western democracies against Asi-
atic despotism now needed to be fought against the German Kaiser, the new
Attila, and his kaiserismo.44
Belgian-born Raymond Wilmart, who had once travelled to Argentina as
an envoy for Karl Marx and had lost a son in the war himself, simply char-
acterised the emperor as the antithesis of the “American ideals”. According
to Wilmart, it was a duty to participate in the war against the emperor.
Wilmart complained most vocally about the infringement of all the prin-
ciples of international law which had arisen in the age of globalisation:

The international community took pride in its enormous interdepend-

ence, which globalized capital and production, and believed it was
destined to create international institutions, whose need seemed to be
54 Stefan Rinke
obvious; it took pride in a humanitarian code that would eventually
become even more humane; it took pride in the collectivity of the law,
which, together with the common possession of the high seas, was the
shared heritage of the international community. Today, the emperor has
violated all of this. For him, there is no law beyond the fantasy of his
backward-looking ambitions.45

As proof of the threat to the global order and of the putative German
expansion strategy in Latin America, resourceful propagandists referred to
the role of Germany in the Venezuelan crisis of 1902. They presented all-
German Pan-Germanism as a particularly dangerous strain of pan-ideology
since it involved an unbridled willingness to destroy.46 As the clearest evid-
ence of Germany’s implicit contempt of Latin America, the Peruvian García
Calderón cited Germany’s racism and the idea of Aryanism, as they were
expressed in the writings of Josef Ludwig Reimer. If Reimer’s vision of a
Germanic empire ever actually came to fruition, García Calderón remarked,
Latin America would be relegated to a slave state because of its “racial
mixing”.47
In Latin America, these ideas had considerable currency not least because
the notion of the “German threat” had already existed as a point of refer-
ence since the turn of the century. The fear that German descendants would
infltrate the country was very pronounced, especially in Brazil and would
play an important role in the war’s further evolution.48
Against this backdrop, the German side found it difcult to defend its
own cause. As a consequence, the lament that the commentator of the
Deutsche La Plata Zeitung voiced in Buenos Aires in November 1914 that
there was a “lack of understanding for the German character abroad” was
quite common.49 By the same token, German propaganda was hardly idle,
for it helped to fuel confrontations among opinion makers throughout Latin
America on how to respond to the war. This aspect has so far been largely
ignored in historical research, which has simply accepted Allied dominance
in this area without further ado. The period’s sources also often presented
the pro-Allied utterances as refecting genuine “public opinion”, whereas
the pro-German statements were dismissed as unrepresentative and the
propagandistic lies of outsiders.50
Emulating France, German Weltpolitik (world policy) discovered foreign
cultural propaganda for itself, although here Latin America played only a
minor role.51 War propaganda was carried out by many military, civilian,
and non-ofcial agencies with little coordination. In the neutral countries of
Latin America, important propaganda actors included the not very numer-
ous, but nevertheless, well-connected Germans and German descendants,
that is, the “ethnic Germans”, along with their clubs and churches. In coun-
tries such as Argentina, Chile, and Paraguay, the institutions merged into so-
called peoples’ federations (Volksbünde) efectively to organise all Germans
during the war in an “overseas truce”. Financially supported by foreign
 Mediating enmity 55
banks and companies, they found their own Spanish-language newspapers
and magazines, published pamphlets and books, and tried, partly through
graft, to infuence the local press.52
For the distribution of German propaganda in Latin America, the new
medium of radio was of central importance. Shortly before the outbreak of
the war, major German companies together with the German Foreign Ofce
established the Transozean GmbH, which sent daily radio transmissions to
Sayville and Tuckerton until 1917. From there, the reports were sent on to
German foreign newspapers and associations, which edited and translated
the reports before putting them out in the press locally.53 From the recipi-
ent’s perspective, the German intelligence service was preferable because,
unlike the reports from Havas and Reuters, it was free.54 By and large, Ger-
man propaganda was based on the news from Nauen near Berlin. This was
then further supplemented by specially prepared articles and reports from
neutral Spain. Spain, in general, constituted a fundamentally important
bridge to the western hemisphere for German operations.55
Given the massive criticism triggered by the invasion of Belgium, German
propaganda initially seemed fat-footed regarding content. The protests of
ethnic German associations against the – from their vantage point – inaccurate
portrayals were stultifed by the Allied-friendly press.56 The activities of the
Reich’s diplomatic representatives proved to be only marginally more efec-
tive. In any event, in Colombia they prompted Foreign Minister Marco Fidel
Suárez to urge, in a circular, the editors-in-chief of his country to reserve
their criticism of the warring powers and to respect the feelings of foreigners
in view of the enormous infuence of the press in this confict.57 The Ecua-
dorian government warned its consuls abroad not to publish anti-German
statements.58 In Uruguay, the intervention of the German envoy led to the
punishment of any who made anti-German statements about the military
and to a ban on anti-German satirical newspapers.59
Another aspect of German propaganda was to refute the Allies’ allega-
tions and “unmask” them as “propaganda lies”. Ofcial agencies and Ger-
mans living abroad repeatedly issued counter-statements, particularly in
the initial phase of the war.60 From the beginning of the war, semi-ofcial
pamphlets were circulated.61 If German war crimes were not simply denied,
they were presented as acts of self-defence. Ultimately, however, there was
only one perfectly valid counterargument that could be used against the
accusation of “German threat”, namely, that Germany, unlike the Allies,
had never had colonial possessions in America.62
The victimisation strategy was quite central to German propaganda. Here,
the German Reich was depicted as a “whipping boy” and the victim of a
disgraceful smear campaign by way of overwhelming enemy propaganda.63
Germany, so the argument went, had elicited the envy of other powers
because of its rapid growth, and now it faced a world of enemies from
Europe, Africa, and Asia who only wanted to crush its economic might.64
German propagandists took special pains to scandalise the other side’s use
56 Stefan Rinke
of soldiers from the colonies and also from Japan. In one of the many propa-
ganda writings, the following could be read concerning the alleged terror of
Asian and African soldiers: “These people, who grew up in countries where
they continue to wage war in an even more abhorrent and barbarous man-
ner, have brought the customs of their countries with them to Europe”.65
According to this rationale, the Allies were irresponsibly jeopardising the
“dominance of the white race” through their use of colonial troops.66 How-
ever, the use of this racist argument in Latin America cut both ways: it was
certainly well received by large sections of the racist elites, yet it also implied
a devaluation of their own ethnically heterogeneous continent.
Finally, the German propaganda strategists focused on publicising the
Reich itself, for according to many Latin American observers, Germany and
its achievements were still too little known. Thus, the works of famous Ger-
man thinkers quickly circulated in Spanish translation.67 In terms of sub-
stance, this type of propaganda centred on military exploits, with German
wartime bestsellers being translated into Spanish that conveyed the linkage
between modern weaponry and traditional notions of soldierly chivalry. In
addition, propagandists emphasised the technical, industrial, and military
progress – in short, the power – of the German Reich.68 Like the Allies, Ger-
man propagandists recognised that pictorial propaganda could be put to
good use in Latin America at the cinema. The success was limited, however.
Eugen Will, the legation councillor who was responsible for the coordina-
tion of the propaganda in Latin America, thus wrote in hindsight in 1918:

Unfortunately, the flms that were shown to us over there did not
always meet with the audience’s approval. Usually, too little emphasis
was placed on variety and efective placement. Viewers were bored by
the endless series of images, captured guns, and obliterated forts. Due
to the lack of explanatory text, destroyed villages only seemed to con-
frm the enemy’s lies about atrocities. The parade march looked ridicu-
lous because of the rapid speed at which it had to be shown in the flm.69

Ofensive attacks against the enemy also did not markedly increase the
efectiveness of German propaganda. That said, the most efective attacks
were those against Russia, which many Allied supporters considered the
epitome of despotism.70 The anti-British component, which was generally
quite pronounced in German propaganda, was well received in countries
like Mexico or Argentina that had experienced tensions in their relations
with the island kingdom. In this context, as a topic of propaganda the Falk-
lands/Malvinas confict was as popular as British imperialism in general.71
Latin Americans who were open to German propaganda, and indeed even
helped to spread it, were conspicuously often personalities from the con-
servative end of the spectrum. Frequently, certain professions were repre-
sented. For instance, soldiers who were trained before the war in countries
like Argentina or Chile by German military advisors and were personally
 Mediating enmity 57
familiar with Germany were open to the arguments put forward by the
German side. Lawyers, philosophers, doctors, and Catholic clergy were
also often sympathetic to Germany. Where the members of the frst group
had often studied in Germany, the latter were clearly moved by anti-French
sentiments.
The fulcrum of German propaganda activities in Latin America was
Argentina. Activists such as the pedagogue Wilhelm Keiper and the newspa-
per publisher Hermann Tjarks succeeded in building an extensive network
that was subsidised by the German embassy. Its chief organ was the Spanish-
language edition of the Deutsche La Plata Zeitung called La Unión, which
started publication on 31 October 1914.72 Like the German-language ori-
ginal, this paper struck a decidedly nationalistic chord that was a noticeable
departure from the moderate style of the other German-language newspaper
in Buenos Aires, the liberal Argentinisches Tageblatt, published by Theo-
dor Alemann. Under the leadership of editor Belisario Roldán, La Unión
reached a circulation of approximately 15,000 copies, making it by far the
largest German propaganda sheet in the region. Its success was due, in part,
to the fact that it did not present itself as a pure propaganda medium, but
also contained general news items. The paper’s infuence extended beyond
Argentina to Uruguay and Paraguay, where military circles and the entour-
age of President Eduardo Schaerer, whose parents came from Switzerland,
ensured its further dissemination.73
Given the widespread Francophilia in Argentina, it was important to con-
vince at least some luminaries to take up the German cause and to defend it
publicly. This included the ofcer Emilio Kinkelin, who went to Germany
shortly before the outbreak of war with the Argentine arms-procurement
commission. Staying there as a war correspondent for La Nación, Kinke-
lin became a counterweight to those correspondents who were otherwise
mostly critical of Germany.74 Another important voice from the military was
José Félix Uriburu, who spoke out openly against Allied propaganda and
stressed the successes of German warfare.75 The lawyers, Alfredo Colmo,
Ernesto Vergara, and Juan P. Ramos, and philosophers, Josué A. Beruti
and Coriolano Alberini, also openly advocated for Germany.76 The Ger-
manophile historian and sociologist Ernesto Quesada was especially active,
attracting public attention already in 1914 with a book that defended Ger-
many and experienced its second printing in the same year.77
In Brazil, public support for the Allies was even greater than in Argentina,
and yet German propaganda developed there as well. With its activities, it
primarily latched on to the propaganda network around Buenos Aires, such
as by appropriating news from La Unión.78 Although eforts to create a
federation of ethnic Germans failed, the latter nevertheless proved to be key
propaganda actors due to the variety of clubs set up and the German press.79
Since the frst naïvely published appeals to the Brazilian public’s sense of
fairness regarding the Germans had little resonance, they tried to gain
the support of well-known personalities. Again, it was frst and foremost
58 Stefan Rinke
military personnel who sided with the Germans, such as Lieutenant Pedro
Cavalcanti de Albuquerque, who wrote a column in the Jornal do Commer-
cio at the end of 1914 under the pseudonym Coronel Fix.80 The faction of
Germanophile physicians was strongly represented in Brazil. One member
of this group was Henrique da Rocha Lima, the co-founder of the Instituto
Osvaldo Cruz, who enjoyed close ties with the Hamburg Institute of Tropi-
cal Medicine.81 Fewer politicians and intellectuals stood up for the German
Reich in Brazil than in neighbouring Argentina. The deputy and chairman
of the Foreign Afairs Committee João Dunshee de Abranches Moura was a
powerfully eloquent exception, as was the writer José Bento Monteiro Lobato,
whose Germanophilia was rather based on an attitude of non-conformism.82
From the perspective of German propaganda in Chile, the situation was
much better. Founded in 1916, the German-Chilean Bund presented a well-
organised propaganda hub with local branches distributed throughout the
country. With El Tiempo Nuevo and the Revista del Pacífco, they sporadic-
ally published Spanish-language newspapers as spin-ofs of the Deutsche
Zeitung für Chile in Santiago, which reprinted reports from La Unión. Well-
known Germanophiles who expressed their views publicly could be found
in many occupational groups due to the country’s historically close ties with
the German Reich. These included former Chilean War Minister Ricardo
Cox Méndez, who travelled across Germany in 1915–1916 and reported
positively on his impressions, and the diplomat Javier Vial Solar, the lawyer
Gallardo, and many others.83
There were even pro-German voices in the region of the North Andes with
whom German propagandists could cooperate. They focused on the capital
and port cities, where small but infuential German communities existed. In
Bogotá, they supported the newspaper Transocean edited by Francisco José
Arévalo, the Eco Alemán in Caracas, the Panorama in Maracaibo, and La
Verdad in Guayaquil. There was also a large number of short-lived news-
papers and magazines.84 But public advocates hoping for a German victory
like Colombian nationalist Laureano Gómez, journalist Jenaro Guerrero, or
the Heraldo Conservador in Bogotá were rare, because here, too, the major-
ity of the politically interested public sympathised with the Allies.85
The German propaganda work in Latin America was organised transna-
tionally. In addition to Buenos Aires in the south, Mexico in the north served
as a dissemination point, whose reach extended into the North Andes. Under
Carranza, German activities could be carried out relatively uninterrupted.86
The efects of the propaganda war in Latin America went far beyond the
activities of the Germans and the Allies. Luminaries became involved on
both sides, and, over time, disputes were increasingly played out in pub-
lic. Sometimes they got physical. For instance, despite President Suárez’s
admonition about maintaining neutrality, the Colombian police had to
physically keep the quarrelling parties in the Great Olympic Hall at arm’s
length in December 1914.87 Incidents like this occurred with particular fre-
quency among the immigrant communities of Argentina and Brazil, where
 Mediating enmity 59
debates on the war carried out in the media spilled over into public assem-
blies and manifested in demonstrations, protest meetings, and situational
encounters on the street.88 As one observer in Argentina noted in Octo-
ber 1914, suddenly there were “flos” (“friends”) and “fobos” (“phobes”)
everywhere, who nervously followed the spectacle in Europe as if the war’s
opponents were directly tied to national political parties.89 In retrospect,
one of the protagonists in Argentina, the nationalist intellectual and Allied-
sympathiser Rojas, observed that the war of opinion even occasionally took
on civil war-like dimensions.90
Unsurprisingly, the media war was carried out in the foreign language
newspapers of immigrant communities. At the same time, the mainstream
press was also afected. The Argentine writer Juan Más y Pi published an
essay in Nosotros in December 1914 in which he unequivocally blamed the
Central Powers for the war and argued that the neutrals had no alternative
but to take the side of the Entente.91 The article prompted the editor of the
magazine to arrange for a survey among well-known public fgures about
the impact of the war on the future of mankind in general and Latin Amer-
ica in particular. The results confrmed in spectacular fashion the predomin-
ance of Argentine Francophilia.92 By no means did this allay the disputes,
however. On the contrary, the debates heated up so much in the follow-
ing months due to intensifying propaganda activity that the editors of the
Revista Argentina de Ciencias Políticas, for instance, prohibited the treat-
ment of the subject in their publication at end of 1915.93
At that time, numerous committees, leagues, and societies had already
been formed in Argentina to support the Allies. Their members belonged to
diferent social groups ranging from students to newspaper vendors. As the
historian María Inés Tato has demonstrated, the most important umbrella
organisation was the Comité Nacional de la Juventud (National Commit-
tee of Youth) founded in 1915, which had subgroups nationwide in the
various districts of the capital, rural cities, and at the universities. Besides
Barroetaveña, Lugones, and Rojas, its members included famous politicians
and thinkers such as the socialist Alfredo L Palacios and the poet Alma-
fuerte (Pedro B Palacios). They primarily organised mass demonstrations
on the French national holiday, which inevitably gave way to disruptions
of public order. The participation of women at these demonstrations was
unprecedented. The arguments of the so-called Aliadóflos (Entente sup-
porters) reproduced the propaganda of the Allies. They claimed that they
represented the will of the people and the country’s true interests. To save
Argentina from the threat of international isolation, the members of the
committee made an appeal early on for renouncing neutrality.94
The Germanophiles and the proponents of maintaining neutrality, the
so-called neutralistas, also made use of interest groups that were, nonethe-
less, much smaller than those of the Allies. The Liga Patriótica pro Neu-
tralidad (Patriotic League for Neutrality), the Comisión Pro-Argentinidad
(Pro-Argentine Commission), and the Comité Argentino (Argentinean
60 Stefan Rinke
Committee) were active in this regard. The dividing line between the two
categories was not always clear, however. Inasmuch as the preservation
of Argentina’s neutrality was a distinct aim of German policy and propa-
ganda, it was possible that a person who self-identifed as a neutralista was
in fact a staunch Germanophile. This was by no means true of all neutral-
istas, even though the pro-Entente forces increasingly made this allegation
over the course of the war. In any event, the Federación Obrera Argen-
tina, which condemned any form of militarism at its congress in April 1915
and threatened the country with a general strike should Argentina enter the
war, was in no way sympathetic to Germany. The neutralistas included not
only Ugarte but also other well-known personalities such as former Foreign
Minister Estanislao Zeballos, the popular writer Manuel Gálvez, and the
conservative politician Ibarguren.95
In Brazil, the domestic confict also took on unexpected forms. It began
with an exchange of verbal blows in parliament between Machado and Dun-
shee de Abranches Moura who responded to Machado’s pro-Entente speech
with an impassioned appeal for the German Reich. In a country intent on
neutrality, they both met with criticism due to their radical stances. Dun-
shee de Abranches Moura had to vacate his post as chairman of the Foreign
Committee, though he remained in the public eye in the following years with
his pro-German writings.96 In the press, statements were at frst restrained.
While there had been pro-Entente newspapers from the outset, like the Cor-
reio da Manhã by Liberato Bittencourt, both sides were allowed their say,
for example, in the leading publication Jornal do Commercio. Magazines
like Fon-Fon or Careta sought in the frst months of the war to maintain a
certain even-handedness.97
The tone intensifed, however, with the establishment of the Liga pelos
Alliados (League for the Allies) in Rio de Janeiro on 17 March 1915, which
sought to organise Brazilians who favoured the Allies in the war. The writer
José Pereira da Graça Aranha became president and the politician Rui Bar-
bosa honorary president, while numerous well-known personalities were
members of the league. Its primary objective was the moral and material
support of the Allies, and branches were founded in all major cities of Brazil.
In the period that followed, the league regularly organised press campaigns
and rallies.98 In Brazil, just as in Argentina, dissenting and neutral voices
were soon suspected of being pro-German.99

Conclusion
The major battlefelds may have been far away, but they cast their long
shadows on Latin America and provoked a number of fundamental concerns.
The war was constantly present in the public debate in Latin America,
especially in the south, where the propaganda with its distortions and mis-
representations dominated. Never before had an event overseas aroused
such a response among the Latin American public. The war’s tremendous
 Mediating enmity 61
efect on mobilising the region was above all apparent in the interest people
expressed for the belligerents’ disputes. Although the focus was unmistak-
ably on the capitals and port cities, the propagandists also sought to reach
rural areas, which in the end was only partially successful. The fact that
pro-Entente voices clearly prevailed was not surprising given the initial
situation of a deeply rooted Francophilia and the German war of aggres-
sion. In general, however, there were heterogeneous groupings on both sides
with diferent motives that can only be understood in the local context. The
propaganda war made one thing particularly clear: in this war, it was not
possible to adopt a wait-and-see attitude.

Notes
1 Ute Guthunz, “La construcción de imágenes de amigo-enemigo y los cambios de
alianza: Cuba y la guerra hispano-cubano-americana” in Iberoamericana, vol.
22, no. 3/4, 1998, pp. 6–21. See also the essays in Sylvia-Lyn Hilton and Steve
JS Ickringill (eds.), European Perceptions of the Spanish-American War of 1898
(Bern: Peter Lang, 1999).
2 Michael Jeismann, “Propaganda” in Gerhard Hirschfeld; Gerd Krumeich and
Irina Renz (eds.), Enzyklopädie Erster Weltkrieg (Paderborn: UTB, 2003),
pp. 198–209.
3 Notwithstanding the war, German foreign propaganda was also very active
“overseas”, contrary to the observation made in Marcus König and Sönke Neit-
zel, “Propaganda, Zensur und Medien im Ersten Weltkrieg” in Frank Bösch and
Peter Hoeres (eds.), Außenpolitik im Medienzeitalter: Vom späten 19. Jahrhun-
dert bis zur Gegenwart (Göttingen: Wallstein, 2013), p. 128.
4 Anonymous, “La Guerra” in Nosotros, 8 August 1914, pp. 118–119. This was
also expressed a few months later by the Basque intellectual Francisco Grand-
montagne Otaegui, also known as Prudencio Amarrete, in “Las simpatías en la
guerra”.
5 Chilian embassy to MRREE (Paris, 15 January 1915), Archivo del Ministerio de
Relaciones Exteriores (AMRREE-Chile) vol. 514.
6 Anonymous, “Neutralidad” in Zig-Zag, 22 May 1915.
7 Anonymous,“L’Œuvre du Comité France-Amérique” in France-Amérique, 8,
November 1917, p. 29.
8 Mont Calm, “La guerra y la paz” in Zig-Zag, 26 December 1914. On the impact
of flm propaganda in Brazil, see Stefan Chamorro Bonow, A desconfança sobre
os indivíduos de origem germânica em Porto Alegre durante a Primeira Guerra
Mundial: cidadãos leais ou retovados? (Phil. Dissertation, Porto Alegre, 2011),
p. 135.
9 Anonymous, “Lo que costará la guerra” in El Mundo Ilustrado, 9 August 1914,
p. 1.
10 Olivier Compagnon, L’adieu à l’Europe: L’Amérique latine et la Grande Guerre
(Argentine et Brésil, 1914–1939) (Paris: Fayard, 2013), pp. 76–78; Tato, María
Inés, Luring Neutrals: Allied and German Propaganda in Argentina During
the First World War” in Troy RE Paddock (ed.), World War I and Propaganda
(Leiden/Boston: Brill, 2014), pp. 328–330.
11 Piccione, Enrico, La guerra ante la historia y la ciencia (Santiago de Chile, 1918);
“Report on foreign and domestic propaganda in the Argentine Republic” (9
April 1918), United States National Archives (NA) RG 165: War Department
General and Special Stafs Military Intelligence Division (MID), MID 2327-L-1.
62 Stefan Rinke
Arthur L Holder (ed.), Activities of the British Community in Argentina During
the Great War 1914–1919 (Buenos Aires: The Buenos Aires Herald, 1920).
12 Piccione, La guerra ante la historia, p. 8; Bonow, A desconfança, pp. 286–287.
13 Francisco Antonio Barroetaveña, Alemania contra el mundo (Buenos Aires:
Otero & Co., 1915), p. 77.
14 For numerous examples from Argentina and Brazil, see Compagnon, L’adieu à
l’Europe, pp. 80–83.
15 Carrasquilla Mallarino, [Eduardo], “Canto de Guerra” in Nosotros, vol. 8,
1914, pp. 58–64.
16 “A  Repercussão da Guerra no Brasil” in Jornal do Commercio, 9 August
1914, p. 4.
17 Mariano H Cornejo, La solidaridad americana y la guerra europea (Lima:
Imprenta del Estado, 1917), p. 32.
18 Alfonso Mejía Rodríguez, La France, notre mère intellectuelle, conférences et
articles (1918), p. 14.
19 Alberto Mackenna, Le Triomphe du Droit (Santiago de Chile: Sociedad
Imprenta-Litografía. “Barcelona”, 1916). Cited in Jean-Pierre Blancpain, Migra-
tions et mémoire germaniques en Amérique Latine à l’époque contemporaine:
contribution à l’étude de l’expansion allemande outre-mer (Strasbourg: Presses
universitaires de Strasbour, 1994), p. 271. These views were collected and pub-
lished in two volumes by the Groupement des universités et grandes écoles de
France pour les relations avec l’Amérique latine: L’Amérique latine et la guerre
européenne (Paris: Groupement des universités et grandes écoles de France pour
les relations avec l’Amérique latine, 1916).
20 Mejía Rodríguez, La France; Ventura García Calderón, “Pourquoi nous sommes
francophiles” in Voix de l’Amérique latine (Paris: Bulletin de la Bibliotheque
Américaine, 1916), pp. 61–67; Roberto Payró, Corresponsal de guerra: cartas,
diario, relatos (1907–1922) (Buenos Aires: Editorial Biblos, 2009).
21 José Enrique Rodó, “La solidarité des peuples latines” in Voix de l’Amérique
latine (Paris: Berger-Levrault, 1916), pp. 71–72. “La América latina y la guerra”
in Los Aliados, 20 July  1915, p.  34; José Pablo Drews, “Estampas desde las
trincheras: José Enrique Rodó y su lectura de la Gran Guerra” in Thémata:
Revista de Filosofía, vol. 48, 2013, pp. 135–136. See also J Corredor La Torre,
“A nos grands frères les français” in Voix de l’Amérique latine (Paris: Berger-
Levrault, 1916), p. 36.
22 “El heroismo de Francia” in A.B.C., 2 October 1918, p. 5. Compagnon provides
a comprehensive account of numerous Francophile demonstrations and state-
ments (Olivier Compagnon, “1914–18: The Death Throes of Civilisation: The
Elites of Latin America Face the Great War” in Jenny Macleod and Pierre Pur-
seigle (eds.), Uncovered Fields: Perspectives in First World War Studies (Leiden:
Brill, 2004), pp. 279–295.
23 Juan Antonio Buero, El Uruguay en la vida internacional: Labor legislativa y
periodística (1914–1918) (Montevideo: Renacimiento, 1919), pp. 215–222. For
examples from Paraguay, see Pedro Sayé, Crema de menta (Asunción: Cándido
Zamfrópolos, 1916), pp. 157–159.
24 Compagnon, L’adieu à l’Europe, pp. 84–88.
25 British envoy to Foreign Ofce (Rio de Janeiro, 23 April 1915), British Docu-
ments on Foreign Afairs [BD], Part II: From the First to the Second World War,
Series D, Latin America, 1914–1939, vol. 1, South America, 1914–1922, p. 29.
Barroetaveña sums up Britain’s positive aspects in Alemania contra el mundo,
pp. 97–106.
26 Leopoldo Lugones, et  al., Mi beligerancia (Buenos Aires: Otero y García,
1917), p.  132; “La confagración europea” in Variedades, 29 August  1914,
pp. 1143–1145.
 Mediating enmity 63
27 Anonymous, “Em torno da Guerra – A historia epica dos Belgas” in Jornal do
Commercio, 2 October 1914, p 3; “¡Bravo belgas!” in El Abogado Cristiano
Ilustrado, 15 October  1914, p.  2; On solidarity: “Las damas uruguayas y el
pueblo belga” in El Día, 6 November 1914, p. 1; Vice Consulate to Paraguayan
MRREE (Antwerp, 20 November 1916) in Paraguay, Archivo del Ministerio
de Relaciones Exteriores (AMRREE) Colección Política Internacional (DPI)
Libro 70.
28 Manuel Ugarte, Mi campaña hispanoamericana (Barcelona: Ed Cervantes,
1922), pp. 184–185. See also “A neutralidade belga e a invasão allemã” in O
Imparcial, 27 August 1914, p. 2; José Manuel Carbonell, “Alba de sangre” in El
Comercio (Quito, 31 December 1914), p. 1.
29 Santiago Pérez Triana, Some Aspects of the War (London: TF Unwin, 1915),
p.  176. See also Jane M Rausch, “Colombia’s Neutrality During 1914–1918:
An Overlooked Dimension of World War I” in Iberoamericana, 14, 2014,
pp. 107–108.
30 See for example “La guerra” in Variedades, 24 October 1914, pp. 1358–1359;
Anonymous, “Os actos de barbarismo praticados pelos allemães na Alta Alsa-
cia” in A Epoca, 17 August 1914, p. 1. “Os horrores commettidos na Belgica
pelos Invasores allemães” in O Imparcial (16, 19, and 20 September  1914),
respectively p.  1; Francisco García Calderón, “La guerra y los ideólogos” in
La Nación, 11 January 1915, pp. 3–4. Critical reports like these were found in
all the examined press items of this period, from Mexico to Argentina. On the
events related to the German march on Belgium, see Alan Kramer, Dynamic of
Destruction: Culture and Mass Killing in the First World War (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2007), pp. 6–30; John Horne and Alan Kramer, German Atro-
cities, 1914: A History of Denial (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2001).
31 Barroetaveña, Alemania contra el mundo, pp. 46–54. See also Enrique Del Valle
Iberlucea, La guerra europea y la política internacional (Buenos Aires: Talleres
Gráfcos Riachuelo, 1914), pp. 33–34.
32 “Em torno da Guerra  – Impressoes de um estudante brasileiro em Liége” in
Jornal do Commercio, 12 October 1914, p. 3. See also “De nuestros correspon-
sales” in La Nación (B.A., 22 September 1914), p. 6; Payró, Corresponsal de
guerra, pp. 641–642. Enrique Del Valle Iberlucea, La cuestión internacional y el
Partido Socialista (Buenos Aires: Martín García, 1917), p. 64. Julio Mesquita, A
guerra, 1914–1918, vols. 1–4 (São Paulo: Editora Terceiro Nome, 2002), vol. 1,
pp. 111–112; “Las deportaciones” in Zig-Zag, 16 December 1916.
33 Los horrores de la guerra (Rosario de Santa Fe: Longo y Argento, circa 1914),
p. 3.
34 The Francophile Silva Vildósola claimed that this concerned all of Chile (Carlos
Silva Vildósola, Le Chili et la guerre (Paris: Alcan, 1917), pp. 44–45. See also
idem, “Le Chili et la guerre européenne” in L’Amérique latine et la guerre euro-
péenne (Paris: Alcan, 1916), p. 72.
35 Julio Mesquita, A guerra, vol. 1 (São Paulo: Editora Terceiro Nome, 2002),
p. 207. Anonymous, “Os barbaros” in A Epoca, 12 May 1915, p. 1; “A guerra e
a civilização” in O Imparcial, 12 May 1915, p. 1; Anonymous, “El hundamiento
del Lusitania” in El Comercio (Quito, 11 May 1915), p. 1. The fact that indi-
vidual Germans and German descendants in Brazil publicly celebrated the sink-
ing only further infamed the situation. See “Destruição do Lusitania” in Jornal
do Commercio, 29 May 1915, p. 2. The German-born Brazilian Foreign Min-
ister Lauro Müller visited Porto Alegre shortly thereafter and expressed pride
in his ethnic roots, which also sparked outrage. See Bonow, A desconfança,
pp. 179–182.
36 Federico García Godoy, “La France et Saint-Domingue” in L’Amérique latine
et la guerre européenne (Paris: Hachette, 1916), p. 96. On the topoi of French
propaganda, see Gerd Krumeich, “Ernest Lavisse und die Kritik an der deutschen
64 Stefan Rinke
‘Kultur,’ 1914–1918” in Wolfgang J Mommsen (ed.), Kultur und Krieg: Die Rolle
der Intellektuellen, Künstler und Schriftsteller im Ersten Weltkrieg (Munich: R.
Oldenbourg-Verlag, 1996), pp. 143–154.
37 Irineu Machado, “A  Allemanha ofende a civilisação e a humanidade” in A
Epoca, 3 September  1914, p.  1. This was argued by the Brazilian intellectual
José Verissimo, “Nós americanos e a guerra” in O Imparcial, 24 August 1914,
p. 2.
38 Sayé, Crema de menta, p. 128; “As barbaridades allemãs” in O Imparcial, 24
March 1915, p. 1. The Brazilian entertainment magazine Fon-Fon had remarked
as early as July 1914 that Europe was divided into “Latin, barbaric, and enslaved
peoples”. See “Guerra!” in Fon-Fon, 1 July 1914.
39 This was true even for a colony like Jamaica, where Marcus Garvey declared his
solidarity. Richard Smith, Jamaican Volunteers in the First World War: Race,
Masculinity and the Development of National Consciousness (Manchester:
Manchester University Press, 2004), p. 44.
40 Anonymous, “A  obra do Germanismo” in Jornal do Commercio, 17 August
1914, p. 2.
41 Santiago Arguello, “L’opinion du Nicaragua sur la guerre européenne” in
L’Amérique latine et la guerre européenne (Paris: Hachette, 1916), p. 140.
42 Anonymous, “A theoria do germanismo” in Jornal do Commercio, 3 April 1915,
p. 4; “Razões contra a Allemanha – Balanço da Cultura Moderna: Sciencia” in
Jornal do Commercio, 14 February 1915, p. 3. Francisco García Calderón, Ide-
ologías (Paris: Garnier, 1918), pp. 376–377. The Argentine Raymond Wilmart,
originally from Belgium, even cited the German language, which he felt was
overly complicated, as evidence of German arrogance. Raymond Wilmart, “I. El
ideal americano. II. Peligros” in Revista Argentina de Ciencias Políticas, vol. 9
(1914/15), pp. 369–385.
43 Anonymous, “Guillermo el macanudo” in El Zorro, 14 September 1914, p. 3.
44 Anonymous, “Ao Redor da Guerra. O Attila dos latinos e o Attila dos germa-
nicos” in Jornal do Commercio, 22 May 1915, p. 2; “Guilherme II, imperador dos
bárbaros do Occidente?!” in A Epoca, 12 August 1914, p. 1. See also Lugones, Mi
beligerancia, p. 40; Barroetaveña, Alemania contra el mundo, pp. 6–7.
45 Raymond Wilmart, “La guerra” in Revista Argentina de Ciencias Políticas, vol.
10, 1915, pp. 514–515.
46 Anonymous, “Ao Redor da Guerra – O programma pan-germanista” in Jornal
do Commercio, 12 February 1915, p. 3; “Pangermanismo” in La Prensa (Lima,
1 September 1918), p. 3; Max Nordau, “Los Pan . . . ismos” La Nación (B.A.,
18 January 1915), p. 3.
47 García Calderón, Ideologias, pp. 488–489.
48 Anonymous, “Impressões do Sr. Graça Aranha” in Jornal do Commercio, 11
December 1914, p. 4.
49 Anonymous,“Das mangelhafte Verständnis für deutsches Wesen im Auslande”
in Deutsche La Plata Zeitung, 8 November  1914, p.  1. See also “Was ist die
Wahrheit?” in Ibid., 6 October 1914, p. 1; Frederik C Luebke, Germans in Bra-
zil: A  Comparative History of Cultural Confict During World War I (Baton
Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1987), p. 89.
50 Barroetaveña, Alemania contra el mundo, p. 34. A good example of this kind
of historiography is Paul-Henri Michel, L’Hispanisme dans les républiques espa-
gnoles d’Amérique pendant la guerre de 1914–1918 (Paris: A. Costes, 1931),
pp. 50–51. Compagnon follows this line of thought in L’adieu à l’Europe.
51 Jürgen Kloosterhuis, “Friedliche Imperialisten”: Deutsche Auslandsvereine und
auswärtige Kulturpolitik, 1906–1918 (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 1994),
pp. 251–252.
 Mediating enmity 65
52 Stefan Rinke, “The Reconstruction of National Identity: German Minorities in
Latin America During the First World War” in Nicola Foote and Michael Goe-
bel (eds.), Immigration and National Identities in Latin America (Gainesville:
University Press of Florida, 2014), pp.  170–174; Luebke, Germans in Brazil,
pp. 93–99.
53 Friedrich Katz, The Secret War in Mexico: Europe, the United States and the
Mexican Revolution (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981), pp.  441–
446. So far, there are only a few studies on the activities of German-language
newspapers in Latin America during the war. On Buenos Aires, by contrast,
see Katrin Hofmann, “¿Construyendo una ‘comunidad’? Theodor Alemann y
Hermann Tjarks como voceros de la prensa germanoparlante en Buenos Aires,
1914–1918” in Iberoamericana, vol. 9, 2009, pp. 127–128.
54 “La Germanoflia de El Nacional” in El Nacional, 17 May 1916, p. 4.
55 Jens Albes, Worte wie Wafen: Die deutsche Propaganda in Spanien während des
Ersten Weltkriegs (Essen: Klartext, 1996), p. 126. On the domestic Spanish dis-
putes on the response to the war, see also Maximiliano Fuentes Codera, España
en la Primera Guerra Mundial: Una movilización cultural (Madrid: Akal, 2014).
56 Anonymous, “Um protesto da colonia germanica” in Correio da Manhã,
21 September  1914, p.  3; “O protesto dos teuto-brazileiros” in A Epoca, 4
September  1914, p.  2; “Nós barbaros?!” in Jornal do Commercio, 15 Janu-
ary 1915, p. 8.
57 Foreign Minister Marco Fidel Suárez to the editors-in-chief of all Colombian
periodicals (Bogotá, 27 November 1914) in Documentos relativos a la neutrali-
dad de la República de Colombia respecto de la actual Guerra Européa, Bogotá
1916, pp. 22–24.
58 German embassy to MRREE (Quito, 2 January 1916) in Ecuador, Archivo del
Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores (AMRREE), Quito B.1.2: Comunicaciones
recibidas de la Legación de Alemania, tomo II. MRREE to consuls abroad
(Quito, 7 February 1916) ibid.
59 Foreign Minister Baltasar Brum to Uruguayan Ministry of War (Montevideo,
2 January  1915), Uruguay, Archivo General de la Nación (AGN), Primera
Guerra Mundial (PGM), Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores (MREE): Caja
735. Montevideo embassy to AA (5 January  1915), in: Carlos Ibarguren,
“Informes diplomáticos de los representantes del Imperio Alemán en el Uru-
guay, 1912-1915” in Revista Histórica, vol. 69 (Montevideo, 1975), pp. 117–
202, 183.
60 “Catecismo da germanophobia” in A Guerra: revista semanal, 5, Decem-
ber  1914, pp.  3–4; Juan Kuempel, La guerra (Valparaíso: Imprenta Victoria,
1915), p. 1. See also Federico Lorenz, “La gran guerra vista por un argentino”
in Todo es Historia, vol. 352, 1996, p. 51; Alfred Scholz, Brasilien im Weltkriege
(Siemerode: A. Scholz, 1933), p. 7; Bonow, A desconfança, pp. 166–167.
61 Julio Kaulen, Las verdaderas causas de la guerra según artículos de reputados
autores franceses escritos años antes de estallar el conficto (Santiago de Chile:
Claret, 1918). Anonymous, “Ao Redor da Guerra” in Jornal do Commercio, 31
January 1915, p. 4; AA to Uruguayan MRREE (Berlin, 21 August 1914), Uru-
guay, AGN, PGM, MRREE, Caja 735.
62 Thus, for example, “A Guerra (Um Ponto de Vista Sympáthico a Allemanha)”
in Jornal do Commercio, 27 September  1914, p.  2; Javier Vial Solar, Conv-
ersaciones sobre la guerra (Santiago de Chile: Imprenta Universitaria, 1917),
pp. 99–101.
63 Leonore Niessen-Deiters, Krieg, Auslanddeutschtum und Presse (Stuttgart:
Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1915), pp. 5, 9–20. Juan P. Ramos, “Alemania ante
la guerra” in Revista Argentina de Ciencias Políticas, vol. 9, 1914/15, p. 437;
66 Stefan Rinke
Anonymous,“Os Allemaes no Rio de Janeiro” in Jornal do Commercio, 22 Sep-
tember 1914, p. 6; Anonymous, “Da Allemanha” in Jornal do Commercio, 1
November 1914, p. 4. See also María Inés Tato, “Contra la corriente: los intelec-
tuales germanóflos argentinos frente a la Primera Guerra Mundial” in Jahrbuch
für Geschichte Lateinamerikas, vol. 49, 2012, pp. 220–221.
64 Ramos, “Alemania ante la guerra”, pp. 428–429; José Enrique Montoro, “Ale-
mania y la Guerra Europa” in Cuba Contemporánea, vol. 6, no. 10, 1914,
pp. 378–401, 391; José Enrique Montoro, “Opinión de un americano sobre la
guerra” in El Comercio (Quito, 25 November 1914), p. 2.
65 Anonymous, Empleo, contrario al Derecho internacional de tropas de color en
el teatro de la guerra europeo (Berlin, 1915), p. 1. See also MRREE to the Ger-
man Ambassador (Bogotá, 17 November 1915), Colombia, Archivo General de
la Nación (AGN), MRREE, 00556, Trasf. 1, fol. 147.
66 Anonymous, “Ao Redor da Guerra” in Jornal do Commercio, 31 January 1915,
p. 4; Ramos, “Alemania ante la guerra”, p. 437. See also “A Inglaterra atraiçoa
a raça branca” in A Guerra: revista semanal, 5, December 1914, p. 11.
67 Thus, for example, Ernst Troeltsch, El espíritu de la cultura alemana (Buenos
Aires: Unión de Libreros Alemanes, circa 1916). See also the extensive collective
edition: Hintze, Otto, Alemania y la guerra europea, vol. 1, Alemania: su política
y sus instituciones (Barcelona: Unión de Libreros Alemanes, 1916); Tato, “Con-
tra la corriente”, pp. 207–210.
68 Nicolás de Dohna Schlodien, Las hazañas del “Moewe” (Madrid: Blass y Cía,
1917); Spiegel von und zu Peckelsheim, Edgar, El submarino U 202: diario de la
guerra (Madrid: Imprenta Blass y Cía, 1917); Montoro, “Alemania y la guerra
europea”, pp. 378–379.
69 Politisches Archiv des Auswärtigen Amts (PAAA), 121950 Brasilien 2, Presse,
Propaganda und Allgemeines, Eugen Will, “Bericht über die Bearbeitung der
Presse und des Nachrichtenwesens”, 6 June 1918.
70 Ramos, “Alemania ante la guerra”, p.  443. See also Rogelio Fernández Güel,
Plus Ultra: La raza hispana ante el conficto europeo (Madrid: Editorial de la
Union Intelectual Latino-Americana, 1917), pp. 5–7; Rogelio Fernández Güel,
“A missão da Russia prophetizada por Euclides da Cunha” in A República, 5
August  1914, p.  1. Fóscolo, Vitelio, Alemania ante la Guerra: estudio psíco-
sociológico (Buenos Aires: Deutscher Wissenschaftl. Verein, 1914), p. 19.
71 Fóscolo, Alemania ante la Guerra, pp. 3–5; Anonymous,“A Inglaterra” in Jor-
nal do Commercio, 29 November 1914, p. 10; Ezequiel A. Chavez, “L’opinion
publique mexicaine et la guerre européenne” in L’Amérique latine et la guerre
européenne (Paris: Hachette, 1916), p. 113; Ramos, “Alemania ante la guerra”,
p. 439. See also Tato, “Contra la Corriente”, pp. 212–213.
72 Anonymous,“Eine spanische Ausgabe unserer Zeitung” in Deutsche La Plata
Zeitung, 4 October 1914, p. 2; Anonymous,“La Unión, die spanische Ausgabe
unserer Zeitung” in Deutsche La Plata Zeitung, 25 October 1914, p. 1.
73 “Enemy propaganda in Argentina”, 25 October  1918, NA, RG 165, MID
2327-B-108; Hofmann, “¿Construyendo una ‘comunidad’?” pp. 129. On the
pro-German military context in Paraguay, see “Nuestro porvenir militar” in El
Diario (Asunción, 8 August 1914), p. 5; British envoy, “Annual Report 1915”
in BD, Part II, Series D, vol. 1, p. 50.
74 See Chapter 8 by María Inés Tato and Luis Esteban Dalla Fontana, “An Argen-
tine reporter in the European trenches: Lieut. Col. Emilio Kinkelin’s war chron-
icle” in this book for more on Kinkelin.
75 José Félix Uriburu, La guerra actual: apuntes y enseñanzas (Buenos Aires, 1915),
pp. 3–4. On Kinkelin: “Tres meses y medio de guerra” in La Nación (Buenos
Aires, 4 January 1915), p. 4; Lorenz, “La gran guerra”.
 Mediating enmity 67
76 Ramos’ book was even translated into German by the German-South American
Institute in Cologne: Juan P. Ramos, Die Bedeutung Deutschlands im europäi-
schen Krieg (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verl.-Anst, 1917); Ronald C Newton, German
Buenos Aires, 1900–1933: Social Change and Cultural Crisis (Austin: University
of Texas Press, 1977), p. 36. See also the work of lawyer F Benavides Olazábal,
En el mundo de la flosofía y de la guerra (Buenos Aires: Imprenta French, 1915).
77 Ernesto Quesada, La actual civilización germánica y la presente guerra (Buenos
Aires: Imprenta Suiza, 1914). See also Ernesto Quesada, “El ‘peligro alemán’
en Sud América” in Revista Argentina de Ciencias Políticas, vol. 9, 1914/15,
pp. 397–399.
78 Bonow, A desconfança, p. 161.
79 On the failure of the ethnic federation eforts, see Rinke, “The Reconstruction of
National Identity”, pp. 173–174.
80 Anonymous, “A Repercussão da Guerra” in Jornal do Commercio, 21 Septem-
ber 1914, p. 2; “Um escriptor militar brasileiro” in A Guerra: revista semanal,
6, December 1914, pp. 19–20. German-friendly voices could also be found in the
military journal A Defesa Nacional; Bonow, A desconfança, pp. 91–97.
81 Henrique da Rocha Lima, “Delenda est Germania” in A Guerra: revista sema-
nal, 6, December 1914, pp. 7–15.
82 João Dunshee de Abranches Moura, Porque devemos ser amigos da Alemanha
(Rio de Janeiro: Litografa e Papelaria de Almeida Marques & C, 1914); Com-
pagnon, L’adieu à l’Europe, pp. 190–193.
83 Anonymous, “Lo que vió, oyó y observó don Ricardo Cox Méndez en la Europa
en guerra” in Zig-Zag, 18 March 1916; Ricardo Cox Méndez, A través de la
Europa en Guerra (Santiago: Imprenta y EncuadernaciÓn Antigua Inglesa,
1916), pp. 135–143; Galvarino Gallardo Nieto, Panamericanismo, Santiago de
Chile 194. A  list may be found in Blancpain, Migrations et mémoire germa-
niques, pp. 272–274.
84 In Guayaquil, the publisher Gutenberg brought out monthly an uncommented
compilation of articles containing translations from German publications on the
war and from German-friendly Latin American publications. La Guerra Mundial
de 1914: traducciones de relatos verídicos y de artículos de fondo de las mejores
publicaciones alemana (Guayaquil: Libr. é Impr. Gutenberg, de Uzcátegui & Co.,
1915).
85 Jenaro Guerrero, Alemania en la lucha (Bogotá: Arboleda y Valencia, 1915),
pp. 5–46. On Gómez, see Rausch, “Colombia’s Neutrality”, p. 108.
86 “Una palabra de introducción” and “Guatemala y la colonia alemana” in El
Eco Alemán, 1 September  1914, p.  1; Nicolás Rivero and J. Gil del Real, El
conficto europeo: actualidades y diario de la guerra (Havanna: Impr. y Linotipo
Pi y Margall, 1916), p. 1; Thomas Schoonover, Germany in Central America:
Competitive Imperialism, 1821–1929 (Tuscaloosa, 1998), pp. 156–158.
87 Rausch, “Colombia’s Neutrality”, p. 107.
88 On the classifcation of the diferent forms of the public, see Frank Bösch and
Peter Hoeres, “Im Bann der Öfentlichkeit? Der Wandel der Außenpolitik im
Medienzeitalter” in Frank Bösch and Peter Hoeres (eds.), Außenpolitik im Medi-
enzeitalter: Vom späten 19. Jahrhundert bis zur Gegenwart (Göttingen: Wall-
stein, 2013), p. 15.
89 Julio Castellanos, “Las consecuencias de la guerra” in Caras y Caretas, 10
October 1914.
90 Ricardo Rojas, La guerra de las naciones (Buenos Aires: Librería “La Facultad”
J Roldán y ca, 1924), p. 184.
91 Juan Más y Pi, “Con los nuestros: un comentario al margen de la Guerra
Grande” in Nosotros, vol. 8, 1914, pp. 228–232.
68 Stefan Rinke
92 See various articles under the title “Nuestra tercera encuesta” in Nosotros, vol.
8, 1914. See also Compagnon, L’adieu à L’Europe, pp. 69–71.
93 “El tema de la guerra” in Revista Argentina de Ciencias Políticas, 11, 1915/16,
p. 399.
94 María Inés Tato, “La disputa por la argentinidad: rupturistas y neutralistas
durante la Primera Guerra Mundial” in Temas de historia argentina y ameri-
cana, 13, July–December 2008, pp. 233–242; Idem, “La contienda europea en
las calles porteñas: manfestaciones cívicas y pasiones nacionales en torno de
la Primera Guerra Mundial” in María Inés Tato and Martín O. Castro (eds),
Del centenario al peronismo: dimensiones de la vida política argentina (Buenos
Aires: Imago Mundi, 2010), p. 43.
95 Raimundo Siepe, Yrigoyen, la Primera Guerra Mundial y las relaciones económi-
cas (Buenos Aires: Biblos – Fundación Simón Rodríguez, 1992), pp. 64–66; Tato,
“La contienda europea en las calles porteñas”, pp. 56-59.
96 João Dunshee de Abranches Moura, A Allemanha e a paz: appello ao Presi-
dente da Camara dos Deputados ao Congresso Nacional do Brasil (São Paulo:
Typographia Brazil de Rotschild, 1917), p. 14. On the relationships, see Com-
pagnon, L’adieu à L’Europe, pp. 44–46.
97 Liberato Bittencourt, “Philosophia da guerra” in Correio da Manhã, 20 Septem-
ber 1914, p. 3; Sidney Garambone, A primeira Guerra Mundial e a imprensa
brasileira (Rio de Janeiro: Mauad, 2003), p. 49.
98 Anonymous, “Liga pelos Alliados” in Jornal do Commercio, 18 March 1915,
p. 3. On the individual members, see also Francisco Luiz Teixeira Vinhosa, O
Brasil e a Primeira Guerra Mundial: A diplomacia brasileira e as grandes potên-
cias (Rio de Janeiro: Biblioteca do Exército, 1990), pp.  31–32; Compagnon,
L’adieu à l’Europe, pp. 73–74.
99 For a critique, see “Liga pelos Alliados” in Jornal do Commercio, 26
March 1915, p. 2. The same newspaper had published a month earlier a series
of articles entitled “Arguments against Germany”. See “Razões contra a Alle-
manha I – A responsabilidade” in Jornal do Commercio, 2 February 1915, p. 2.
On Oliveira Lima in detail, Compagnon, L’adieu à l’Europe, pp. 94–96; Bonow,
A desconfança, pp. 197–210.

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4 Reporting the war
in British Africa
Anne Samson

For the people of Africa, the war of 1914–1918 was as real as it was for
those in Europe. However, for the people of Europe, and in Britain espe-
cially, the war in Africa was a “sideshow”, a drain on men, shipping, and
material which could be better utilised in the war on the European conti-
nent. Extending the war to Africa would, it was hoped, ensure safety of Brit-
ish sea routes and eventually, along with propaganda value, deny Germany
possession of its colonies of Togoland, Kamerun, South West Africa, and
East Africa. Alternatively, captured territories could be used for bargaining
with at the peace negotiations.
The British declaration of war against Germany and its allies automati-
cally meant the British Empire was at war. Whilst each territory in Africa
was governed diferently, its involvement in the war was almost universally
incidental but far-reaching. Attempts had been made to keep the Congo
Basin neutral in the event of war breaking out, but by the time, 10 Sep-
tember  1914, the European powers were able to consider what was hap-
pening in Africa, too much confict had occurred to maintain neutrality in
the area. Even Britain’s ally, Portugal, which was ostensibly neutral until 9
March 1916 was involved in the confict through sending out expeditionary
forces to protect its colonial borders of Angola and Portuguese East Africa
against German incursions in 1914. Belgium went on the ofensive–defen-
sive in Africa to safeguard its interests.
Britain’s interest and infuence stretched across the African continent. In
the south, there was the Union of South Africa, a dominion, and the pro-
tectorates of Swaziland, Basutoland, and Bechuanaland. These were gov-
erned by the same person in two diferent capacities: Governor General of
the Union and High Commissioner for the protectorates. In central Africa,
Nyasaland had its own Governor, and both Southern and Northern Rhode-
sia were administered by the British South Africa Company under charter
to Britain and overseen by the High Commissioner in South Africa. In east
Africa, British East Africa, Uganda, and Zanzibar were colonies and protec-
torate respectively, whilst in the west, there were the colonies of Gold Coast,
Nigeria, Gambia, and Sierra Leone. Finally, in the north, Egypt had been
made a protectorate following the outbreak of war to ensure British control
74 Anne Samson
over the Suez Canal. Each territory, except Zanzibar, had its own Gover-
nor, Zanzibar being administered by a High Commissioner who doubled as
Governor of British East Africa. These men mediated between the African
territory and peoples and the metropole. They were in efect the gatekeep-
ers of ofcialdom. Alongside them, however, were news distributors such as
Reuters and the Press Association which were able to disseminate ofcial
information once it had been made public in Britain. Similarly, they were
able to feed local news and views back to the metropole, depending on the
availability of communication channels.
Newspapers have a relatively long history in Africa, dating back to the
frst known paper printed in 1800 in Cape Town, South Africa and the
second in 1801 in Sierra Leone. Both papers spread government informa-
tion. Liberia was the next territory to embark on newspaper publishing in
1826 for a few months. However, it was only in 1830 that newsprint in a
more general sense took of, again in Liberia under the auspices of an “anti-
colonial thinker and academic” from the Caribbean Island of St Thomas.
Gold Coast saw its frst newspaper arrive in 1858 in Accra and the follow-
ing year, one in Yoruba, Iwe Ihoren – the paper with news – which cost 30
cowrie shells. South Africa saw its frst vernacular paper appear in 1876 in
Xhosa, Isigidimi Sama Xhosa, and a dual language paper in 1886, although
the frst southern African paper published in the local vernacular was in
Basutoland in 1863, Leselinyana la Lesutho, in the Sotho language.1 Cen-
tral Africa’s frst paper was in Southern Rhodesia in 1894, The Bulawayo
Chronicle, whilst The Central African Times arrived in 1899 in Blantyre,
Nyasaland, under the guidance of a Scotsman wanting to support the local
settlers. East Africa, an area colonised later than the others, received its frst
paper, African Standard, in 1902 courtesy of Karachi-born AM Javanjee
who, in 1905, sold it onto white settlers.2
Initially, newspapers centred around settlers and government employees,
providing them with information from home and news relevant to where
they were based.3 However, as more indigenous peoples became familiar,
in this case, with the English language, so they too started accessing news-
papers. The increased use of English, the language of the dominant group,
was encouraged for diferent reasons. The more locals who could commu-
nicate in English, the better economically as local labour was cheaper: Afri-
can black clerks could take over tedious administrative functions, although
this needed to be mediated to limit demands for equality.4 To communicate
with government, it was important to speak government’s language. For
the local populations, motivation to learn the coloniser’s language was to
progress up the social ladder.5 Leading the way in the learning and teach-
ing of languages were missionaries. While there was a pragmatic approach
and reason for teaching in the vernacular, missionaries, both Christian and
Muslim, had seen opportunities for teaching their own language as a means
to embed “civilised” culture, refected in the respective religion. Publishing
local vernacular newspapers amongst other publications enabled a wider
 Reporting the war in British Africa 75
reach, helped preserve local languages whose existence was starting to be
threatened by the dominance of English, and subtly kept ethnic groups in
their place and separated.6
The nature of each territory, the reason for colonising, the extent to
which the land had been settled, and length of British control determined
the manner and extent to which the war was reported. The greater the white
settler and English-educated black and Asian populations in a territory, the
more newspapers there were. Most newspapers were, unsurprisingly, to be
found in the capital cities and main economic centres as this was where
the elites were to be found. With greater diversity of readership, the role of
print media began to change, becoming an outlet for political expression.
By the outbreak of the First World War, the use of newspapers for political
purposes was well established on the African continent.7
It is, therefore, not surprising that most newspapers were printed in
English. This was the most efective way, before the advent of radio, of
ensuring views were carried to those of the metropole who had not learnt the
language of the peoples amongst whom they lived8 and allowed for ease of
transfer to metropole publications. There were a few dual-language papers
where the dominant African vernacular was used, allowing for greater local
engagement and expression of views. For the politically motivated African
black, and for the upwardly mobile, publishing and reading a newspaper in
English were marks of status. Where the masses needed motivating, use of
the vernacular appeared to dominate. Of the 79 African newspapers cover-
ing the war years listed on the British Library catalogue, only four are not
in English. These are all in Dutch/Afrikaans. In contrast, of the 27 British
African newspapers listed on Readex, fve are published in two languages
and two in four languages.9 The non-English newspapers are South African,
in both African and Asian languages. In total, there is access to 92 diferent
African titles either in the British Library or online, the majority being South
African. This for an estimated continental British-controlled population of
33,409,000 in 1907.10
Publishing local papers was a challenge and relied on the commitment of
the editor as Derek Peterson and Emma Hunter remind us concerning Sol
Plaatje, who edited Tsala ea Batho which ran from July 1910 through to
July 1915. Plaatje himself:

Collected the post, opened and read letters . . . and kept records. . . . He
read papers of other publishers and editors; Government gazettes and
papers and translated them all from English into Tswana and Xhosa.
Using a typewriter he arranged all ideas and news, proof-read various
communications and letters and after correcting [and] editing them sent
everything to the printing press.11

For this reason, papers did not survive long, 22 closed during the years
1914–1918, of which 11 appear to have started and folded during the war
76 Anne Samson
years. Excluding those which closed during the war years, 11 newspapers
started during the confict and continued for at least a year thereafter. Fur-
ther research is needed into why specifc papers closed during the confict,
most notably the East African Standard in July 1915. Although some meas-
ure of censorship had been introduced during the war,12 it does not appear
to have been as stringent in Africa as it was in Britain. JX Merriman, a
leading politician in South Africa complained to Deputy Prime Minister Jan
Smuts that the opposition National Party, which had tacitly supported the
1914 rebellion, should have had numerous publications banned for being
anti-war and treasonous.13
By the time of the Great War, newspapers were playing an important
role in communicating information to large portions of the population in
African territories. Although not all inhabitants were literate in the admin-
istrative language, those who could read and translate were called upon to
disseminate the news. A single paper would have a large readership in this
way and the dissemination process was often a social occasion. The Gold
Coast Leader of 22 August 191414 explained:

It is war, and rumours of war everywhere. Throughout the Colony, peo-

ple seem to be able to think of nothing else but war. The martial instinct
in man is aroused and eagerly news that come through Reuter’s Agency
[sic] are devoured by the fortunate subscribers at Seccondee and Accra
and from them they pass in distorted forms through the various classes
of the native community; and in the market place women detail to one
another in bated breath the latest news of the war in the white man’s
country and in Togoland as supplied to them by the fertile imaginative
faculty of those wonder “scholar” sons and nephews.

The most developed papers were found in South and West Africa, where
many editors had been exposed to British, European, and/or American cul-
ture, having lived abroad for some time, invariably whilst studying. Many
African black editors had been funded by missionaries to train as evange-
lists, whilst the African white, Boer, and Afrikaner had looked to study law
or theology, and British businessmen regularly travelled between the two
continents. This enabled editors to bring back new ways of reporting, exert
pressure on government, and combined with Christian theological under-
standing, placed them in an ideal role to mediate between their own people
and the metropole. On occasion, such as in Nyasaland, this led to violent
outbreaks as happened with John Chilembwe’s followers in 1915.
It has been important to provide some background to the prevalence of
newspapers in British Africa before the outbreak of war so that meaningful
comparisons can be drawn, both between African territories and between
Africa and the metropole. To provide a meaningful base for comparison,
select events will be considered: the outbreak of war, the surrender of
the Germans in Togoland at the end of August  1914, the South African
 Reporting the war in British Africa 77
rebellion of October to December 1914, the Chilembwe uprising in Nyasa-
land in February 1915, the defeat of the Germans in South West Africa in
July 1915 and Kamerun in March 1916, and the end of the war in Africa
on 25 November 1918.

Newspaper comparisons
Using the Readex collection of papers published in Africa during the war
years,15 of the 25,513 pages identifed referring to “war”, 2,964 pages
appeared in the last fve months of 1914, nearly 6,500 in 1915, while 1916
and 1917 each saw just under 5,500 pages, and 1918 nearly 5,000 pages.
Signifcantly, the collection does not include the Afrikaans or Dutch newspa-
pers which were founded before and during the war in South Africa. In com-
parison, a search on “Africa” on the British Library Newspaper catalogue
for the same period elicited 210,149 articles, 17,696 illustrations, 10,763
advertisements, 1,120 family announcements, and 336 miscellaneous men-
tions. Caution has to be exercised with these fgures as the number of news-
papers vary and reference to “war” in the African papers and “Africa” in
the British papers might have nothing to do with the 1914–1918 war. In
London alone, over the war years, 22,586 articles mentioned Africa, while
in Edinburgh it was 14,912, and in Ireland there were 12,757 mentions. The
annual trend of number of articles published in Britain broadly accords with
that in Africa. Of the total number of articles, 77,186 appeared in 1914,
64,276 in 1915, 48,315 in 1916, 36,546 in 1917, and then a signifcant
drop to 14,144 in 1918.
For this analysis, two papers published in England have been selected, one
regional and one London-based. The Drifeld Times, published in York-
shire, England, provides insight into what was deemed newsworthy out-
side the main political centres. While Yorkshire had the largest number of
“Africa” mentions,16 the Drifeld Times had one of the lowest suggesting
only items of signifcance were reported. In all, the Drifeld Times men-
tioned Africa or an associated term in 122 articles and adverts. Apart from
two letters from a dresser in the Royal Army Medical Corps, who served in
East Africa for just over a year, there was little discussion of conditions on
the continent. By far, the greatest interest was in fundraising for missionary
work in Central Africa and support for hospitals across the theatres, East
Africa and Egypt included in the list. In comparison, the London Globe, an
evening paper aimed at “a gentleman relaxing in his Club . . . between work
and the night’s social events” reaching about 5,000 readers,17 carried 3,090
articles and illustrations mentioning Africa over the same period.
One of the dominant features in both British English papers was the focus
on Louis Botha and Jan Smuts, the Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Min-
ister of South Africa respectively. Having led the Boer contingents against
the British in war between 1899 and 1902, they were now fghting alongside
British forces against Germany, a country which had ostensibly supported
78 Anne Samson
the Boers. Their success in German South West Africa gave credence and
justifcation to Britain’s involvement.18 Concerning the African papers, those
in South and East Africa stand out for their reporting on the European
situation. They aimed to keep their readers as fully informed as possible of
what was happening in Europe. In addition to their daily print runs, news
received during the day would be made available for readers and if deemed
signifcant, a special edition would be produced that evening. The news fed
through to Central Africa in summarised form. In contrast, all the African
papers mentioned within a week, depending on whether they were dailies
or weeklies, that Britain was at war. For the West African papers this raised
concerns over food and impact on the local economy, especially in territo-
ries such as Gambia where there was no locally produced food.19 The South
African papers also expressed a concern about food and the economy, soon
banning exports of meat to Britain.20
Throughout the war, the issue of food and stock markets featured in all
papers. Britain was reassuring its readers that shortages were not anticipated
as the Royal Navy had control of the seas. In Africa, there was an attempt
to regulate prices from early on. Of greater interest to Britain was the fnan-
cial position and to some extent in South Africa as well. The position and
security of the goldfelds, in South, Central, and West Africa, was regularly
reported, with concern expressed when South Africa experienced an inter-
nal rebellion against supporting Britain. Reporting and the payment of divi-
dends, exchanging currencies, realising German promissory notes, and what
to do with captured German ships and goods were all covered in various
ways, being of great concern to businessmen in London. These issues were
of little concern for readers of the Drifeld Times; rather they were informed
of practical issues such as the last date to post goods to ensure they arrived
in Africa in time for Christmas and later the need for obtaining a passport if
one wished to travel to South Africa (5 January 1918).
In terms of the actual confict, mention was made in the British press of
various events in Africa, both British successes such as the fall of Togo-
land (29 August 1914) and Cameroons (26 February 1916), and German
achievements including the attack on Abercorn in Northern Rhodesia (22
September 1914) and the sinking of HMS Pegasus in Zanzibar harbour (26
September  1914). Most received a mention in the Drifeld Times with a
bit more detail in The Globe. On occasion, The Globe would explain the
signifcance of the event for Britain’s continued presence in Africa.21 The
Illustrated London News saw value on 17 March 1917 in a pictorial report
on the “Work by Native Troops” in “The conquest of German East Africa”,
and continued, in the same article, to highlight the diversity of soldier:
“British, South Africans, Indians and Natives”. In the African press, the
South African papers, followed by the East African Standard, carried more
information and analysis than other African countries did. Little if anything
was said in the West African press of events in South Africa except for the
land issue,22 while the surrender of the West African German colonies of
 Reporting the war in British Africa 79
Togoland and Cameroons was considered in terms of what it meant for
the locality. Although there was some relief at Germany no longer being
involved in the area, there was concern at the removal of German business-
men and the withdrawal of French merchant houses, as the lack of competi-
tion would lead to higher prices.23
As the war progressed, so articles or evidence of German aggression
and “unfair play” began to appear. One of the earliest mentions, 28 Octo-
ber  1914, was in The Globe when Germany invaded neutral Portuguese
Angola. After the sinking of the Lusitania, German atrocities in Africa were
reported in the British press on 21 October 1915 and an American investi-
gation in May 1918. In addition to these mentions, the Drifeld Times, in
1918, took the opportunity of letting readers know how Germany had mis-
used the white fag and on 4 August 1914 in Dar es Salaam took the Belgian
ambassador to German East Africa prisoner at the end of a dinner that he
attended as guest of the German governor.
Mention of British ships sunk by the Germans was noticeable in the Brit-
ish press (e.g. The Globe, 24 October 1914). However, in contrast to the
atrocities referred to earlier, these mentions were practical, informing poten-
tial family of what and where loved ones were and that letters might not be
delivered. It is through such communication that we learn of female nurses
of the Colonial Nursing Association going from Britain to serve in West
Africa (The Globe, 20 April 1915). Similarly, much of the detailed reporting
of what was happening in southern Africa in particular was due to the close
link between South Africa and Britain, many of the mining magnates and
other businessmen moved between the two countries regularly, and many
whites in South Africa had family in Britain. News reports allowed family
members and business partners to keep up to date with what was happening
elsewhere. The same accounted for the reporting of ships and submarines
sunk of the African coast.
In portraying the confict in Africa, the British press tended to down-
play the conditions, providing a romanticised view as set out on 30 Janu-
ary  1915, “Each expedition is a romance of adventure”. The campaigns
referred to were Togoland, Cameroons, West and East Africa, the Great
Lakes, and the source of the Nile. However, the reporting of events across
the continent was very uneven. There were virtually daily updates of South
Africa’s movements in South West Africa, with limited reporting from East
Africa and even less concerning West Africa, yet South Africa was left of a
poster dealing with the Empire (The Globe, 26 March 1915). It is noticeable
that as the war in South West Africa was coming to an end, so reporting
from East Africa increased. This coincided with the lifting of the censorship
ban but also with the arrival of the second British white contingent, the 25th
Royal Fusiliers (Legion of Frontiersmen), who led a successful raid against
the Germans at Bukoba (The Globe, June & July 1915) and then the arrival
of the South African contingent at the end of the year, although reporting
dropped of again in 1917 after many of them had returned to the Union.
80 Anne Samson
Belgian Congo’s successes in German East Africa (The Globe, 24 June 1915,
28 October 1915, 4 May 1916, 9 & 21 June 1916, 4 August 1916) con-
trasts with the omission of Belgian involvement in most accounts of Britain’s
war efort in Central Africa, most notably the Lake Tanganyika Expedition.
Despite these mentions in the British press, reporting was felt to be insuf-
fcient as noted by the request to the Secretary of State for the Colonies for
more information in late November 1914 and then by Lord Curzon on 19
April 1915. These questions together with a release of information through
the Berlin press about a British defeat at Jasin (The Globe, 21 April 1915)
led to a lifting of silence concerning the war in East Africa. However, ques-
tions continued to be asked about German successes and British setbacks
such as the arrival of blockade runners to restock German supplies (The
Globe, 5 November 1915).
Although most British press reports concerned white or British involve-
ment in Africa, there was limited mention of other African involvement,
most likely due to a lack of foreign reporters in the territory.24 While Brit-
ain was reluctant to use African troops of colour on the Western Front,
the success of the African French troops was specifcally reported on 25
August 1914, as was their being in the frst line of attack; this was their only
mention in the papers concerned. In October  1914, The Globe informed
readers of the King’s African Rifes who served in East Africa, how many
there were and their role, as well as how they were managed. The same
month, there was discussion about how confict between white settlers in
German and British East Africa had traditionally been resolved leading
to the war in Africa technically being a “white man’s war” and how the
involvement of local African black and Arab troops would undermine the
superiority of the white man. In particular, the Germans were accused of not
playing the game as they were recruiting from “the most ferocious tribe in
all Africa” (17 October 1914). In May 1915 and again in 1916, questions
were asked about poisoning wells in Africa and how through this, together
with the use of gas in Europe, Germany was contravening the Hague Con-
vention. Without giving any details away it was acknowledged that Indian
troops were participating in the war, including in East Africa (The Globe,
17 October 1914). For all the reluctance to utilise African troops elsewhere,
there was a reference to Africa being a potential reservoir of men during the
conscription debates in England (The Globe, 27 May 1916).
Overall, reporting Africa in Britain was limited, reinforcing the continent
being of peripheral importance and signifcance. This was most notable in
reporting the end of the war. Although there was mention made of Britain
assuming administrative control of German East Africa at the end of 1916
and a few setbacks in Portuguese East Africa, little was said about the war
ending in that theatre. Despite the last battle or skirmish taking place on 13
November 1918 and the Germans laying down their arms on 25 Novem-
ber 1918, the armistice and peace in Europe dominated the British papers.
It is difcult to accept this was because the main fghting force consisted
 Reporting the war in British Africa 81
of local troops  – all the British victories in Africa had been achieved by
predominantly African troops with, except for South West Africa, British
ofcers. The omission was simply that local, to Britain, news dominated.
Although nothing was said about peace in Africa, there was some dis-
cussion on 12 November 1918 in The Globe about allocating the German
African colonies between the British dominions. The next day, mention was
made of colonial representation at the peace talks, only the dominions were
to be part of the British delegation. On 14 November, The Globe informed
its readers that the German forces in Africa had been notifed of the armi-
stice in Europe, but nothing was said about the events on 25 November.
On 6 and 7 December, the paper carried the story of the zeppelin sent to
reinforce the German force in East Africa. A report on 27 December about
the deaths in each theatre included East Africa, noting specifcally that of
the 1,800 reported deaths, 1,200 were from disease. The year ended with a
report of the Germans in South West Africa wanting their own territory (30
December) and two pilots identifying a transcontinental route for planes
fying from Cairo to Cape Town (28 December). West Africa and Egypt
were omitted from these reports. The politics behind business and economic
interest seemed to dominate and as Britain would not have to share or con-
sider dominion involvement in West Africa or Egypt, there was no apparent
incentive to focus on those territories in the British press.
The South African press carried news of the armistice on 11 Novem-
ber  1918, whilst the Lagos Standard did on 13 November alongside an
article on the departure of Frederick Lugard, whose time in Nigeria was
looked on as “a time of national misfortune”. The Mafeking Mail published
the terms of the armistice on 13 November and the following day adver-
tised a street collection to “make the ‘boys’ happy on their last Christmas at
the front”. This contrasted with news of the infuenza epidemic which was
causing havoc across the continent. The Nyasaland Times on 14 Novem-
ber carried an article considering what needed to happen in German East
Africa for the Germans to be brought to book, but there was no mention
of war having ended in the neighbouring territory. On 15 November, the
Bulawayo Chronicle carried an announcement that mobilisation had been
cancelled and that “under the circumstances it is reasonable to suppose that
the elusive Von Lettow has received news of the armistice”. Notifcation of
the German forces in Africa having received news of the peace was fnally
announced on 16 November 1918 in South Africa and on 22 November in
Rhodesia, the report having come from Salisbury on Friday 15 November.
On 18 November, the “unconditional surrender” of von Lettow-Vorbeck
and his force featured in the South African press, the news received from
Nairobi. The news did not feature in the West African papers.
There is a distinct diference in how the various African theatres perceived
the war, most notably between West Africa and the rest. While all reported
on events in other theatres, generally, there was more analysis and discus-
sion around the war in West, South, and East Africa than Central Africa.
82 Anne Samson
West Africa’s reporting, though, had a more local orientation than the other
theatres, most likely due to the editors having fewer direct links with Britain.
The capitulation of Togoland prompted anti-German rhetoric to appear
in the West African press. The Gold Coast Leader editorial, likely writ-
ten by editor Joseph Ephraim Casely Hayford aka Ekra Agiman, of 29
August 1914:

Now that British forces have occupied Togoland I hope that no consid-
eration whatever will induce the authorities to relinquish their hold, for
not only is the achievement a material advantage to civilisation but the
territory will form a natural and necessary adjunct to the Gold Coast.
For myself I wish from the bottom of my heart that the Germans were
driven out of Africa, and the worst state of native governments, how-
ever steeped in barbarity, is in substance only a trife worse than the
German administration in Africa.25

As the war progressed, so anti-German articles increased, especially in

South Africa, culminating in outbursts after the sinking of the Lusitania.
The Union was building a case for being awarded German South West
Africa at the end of hostilities. Reports on the Lusitania sinking and the
riots were restricted to South and Central African papers with occasional
mentions in the East African Standard and Uganda Herald.26
The complexity of the colonial relationship featured in the Gold Coast
Leader of 29 August. While deprecating German colonialism, Hayford criti-
cised the British but also called for German shops to remain open in the best
interests of local consumers.27 The Lagos Standard edited by GA Williams,
expressed similar contradictions.28 Loyalty did “not mean the abandonment
of criticism or agitation in subtle forms, not by any means did it signify the
loss of a sense of irony”.29 The same applied to the Afrikaans Nationalist
press in South Africa although it was a little more cautious, or restricted, in
what it printed following the suppression of the October to December 1914
anti-British rebellion in the Union. Many of the nationalist editors, such as
Dr FV Engelenberg, were friends with the Prime Minister or had little expe-
rience of newspaper publishing, most notably Die Volksblad which started
publishing in 1915 under the leadership of Dr DF Malan, a Dutch Reformed
Minister and politician. The complex relationship between the colonised
and the colonisers extended beyond the British. In The Golden Age of Black
Nationalism, Wilson Moses notes that West African editors and the elite
sympathised with Belgium despite its treatment of the local black popula-
tion and “pointed to the Huns as destroyers of civilization and ravagers
of a noble and peaceful nation”. He continues that “Loyal West Africans
were not inclined to publicize an abortive revolt in Nyasaland, led by the
American-educated John Chilembwe”. On occasion, “a West African news-
paper would bitterly remark to the efect that Africans were only pawns
in the struggle between the European titans, and that conditions were not
 Reporting the war in British Africa 83
perfect in the British colonies”.30 Despite the signifcant anti-British Afri-
kaner minority, overall, across Africa, support for the British war efort
“was heartfelt and steadfast”.31
One of the main roles of the press was to convey ofcial messages to
the people. Notices about enlisting, recruitment needs, and martial law
all feature. These notices, however, were not only to support Britain. The
various consulates placed notices for their countrymen explaining what
they needed to do. Austrian vice-consul Marons informed East African
Standard readers on 8 August  1914 that Franz Joseph had issued frst
general mobilisation orders for the Austro-Hungarian Army, and “all
liable to military service must, without exception, join the forces and
report themselves without delay”. This was published in both German
and English. On 20 August  1914, the Bulawayo Chronicle reported via
the Ottoman consul in Cape Town that the “Sultan of Turkey commands
that all conscripts having been called to colours, with the exception . . .
must take immediate steps to join their respective corps”. On 22 August,
the East African Standard reported that the German consul had sailed
on SS Gaika and on 29 August that the French Mission had left to “join
the army” as instructed by the French consul at Mombasa. The French
consul in Johannesburg ordered the repatriation of French citizens in the
Bulawayo Chronicle of 3 September  1914. In April  1915, Indian Army
ofcers were being tempted to purchase land before they left East Africa:
Macdonald and Jameson were ofering advice “on what to buy and what
not to buy”.32
As late as 11 September and 17 October 1914, the Uganda Herald and
East African Standard were advertising the German East Africa Line run-
ning a “Regular two weekly service”, while the adverts continued in the
Nyasaland Times until 3 December 1914, this last reiterating since 21 Octo-
ber: “service cancelled until further notice”. Linked with these adverts, until
17 December 1914, was mention of Ludw. Deuss & Co., agents for the ship-
ping line but also “General Importers and Exporters” with its head ofce
in Hamburg, Germany and an ofce in Chinde, Nyasaland. However, most
of the adverts referred only to Zambezi Sugar and Salt with local contacts.
On 28 October  1915, it was reported that the General Manager for the
company had died in Blantyre. Similarly, in West Africa, in the Gold Coast
Leader, the German EA Lohmann  & Company line was still advertising
on 5 September 1914 and on 4 December in the Nigerian Chronicle. The
Sierra Leone Weekly ran its last advert for the company on 15 August 1914.
The Gold Coast Leader of 5 September carried an article on the death of
John Dempster, one of the founding partners of the German Elder-Dempster
Line, it being noted that without the likes of Dempster, “our commercial
life would be bereft of its solid constructive power”, and it was due to men
like him that “we derive our reputation for business integrity and fair deal-
ing”. Alongside Elder-Dempster Line adverts were German remedies such as
EROL in the Gold Coast Nation until 3 September 1914. No doubt these
84 Anne Samson
adverts ran for contractual reasons, the companies having paid for adverts
to run for a given time.
Another feature of the African press was the call for communities to pray
for the war. On 27 August 1914, the Gold Coast Nation announced thanks-
giving prayers were to be held for Togoland, on 18 September  1914 the
Lagos chiefs called for a day of prayer “about the Great War”. In Novem-
ber 1917, the Gold Coast Leader published the news that the Basel Mission
in Kibbi had held a prayer meeting on 4 August where they prayed “for the
English at the front”. The East African Standard printed “Forms of prayers
for use during the war”.33 These prayer meetings were the equivalent of
pledges and messages of loyalty,34 the word appearing 2,243 times across
27 African papers between August  1914 and 30 November  1918. Many
also undertook fundraising to support the British Empire war efort and the
soldiers serving.35
Stephanie Newell observed that, “In the African-owned newspapers of
Colonial Ghana, the conditions faced by African soldiers on the ground
were rarely discussed, and the issue of conscription was ignored”. She con-
tinued that “British propaganda emphasized their patriotism and loyalty
to empire”.36 The same can be said for the papers in Central and Southern
Africa, although the East African Standard reported on the “heavy country
to work in”.37 The focus was on the contribution and loyalty of the terri-
tories concerned, fundraising and donations contributed to the war efort.
On 21 April, The Globe carried an account of the British defeat at Jasin,
East Africa of 18–19 January 1915 as reported by “a Berlin telegram”. This
raises an interesting point as to how news was conveyed. At the outbreak of
war, the telegraph wires at Zanzibar were cut, which meant Germany lost
that avenue of communication with its African colonies. With the defeat
of Togoland, the main wireless transmitter was put out of action and that
in East Africa had been disabled by the end of the year. Short-wave radio
contact with passing ships could be maintained, but as experienced with the
Königsberg, using this option betrayed the whereabouts of German ships.
With blockade runners managing to break through to German East Africa
disguised as neutral ships, and stranded men being able to return to Ger-
many via Portuguese East Africa and neutral ships, messages were fed back
to the German metropole. However, the last blockade runner got through
in mid-1916 which left the German colony somewhat stranded, although a
radio message was technically conveyed to the zeppelin which was sent to
reinforce the German force in 1917, suggesting there were other means of
communication.
The main suppliers of news to and from Africa was Reuters, although the
Central News Agency and Press Association also supplied news. Of par-
ticular interest is Reuters, which from 1916 was run by Roderick Jones,
Reuters’ general manager in South Africa until he left in 1915 to claim the
Reuter chair after Baron Herbert de Reuter’s death. Jones had held back
General CF Beyers’ letter of resignation as head of the South African Union
 Reporting the war in British Africa 85
Defence Force until Prime Minister Louis Botha had compiled a reply.38
He had also spent time with the forces in South West Africa. Once in Lon-
don, Jones entered into agreements with the Foreign Ofce to protect the
company, reinforcing its partiality to the British Empire.39 Whilst in South
Africa, Jones had been instrumental in setting up the South African Press
Agency in which Reuters had a majority control. By 1914, the South African
Press Agency served 26 newspapers in the region, including two in Rhode-
sia.40 Jones maintained close contacts with South Africans, and according
to Hyam and Henshaw acted as Smuts’ “personal adviser on foreign policy
matters”.41 With little local competition, that Reuters’ news was tailored to
meet the South African situation and reduce any chance of the National-
ist press being able to use material to further its agenda and promote the
Empire is highly probable. A perusal of the Afrikaans and Dutch papers sug-
gests this was the case as reports on the war, where they do appear, replicate
what is printed in the pro-government English press.

Conclusion
In general, little has been written about the press and its role in and about
Africa during the First World War. West African researchers have started to
do so, seeing the Great War as a forerunner to African nationalism which
came to prominence during the Second World War. In the late 1970s, South
African editor Vic Alhadef published two books containing articles from
the First World War: A Newspaper History of South Africa (second edition
1985) and South Africa in Two World Wars: A Newspaper History (1979).
Both are naturally selective in what they report at a time when the National-
ist Party, which had been against South African involvement in the war, was
in power and apartheid was reaching its climax. Today, one hundred years
after the Great War, reporting of commemoration events and recollections
of the cataclysmic time have hardly featured, in both Africa and Britain,
reinforcing for the British that African involvement was peripheral and that
for Africa, the war was simply another in a long stream of conficts.42 As
with Britain’s reporting of the peace in 1918, so the African territories have
tended, then and today, to focus on more pressing and immediate “local”
and “now” news.

Newspapers published in Africa between August 1914

and December 1918
African Chronicle, 1908–1930, South Africa – Durban
Bulawayo Chronicle, 1894–10–12 to 1922–12–30, Zimbabwe – Bulawayo
Colony and Provincial Reporter, 1912–09–21 to 1920–11–06, Sierra
Leone – Freetown
De/Die Volksstem, 1876–1921, South Africa – Pretoria
De Zuid-Afrikaan, 1902–1930, South Africa – Cape Town
86 Anne Samson
Diamond Fields Advertiser, 1887–to 1921, South Africa – Kimberley
Die Oosrandse Gids, 1917–1918, South Africa – Benoni
Die Volksblad, 1918–1978, South Africa – Bloemfontein
East London Daily Dispatch & Frontier Advertiser, 1904–1924, South
Africa – East London
Eastern and African Engineering, 1914–1915, England – London
Grocott’s Penny Mail, 1900–1920, South Africa – Grahamstown
Ilanga Lase Natal, 1903–04–10 to 1922–12–29, South Africa – Durban
Imvo Zabantsundu, 1884–11–03 to 1922–12–26, South Africa  – King
William’s Town
Indian Opinion, 1903–06–04 to 1922–12–29, South Africa – Durban
International, 1915–09–10 to 1924–09–05, South Africa – Johannesburg
Izindaba Zabantu, 1910–10–17 to 1922–12–15, South Africa – Pinetown
Leselinyana La Lesutho, 1863–11–03 to 1922–12–29, Lesotho – Moria
Pretoria News, 1898 to date, South Africa
Rhodesia Advertiser, 1895–1934, Zimbabwe – Mutare
Rhodesia Herald, 1892–1950, Zimbabwe – Harare
Somerset Budget and Pearston Advocate, 1896–1922, South Africa  –
Somerset East
South African Outlook, 1870–10–01 to 1922–12–01, South Africa  –
Lovedale
South African Pictorial, 1917–1918, South Africa – Johannesburg
South African, 1918–1919, South Africa
Sunday Post, 1914–1915, South Africa – Johannesburg
The African Herald, 1918 to 1918, South Africa – Johannesburg
The African Mail, 1907–1917, England – Liverpool
The African Telegraph and Gold Coast Mirror, 1914–1919, England –
London
The African World and Cape-Cairo Express, 1902–1946, England  –
London
The Bloemfontein Post, 1907–1917, South Africa – Bloemfontein
The Cape Argus, 1857–1969, South Africa – Cape Town
The Cape Mercury, 1875–1947, South Africa – King William’s Town
The Colonial and Provincial Reporter, 1913–1920, Sierra Leone  –
Freetown
The Daily Representative and Free Press, 1905–1923, South Africa  –
Queenstown
The Diamond Fields Advertiser, 1878–1996, South Africa – Kimberley
The East African Standard, Mombasa Times,  & Uganda Argus, from
1903–01–15 to 1915–10–30, Kenya – Mombasa
The East African Standard, 1905–1974, Kenya – Nairobi
The East Rand Express, 1908–1936, South Africa – Germiston
The Eastern Province Herald, 1898– 1975 South Africa – Port Elizabeth
The Egyptian Gazette, from 1882 to date, Egypt – Cairo
The Egyptian Mail, 1916–1968, Egypt – Cairo
 Reporting the war in British Africa 87
The Evening Chronicle, 1913–1915, South Africa – Johannesburg
The Farmer’s Weekly, 1918–1970, South Africa – Bloemfontein
The Farmer’s Weekly Supplement The Homestead, 1918–965, South
Africa – Bloemfontein
The Fort Beaufort Advocate  & Adelaide Opinion, 1885–1969, South
Africa – Fort Beaufort
The Friend, 1899–1985, South Africa – Bloemfontein
The Gold Coast Independent, 1918–1948, Ghana – Accra
The Gold Coast Leader, 1902–1929, Ghana – Cape Coast
The Gold Coast Nation, 1912–1920, Ghana – Cape Coast
The Greytown Gazette, 1906–1927, South Africa – Greytown
The Illustrated Star, 1912–1917, South Africa – Johannesburg
The Journal, 1864–1920, South Africa – Grahamstown
The Lagos Standard, 1895–1920, Nigeria – Lagos
The Lagos Weekly Record, 1891–1921, Nigeria – Lagos
The Leader of British East Africa, 1908–1922, Kenya – Nairobi
The Livingstone Mail, 1906–1965, Zambia – Livingstone
The Lydenburg News, 1905–1921, South Africa – Lydenburg
The Mafeking Mail and Protectorate Guardian, 1903–1966, South
Africa – Mafkeng
The Matatiele Mail, 1915–1917, South Africa – Matatiele
The Midland News and Karroo Farmer, 1891–1952, South Africa  –
Cradock
The Morogoro News, 1916–1916, England
The Natal Mercury, 1863–1996, South Africa – Durban
The Natal Witness, 1874–1974, South Africa – Pietermaritzburg
The Natal Witness, 1912–1917, South Africa – Pietermaritzburg
The Newcastle Advertiser and Northern Post, 1917–1969, South Africa –
Newcastle
The Nigerian Chronicle, 1908–1915, Nigeria – Lagos
The Nigerian Pioneer, 1914–1934, Nigeria – Lagos
The North Western Press, 1913–1921, South Africa – Prieska
The Nyasaland Times, 1911–1963, Malawi – Blantyre
The Rand Daily Mail, 1903–1985, South Africa – Johannesburg
The Record of Klerksdorp & the Western Transvaal, 1910–1921, South
Africa – Klerksdorp
The Rhodesia Herald, from 1892–10–29 to 1922–12–29, Zimbabwe –
Harare
The Sierra Leone Guardian & Foreign Mails, 1908–1932, Sierra Leone –
Freetown
The Sierra Leone Weekly News, from 1884–09–06 to 1922–12–30,
Sierra Leone – Freetown
The South African News, 1899–1914, South Africa – Cape Town
The Sphinx, 1893–1917, Egypt – Cairo
The Standard, 1902–1950, South Africa – Krugersdorp
88 Anne Samson
The Star of Egypt, 1915–1915, Egypt – Cairo
The Star, from 1889 to date, South Africa – Johannesburg
The Sudan Herald, 1913–1929, Sudan – Khartoum
The Times of Natal, 1876–1927, South Africa – Pietermaritzburg
The Times of Nigeria, 1914–1920, Nigeria – Lagos
The Times of Swaziland, 1903–2009, Swaziland – Mbabane
The Tribune, 1913–1917, South Africa – Cape Town
The Uganda Herald, 1912–1955, Uganda – Kampala
The Uitenhage Times, 1875–1969, South Africa – Uitenhage
The Vereeniging Advertiser & Vereeniging Representative, 1916–1916,
South Africa –Viljoensdrift
The Weekly Mirror, 1918–1918, South Africa – Johannesburg
The Zululand Times & Victoria County Advertiser, 1914–1920, South
Africa – Eshowe
Transvaal Leader, 1904–1915, South Africa – Johannesburg
Tsala Ea Batho, from 1910–07–09 to 1915–07–24, South Africa  –
Kimberley
Victoria West Messenger/Nieuwsbode, 1916–1921, South Africa – Victoria
West

Notes
1 BBC, “The Story of News” [online: www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/africa/features/
storyofafrica/13chapter7.shtml accessed 26 October 2019].
2 James Simon, “World Newspaper Archive  – African Newspapers in Focus on
Global Resources”, vol. 29, no. 4, 2010 [online: www.crl.edu/focus/article/6694
accessed 26 October 2019].
3 Louise M Bourgault, Mass Media in Sub-Saharan Africa (Bloomington: Indiana
University Press, 1996), p. 23.
4 Bettina Miggee and Isabelle Léglise, “Language and Colonialism. Applied Lin-
guistics in the Context of Creole Communities” in Marlis Hellinger and Anne
Pauwels (eds.), Language and Communication: Diversity and Change. Hand-
book of Applied Linguistics 297–338 (Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 2007), p. 6
[online: https://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/halshs-00292388/document accessed
26 October 2019].
5 Ibid., p. 6.
6 Ibid., pp. 5–6,12; Abiodun Salawu, “Indigenous Language Media and Democ-
racy in Africa” in Abiodun Salawu; Monica Chibita and Sotirios Sarantakos
(eds.), Indigenous Language Media and Language Politics and Democracy in
Africa (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016), pp.  13–14; Jide Oluwajuyitan,
Nigeria: The Crisis of Nationhood and the Print Media 1900–2000 (Ibadan:
Bookbuilders, 2015), pp. 45–46.
7 Salawu, pp. 14–15.
8 Advert in and for Gold Coast Nation, 13 August 1914.
9 See list of newspapers at the end of this chapter.
10 Austen P Nuttall, Nuttal Encyclopaedia, 1907 [online www.gutenberg.org/
fles/12342/12342-h/12342-h.htm] collated on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
List_of_countries_by_population_in_1907.
 Reporting the war in British Africa 89
11 Derek R Peterson; Emma Hunter and Stephanie Newell (eds.), African Print
Cultures (Michigan: University of Michigan Press, 2016), p. 1; see also Oluwa-
juyitan, Nigeria, p. 50.
12 TNA: CO583/17
13 Anne Samson, Britain, South Africa and the East Africa Campaign (London: IB
Tauris, 2005), Anne Samson, “South Africa and the First World War” in Troy
RE Paddock (ed.), World War 1 and Propaganda (Leiden: Brill, 2014).
14 Gold Coast Leader, p. 4.
15 Excluding The Rand Daily Mail as this is on a separate catalogue.
16 Individual territory names were included, namely Togoland, Kamerun/Came-
roons, Nyasaland, Zanzibar, Rhodesia.
17 Peter Robbins, “The Death of Newspapers, 1921 London Evening Massacre” in
The Guardian, 23 September 2009.
18 The Drifeld Times, 22 May 1915, 17 July 1915, 7 August 1915, 10 June 1916,
15 June 1918; The Globe: almost daily reports once German South West Africa
campaign starts, cf 10 September 1914.
19 Colony and Provincial Reporter, Sierra Leone, 1 August 1914, p. 7, Mafeking
Mail, 5 August 1914, p. 3; Sierra Leone Weekly News, 8 August 1917, p. 17.
20 The Globe, 5 August 1914.
21 The Globe, 11 & 24 August 1914, 11 September 1914, July 1915.
22 In 1913 the South African government passed the Land Act which saw numer-
ous African blacks forcibly removed of the land into specially designated areas.
Sol Plaatjie wrote about this in Native Life in South Africa (1916).
23 Sierra Leone Weekly News, 8 August  1917, p.  17; Wilson Jeremiah Moses, The
Golden Age of Black Nationalism, 1850–1925 (Hamden, CT: Archon, 1978), p. 323.
24 Donald Read, The Power of News: The History of Reuters (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2nd edition, 1999), p. 142.
25 Gold Coast Leader, 29 August 1914, p. 8.
26 May to July 1915.
27 Moses, Black Nationalism, p. 323.
28 Ibid., p. 236.
29 Ibid., p. 237.
30 Ibid., p. 224.
31 Ibid., p. 225.
32 3 April 1915.
33 8 August 1914.
34 Imvo Zabantsundu, Mafeking Mail, 1 September  1914, Indian Opinion, 2
September 1914.
35 Stephanie Newell, “Writing Out Imperialism” in Exit: Endings and New Begin-
nings in Literature and Life (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2011), p. 87, funds included
the Governor General’s Fund in South Africa, a Relief Fund for Widows and
Orphans of the British Soldiers in Gold Coast.
36 Stephanie Newell, “An Introduction to the Writings of JG Mullen, An Afri-
can Clerk, in the Gold Coast Leader, 1916–19” in Africa, vol. 78, no. 3, 2008,
p. 385; Anonymous, “Nigerian Loyalty: The Emir of Katsena and His State” in
The Illustrated London News, 5 May 1917.
37 3 April 1915.
38 Samson, World War 1 and Propaganda, p. 120.
39 Read, The Power of News, p. 158.
40 Jonathan Silberstein-Loeb, The International Distribution of News: The Associ-
ated Press, Press Association, and Reuters, 1848–1947 (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2014), p. 171.
90 Anne Samson
41 Ronald Hyam and Peter Henshaw, The Lion and the Springbok: Britain and
South Africa since the Boer War (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2003), p. 115; Peter Putnis, “Reuters and the South African Press at the end of
Empire” in Ruth Teer-Tomaselli and Donal P McCracken (eds.), Media and the
Empire (Routledge, 2017), p. 163.
42 Anne Samson, “Who in Africa Remembered? Who Remembered Africa?” at
Royal Historical Society Symposium at The Open University, Milton Keynes, 17
May 2019 [online: www.open.ac.uk/blogs/history/?p=534].

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 Reporting the war in British Africa 91
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Samson, Anne, Britain, South Africa and the East Africa Campaign, 1914–1918:
The Union Comes of Age (London: IB Tauris, 2005).
Samson, Anne, “South Africa and the First World War” in Paddock, Troy RE (ed.),
World War 1 and Propaganda (Leiden: Brill, 2014).
Samson, Anne, “Who in Africa Remembered? Who Remembered Africa?” in
Royal Historical Society Symposium at The Open University (Milton Keynes, 17
May 2019) [online: www.open.ac.uk/blogs/history/?p=534].
Silberstein-Loeb, Jonathan, The International Distribution of News: The Associ-
ated Press, Press Association, and Reuters, 1848–1947 (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2014).
Simon, James, “World Newspaper Archive  – African Newspapers in Focus on
Global Resources”, vol. 29, no. 4, 2010 [online: www.crl.edu/focus/article/6694
accessed 26 October 2019]
5 Coverage of the First World
War in regional Mexican press
An analysis of El Informador in
Guadalajara1
Guillemette Martin

Until recently, few Mexican historians had researched the impact of the
First World War in Mexico, as they understandably focused their eforts
on studying the Mexican Revolution, which began in 1910. The frst major
research studies on the First World War and Mexico were published in the
1980s and 1990s and approached the subject from a diplomatic perspec-
tive, analysing the connections between the factions struggling for control
in revolutionary Mexico and the warring powers involved in the global con-
fict during the period 1914–1918. This is seen in the frequently cited works
published by Friedrich Katz2 and Esperanza Durán.3 Research conducted
by Yolanda de la Parra Escontria,4 on the other hand, ofered an original
perspective regarding mobilisation of the Mexican press during the Great
War based on an in-depth study of the intense debate that occurred between
the two Mexico City-based newspapers El Universal and El Demócrata dur-
ing the war. De la Parra’s work revealed the profound interest that existed
among Mexican journalists and intellectuals regarding what was happening
in the Old World, as well as the distinct polarisation of public opinion in
Mexico during the confict.
More recently, the commemoration of the centennial of the First World
War sparked a renewed interest in the confict among Mexican historians,
leading to the publication of multiple articles and books that analysed the
impact of the Great War in Mexico from a variety of perspectives. Sandra
Kuntz Ficker5 published important refections on Mexico’s economic par-
ticipation in the war, while Romain Robinet6 and Adriana Ortega Orozco7
shed new light on the mobilisation of Mexico City’s intellectuals and politi-
cians during the war.
This research has opened an interesting debate in terms of the blurred line
between the “pro-Allied” and “pro-German” perspectives in Mexican pub-
lic opinion during the war,8 while also shining a light on the eforts of a large
number of Mexican actors, journalists, editors, and intellectuals to medi-
ate and analyse information regarding the “European confict” throughout
Mexico. This chapter seeks to contribute to the discussion regarding the
reception of the First World War in Mexico by focusing on a perspective
outside of Mexico City, specifcally the public debate in Guadalajara, the
 Coverage of WWI in regional Mexican press 93
second largest city of the country. To what extent did the regional press in
Mexico establish its own understanding of the confict beyond the conversa-
tion being held in Mexico City? In Guadalajara, the capital of the State of
Jalisco, which media outlets mediated the confict for their readers?
This chapter explores these issues based on an in-depth analysis of the
newspaper El Informador, an archetype of the Mexican modern newspaper
during the First World War period and currently the “longest running news-
paper in Jalisco”. Founded on 5 October  1917, El Informador ofers an
exceptional opportunity to study the reception of the Great War in Mexico.
This is partially due to the national and international context at the time of
its creation. In 1917, Mexico was in the midst of a reconstruction period
following years of civil war, as well as the ongoing consolidation of the
power of the revolutionary forces, including the ratifcation of a new con-
stitution that allowed for the creation of an independent Mexican press.
Internationally, 1917 saw a decisive shift in the “European War” with the
entrance of the United States of America into the confict, an event that
was widely covered by El Informador. El Informador is an excellent pri-
mary source due to its importance within the regional and national media
landscape. In a short period of time, El Informador became the most circu-
lated newspaper in Guadalajara and one of the most important newspapers
in Mexico, ofering journalists and intellectuals based outside of Mexico
City a platform to participate in public debate. Additionally, the paper was
founded with the aim of providing its readers with “objective” information
that would go beyond the partisan struggles that divided Guadalajara at the
time. Within an unstable and constantly shifting context, El Informador
was the frst publication to ofer information in a modern fashion, includ-
ing an international newswire service and with a streamlined design. Lastly,
within the context of local public opinion that was largely pro-German, El
Informador was one of the few newspapers that defended the cause of the
Allied powers while also denouncing anti-USA sentiment.
This chapter documents the paper’s dual discourse, as well as its cov-
erage of the confict, analysing the articles published during the frst year
of the newspaper’s existence, from its founding to the Armistice of 11
November 1918.

Guadalajara during the First World War

As noted many times by scholars focused on the Mexican Revolution, Jalisco
initially remained on the margins of the revolutionary activities that began
to emerge in 1910. This changed on 8 July  1914, when Constitutionalist
troops led by General Álvaro Obregón arrived in Guadalajara. Over the
course of the rest of the year, the city was rocked by violent confrontations
between the various revolutionary factions.9 General Obregón appointed
General Manuel M Diéguez as governor of Jalisco, a position he would hold
intermittently until 1919. As an ardent defender of the Constitutionalist
94 Guillemette Martin
cause in Jalisco, General Diéguez adhered to an openly anti-clerical policy.
As part of this policy, he implemented secular education in Jalisco, shut
down churches in Guadalajara, established a ban on Catholic seminaries,
and exiled the powerful Archbishop of Jalisco, José Francisco Orozco y
Jiménez, who led the Catholic opposition at the time. Although El Infor-
mador hardly mentioned the confict between the state government and the
Catholic Church and its adherents in an attempt to maintain neutrality, this
confict polarised much of the public debate in Jalisco at the time.
In addition to the tension between the recently installed revolutionary
government and the local population, which still generally sympathised
with the Catholic Church, Guadalajara also experienced a major economic
crisis in 1917 which brought the state to the brink of famine. On 9 Octo-
ber 1917, El Informador published its concern regarding the “ghost of hun-
ger” that threatened the state as a result of the severe crop loss that year.10
El Informador dedicated signifcant coverage to social tensions exacerbated
by the economic crisis, publishing a number of pieces on bandit attacks in
the rural areas of the state, as well as in the city.11
Between the economic crisis, famine, bandit attacks in rural areas of
Jalisco, increasing crime in Guadalajara, and escalating confrontations
between the revolutionaries and Catholics, residents of Guadalajara had a
lot to deal with in 1917. Within this context of profound political crisis and
food insecurity, and after years of civil war, it is pertinent to question just
how relevant it was for the people of Guadalajara to engage in a discussion
regarding a global crisis that was, in fact, very far away.
Indeed, if the capital cities of Latin America were generally far removed
from the core of the First World War,12 the large provincial cities were even
more so. The little information that did travel from Europe did so extremely
slowly, and it generally passed through capital cities frst. Local newspapers
often had to make do with limited, indirect information on the confict,
which was usually signifcantly delayed.
In addition to this information gap, there was also the issue of the general
population’s ability to engage with international information, considering
that up to 65 per cent of the population in smaller cities was illiterate at
the time.13 Although these fgures speak of a fairly limited circulation of the
press, it is important to take into account group reading practices that were
common in Guadalajara in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries,
as documented by Juan Bautista Iguíniz.14 Who bought and read newspa-
pers? How many people did these group readings reach? Accurately identi-
fying the readership of the press published during this period is impossible.
However, the limited reach of the press does not negate the fact that
the people of Guadalajara had a real and signifcant interest in the First
World War, particularly within the communities of Europeans who were
living in the city. At the beginning of the 1910s, there were 142 German,
246 Spanish, and 256 French citizens living in Guadalajara.15 Although
these numbers might seem low, Europeans living in Mexico had exercised
 Coverage of WWI in regional Mexican press 95
signifcant economic, political, and social infuence in Guadalajara since the
mid-nineteenth century.16 By the beginning of the twentieth century, French
citizens living in Mexico led the most powerful business enterprise in the
city, which included fabric, clothing, and accessories,17 while Germans con-
trolled the primary ironworks and breweries.18 European business owners’
dominant control of commercial, social, and day-to-day activities in Guada-
lajara largely explains the city’s interest in the First World War.

Coverage of the First World War in the press in Guadalajara

The newspapers published in Guadalajara echoed this interest, dedicating
pages, reports, and columns to the First World War. During the wartime
period, the media landscape in Guadalajara was undergoing a period of
reorganisation after numerous years of decline due to the Mexican Revolu-
tion. In the early 1910s, various important local titles disappeared, includ-
ing La Chispa, El Porvenir, and El Diario de Occidente. The arrival of
revolutionary troops in Guadalajara led to the emergence of newspapers
that focused on supporting the revolutionary cause. Such was the case of
the newspaper El Occidental, which was published from 1916 to 1918. The
Constitution of 1917 also paved the way for a more developed journalism
industry, which resulted in the creation of dozens of new publications in
Guadalajara between 1917 and 1918 alone. Many of these new publica-
tions were focused on supporting the Catholic Church, such as La Palabra
and La Época, which served as mouthpieces for the city’s Catholics.
The Catholic publications, cultural and literary reviews, and the more
community-focused local newspapers dedicated relatively limited coverage
to the First World War. Although a handful of general articles on the con-
fict have been found in the Catholic newspapers La Época19 and Restau-
ración,20 only a handful of publications in Guadalajara published regular,
comprehensive coverage, including El Informador. In her Catálogo de la
hemerografía de Jalisco (Catalog of Periodicals in Jalisco), Celia del Palacio
Montiel highlights a handful of other publications that featured coverage of
the First World War. For example, the student publication Renacimiento,
founded in 1915, published “a section dedicated to providing information
on the European war” on its second page. In 1916, Revista Contemporánea,
a “biweekly global news publication”, was created out of “a lively sympa-
thy . . . towards the Central Powers and their aid”.21 Although I have been
unable to locate copies of these publications, they nevertheless attest to the
local interest in the First World War, as well as the existence of openly pro-
German publications. Various indicators (starting with the complaints pub-
lished in El Informador) suggest that the press in Guadalajara was generally
pro-German, likely a result of subsidies received from the German legation
in Mexico. In his book, Friedrich Katz highlights the signifcant propaganda
eforts implemented in Mexico by the German authorities, due mainly to
German ambassador Heinrich Von Eckardt.22
96 Guillemette Martin
Table 5.1 The Media Landscape in Guadalajara During the First
World War1

Title

México Libre 1914

El Correo de Jalisco 1910; 1914
El Diario de Occidente 1912; 1914
Selecta, illustrated weekly 17 January 1915
Labor Nueva 1915
Acción 1915–1916
El Demócrata 1915
Renacimiento 1915
Jalisco 1915
El Informador 1917 to present
El Occidental 1916–1918
Aurora, art magazine 1916–1928
Revista Contemporánea 1916
El Regional 1904, 1910; 1914–1918
Atenas 1917–1920
La Época 1917–1921
Bohemia 1917–1918
Guadalajara Independiente 1917
El Radical 1917
La Palabra June–December 1917
El Independiente 1917–1929
Vida Latina 1917
El Eco Guadalupano 1917
Revista de Guadalajara 1918–1922
El Paladín 1918
Verbo Libre 1918–1922
La Lucha 1918–1919
Hojas Populares 1918
1 This list was created using the Catalogue of Periodicals in Jalisco (coor-
dinator: Celia del Palacio Montiel, 2006), as well as my own research
conducted at the Public Library of the State of Jalisco.

According to research conducted by Katz, German propaganda

encountered signifcant resistance in Guadalajara, primarily due to the
city’s powerful Catholic groups. Katz features the case of the newspaper
El Occidental, which served as a mouthpiece for the Central Powers in
Guadalajara:

The newspaper, strongly supported by advertisements purchased by

various German companies, launched a vigorous anti-clerical campaign
in line with the internal politics of the Carrancista government. The
Church, which was extremely powerful in Guadalajara, reacted vio-
lently. La Época, the Church newspaper, not only attacked El Occiden-
tal, but also published a “blacklist” that included all the companies that
 Coverage of WWI in regional Mexican press 97
purchased advertisements in El Occidental and called on the Catholics
of Guadalajara to boycott them.23

Despite Eckardt’s intervention to encourage German business owners

in Guadalajara to also purchase advertisements in La Época, the reaction
from the Catholic community was overwhelming, and El Occidental was
shunned. It is important to note that the opposition to El Occidental from
the Catholic community in Guadalajara contradicts the idea held by many
historians that Mexican Catholics were pro-German and encourages a more
careful analysis of the pro-Allied/pro-German division.24
However, it is true that when El Informador was launched in 1917 to
defend the Allied cause, it emerged into a local media landscape that was
largely pro-German.

El Informador, a pro-Allied newspaper25

Founded on 5 October  1917 by Jesús Álvarez del Castillo, at the time
a member of the City Council in Guadalajara, El Informador emerged
on the scene with the purpose of providing its readers access to objec-
tive, accurate, and international information through its newswire ser-
vice. From the very frst edition, El Informador maintained its political
independence:

Our publication will be independent in the broadest and most profound

sense of the word. We do not have ties to the government or any other
organization; our only responsibility lies with our readers; we have
no political obligations and are capable of daring to tell the truth, of
declaring and proclaiming it.26

Often considered a conservative and neoliberal publication, during its

frst few years of publication El Informador maintained a relatively neu-
tral stance regarding the Catholic Church, but occasionally took a position
against the federal government.
Historian Enrique E Sánchez Ruiz recalls the fnancial difculties that the
newspaper faced during its frst year:

According to information provided by the newspaper itself, the Com-

pañía Editora de Guadalajara, S.A. (which was later known as El Infor-
mador S.A.), formed by Jesús Álvarez del Castillo, planned to launch
with initial startup capital totaling $20,000 thanks to partnerships
with business owners in Guadalajara. However, he was unable to raise
the necessary total, and in fact launched with only $4,200 in capital.
Álvarez del Castillo contributed the majority and Ramón Castañeda y
Castañeda contributed $500.27
98 Guillemette Martin
To keep the publication afoat, Álvarez del Castillo sought fnancial sup-
port from Guadalajara’s French business owners and merchants, who used
El Informador to run advertisements for their businesses. The initial con-
tribution of capital from French sources and the ongoing support of the
French community during the newspaper’s initial years help explain its pro-
Allied position during the war.
Sánchez Ruiz states that because of its pro-Allied stance, El Informador
also beneftted from economic support from the Committee on Public Infor-
mation,28 the propaganda agency of the United States of America. Jesús
Álvarez del Castillo himself had a certain afnity for Mexico’s northern
neighbour, having completed a part of his studies in the United States of
America.29
Whereas the German community living in Guadalajara found its eco-
nomic interests directly threatened by the boycott campaign led by the Cath-
olic newspaper La Época, the Allied powers found a powerful spokesperson
for their diplomatic interests in El Informador. In this sense, El Informador
was novel within Guadalajara’s media landscape, not just because of the
modern layout of its pages, but also because it became the leading voice for
the Allied cause in the city.
A true source of pride for El Informador and an indicator of the newspa-
per’s modernity was its newswire service, which gave the paper the ability
to access international news relatively quickly, allowing it to publish major
news items “at the same time as the press [in Mexico City]”.
On the front page of each edition, El Informador published a section
titled “Foreign Service”, which ofered a selection of newswire stories from
Washington, New York, Paris, London, etc. Clearly, these communications,
which arrived directly from French, British, and USA news bureaus, primar-
ily focused on Allied victories.30 The direct connection with Mexico City
ofered by the newswire also allowed El Informador to occasionally publish
articles from newspapers located in the capital, particularly from El Univer-
sal, which was also pro-Allied.31
Although El Informador’s newswire service would eventually become “so
efcient, broad, and timely as that of the newspapers in [Mexico City]”,32
receiving international reports in Guadalajara was often extremely difcult.
On 24 October 1917, the newspaper announced a temporary interruption
of the newswire connection with Mexico City, which made it impossible to
receive information from abroad.
Despite the technical difculties that the paper faced as it sought to access
timely and accurate international information, El Informador quickly posi-
tioned itself as the primary, if not the only, distributor of pro-Allied propa-
ganda in Guadalajara. El Informador clearly stated the paper’s support for
the Allied cause from its very frst edition, when it reproduced a text written
by the French historian Ernest Lavisse on the “economic causes of the War”,
which identifed “German greed” as one of the primary explanations of the
confict.33
 Coverage of WWI in regional Mexican press 99
A year later, on 5 October  1918, on the frst anniversary of its found-
ing, El Informador reiterated its pro-Allied stance, incorporating it into the
paper’s editorial position.

Over the past year, a great war has gripped the world: the world war,
the open fght, to the death, between Order and Force, between Democ-
racy and the most unrelenting Military Dictatorship humanity has ever
seen, between Culture and Kultur. When “EL INFORMADOR” frst
appeared in Guadalajara, pro-German propaganda dominated: the
Allied Powers, for one reason or another, had allowed their enemies
to continue to spread their lies and tricks. Not a single newspaper in
the whole city was willing to wave the fag of justice and of truth! “EL
INFORMADOR” has the honor of waving that fag high.34

Over the course of its frst year, El Informador fne-tuned the layout of the
newspaper. The front page featured three primary sections: “Foreign Ser-
vice” reproduced newswire stories provided by partner news bureaus, “The
Metropolis Today” ofered information on Mexico City, and “From Gua-
dalajaran Society” featured local news. This format made it very clear that
El Informador sought to connect local coverage with regular coverage of the
goings-on in Mexico City and an ongoing concern for international afairs.
The second page was more fexible, ofering the reader long opinion
pieces on various current events, both domestic and international. Most of
the columns on the First World War published by El Informador were pub-
lished on the second page.
Beginning with its very frst edition, El Informador openly claimed its
pro-Allied stance and spoke out against the Mexican government’s neutral-
ity in an efort to break the natural assumption that anti-USA sentiments
equated with being pro-German.35 The First World War coverage published
by El Informador focused on three primary arguments.
The frst argument sought to challenge readers’ anti-USA sentiments by
explaining the benefts that Mexico would obtain from an alliance with the
United States of America. During its frst decade of publication, El Infor-
mador demonstrated a strong interest in favour of establishing a commer-
cial partnership with the United States of America. In the early 1920s, the
newspaper even published articles in English targeted at USA businessmen36
in anticipation of the future establishment of a railway line connecting Gua-
dalajara and San Francisco.37 In its pages, El Informador repeatedly and
pragmatically defended the idea that Mexico needed the United States of
America in order to develop its economy, and that it was therefore essential
for Mexico to maintain a positive relationship with its northern neighbour.

The situation in Mexico revolves around its economy, and the sooner the
fnancial issue is solved, the sooner [Mexico] will be able to enjoy peace
and tranquility and seriously address the issue of reconstruction. . .
100 Guillemette Martin

Image 5.1 Front page of El Informador (23 October 1917).

Source: http://hemeroteca.informador.com.mx/
 Coverage of WWI in regional Mexican press 101
Mexico’s friendship currently suits the United States, as it needs to
control public opinion in Latin America, to take ownership of that pow-
erful element called moral imperative, without which no triumph is pos-
sible, and for their own convenience. . .
The entry of the United States into the confict debunks the restricted
and selfsh interpretations of the Monroe Doctrine, a doctrine that is
scientifcally worthless, but has been invoked on many occasions and
has been the rule of law. Henceforth, and once the last spark of the
war has been extinguished, there will be greater solidarity between both
Continents, greater Union between the peoples, [and] the weak will fear
less, if they are prudent, the aggression of the strong. Mexico cannot
harbor fears for the future, should it acquire a pecuniary commitment
with the United States, as this acquisition is inevitable if our country is
to quieten down in order to repair the many blunders we have commit-
ted in these extremely long seven years of struggle.38

This column features one of the primary talking points of El Informador

during its frst years of publication, which is that the successful reconstruc-
tion of Mexico after multiple years of destructive civil war required a posi-
tive collaboration with the United States of America.
The second argument that appeared in El Informador’s coverage of the
confict focused on denouncing the pro-German sentiments of the Mexican
population, as well as the eforts of the German government to exacerbate
tensions between Mexico and the United States of America.

The pro-German sentiments à outrance of our country indicate a regret-

table and inconvenient loss of national criteria. Our easily impression-
able disposition has led us to be carried away by the illusion of Prussian
values, which, properly analyzed, are nothing more than intellectual
barbarism taken to the highest degree. Slowly, without even noticing,
Mexico has allowed itself to be infuenced by the persistent and Machia-
vellian German propaganda that, on the one hand, knowing our “weak
side”, exploits our resentment towards our neighbors to the North and,
on the other hand, would not hesitate to sacrifce us in their own inter-
ests, provoking a tremendous and unequal fght between Mexicans and
Americans, with the sole purpose of distracting from the great tragedy
that has moved the world.39

The third argument developed by El Informador focused on establish-

ing a frm position against Mexico’s ofcial neutrality and supported the
country taking a stronger stance in favour of the Allied powers. On 24
October 1917, El Informador reported on a series of debates hosted at the
Jalisco State Congress, where local representatives declared themselves to
be against the neutral position of the Carranza government and in favour of
open and active support for the Allied powers.40 El Informador declared its
102 Guillemette Martin
support for the State Congress while simultaneously establishing its opposi-
tion to the federal government’s response to the confict.
On 30 October 1917, following the entry of the United States of America
into the war, the newspaper highlighted Mexico’s illogical neutrality and the
importance of taking a clearer position in the confict:

With the entrance of the United States into the Entente, the fre in
Europe has spread to the Americas, and one by one the countries of
this “virgin land” have taken part in the unfolding events, sometimes
according to their wishes and aspirations, and at other times, according
to the pressing needs of their politics, as it should be. Only a handful of
Latin American countries have not declared a side, as each of the bellig-
erents declares: those that are not for me are against me, and it is neces-
sary to declare oneself a Montague or a Capulet, a Guelf or Ghibelline.
Against all theories of international law, which this war will profoundly
modify, no country can hide behind strict neutrality without exposing
itself to grave dangers, at least at the present moment. Mexico, which
today faces exceptional circumstances due to the extended turmoil we
have sufered, which lacks everything necessary not only to prosper but
to simply live, which is teetering on the edge of bankruptcy, will not
be able to maintain its neutrality for long and will inevitably be swept
away by the avalanche. We have no other choice: we must bend to the
circumstances, live in the cruel era that fate has given us. Each citizen
must overcome his selfshness, sacrifce his immediate peace and tran-
quility, forgo his personal sympathies, if necessary, and see what is best
for the country, see that our children will be the ones who sufer, in a
not too distant future, the consequences of the mistakes of today.41

It is obvious that for El Informador supporting the United States of Amer-

ica was “best for the country”.

The columns of Pedro Sánchez

These three positions regarding the global confict found their greatest sup-
porter in Pedro Sánchez, a contributor to El Informador, who wrote most
of the opinion pieces regarding the First World War that were published in
the newspaper. On 17 October 1917, El Informador announced the recent
arrival of two new contributors to the editorial team as follows:

The refned gentlemen and talented writers, Mr. Cástulo Gallardo Rojas
and Mr. Pedro Sánchez. The frst has arrived to share with you a well
thought-out piece regarding the question of the day, which we publish
today in the place of honor, and the second, a pro-Allied sympathizer
through and through, a handful of “Tableaux”, which can be found in
the “Neutral Ground” section of this paper.42
 Coverage of WWI in regional Mexican press 103
Although the “Neutral Ground” section did not last long, Sánchez con-
tinued to write a daily opinion piece on the war and his arguments aligned
with the paper’s three primary positions: support for the United States of
America, systematic critique of pro-German sentiment in Mexico, and a
strong stance against Mexican neutrality.
In his “Tableaux” series, Sánchez brought a literary approach to his
pieces, ofering his readers detailed and emotional descriptions of a Bel-
gium destroyed by war,43 of French soldiers leaving for the front,44 etc. As
time went on, his writing became more political and less literary, taking a
political position that was more clearly pro-Allied45 and anti-German. On
30 November 1917, Sánchez concluded his article titled “The Ambushes of
the Beast” with this unequivocal statement: “the need, the purpose, of Ger-
many, is to convert humanity into an unending army of servants”.46 Sánchez
frequently wrote in the name of all pro-Allied supporters (“we the Allied
sympathizers”47) and developed a consistent anti-German rhetoric, always
positioning himself in favour of interventionism and of the Allied powers.
His articles draw a clear distinction between neutrality and intervention
and between pro-German (which Sánchez associated with neutrality) and
pro-Allied:

Mexico’s neutrality in the face of the global confict continues to cause

passionate debates, however, neither the “neutrality-pro-German”
or “no-neutrality-pro-Allied” debaters are convinced to change their
mind. This is because our Latin temperament, eminently passionate,
tends to pour our own feelings into the issue. And when this occurs, we
lose calm and are no longer able to reason.48

Pedro Sánchez took a stance in favour of “no-neutrality” and associated

neutrality with pro-German sentiments, which he was also against. On 25
December  1917, Sánchez announced the launch of a new column titled
“The Whys of the German Sympathizers”, where he would seek to explore
the arguments made by pro-German sympathisers.49
Although it is impossible to include a detailed analysis of every text pub-
lished by Sánchez within this chapter, it is important to note the recurrence
of this double dichotomy – neutrality versus no-neutrality and pro-German
versus pro-Allied  – in his columns. The texts written by Sánchez ofer a
window into the deep divisions within Mexican public opinion regarding
the confict, as well as proof of the active mobilisation of a certain part of
Guadalajaran society in the debate.
In October 1918, with the end of the war approaching and on the news-
paper’s frst anniversary, El Informador decided to reveal the true identity of
Pedro Sánchez, surely causing quite a shock among its readers. Sánchez was
the pseudonym of Micaela Contreras Medellín, a well-known intellectual
and poet from Guadalajara and a pioneering female journalist and tireless
advocate for women’s labour rights.50
104 Guillemette Martin
Born in 1890, Contreras Medellín started her career as a journalist as
soon as she fnished secondary school. Shortly thereafter, she decided to
dedicate her pen to the service of the Allied cause and took advantage of
the creation of the newly formed El Informador to publish her work.51 On
5 October 1918, in the frst article written under her real name, Contreras
Medellín explained to the readers of El Informador how she came to sup-
port the Allied cause, as well as the reason for her pseudonym.

A while ago, I took an interest in the great question: I read, I read a

lot. Thousands of pages written by Belgian and German, French and
Austrian, British, Dutch, American, Russian, Romanian, and Serbian
authors all passed before my eyes. I  read arguments from men of all
nationalities: belligerent and neutral, pro-Allied and pro-German. And
from this reading emerged an unshakeable conviction: Germany had
unleashed the war in order to dominate humanity, believing itself fated
to win and [be] superior to all; Germany had put into practice the theo-
ries, the doctrines, of all its philosophers and great men: wage barba-
rous, cruel war, terrorizing and martyring its enemies; Germany had
no mercy and intended to make of the vanquished miserable slaves. In
other words, if Germany were to win, life would be unbearable, and it
would not be worth living.
In light of this belief, full of indignation in the face of the horrors that
had been committed and were still being committed by the Germans
in Belgium and France and by the Austrians in Serbia, I wanted to do
something, whatever I could do, to convince my countrymen of the mis-
take that they were making by aligning themselves with the Germans,
seduced by their propaganda. My gender and the way I  live were an
obstacle: nobody would read articles written by a woman, much less
about a matter such as this. What to do? . . . There was only one option:
use a male pseudonym. And I  looked for one that suited my obscure
personality, absolutely unknown in every way.52

After various failed eforts to get her pieces published, because “the press
in [Guadalajara] was markedly pro-German”, Contreras Medellín found
the recently established El Informador to be the ideal outlet for her ideas
and pro-Allied propaganda eforts. These eforts were eventually recognised
by King Albert of Belgium, who granted her the Cross of the Order of the
Crown53 on 8 October 1919, as well as by the French government, which
bestowed upon her the Order of Academic Palms “for her valuable written
contributions in defense of the Allied cause”.54
After the war, Contreras Medellín continued to work as a journalist, shift-
ing her focus to women’s labour rights in Guadalajara,55 publishing articles
in the feminist magazine Alma Femenina,56 and writing in favour of wom-
en’s right to vote.57
 Coverage of WWI in regional Mexican press 105
According to María Guadalupe Mejía Nuñez, Contreras Medellín’s repu-
tation as a journalist sufered somewhat in the 1930s when she publicly
declared her support for Narciso Bassols, head of the Ministry of Public
Education at the time, when he decided to “remove religious education from
the classroom in order to replace it with care and understanding of the
body”58 in an efort to prevent adolescent pregnancies in Mexico. Contre-
ras Medellín published various articles that denounced the infuence of the
Catholic Church on education in Mexico, supported Bassols, and advocated
for women’s rights in Guadalajara.
Rejected by the local press for being a “woman with revolutionary ideas”,
Contreras Medellín left journalism in the late 1930s to focus on teaching59
at local women’s schools and as a private tutor “for foreigners, Spanish
grammar [and] conversation”.60 She also continued to be involved in cul-
tural and social activities in Guadalajara throughout her life, including as a
member of the Jalisco Cultural Association,61 as the head of the literary sec-
tion of the Jalisco Athenaeum of Communications (1940),62 and as part of
the board of directors of the Inmate Protection Society, which was dedicated
to supporting inmates imprisoned at the state penitentiary.63
Micaela Contreras Medellín died in 1976 after a long life of teaching, jour-
nalism, creative writing, and participation in the public debates of her time,
mainly in favour of women’s rights. She was one of the few Latin American
women who raised their voices during the First World War, using her writ-
ing to share her original, female, and local perspective on the situation.64

Conclusion
Although the columns published by Pedro Sánchez represent, above all,
the opinions of their author, they also refect the signifcant divisions in
public opinion at both the national and regional levels. Micaela Contreras
Medellín revealed that the writers for El Informador were the victims of
various attacks and insults because of their pro-Allied position, proof of
the passionate debate regarding the war that existed in Guadalajara. This
local interest in the First World War can not only be explained by the inter-
est in incorporating international issues into regional journalism but also
the result of interaction between the local Mexican population in Guadala-
jara and the Europeans living there. For example, at the end of the war, El
Informador published a long article dedicated to “the Allied supporters in
Guadalajara” in which the editorial staf congratulated the “members of the
Allied communities”.65
In general, the pro-Allied position of El Informador did not vary from
the positions maintained by other pro-Allied organisations in Mexico, such
as El Universal. However, El Informador represented the mobilisation of
regional public debate in Mexico during the First World War. Nor was El
Informador an isolated case – it is just one example of the interesting and
106 Guillemette Martin
dynamic mobilisation of journalists outside of Mexico City to inform Mexi-
cans across the country about what was going on in Europe.66 With these
publications, journalists throughout Mexico afrmed their willingness to
contribute their voices to the national and international debate regarding
the Great War, thus helping to bring the reality of a truly global confict to
a readership far removed from the battlefelds.

Notes
1 An initial version of this text was published in Spanish in 2018 in La Gran
Guerra en América Latina. [The Great War in Latin America], coordinated
by Olivier Compagnon, Camille Foulard, Guillemette Martin, and María Inés
Tato (Mexico: Centro de Estudios Mexicanos y Centroamericanos, Institut des
Hautes Études de l’Amérique Latine, Centre de Recherche et de Documentation
des Amériques, 2018), pp. 287–306.
2 Friedrich Katz, La Guerra secreta en México. La revolución mexicana y la tor-
menta de la primera guerra mundial (Mexico: Ediciones Era, 1990).
3 Esperanza Durán, Guerra y revolución: las grandes potencias y México, 1914–
1918 (Mexico: El Colegio de México, Center for International Studies, 1985).
4 Yolanda De la Parra Escontria, La Primera Guerra mundial y la prensa mexi-
cana (Undergraduate Thesis, UNAM, School of Philosophy and Humanities,
Mexico, 1980).
5 Sandra Kuntz Ficker, “El impacto de la Primera Guerra Mundial sobre el comer-
cio exterior de México” in Iberoamericana, 53, March, 2014, pp. 117–137; San-
dra Kuntz Ficker, “La contribución de México a la causa de los aliados durante
la Primera Guerra Mundial” in Olivier Compagnon, Camille Foulard, Guillem-
ette Martin and María Inés Tato (coords.), La Gran Guerra en América Latina.
Una historia conectada (Mexico: Centro de Estudios Mexicanos y Centroameri-
canos, Institut des Hautes Études de l’Amérique Latine, Centre de Recherche et
de Documentation des Amériques, 2018), pp. 149–169.
6 Romain Robinet, “Defender y orientar la Revolución. Los diputados mexicanos
ante la “guerra europea” (1916–1918)” in Olivier Compagnon; Camille Foulard;
Guillemette Martin and María Inés Tato (coords.), La Gran Guerra en América
Latina. Una historia conectada (Mexico: Centro de Estudios Mexicanos y
Centroamericanos, Institut des Hautes Études de l’Amérique Latine, Centre de
Recherche et de Documentation des Amériques, 2018).
7 Adriana Ortega Orozco and Romain Robinet, “Aliadóflos, germanóflos y
neutralistas. La opinión pública mexicana ante la Primera Guerra Mundial” in
Mexican Studies/Estudios Mexicanos, vol. 33, no. 2, 2017.
8 Jean Meyer, “¿Fue México germanóflo de 1914 a 1918?” in Olivier Compagnon;
Camille Foulard; Guillemette Martin and María Inés Tato (coords.), La Gran
Guerra en América Latina. Una historia conectada (Mexico: Centro de Estu-
dios Mexicanos y Centroamericanos, Institut des Hautes Études de l’Amérique
Latine, Centre de Recherche et de Documentation des Amériques, 2018).
9 Rafael Torres Sánchez, Revolución y vida cotidiana en Guadalajara (Mexico:
Galileo Ediciones, 2001).
10 El Informador, 9 October 1917, “Con pasos cautelosos se acerca el fantasma del
hambre” [The Ghost of Hunger Cautiously Approaches]; “La pérdida de gran
parte de las cosechas preocupa a la Cámara de Comerciantes” [Severe Crop Loss
Concerns Chamber of Commerce].
11 El Informador, 13 October  1917, p.  3, “Hay muchos ladrones” [There Are
Many Thieves].
 Coverage of WWI in regional Mexican press 107
12 This is not to say that these cities were not involved in the discussion regard-
ing the confict, as shown by Olivier Compagnon in his study on the signifcant
mobilisation of Argentinian and Brazilian intellectuals during the war (2013).
13 Moisés González Navarro, El Porfriato. Vida Social. Historia Moderna de Méx-
ico (Mexico: Ed. Hermes, 1970).
14 Juan Bautista Iguíniz, El periodismo en Guadalajara, 1809–1915 (Guadalajara:
Universidad de Guadalajara, 1955).
15 González Navarro, El Porfriato.
16 Sergio Valerio Ulloa, Empresarios extranjeros en Guadalajara durante el porfri-
ato (Guadalajara: Universidad de Guadalajara, 2002).
17 One of the most signifcant commercial success stories within the French com-
munity living in Guadalajara was the department store, Fábricas de Francia,
which was founded by Léon Fortoul and Joseph Chapuy in the late nineteenth
century. Although the First World War briefy interrupted the expansion of the
business, it continued to be symbolic of Guadalajara until it was shut down by
the retail chain Liverpool in 2019.
18 Guillemette Martin, Représentations de l’Europe et identité au Mexique.
Le Juan Panadero, un journal de Guadalajara (Paris: Éditions de l’IHEAL,
2008).
19 La Época, “Semana de la guerra. Informaciones de los Aliados. Informaciones
Alemanas” [This Week in the War: Information from the Allied Powers. Infor-
mation from the Germans], 18 November 1917, p. 1.
20 Restauración, 23 April 1919, p. 4; Restauración, 19 January 1921, p. 4.
21 Celia Del Palacio Montiel, Catálogo de la hemerografía de Jalisco, 1808–1950
[Catalogue of Periodicals in Jalisco, 1808–1950] (Mexico: CONACYT, Univer-
sidad de Guadalajara, 2006), p. 46.
22 Katz, La Guerra secreta en México, pp. 134–135.
23 Ibid., p. 145.
24 Meyer, “¿Fue México germanóflo. . . ?”, p. 81.
25 Every edition of El Informador ever published is available online: http://hemer
oteca.informador.com.mx/
26 El Informador, “Al comenzar la labor” [Time to Get to Work], 5 October 1917,
p. 1.
27 Gilberto Fregoso Peralta and Enrique E. Sánchez Ruiz, Prensa y poder en Gua-
dalajara (Guadalajara: Universidad de Guadalajara, CEIC, 1993), p. 26.
28 For more information on the activities of the Committee on Public Information
in Latin America, see James R Mock, “The Creel Committee in Latin America”
in Hispanic American Historical Review, vol. 22, 1942, pp. 262–279.
29 Fregoso Peralta and Sánchez Ruiz, Prensa y poder en Guadalajara.
30 The stories published on the front page of the second edition of El Informador,
6 October 1917, ofer one example of many: “La ofensiva británica se reanuda
con ímpetu formidable al este de Iprés” [The British Ofensive Resumes with
Impressive Momentum to the East of Ypres]; “Las tropas ingleses obtienen una
señalada victoria en sus nuevos ataques” [British Troops Achieve Expected Vic-
tory in New Attacks]; “En su victorioso avance al Este de Iprés, obtienen los
Ingleses magnífco botín” [British Claim Magnifcent Spoils in Their Victorious
Advance to the East of Ypres], etc.
31 El Informador, “Porqué es Ud. germanóflo?” [Why Are You a German Sympa-
thizer?], 16 December 1917, p. 2.
32 El Informador, “Para corresponder al favor del público” [In Favour of the Pub-
lic], 15 December 1917, p. 1.
33 El Informador, “El porqué de la lucha, por Ernesto Lavisse, (de la Academia
Francesa). Causas económicas de la Guerra: La Alemania industrial. Traducido
especialmente para El Informador” [Why We Fight, by Ernesto Lavisse (from
108 Guillemette Martin
the Académie Française). Economic Causes of the War: Industrial Germany.
Translated Specially for El Informador], 5 October 1917, p. 3.
34 El Informador, 5 October 1918, p. 1.
35 According to historian Esperanza Durán, the success of German propaganda
eforts was fuelled by the anti-USA sentiments of the Mexican population
(Durán, 1985, pp.  257–261). However, Jean Meyer encourages caution when
it comes to this simplistic confation of anti-USA and pro-German sentiments
(Meyer, 2018).
36 El Informador, “Notes in English”, 23 April 1923, p. 6. “The Business men of
San Francisco and of Guadalajara have lots to gain by getting in touch with each
other because just as soon as the S.P. is fnished the two cities will be united by
rail and quick transportation always helps business [sic]”.
37 This rail line was inaugurated in 1927.
38 El Informador, “El dinero que México necesita está en el Norte y es preferible
que venga a hacer labor de paz y no de guerra” [The Money Mexico Needs Is
in the North. It’s Better If It Works Towards Peace and Not Towards War], 26
October 1917, p. 2.
39 El Informador, “Tienen ojos y no ven”. [They Have Eyes but They Cannot See]
(A Collaboration with “Rudel”), 30 October 1917, p. 3.
40 El Informador, “La cuestión internacional en el Congreso Local” [The Interna-
tional Concern in the Local Congress], 24 October 1917, p. 1.
41 El Informador, 30 October 1917, p. 2.
42 El Informador, “Información local” [Local Information], 17 October  1917,
p. 4.
43 El Informador, “Campo neutral de ‘El Informador’. Cuadros vivos. El martirio
del Vicario de Hérent” [Neutral Ground in El Informador. Tableaux: The Mar-
tyrdom of Vicario de Hérent], 18 October 1917, p. 2.
44 El Informador, “Cuadros vivos. La deportación” [Tableaux: Deportation], 30
October 1917, p. 3.
45 El Informador, “Por el derecho, contra la fuerza” [For Order, Against Force], 8
November 1917, p. 2.
46 El Informador, “Las emboscadas de la fera” [The Ambushes of the Beast], 30
November 1917, p. 2.
47 El Informador, “Dónde está la verdad y dónde está el engaño” [Where Is the
Truth and Where Is the Lie?], 13 December 1917, p. 2.
48 El Informador, “Unas preguntas a los neutralistas” [Some Questions for the
Neutralists], 8 December 1917, p. 2.
49 El Informador, “Los porqués de los germanóflos” [The Whys of the German
Sympathisers], 25 December 1917, p. 2.
50 Elvira Hernández Carballido, Las informadoras. Mujeres periodistas en Guada-
lajara (Mexico: Universidad Autónoma del Estado de Hidalgo, 2018).
51 María Guadalupe Mejía Nuñez, “Faldas en el periodismo tapatío (primeras
décadas del siglo XX)” in Lourdes Celina Vázquez Parada and Dario Armando
Flores Soria (coords.), Mujeres jaliscienses del siglo XIX: cultura, religión y
vida privada (Guadalajara: Universidad de Guadalajara, Editorial Universitaria,
2008), pp. 176–181.
52 El Informador, “Al cabo de un año” [After a Year], 5 October 1918, p. 6. Pedro
Sánchez is the name of a character in a novel by José María de Pereda (Mejía
Nuñez, 2008, p. 176).
53 El Informador, 5 October 1969, 10d.
54 El Informador, 21 November 1927. The Order of Academic Palms was bestowed
upon her by Julien Fruchier, the French consulate in Mexico.
55 Silvia Quezada Camberos, “La representación social de la mujer en el periódico
Alma femenina (1932–1933)” in Estudios Jaliscienses, vol. 111, 2018, p. 32.
 Coverage of WWI in regional Mexican press 109
56 Alma Femenina was founded in Guadalajara on 1 January 1932 as a counter-
point to the biased image of women that was commonly spread in the local
press. For more on early feminism as refected in this magazine, see the work of
Silvia Quezada Camberos, “La representación social de la mujer en el periód-
ico Alma femenina (1932–1933)” [The Social Representation of Women in the
Newspaper Alma Femenina (1932–1933)], in Estudios Jaliscienses, vol. 111,
February 2018, pp. 26–36.
57 El Informador, 30 September 2005, 16b.
58 Mejía Nuñez, “Faldas en el periodismo tapatío”, p. 179.
59 Ibid., p. 180.
60 El Informador, 24 October 1932, p. 4.
61 El Informador, 27 March 1920.
62 El Informador, 8 March 1940, p. 2.
63 El Informador, 25 January 1970, 8d.
64 However, she was not the only one. It is worth mentioning, for example, the
journalism of Dora Mayer, a Peruvian writer of German origin, who published
several articles in favour of the Allied powers in the Lima newspaper El Comer-
cio during the war.
65 El Informador, “A las colonias aliadas de Guadalajara” [To the Allied Support-
ers in Guadalajara], 13 November 1918, p. 6.
66 Among many other examples, journalists from the city of Mérida founded sev-
eral publications to inform readers in Yucatán of what was happening in Europe.
Such was the case with the newspapers Ecos de la Guerra and Adelante, which
were both published in Mérida during the war.

References
Compagnon, Olivier, L’adieu à l’Europe. L’Amérique latine et la Grande Guerre
(Argentine et Brésil, 1914–1939) (Paris: Fayard, 2013).
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(Undergraduate Thesis, UNAM, School of Philosophy and Humanities, Mexico,
1980).
Del Palacio Montiel, Celia, Catálogo de la hemerografía de Jalisco, 1808–1950 [Cat-
alogue of Periodicals in Jalisco, 1808–1950] (Mexico: CONACYT, Universidad
de Guadalajara, 2006).
Fregoso Peralta, Gilberto and Ruiz, Enrique E Sánchez, Prensa y poder en Guadala-
jara (Guadalajara: Universidad de Guadalajara, CEIC, 1993).
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(Mexico: Ed. Hermes, 1970).
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jara (Mexico: Universidad Autónoma del Estado de Hidalgo, 2018).
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Universidad de Guadalajara, 1955).
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de la primera guerra mundial (Mexico: Ediciones Era, 1990).
Kuntz Ficker, Sandra, “El impacto de la Primera Guerra Mundial sobre el comercio
exterior de México” in Iberoamericana, vol. 53, March, 2014, pp. 117–137.
Kuntz Ficker, Sandra, “La contribución de México a la causa de los aliados
durante la Primera Guerra Mundial” in Compagnon, Olivier; Foulard, Camille;
Martin, Guillemette and Tato, María Inés (coords.), La Gran Guerra en Amé-
rica Latina. Una historia conectada (Mexico: Centro de Estudios Mexicanos y
110 Guillemette Martin
Centroamericanos, Institut des Hautes Études de l’Amérique Latine, Centre de
Recherche et de Documentation des Amériques, 2018), pp. 149–169.
Martin, Guillemette, Représentations de l’Europe et identité au Mexique. Le Juan
Panadero, un journal de Guadalajara (Paris: Éditions de l’IHEAL, 2008).
Mejía Nuñez, María Guadalupe, “Faldas en el periodismo tapatío (primeras décadas
del siglo XX)” in Parada, Lourdes Celina Vázquez and Soria, Dario Armando
Flores (coords.), Mujeres jaliscienses del siglo XIX: cultura, religión y vida privada
(Guadalajara: Universidad de Guadalajara, Editorial Universitaria, 2008).
Meyer, Jean, “Fue México germanóflo de 1914 a 1918?” in Compagnon, Olivier;
Foulard, Camille; Martin, Guillemette and Tato, María Inés (coords.), La Gran
Guerra en América Latina. Una historia conectada (Mexico: Centro de Estudios
Mexicanos y Centroamericanos, Institut des Hautes Études de l’Amérique Latine,
Centre de Recherche et de Documentation des Amériques, 2018), pp. 71–84.
Mock, James R, “The Creel Committee in Latin America” in Hispanic American
Historical Review, vol. 22, 1942, pp. 262–279.
Ortega Orozco, Adriana and Robinet, Romain, “Aliadóflos, germanóflos y neutral-
istas. La opinión pública mexicana ante la Primera Guerra Mundial” in Mexican
Studies/Estudios Mexicanos, vol. 33, no. 2, 2017, pp. 220–244.
Quezada Camberos, Silvia, “La representación social de la mujer en el periódico
Alma femenina (1932–1933)” in Estudios Jaliscienses, vol. 111, 2018, pp. 26–36.
Robinet, Romain, “Defender y orientar la Revolución. Los diputados mexicanos
ante la ‘guerra europea’ (1916–1918)” in Compagnon, Olivier; Foulard, Camille;
Martin, Guillemette and Tato, María Inés (coords.), La Gran Guerra en Amé-
rica Latina. Una historia conectada (Mexico: Centro de Estudios Mexicanos y
Centroamericanos, Institut des Hautes Études de l’Amérique Latine, Centre de
Recherche et de Documentation des Amériques, 2018), pp. 85–100.
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(Guadalajara: Universidad de Guadalajara, 2002).
6 All about national survival
Chinese intellectuals’
understanding of war during the
interwar period, 1914–19371
Kwong Chi Man

War is a central feature in modern Chinese history, and even more so

between 1912 and 1949 when the country experienced a long series of civil
and external wars that led to tens of millions of deaths. Among these wars,
the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945) was the most severe, killing
more than ten million Chinese soldiers and civilians. As Hans van de Ven
suggested, the Second Sino-Japanese War was not only against the Japanese
invasion, it was also about the attempts, mainly led by the Chinese Nation-
alists and the Communists, to create the modern Chinese state and nation.
Further, the period was about the Chinese states trying to exert control over
the remnants of the Qing Empire, including the peripheral areas where the
Han Chinese were the minority. Those areas, such as Mongolia, Tibet, and
Xinjiang, were parts of the Qing Empire, with the latter only being incorpo-
rated during the second half of the nineteenth century.
The military history of China during this period has been studied exhaus-
tively, but little has been known about the Chinese understanding of war
and factors that shaped it. Citing publications about war written by Chinese
civilian and military intellectuals, this chapter seeks to elucidate the Chinese
understanding of war during the period between the First World War and
the beginning of the Second Sino-Japanese War. It suggests that the Chinese
were receptive to the perceived lessons of the First World War, and that
they were distrustful of the post-war international order. Filled with racial
nationalism that prevailed in China even before the First World War, many
Chinese intellectuals believed that the “Chinese race” faced a survival threat
and that international order was simply one of survival of the fttest. They
also saw war as primarily a technological and economic struggle and that
China could only cope with such a struggle through a total mobilisation of
society. The primacy of national survival persuaded civilian and military
intellectuals alike to ignore some signifcant aspects of international order
during the interwar period, such as restraint in the conduct of war and
criminalisation of certain actions at war.
The First World War was an unprecedented confict in terms of scale,
tools, and dimension. In Europe and the United States of America, tens of
millions of men were mobilised to fght at the front. The battlefeld was
112 Kwong Chi Man
dominated by rifes, machine guns, rapid-fring feld guns, and all sorts of
heavy artillery. In northwest Europe and to a certain extent on the Eastern
Front, the ground battle became one of attrition, with both sides dug into
near-impregnable trench systems. New weapons such as tanks and poison-
ous gas were introduced, and the air dimension of war became increasingly
important. All these developments forced the belligerent countries to mobi-
lise not only their armed forces but also their economic capacity. Other
aspects of society, from science to art, were also mobilised to contribute
to the war efort. After the war, there were attempts to build a framework
of collective security so that wars between the major powers could be pre-
vented; the founding of the League of Nations, Locarno Treaty, and Geneva
Convention being the milestones. On the other hand, countries also learned
from the war, not only from a tactical and technical perspective. The pow-
ers paid attention to national mobilisation and introduced institutional
and legal changes to better equip themselves and to mobilise the nation
in times of war. A Chinese writer suggested in 1934 that “the only lesson
learned by the powers from the [Great] war was the so-called national total
mobilisation”.2
During the war, China experienced periods of political turmoil, including
the Second Revolution, President Yuan Shikai’s failed bid to reinstall the
monarchy with him becoming Emperor, and a brief restoration of the Qing
Empire. Although China did not participate in the war until 1917 and had
not sent any large-scale military contingent to the fronts, Chinese civil and
military intellectuals took a keen interest in the war. Articles covering all
aspects of the war appeared in newspapers, popular magazines, as well as
academic journals of the armed forces. As Eugene Chiu suggests, the First
World War was an opportunity for popular enlightenment. While there
were many rumours and exaggerated stories of heroism or cowardice, there
were also serious discussions of the political, military, economic, and social
impact of the war on diferent societies. Chinese intellectuals were par-
ticularly impressed by several aspects of the war: the sweeping patriotism
and militarism of the peoples in Europe, the staggering cost of the war,
the importance of technology, the increasing control of the government over
the economy, and the role of women.3 Intellectuals such as Chen Duxiu, Du
Yaquan, and Zhang Shichao took a keen interest in studying the war, and
some saw the war as a refection of the weaknesses of “Western Civilisa-
tion”, namely the emphasis on “force over morality”. On the other hand,
others (notably Chen Duxiu) argued that the Chinese should learn from the
aggressiveness of the Europeans.4
Like the Japanese government, the Beiyang government sent ofcial del-
egations to Europe and studied the latest developments in not only military
technology but also the social and economic impact of the war.5 After the
war, Chinese intellectuals, civil and military alike, continued to learn about
the war, especially from the Japanese who studied the war more systemati-
cally. Chinese ofcers and students educated in Japan translated Japanese
 All about national survival 113
works on the topic, and those who studied in Europe and the United States
of America also contributed to the discussion. Many of their contribu-
tions were published in Chinese journals, some of them printed in copies
of thousands. These serials allowed new knowledge to be introduced to
Chinese intellectuals, who used the same platform to exchange ideas or to
disseminate what was regarded as valuable knowledge and information.
This proved to be an essential source of information when trying to discuss
the Chinese understanding of war during the early twentieth century. From
articles written by Chinese civilian and military intellectuals, one can have a
glimpse of the Chinese understanding of the lessons of the First World War,
from tactical and technical aspects to the relationship between the state and
society. Such understanding also, to an extent, shaped the Chinese tendency
to understand modern war as struggles between races that required the com-
plete mobilisation of society.
From 1931, because of the Japanese occupation of Manchuria and the
Shanghai incident, many Chinese intellectuals increasingly saw the com-
ing of another world war as inevitable and the ensuing situation as one
of national survival. To save the nation, they urged the introduction of
the “total war” measures implemented in other countries, such as greater
state intervention in the society, conscription, and propaganda. This under-
standing of war as “total confict” led to Chinese intellectuals deliberately
ignoring the restrictions, over the use of certain weapons and actions in
war, imposed by the post-war international humanitarian agreements. In
response to the need for total confict, some Chinese intellectuals urged a
moral revival through state tutelage, while others called for an expansion of
strategic space by strengthening Chinese control over areas such as Xinjiang.
This led to employing the language of racial struggle, and the forceful trans-
formation of ethnic minorities into “Chinese” was seen as necessary and
legitimate. Discussion about total war was also entangled with party politics
at that time, during which the Chinese Nationalist and Communist parties
were competing for infuence over the intellectuals. While both sides agreed
on the need for turning the Chinese state and society into one that could
be mobilised for “total war”, the two parties argued divergent approaches.
On the one hand, pro-Nationalist intellectuals talked of the need to set up
a unifed government (often with the caveat that it should be led by the
Nationalist Party) to coordinate the war efort, and some even went so far
as to suggest that loyalty to “the leader (namely Chiang Kai-shek)” was
essential for Chinese society to be mobilised in war. On the other hand, left-
ist intellectuals appealed to the initiative of “the mass” and argued that the
people should be allowed to “organise themselves”. They also argued that
mass political participation was essential for any society to be mobilised to
fght a modern “total war”. Whether these ideas were implemented in the
areas under Chinese Communist control was not certain, however, this line
of argument was arguably more appealing to the intellectuals who were less
satisfed with the Nationalist narrative.
114 Kwong Chi Man
This chapter is divided into four parts. It frst deals with the Chinese intel-
lectuals’ understanding of the nature of international relations and China’s
position after the First World War. It then turns to the prevailing narra-
tive among Chinese intellectuals that modern warfare is a struggle between
races, in which the loser would face enslavement and elimination. The third
part discusses how the idea of “national total mobilisation (guojia zong-
dongyuan)” was introduced to China and the role such rhetoric played in
shaping the Chinese’ understanding of war. The Chinese intellectuals noted
the importance of technology and economic mobilisation during the First
World War and urged for changes in the state apparatus and society to meet
such demands. The last part discusses the role of the “total war” rhetoric
in party politics during the 1930s, when the Chinese Nationalist and Com-
munist parties suggested diferent approaches to preparing the nation for
total war.

Understanding China’s position

Chinese intellectuals who genuinely believed that the end of the First World
War would herald an age of internationalism and equality among nations
were to be disillusioned by the Great Powers’ treatment of China during
the Versailles peace talks. However, many had little faith in the Great Pow-
ers even before Versailles. For many intellectuals, especially the ofcers, the
First World War only reinforced their understanding of international order,
which was based on jungle rules of survival of the fttest. International
cooperation through the League of Nations was believed unreliable, and
the Pacifst movement was seen as naive if not outright treacherous. In the
early 1930s, there was an increasing number of articles written by Chinese
intellectuals on the inevitability of the Second World War and the need to
prepare the country for it.
In September  1918, an anonymous contributor to the Military Afairs
Magazine (bingshi zazhi) of Zhejiang wrote:

[A]s we entered the twentieth century, it is known that only war can
ensure peace, and only with force can one defend oneself against out-
side threats . . . the rape of Belgium by the German army suggested
that the weak could never rely on the dead letters of international
laws.6

Both civilian and military intellectuals were equally disappointed with the
Treaty of Versailles. An ofcer wrote in the Military Afairs Magazine:

[T]he world would be increasingly unstable; why? It is because other

than the vanquished, we are also dissatisfed [with the peace treaty];
even Italy and Belgium were not satisfed with some of the points of the
Treaty, but our country was the most embarrassed [victor] of all.7
 All about national survival 115
Thus, it is not coincident that the Chinese ofcers quoted John Frederick
Charles Fuller’s line, “the so-called ‘eternal peace’ was only rhetoric for the
cenotaph”.8
There existed among Chinese intellectuals a considerable degree of hostility
towards pacifsm and internationalism that prevailed briefy in the United States
of America and some Western European countries after the First World War.
Zhou Yawei, an ofcer who was educated in Japan and later became the Deputy
Inspector General of Training of the Nationalist Army, compared the Kellogg–
Briand Pact of 1928 to the disarmament meeting of the spring and autumn
period and suggested that wars between nations were inevitable until the ulti-
mate arrival of the stage of “Great Unity (datong)” of the world.9 Li Erkang,
who published a book on the military development of Japan after the First
World War, in 1929, wrote at the very beginning of his book, “war is the driving
force of human evolution”. He warned of the increasing popularity of pacifcism
among the Chinese intellectuals: “the recent experience of the European War
has clearly shown: if our countrymen blindly talk about benevolence and urge
for peace while ignoring the situation of this dangerous and distrustful world,
they are inviting disaster”.10 This sentiment prevailed not only among ofcers
but also among civilians, who wrote in similar tone in other publications.11
Thus, even before the fall of Manchuria in 1931, many Chinese intel-
lectuals had little faith in the ability of the League of Nations to prevent
wars. Zhou Yawei suggested that instead of relying on international organi-
sations, China should engage in peaceful diplomacy to maximise its number
of allies and isolate the enemy while maintaining a strong and self-sufcient
military, because “moral and friendship counts very little in international
afairs”.12 Zhou’s view was not uncommon. Tan Yimin, a Nationalist Party
ofcial and scholar, wrote that the League of Nations was only “an organi-
sation set up by the imperialist powers to divide their spoils of war”.13 Yang
Jie, the Director of Education of the Staf College,14 wrote:

[A]fter the First World War there were a number of international con-
ferences aimed at imposing limits on the expansion of the navy, army
and air force. [However], . . . after more than a decade of efort, the
situation is now nearly hopeless.15

In 1930, an ofcer even claimed that the “Second World War” was
imminent – and he used this term long before any other powers ofcially
adopted the nomenclature: “the Second World War is not only inevitable
but also many times more intense”.
This understanding of the international order refected not only Chinese
frustration towards the League of Nations; it also refected the Chinese view
of modern warfare. From their writings, one can see that they were heav-
ily infuenced by the German understanding of the world in the nineteenth
century, mainly through the lens of Japan. The First World War did nothing
to change that. A contributor to the journal of the Northeast Army quoted
116 Kwong Chi Man
Nietzsche: “although such an idea is against humanitarianism (rendao), it
is of utmost relevance to human progress . . . war is a means to diferentiate
the superior races from the inferior ones”.16 Such an idea was so common
among ofcers that on the back page of the Military Magazine, the of-
cial journal of the Central Military Academy, quotes by General Friedrich
von Bernhardi about the importance of war for human progress appeared.17
In their understanding of international order, many Chinese intellectuals
difered little from their predecessors who advocated civic militarism (jun-
guomin zhuyi), such as Cai E and Liang Qichao, who saw international
relations in Social Darwinist terms. The First World War and the post-war
international peace efort did nothing to shake their view, and many believed
that China was unjustly treated. The subsequent Washington Conference
did little to alleviate such distrust.
As many Chinese intellectuals at that time saw international order in
Social Darwinist terms, many subscribed to the view that nations were
locked in an existential struggle for resources, space, and glory. Losers of
the struggle, as many believed, would face racial extinction. The country
was perceived as constantly under external threat, particularly from Japan
and the Soviet Union. Duan Muzhang, who wrote about the First World
War from the 1920s, wrote:

[O]ur country is deep-rooted in civil strife and external threats; the voice
of [foreign] intervention is sometimes heard from diferent corners; our
sovereignty, in whatever form, has always been under threat  .  .  . the
“national body” (guoti) of our country is non-existent.18

After the “Manchurian Incident”, some Chinese intellectuals considered

the possibility of a prolonged Sino-Japanese struggle and the importance
for China to obtain strategic space for considering the confict. For exam-
ple, Yang Jie discussed the importance of developing an inland “center for
national defense” to prepare for the eventuality of the fall of the Shanghai–
Nanjing area. He proposed establishing such a centre in the Xian area, as it
was close to natural resources and allowed the government to enhance its
control over the inland provinces of Gansu, Shanxi, Henan, Hubei, Hunan,
and Sichuan. In peacetime, it could cooperate with the “commercial prov-
inces” along the China coast; in war, it would be the centre of gravity for the
nation.19 Other contributors also mentioned the importance of developing
northwest China as a means to gain “economic independence”.20 Another
suggested that by moving part of the population to the hinterland, the nation
could “withstand another thirty to ffty years of war”.21
In the search for strategic space, some Chinese intellectuals urged an
extension of Chinese infuence over areas such as Tibet and Xinjiang, where
the Nationalist government had only nominal control. To save the “Chi-
nese nation”, the Chinese intellectuals were not hesitant in applying the
same logic of racial struggle in dealing with the inhabitants of these areas.
For example, an anonymous author published a piece in the Combined
 All about national survival 117
Journal of Military Afairs (Junshi huikan) on a plan to annex Tibet. He
wrote of the need to “seize the core of Tibet and get hold of everything;
and then [we should] gradually transplant Tibet to China by luring the
Tibetans, without raising their opposition or even awareness”. Specifcally,
he proposed to colonise Tibet with Han Chinese and then to “eliminate”
the Tibetan language, which the author saw was “the foundation of the
thoughts of a nation”.22 He also urged to “dominate” the economy of
Tibet and ruthlessly suppress any possible opposition. If necessary, he sug-
gested, the Nationalist government should send an expedition to Lasha, as
“force is the fundamental tool to solve the problem of Tibet”.23 He argued
that if China failed to follow such a plan, Britain or the Soviet Union, the
two powers which had much infuence in the area, would continue their
advance and eventually threaten the coastal provinces of China, because
“when a country is afuent, it would naturally seek expansion”.24 This
piece suggests that at least some Chinese intellectuals had no qualms about
destroying an entire nation for the sake of the perceived survival of China.
As many Chinese intellectuals often saw modern wars as an all-or-nothing
struggle between nations, they were also ready to ensure the “purity” of the
Chinese nation by exterminating “aliens” within their perceived boundary.
Just what constituted the “Chinese” however, was never clear in almost all
the discussions.
By 1937, it was already a common thought among Chinese intellectuals
that a global war was imminent. Thus, some ofcers started to propose
ways for China to survive, or even gain the upper hand in its struggle against
Japan, by standing with the right side. Half a year before the outbreak of the
Sino-Japanese War, two years before the German invasion of Poland, and
three years before the Tripartite Pact, Chen Fuguang, an America-educated
instructor of diplomatic history at the Kunming Branch of the Central Mili-
tary Academy, suggested that the world was already divided into “Fascist
and the Anti-Fascist Camps (original quote)” and that global war would
begin “not later than 1942”. However, to Chen, the global war was an
opportunity for China to restore its international position amidst global
confict.25 The idea that China could beneft from the coming world war
was also shown among the leaders of the Nationalist Army. Chen Cheng,
Chiang’s right-hand man who succeeded the Chief of General Staf, submit-
ted a plan after the Marco Polo Bridge Incident when many of the senior
ofcers of the Nationalist Army gathered at Lushan for the annual educa-
tion programme. His plan was more or less a summary of the understanding
of the Chinese intellectual ofcers’ view concerning the situation of China
and the world. Chen proposed a three-stage plan to solve the perceived
problem of security. In the frst stage, China was to hold the existing terri-
tory under its control and establish a strong military and arms industry. The
second stage, which he called the “national revolutionary stage”, was about
creating a self-sufcient military and arms industry so that China would not
need to rely on foreign arms or advisors. The third stage was that of the
“completion of the national revolution”, which involved China developing
118 Kwong Chi Man
“a forward and ofensive-oriented military”, to recover all previously lost
territory from the Qing dynasty.26

Modern warfare as “total war”

The First World War left a long-lasting impact on Chinese intellectu-
als’ understanding of war by introducing to them the idea of “total war
(zongtizhan)”, a term that was often attributed to the German General Erich
Ludendorf, whose work Der Totale Krieg was translated into Chinese in
1936 by Zhang Junmai. A diferent term along the same idea, guojia zong-
dongyuan (literally translated as “national total mobilisation”) appeared as
early as January 1919.27 Even before the war ended, some Chinese intellec-
tuals had already described the First World War as an unprecedented con-
fict. To many, the frst unprecedented feature was the predominant role of
technology in war. He Sui, who published the frst comprehensive Chinese
report on the First World War, wrote at the beginning of his book: “today,
war is a contest of technology”.28 An ofcer recorded:

[S]ince the last Great War in Europe, tanks, aircraft, and poisonous
gas started appearing on the battlefeld . . . in the future, in terms of
equipment, there would be amphibious planes and tanks, anti-aircraft
guns, long-range artillery, wireless telephone  .  .  . and the strange
weapons that the powers were secretly developing and making. In
terms of the extent of the battlefeld, because of the development of
airpower, rear areas far from the front would also be under constant
threat  .  .  . thus, every person in the country would become a com-
batant, and every bit of resources would be counted as material and
immaterial elements of war and contribute directly or indirectly to the
war efort.

He concluded that “countries that are unable to execute national total

mobilisation will not be qualifed to fght a war – and thus lose the right to
exist in the world”.29
It was a common understanding among the intellectuals during the 1920s
and 1930s that warfare was increasingly a contest of technology and fre-
power. He Sui, who visited the Western and Italian fronts in 1917, was
thoroughly impressed by the role of frepower in the war and suggested that
armies could no longer launch ofensive operations without large stocks of
artillery pieces. When talking about the importance of frepower, an ofcer
wrote:

[I]t should be noted that modern warfare is incomparable with the old
way of war; it is not enough to win by possessing greater morale and the
use of “human bullets” tactics; outcomes of war are decided through
scientifc innovations and application of technology.30
 All about national survival 119
Liang Ji, an editor of the NJMA, also highlighted the importance of tech-
nology and the material side of the war in his discussion of the industrial
mobilisation of Britain, the United States of America, and Germany. He
wrote, “the material civilisations of Europe and the United States were
innovating every day and month . . . and improved further during the Euro-
pean war. Future wars will be contests of scientifc prowess”. Some also sug-
gested that as war became a scientifc contest between nations, society had
to contribute to fghting in ways other than by military action.31
Chinese intellectuals also saw the application of the latest military tech-
nology as a shortcut to redress the disparity of power between China and
the world powers. One of the features of the military journals published
during the period was the near absence of discussion of any Chinese military
thoughts and history. Instead, intellectual ofcers focused on the use of new
weapons and the application of various technologies in warfare, including
far-fetched “future weapons” such as laser beams. Of the latest military
technology, Chinese intellectuals paid much attention to chemical weap-
ons and aircraft. Many stressed the idea that the application of technol-
ogy should not be bound by any international rules and standards. Writing
about chemical warfare, Quan Jingcun, an ofcer, noted:

After the signing of the Washington Treaties, the powers invariably feared
their enemy would use the poisonous gas . . . although none talk of [con-
ducting chemical warfare] openly, [all the powers] discussed the issue
in private. Alas, it is a world in which only the fttest can survive. No
one would care about humanitarianism or international law. We have
to wake up to this fact, as we now live in the age of scientifc warfare.32

Another unnamed ofcer was explicit in his advocation for bombing civil-
ians with chemical weapons:

[Bombing civilians with chemical weapons] is forbidden by interna-

tional law. However, in desperate situations, who would care about
[international law] when one is trying to overcome the enemy by all
means? . . . if the aerial war is being conducted more cruelly and inten-
sively, the war can be shortened. To win, one has to kill.33

Thus, although China was one of the signatories of the Geneva Protocol,
intellectuals openly discussed the use of chemical weapons against not only
soldiers but also civilians. However, their observation was by no means unjus-
tifable; all the major powers invested in chemical weapons, and almost all the
powers deployed chemical weapons to the front (although not all used them).
The understanding of war as a contest of technological prowess led many
Chinese intellectuals to subscribe to the view that the economic dimension
of the war became predominant, and a country had to be able to mobilise
not only the armed forces of the country. As the scale of war increased
120 Kwong Chi Man
dramatically, many pointed out the importance of empowering the state to
control the economy, resources, and manpower of the country as efciently
and cost-efectively as possible. He Sui suggested that modern warfare was
“a struggle of a state’s entire strength; the success and failure of a state is
the success and failure of all its people”. He then suggested that in wartime,
the state should be able to exert complete control over the “the ability to
mobilise the soldiers”, “all national resources”, “all industrial capabilities”,
and “spiritual force of the national army”. He suggested that China form an
organisation within the Ministry of War that was responsible for the overall
planning of building an arms industry. The organisation should play a role
not only in planning but also in weapon design, training of technical per-
sonnel, and working closely with private enterprises. He further suggested
establishing a system to mobilise all automobiles in the country. In sum, he
argued for more state control over the economy. Zhang Naiqi, an economist
teaching at the University of Shanghai, who later became head of the Minis-
try of Food in the People’s Republic of China, wrote, “the national economy
is the basis for the economy of national defense”.34 Perhaps it was because
of the German infuence on Chinese military thinking that many articles
discussing national mobilisation began with Walther Rathenau’s proposal
to set up the War Raw Materials Department in the German Ministry of
War.35 Articles about the government playing a greater role in managing
a national economy appeared regularly, suggesting measures such as price
control, tarif, government intervention to prevent competition, and forma-
tion of cooperatives in order to control certain economic branches. Most
agreed that it was necessary to introduce a government agency for economic
coordination in peacetime and mobilisation in times of war.36
Throughout the 1920s and 1930s, the idea of “total mobilisation”
(zongdongyuan) was widely discussed and refned. Although the term was
introduced in the 1920s, it was during the “Manchurian Incident” and the
subsequent Battle of Shanghai of 1932 that the term became widely known
in China. At that time, while many wrote of “total mobilisation”, others
still used the term to refer to a general mobilisation of armed forces. Yet
others used the term to describe the introduction of conscription or general
military training of the population or channeling manpower and resources
for the armed forces.37 Wang Jingwei, who tried to curb enthusiasm for an
all-out war with Japan, suggested that China could not introduce “total
mobilisation” because the nation lacked the institutional apparatus to do
so, particularly to introduce conscription. One author criticised him for
twisting the idea of total mobilisation as well as being a defeatist. The critic
then suggested that it was already known by many that the idea of “total
mobilisation” was more about exerting government control and planning
over economic activities, manpower allocation, as well as popular mobilisa-
tion through propaganda than arming the entire nation.38
By the late 1920s and early 1930s, it was common for intellectuals to take
a more holistic view of the idea of “total mobilisation”, in line with those
 All about national survival 121
who discussed this issue around the world, particularly in Japan. Zhou
Yawei suggested it was necessary to mobilise all the “tangible and intangible
forces” of a nation in wartime:

Modern wars of national defense (guofang zhanzheng) are wars between

nations. As the number of soldiers and material mobilised is immense,
the responsibility of defending the nation rests on the people. It is nec-
essary to disseminate the knowledge of national defense to the entire
population, as “materials of war” (junbei) include not only soldiers but
also all kinds of tangible human, animal, and material resources as well
as intangible factors such as ideas, knowledge, and techniques that are
related to the military. The army, navy, and other military institutions
and military infrastructure that existed in peacetime constituted only
a portion of national defense; all aspects of a nation are part of the
organisation of national defense (guofang zuzhi zhi quanti nai guojia
zhi quanti).39

Li Erkang wrote:

Nations that join in the war should never entrust the duty of protecting
the country to its military; from the rulers to the common people, despite
their age and sex, should exhaust their ability for the use of the country.
The nation should also exhaust its resources for military use . . . even
the countries that had not participated in the last Great War understood
from the experience [of others] that total national mobilisation [guojia
zongdongyuan] is the most important element of war.40

In addition, he suggested introducing national control over fuel and food,

as well as scientifc research eforts. In his book, Li discussed in detail the
steps taken by the Japanese government to foster its ability to mobilise the
economy and resources after the First World War, such as legislation per-
mitting wartime economic mobilisation, encouragement of civilian aviation
industry, and introduction of military training in schools.
The idea of total war was increasingly common among the Chinese in
the late 1930s, when war with Japan seemed inevitable. Even political fg-
ures discussed future conficts in terms of total war. Chen Lifu, head of the
Organisation Department of the Nationalist Party, wrote that wars between
nations nowadays were about mobilising all aspects of society.41 Sun
Baogang, a junior ofcer and future co-founder of the Chinese Social Demo-
cratic Party (led by intellectuals such as Zhang Junmai), wrote that to pre-
pare the nation for total war, the government should pay attention to aspects
such as propaganda, “national health”, “mobilisation of knowledge”, and
“preparation for wartime legislation”.42 Tighter government control over
cultural activities for the purpose of mobilisation was also proposed.43 Some
argued the need to mobilise society to prepare for attacks from the air, as it
122 Kwong Chi Man
was considered that Chinese cities were ill-prepared for air attacks.44 One
of the often-cited myths showing the need to subject all aspects of planning
to military consideration was about how Germans designed park benches
so they could be immediately converted into train seats for soldiers during
general mobilisation.45
In 1936, Dushu Shenghuo (Reading Life) produced a special issue on
total mobilisation, in which the contributors urged for total mobilisation
not only of the armed forces and the economy but also music, drama, litera-
ture, flm, education, and even written Chinese. The goal of such mobilisa-
tion, to the contributors, was not only to prepare the nation for war but
fundamentally to change Chinese society.46 Hu Sheng, a leftist intellectual
who later became a propagandist of the People’s Republic of China, even
wrote of the need to introduce a new form of written Chinese so that the
nation could be better unifed to face a total war. He suggested that the new
type of written Chinese was “a cultural and educational tool as well as a
means of national defense”.47 Chen Boda, educated in Moscow, urged for
the cooperation of all “patriotic, democratic, liberal, rational, materialistic”
philosophers to combat foreign philosophical enslavement on the one hand,
and traditional rituals, superstition, and blind obedience on the other.48

Party politics and “total mobilisation” rhetoric

The Chinese intellectuals’ understanding of “modern warfare” also led
them to consider the issue of the relationship between the military and soci-
ety. Some became increasingly attracted by the notion that the state needed
to micromanage diferent aspects of society to instil discipline and foster
planning; the two elements considered essential for a society to survive an
industrialised war. Some believed that the military had to direct the govern-
ment and “militarise” society even in peacetime. Others went further and
argued that the nation should be led by a single party or a single leader. In
contrast, some intellectuals argued that it was the civil society which should
be empowered, and only through widening political participation that the
state could realistically mobilise society. These discussions, however, should
not be seen purely from a theoretical perspective but should be put in the
context of party politics at that time and the internal struggle within the
Nationalist Party between Chiang Kai-shek and non-military political lead-
ers such as Wang Jingwei and the struggle between the Nationalist Party and
the Chinese Communist Party, which mobilised its literary and intellectual
fgures to join in the debate.
Among those who discussed the need to turn China into a “total mobi-
lisation state”, most believed that it was necessary to empower the state to
exert more control over economic activities and society. One even argued
for an “unlimited expansion” of state power.49 In the conclusion of his
book on Japanese eforts at building a total mobilisation state, Li Erkang
listed twelve suggestions for preparing Chinese society for modern warfare,
 All about national survival 123
including the introduction of a strong government that could unify the civil
government and the military. Tan Yimin wrote that in wartime, government
should become a “dictatorship” (he used the term diketuiduo, the translit-
eration of “dictator” in English).50 Bian Zongmin cited the rise of totalitar-
ian regimes in the Soviet Union, Germany, Italy, and Japan as examples of
successful conversions of states for total war and suggested that “even the
President of the United States of America had largely extended its executive
power”.51 Lin Qianhu, an educator in Guangdong who was also a member
of the Nationalist Party, wrote in an article titled “Should the Nationalist
Party End Political Tutelage?” that as it was necessary for China to have a
centralised government to deal with foreign threats and that the Nationalist
Party should maintain party rule.52 Some suggested that although the central
government was far from perfect, the people should not aim to overthrow
it, as, without a central government, the Chinese would face “extinction”.53
The stress on discipline and obedience to ensure the state could mobi-
lise efectively was most apparent among those in power. Chiang Kai-shek,
when discussing modern warfare, suggested that the people needed to be
disciplined even in peacetime. He wrote, “modern warfare was all about
organisation [of men and resources]; everything has to be organised so that
they can be controlled; everything has to be controlled so that they can be
mobilised”. He concluded:

[F]rom now on, all political, military, education, economic, social

works, in terms of spirit or material  .  .  . should serve one fnal over-
all target: that is to achieve national total mobilisation (quanguo
zongdongyuan)!54

In another article on national mobilisation, he highlighted the need to

introduce military discipline and control over diferent aspects of society
even during peacetime, so that the country could be prepared for war. To
him, the introduction of top-down military discipline over society meant
“rationalisation” and “organisation”.55 The need to obey authority was
pushed to the limit by people such as Chen Lifu, who argued that the most
important quality for the citizens was “loyalty” if China wanted to be a
state that could efectively mobilise its people and resources:

Modern warfare is about the mobilisation of all aspects of the soci-

ety; [a successful total mobilisation] needs organisation and discipline,
as well as perseverance and stoicism. Only the combination of intense
emotion and calm calculation can bring out the full fghting poten-
tial of a nation. Our foremost priority can be encapsulated in a single
word – “loyalty”!56

He then elaborated that everyone in society should stay loyal to their

respective role and position; for example, students and professors should
124 Kwong Chi Man
“stay in libraries to create and study all things related to the nation”.57 This
shows a clear preference for Nationalist leaders, for discipline and obedi-
ence over initiative and creativity. It was in this context that some argued
that the purpose of the New Life Movement was to create a state that could
fght a “total war”. Zhou Nianxing, a Whampoa graduate and associate of
Dai Li, the future head of the National Bureau of Investigation and Statis-
tics (Military Commission), wrote of spiritual revival through the New Life
Movement as a means to strengthen national defence.58 It was argued that
the New Life Movement would bring “unity” in the habits of the “next
generation of citizens” so that they could be efectively mobilised for future
war.59 Some also linked the need to be loyal to “the leader”, improvement
of the morale of society, and China’s ability to mobilise its manpower and
resources in wartime.60 It was also argued that the methods of national mobi-
lisation (enhanced state control of diferent aspects of life) could be used to
modernise China quickly.61 When war broke out, pro-Nationalist intellectu-
als continued to stress the need for a central government. Yang Xingrong,
head of the mass education museum (dazong jiaoyuguan) at Xian, wrote
that in war the people should share the same belief and the same goal under
the government’s direction. Appealing to the general public, he concluded
with a traditional Chinese idiom, “a snake can go nowhere without its head
(she wutou buxing)”.62 While some Nationalist intellectuals pointed to the
importance of educating the mass, they too prioritised the establishment of
a central authority.63
In contrast, some intellectuals argued that the existence of a robust civil
society founded on widespread political participation was a prerequisite for
the establishment of a “total mobilisation” state. As early as the late 1920s,
it was already suggested that democratic countries such as Britain and the
United States of America could also excel in the mobilisation of society
for war.64 Zhou Yawei suggested that as the “Chinese Republic was for
the people”, the state should be responsible for providing popular military
training so that the people could understand “the current situation and the
justifcation of the state to arm itself”. In schools, he argued that pupils had
to understand “the importance of national defense” and be instilled with
“national consciousness”. Citizens would also acquire “a sense of respon-
sibility and discipline” so that, in future, they would be “the backbone of
the nation”.65 Zhou implied that military service became a responsibility
when the state guaranteed the political rights of the people, and the people
were provided with military training not only because they would serve in
the armed forces of the state but also protect the republican institution, by
force if necessary.
Zhang Naiqi wrote that the key to efective total mobilisation was the
establishment of a strong civil society rather than a top-down bureaucracy:
“the people can only be strengthened through self-initiated organisations
and constant struggle  .  .  . they are not interested in [cooperating] with a
 All about national survival 125
top-down bureaucracy that could not even handle its day-to-day busi-
ness”.66 Li Gongpu argued that to prepare the nation for mobilisation, “the
maximum level of democratisation of political power (zhengquan jidu de
minzhuhua)” was needed.67 Among the leftist intellectuals, bottom-up mobi-
lisation was preferred. Lu Qi, who argued for the mobilisation of music,
urged musicians to focus on the creation of songs that could be understood
by the “workers and peasants”.68 Lu, however, unwittingly revealed his
intention for a larger goal. He suggested at the end of the article that to
better mobilise music, a “congress” of all practitioners of music should be
formed; it was a typical “United Front” tactic of soliciting support for the
Chinese Communist Party. The idea of widening political participation as
a means of enabling China to fght a total war became one of the themes of
the Chinese Communist political narrative during the Second Sino-Japanese
War. In 1937, in a declaration on total mobilisation, Li Gongpu wrote:

The goal of the [proposed] reform in political structure is to foster

national unity and save the country; to achieve [total mobilisation], the
implementation of democracy is required . . . [the government] should
allow complete freedom for the mass movement to reform the local
administrations . . . national mobilisation is not an empty phrase; it is
necessary to allow the people to be organised and educated, so that they
can be mobilised to contribute to the war efort. The people should be
given the freedom to organise themselves.69

Such rhetoric certainly would fnd supporters among the civilian and mili-
tary intellectuals who were dissatisfed with Chiang Kai-shek’s unwilling-
ness to widen political participation outside the Nationalist Party during
the 1930s.

Conclusion
To many of the Chinese intellectuals who were concerned with the survival
of China in the face of real and perceived foreign invasion, the First World
War was an object lesson showing the need to create a “total-mobilisation
state”. Such a state would mobilise and control aspects of society enabling
it to sustain a protracted and costly war that was believed not only inevita-
ble but also imminent. Already during the war, Chinese intellectuals noted
the changes in the state machinery of belligerent powers, either through
frst-hand experience or discussions among the Japanese military and intel-
lectuals. To those who believed that the establishment of an all-powerful
state was necessary, the international order was little diferent from the rule
of the jungle, and the post-war eforts made by the democratic powers to
achieve collective security were dismissed by many Chinese intellectuals as
either high-sounding nonsense or plots to disguise their rearmament. This
126 Kwong Chi Man
understanding of international order persuaded the intellectuals to sub-
scribe to the view that China needed to take drastic measures to establish an
all-powerful state which could prepare the nation for the coming struggle
for survival.
Recognising the importance of technology and economic power in future
wars, the state that Chinese intellectuals envisioned would not only be
able to mobilise manpower but also its economic and fnancial resources;
market forces would be harnessed by more “rational” state control and
planning, subject to the needs of the military. As war became a protracted
and attritional afair, the state would also be able to infuence and con-
trol public opinion and cultural activities, which would be allowed to exist
only because of the need to sustain the elusive “national morale”. However,
while most agree it was necessary for the state to exert control over diferent
aspects of the society, just how it was to be done in a political framework
that was suitable for China proved to be a more difcult question that the
contemporary intellectuals, including the political leaders, had admitted.
While the Chinese Republic had been formed in 1911, the republican
institutions had not been able to resolve political struggles, let alone exert
control over much of China. The Nationalist takeover in 1928 promised to
solve this problem by introducing party rule, but it was nevertheless plagued
by factionalism and internal strife within the same party. Political leaders
such as Chiang Kai-shek, who deferred introducing popular political par-
ticipation as the Nationalist Party promised, saw the prevalence of the total
war rhetoric as justifcation to concentrate power and even argued that it
was necessary and desirable to introduce military discipline to 300 million
Chinese. On the other hand, Chiang’s critics, many of them left-wing and
Chinese Communist intellectuals, suggested a “bottom-up” approach that
stressed the “initiative” of the people to organise themselves. During the
early stage of the Sino-Japanese War, when the rhetoric of total war was
most prevalent, the left-wing and Communist intellectuals used this alter-
native vision to counter the Nationalist party-state narrative. Whether this
more democratic vision was realised in the areas under Chinese Communist
Party control, however, was a diferent matter.
The rhetoric of total war and of China facing a survival threat was also
used by the Chinese intellectuals to justify radical ideas concerning its ethnic
minorities during the 1930s. As the world was seen as one of survival of
the fttest, some Chinese intellectuals had no qualms about “eliminating”
peripheral ethnic groups who hindered the Chinese state developing its stra-
tegic space, so that the survival of the “Chinese nation” could be ensured.
In addition, ethnic, cultural, and even religious diversity of the so-called
Chinese nation was ignored, in favour of uniformity and unity, which were
regarded as paramount. In retrospect, this kind of rhetoric chillingly resem-
bles that of ethnic cleansing and purges in many parts of the world, another
product of the First World War.
 All about national survival 127
Notes
1 Research on this article was supported by the General Research Fund of the
Research Grants Council, Hong Kong (Project Code: 22602316 ECS).
2 Bian Zongmeng, “Guojia zongdongyuan zhi yiyi yu Zhongguo guofang wenti”
(The Meaning of National Total Mobilisation and the Question of National
Defence of China) in Xingjian yuekan (Xingjian Monthly), vol. 4, no. 1, 1934,
p. 3.
3 Eugene W Chiu, Qimeng, lixing, yu xiandaixing: jindai Zhongguo qimeng yun-
dong 1895–1925 (Enlightenment, Rationality, and Modernity: The Enlighten-
ment Movement of Modern China) (Taipei: National Taiwan University Press,
2018), pp. 224–227, 230–236, 310.
4 Susanne Weigelin-Schwiedrzik and Zhu Jiaming (eds.), Yizhan yu zhongguo:
yizhan bainian huiyi lunwenji (The First World War and China: A Collection of
Papers for the Conference of Centenary of the First World War) (Beijing: Dong-
fang chubanshe, 2015), pp. 34–36.
5 Kwong Chi Man, Minguo hu? Junguo hu? dierci zhongri zhanzheng qian de
minguo zhishi junren, junxue, yu junshi biange (State for the People or State for
War? The Intellectual Ofcers, Military Science and Military Change Before the
Second Sino-Japanese War) (Hong Kong: Chunghwa, 2017), pp. 47–48.
6 Tianfu, “Duiyu ouzhan zhi ganxiang” (Thoughts on the European War) in Bing-
shi zazhi (Military Afairs Magazine), vol. 53, 1918, pp. 2–3.
7 Yue Zhang, “Jinhou wu junren yu guomin zhi yanguang” (What Should Our
Soldiers and People Focus on in the Future) in Bingshi zazhi, vol. 63, 1919,
pp. 11–15.
8 Zhang Gushan, “Guanyu jianglai zhanzheng jishu wenti” (Technological Dimen-
sion of Future Warfare) in Junshi huikan (Combined Journal of Military Afairs),
vol. 7, 1933, p. 9.
9 Also see Kwong Chi Man, “Building a ‘Total Mobilisation State’: Thinking
about War and Society in 1920s Manchuria” in American Journal of Chinese
Studies, vol. 26, no. 1, 2019, p. 5.
10 Li Erkang, Ouzhan hou riben zhi junshiguan (Japanese Military Thoughts after
the European War) (Nanjing: Junyong tushushe, 1929), pp. 66–67.
11 Xu Gongwu, “Guojia zongdongyuan” (National Total Mobilisation) in Jianguo
(Nation Building), vol. 9, 1928, p. 13.
12 Zhou Yawei, Guofang lun (On National Defence) (Beijing: Jinghua yinshuju,
1926), p. 3.
13 Tan Yimin, “Jiburonghuan de quanguo zongdongyuan” (The Urgency of
National Total Mobilisation) in Xinmin (New People), vol. 1, no. 7, 1930, p. 43.
14 Yang was the de facto head of the College since Chiang Kai-shek was the nomi-
nal head of all military colleges in China after 1932.
15 Yang Jie, Xiandai guofang de jiben tiaojian shi shenme (What Are the Basic Ele-
ments of Modern National Defence), self-published pamphlet (Nanjing: Yang
Jie, 1935), p. 20.
16 Liu Zhupei “Zhanzheng yu Jinhua” (War and Progress) in Junshi yuekan
(Northeast Military Afairs Monthly), vol. 20, 1930, p. 2.
17 Kwong Chi Man, Minguo hu? Junguo hu? p. 156.
18 Duanmu Zhang, “Shijie dazhan zhi yanjiu” (A Study of the World War) in Jun-
shi zazhi, vol. 34, 1931, p. 31.
19 Yang Jie, Xiandai guofang de jiben tiaojian shi shenme, p. 43.
20 Xu Hanwen, “Guofang yu xibei jianshe” (National Defence and the Develop-
ment of the Northwest) in Guofang luntan (National Defence Forum), vol. 4,
no. 1, 1935, p. 20.
128 Kwong Chi Man
21 Han Xuchu, “Zhongguo guojia zongdongyuan de wojian” (My View on
National Total Mobilisation of China) in Minsheng zhoubao (People’s Voice
Weekly), vol. 15, 1932, p.  6; Lin Yongxi, “Dierci shijiedazhan qian woguo
yingyou zhi zhunbei” (Our Country Should Prepare for the Second World War)
in Daxia xuesheng (Daxia Students), vol. 1, no. 8, 1934, p. 3.
22 Ping, “Xizhaung yu guofang” (Tibet and National Defence) in Junshi huikan,
vol. 18, 1935, pp. 57–58.
23 Ping, “Xizhaung yu guofang, cont”. (Tibet and National Defence) in Junshi hui-
kan, vol. 19, 1935, pp. 26–34.
24 Ibid., pp. 35–36.
25 Chen Fuguang, “Dierci shijiedazhan yu zhongguo zhi mingyun” (The Second
World War and the Fate of China) in Luda yuekan (Staf College Monthly), vol.
3, no. 2, 1937, p. 19.
26 Kwong Chi Man, Minguo hu? Junguo hu? pp. 165–166.
27 Anonymous, “Geguo zongdongyuan zhi jiaoxun” (Lesson of Total Mobilisation
of the Nations) in Minguo ribao (Republic Daily), 1919.
28 He Sui, Canguan ouzhou dazhanji (A Record of the European War as an
Observer) (Chongqing: Junshi rikanshe, 1920), p. 46.
29 Dai Gaoxiang, “Guojia zongdongyuan gailun” (A Brief Discussion on National
Total Mobilisation) in Luda yuekan (Staf College Monthly), vol. 2, no. 1, 1936,
p. 15.
30 He Sui, Canguan ouzhou dazhanji, p.46.
31 Liu Qinren, “Guomin zongdongyuan zhi yanjiu” (A Study of the Mobilisation
of the Population) in Qiantu (The Future Way), vol. 5, no. 7, 1937, p. 67; Lu
Shunong, “Guomin zongdongyuan de yiyi jiqi tujing” (The Meaning of National
Total Mobilisation and its Methods) in Jianguo, vol. 10, 1928, p. 22; Ji Ming,
“Guojia zongdongyuan yu guojia zongfuyuan” (National Total Mobilisation
and Demobilisation) in Junshi zazhi (Military Magazine), vol. 58, 1933, p. 20;
Liu Daben, “Guojia zongdongyuan yu kexue” (National Total Mobilisation and
Science) in Kexue de Zhongguo (Scientifc China), vol. 6, no. 3, 1935, p. 3; Wang
Jun, “Guojia zongdongyuan zhi yanjiu” (A Study of National Total Mobilisa-
tion) in Junshi zazhi, vol. 78, 1935, p. 1; Wu Jingcheng, “Jindai guojizhan yu
quanmin zongdongyuan” (Modern International Wars and Total Mobilisation
of the People) in Mingda (Mingda Magazine), vol. 1, 1934, p. 78.
32 Quan Jingcun, “Xinbingqi yanjiang zhi sanze” (Three Speeches on New Weap-
ons) in Junshi yukan (Northeast Journal of Military Afairs), vol. 6, 1929, Com-
ments (lunshuo) Section, p. 1.
33 Ruan Ziwei, “Jianglai de kongzhan zhi guancha” (An Observation of Future
Aerial Warfare) in Junshi zazhi, vol. 19, 1930, p. 80.
34 Zhan Naiqi, “Jingji de guofang dongyuan” (Economic Mobilisation for National
Defence) in Dushu shenghuo (Reading Life), vol. 4, no. 9, 1936, p. 445.
35 Guo Zhentai, “Guofang yu zongdongyuan” (National Defence and Total Mobi-
lisation) in Dongfang gonglun (Oriental Public Commentary), vol. 69, 1932,
p. 5.
36 Sun Fei, “Woguo gongye tongzhi de xuyao jiqi qiantu” (The Need for State Con-
trol over Our Country’s Industry and Its Future) in Guofang luntan, vol. 4, no.
9–10, 1935, p. 33; Zhu Fakuan, “Woguo zongdongyuan yingyou de zhunbei”
(Necessary Preparation for Our Country’s Total Mobilisation) in Henan baoan
yuekan (Henan Security Monthly), vol. 2, 1935, p. 29; Liu Qinren, “Guomin
zongdongyuan zhi yanjiu”, pp. 69–70; Dai Jiemin, “Zhongguo tongzhi jingji de
qianzhan yu hougu” (State Control of Economy in China: Looking Back and
Forward) in Guofang luntan, vol. 4, no. 9–10, 1935, p. 1.
37 Ling Jiang, “Guonan dangtou ruhe zhunbei zongdongyuan” (How to Prepare
for Total Mobilisation in the Face of National Calamity) in Shengming (Life),
 All about national survival 129
vol. 18, 1931, pp. 280–281; Qian Mao, “Ruhe shixing quanguo zongdongy-
uan” (How to Achieve National Total Mobilisation) in Renmin zhoubao (Peo-
ple’s Weekly), vol. 59, 1933, pp. 2–3; Hu Menghua, “Guomin zongdongyuan
caoyi” (A Draft Plan for National Total Mobilisation) in Wudi zhoubao (Invin-
cible Weekly), vol. 8, 1937, p.  2; Rong Sheng, “Quanguo zongdongyuan de
yiyi jiqi biyao” (The Necessity and Meaning of National Total Mobilisation)
in Renmin zhoubao, vol. 7, 1932, p.  11; Dong Guangfu, “Quanguo zong-
dongyuan shuo zhi pingjia” (Comments on the Idea of National Total Mobi-
lisation) in Zhengzhi pinglun (Political Commentary), vol. 54, 1933, p.  99;
Liang Zuomin, “Quanminzu zongdongyuan” (Total Mobilisation for the
Whole Nation) in Haiwai yuekan (Overseas Monthly), vol. 7, 1933, p.  10;
Zi You, “Quanguo zongdongyuan yu guomin junshi jiaoyu” (National Total
Mobilisation and National Military Education) in Junxun (Military Training),
May 1932, p. 7.
38 Guo Zhentai, “Guofang yu zongdongyuan” (National Defence and Total
Mobilisation) in Dongfang gonglun, vol. 69, 1932, p.  4; Nian Lu, “Shenme
shi quanguo zongdongyuan? Jiuzheng Wang Jingwei xiansheng de yige cuowu
guannian” (What Is National Total Mobilisation? Correcting a Mistake Com-
mitted by Wang Jingwei) in Nanzhen (Nanzhen Magazine), vol. 1, no. 4, 1932,
p. 21.
39 Zhou Yawei, Guofang lun, p. 2.
40 Li Erkang, Ouzhan hou riben zhi junshiguan, p. 2.
41 Chen Lifu, “Zenyang shi guoli de zongdongyuan” (How to Achieve Total Mobi-
lisation of the Nation’s Strength) in Shoudu gejie kangri jiuguohui xuanchuan
huikan (Information Leafet of the Popular Anti-Japanese Society of the Capital),
First issue, 1933, p. 52.
42 Sun Baogang, “Zongdongyuan yu daxuesheng” (Total Mobilisation and Univer-
sity Students) in Yuzhou (Cosmos), vol. 5, no. 1, 1936, p. 14.
43 Lin Shicun, “Guojia zongdongyuan” (National Total Mobilisation) in Qiantu,
vol. 2, no. 2, 1934, p. 4.
44 Zhu Sichen, “Fangkong – Guomin ruhe zongdongyuan” (Air Defence – How to
Achieve Total Mobilisation of the People) in Hanxue zhoubao (Sweat and Blood
Weekly), vol. 7, no. 17, 1936, p. 324.
45 Zhu Jianxiong, “Yuzhuren jiaoshou zhi guojia zongdongyuan jiangshou lu”
(Director Yu on National Total Mobilisation) in Junxiao xunkan (Military
Academy Bi-weekly), vol. 8, 1933, p.  31; Pei Fen, “Shijie geguo guojia zong-
dongyuan de shili” (Examples of National Total Mobilisation of the Nations) in
Guonan banyuekan (National Calamity Bi-weekly), First Issue, 1932, p. 54.
46 Lu Ji, “Yinyue de guofang dongyuan” (Mobilisation of Music for National
Defence) in Dushu shenghuo, vol. 4, no. 9, 1936, p. 462.
47 Hu Sheng, “Xinwenzi yundong de dongyuan” (Mobilisation of the New Written
Language for National Defence) in Dushu shenghuo, vol. 4, no. 9, 1936, p. 466.
48 Chen Boda, “Zhexue de guofang dongyuan” (Mobilisation of Philosophy for
National Defence) in Dushu shenghuo, vol. 4, no. 9, 1936, p. 454.
49 Pan Qilu, “Guojia zongdongyuan yu chanye zhi dingxing fenxi” (An Analysis
of National Total Mobilisation and Economic Categorisation) in Junshi zazhi
(Nanjing), vol. 82, 1935, p. 82.
50 Tan Yimin, “Jiburonghuan de quanguo zongdongyuan”, p. 40.
51 Bian Zongmeng, “Guojia zongdongyuan zhi yiyi yu Zhongguo guofang wenti”,
p. 8.
52 Lin Ganghu, “Guomindang jinri keyi jieshu xunzheng ma?” (Can the KMT Ends
Political Tutelage Today?) in Guofang luntan, vol. 5, no. 2, 1936, p. 6.
53 Wu Weiping, “Guonanqi zhong xinli zhi jianshe” (Psychological Build-up
for National Calamity) in Guofang luntan, vol. 3, no. 4, 1935, p. 14; Wang
130 Kwong Chi Man
Zuhua, “Dierci shijiedazhan de nanmian jiqi yingfu” (The Inevitability of the
Second World War and Ways to Tackle It) in Yaguang (Asia Light), vol. 2, no.
3, 1936, p. 7.
54 Liu Qinren, “Guomin zongdongyuan zhi yanjiu”, p. 68.
55 Chiang Kai-shek, “Quanguo zongdongyuan yingzhan lun” (A Thesis for
National Total Mobilisation for War) in Dizhu (Foundational Piller), vol. 9, no.
11937, p. 10.
56 Chen Lifu, “Zenyang shi guoli de zongdongyuan” (How to Achieve Total Mobi-
lisation of the Nation’s Strength) in Shoudu gejie kangri jiuguohui xuanchuan
huikan (Information Leafet of the Popular Anti-Japanese Society of the Capital),
First Issue, 1933, p. 52.
57 Ibid.
58 Zhou Nianxing, “Guofang yu jingshen jiuguo” (National Defence and Saving
the Country with Spirit) in Guofang luntan, vol. 2, no. 3, 1934, p. 17.
59 Mu Gong, “Xinshenghuo yundong yu guofang zongdongyuan” (New Life
Movement and Total Mobilisation for National Defence) in Xinshenghuo (New
Life), vol. 1, no. 12, 1934, p. 69.
60 Liu Qinren, “Guomin zongdongyuan zhi yanjiu”, p. 73; Ru Chunpu, “Fanqiu-
zhuyi de jingshen yu jiuguo zongdongyuan” (Self-refection and Total Mobilisa-
tion for National Salvation) in Zhongxin pinglun (Central Commentary), vol.
34, 1936, p. 2; Wang Jun, “Guojia zongdongyuan zhi yanjiu” in Junshi zazhi,
vol. 78, 1935, p. 8; Yang Zhengan, “Xinshenghuo yundong yu quanguo zong-
dongyuan” (New Life Movement and National Total Mobilisation) in Xinyun
yuekan (New Life Movement Monthly), vol. 36, 1936, p. 10.
61 Lu Shunong, “Guomin zongdongyuan de yiyi jiqi tujing”, p. 22.
62 Yang Xingrong, “Zenyang caineng zhenzheng zongdongyuan quanguo min-
zhong” (How to Actually Mobilise the People) in Shejiao yu kangzhan (Social
Education and the War of Resistance), vol. 1, no. 2, 1937, p. 2.
63 Wang Huiqin, “Zongdongyuan quanguo minzhong de wojian” (My View on
Total Mobilisation of the Nation) in Shejiao yu kangzhan, vol. 1, no. 2, 1937,
p. 7.
64 Jie San, “Ouzhan jian guojia zongdongyuan zhi gaikuang” (National Total
Mobilisation During the European War) in Junfan xunkan (Model Army Bi-
weekly), vol. 16, 1926, p. 2.
65 Kwong Chi Man, Minguo hu? Junguo hu? p. 72.
66 Zhan Naiqi, “Jingji de guofang dongyuan” (Economic Mobilisation for National
Defence) in Dushu shenghuo, vol. 4, no. 9, 1936, p. 445.
67 Li Gongpu, “Zhengzhi de guofang dongyuan” (Political Mobilisation for
National Defence) in Dushu shenghuo, vol. 4, no. 9, 1936, p. 441.
68 Lu Ji, “Yinyue de guofang dongyuan”, p. 464.
69 Li Gongpu, “Quanguo dongyuan gao guoren shu” (A Declaration to the Nation
on National Mobilisation) in Jiuwang wenji (Essays on National Salvation), vol.
3, 1937, pp. 15–16.

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Ji, Ming, “Guojia zongdongyuan yu guojia zongfuyuan” (National Total Mobili-
sation and Demobilisation) in Junshi zazhi (Military Magazine), vol. 58, 1933,
pp. 4–20.
Jie, San, “Ouzhan jian guojia zongdongyuan zhi gaikuang” (National Total Mobi-
lisations during the European War) in Junfan xunkan (Model Army Bi-weekly),
vol. 16, 1926, p. 2.
Kwong, Chi Man, Minguo hu? Junguo hu? dierci zhongri zhanzheng qian de min-
guo zhishi junren, junxue, yu junshi biange (State for the People or State for War?
The Intellectual Ofcers, Military Science and Military Change before the Second
Sino-Japanese War) (Hong Kong: Chunghwa, 2017).
Kwong, Chi Man, “Building a ‘Total Mobilisation State’: Thinking About War and
Society in 1920’s Manchuria” in American Journal of Chinese Studies, vol. 26,
no. 1, 2019, pp. 1–15.
132 Kwong Chi Man
Li, Erkang, Ouzhan hou riben zhi junshiguan (Japanese Military Thoughts after the
European War) (Nanjing: Junyong tushushe, 1929).
Li, Gongpu, “Zhengzhi de guofang dongyuan” (Political Mobilisation for National
Defence) in Dushu shenghuo, vol. 4, no. 9, 1936, pp. 441–442.
Li, Gongpu, “Quanguo dongyuan gao guoren shu” (A Declaration to the Nation on
National Mobilisation) in Jiuwang wenji (Essays on National Salvation), vol. 3,
1937, pp. 12–18.
Liang, Zuomin, “Quanminzu zongdongyuan” (Total Mobilisation for the Whole
Nation) in Haiwai yuekan (Overseas Monthly), vol. 7, 1933, pp. 6–11.
Lin, Ganghu, “Guomindang jinri keyi jieshu xunzheng ma?” (Can the KMT Ends
Political Tutelage Today?) in Guofang luntan, vol. 5, no. 2, 1936, pp. 6–7.
Lin, Shicun, “Guojia zongdongyuan” (National Total Mobilisation) in Qiantu, vol.
2, no. 2, 1934, pp. 1–6.
Lin, Yongxi, “Dierci shijiedazhan qian woguo yingyou zhi zhunbei” (Our Country
Should Prepare for the Second World War) in Daxia xuesheng (Daxia Students),
vol. 1, no. 8, 1934, pp. 1–3.
Ling, Jiang, “Guonan dangtou ruhe zhunbei zongdongyuan” (How to Prepare for
Total Mobilisation in the Face of National Calamity) in Shengming (Life), vol. 18,
1931, pp. 280–281.
Liu, Daben, “Guojia zongdongyuan yu kexue” (National Total Mobilisation and
Science) in Kexue de Zhongguo (Scientifc China), vol. 6, no. 3, 1935, pp. 3–4.
Liu, Qinren, “Guomin zongdongyuan zhi yanjiu” (A Study of the Mobilisation of
the Population) in Qiantu (The Future Way), vol. 5, no. 7, 1937, pp. 67–73.
Liu, Zhupei, “Zhanzheng yu Jinhua” (War and Progress) in Junshi yuekan (North-
east Military Afairs Monthly), vol. 20, 1930, pp. 1–20.
Lu, Ji, “Yinyue de guofang dongyuan” (Mobilisation of Music for National Defence)
in Dushu shenghuo, vol. 4, no. 9, 1936, pp. 462–465.
Lu, Shunong, “Guomin zongdongyuan de yiyi jiqi tujing” (The Meaning of National
Total Mobilisation and Its Methods) in Jianguo, vol. 10, 1928, pp. 21–23.
Mu, Gong, “Xinshenghuo yundong yu guofang zongdongyuan” (New Life Move-
ment and Total Mobilisation for National Defence) in Xinshenghuo (New Life),
vol. 1, no. 12, 1934, pp. 67–69.
Nian, Lu, “Shenme shi quanguo zongdongyuan? jiuzheng Wang Jingwei xiansheng
de yige cuowu guannian” (What Is National Total Mobilisation? Correcting a
Mistake Committed by Wang Jingwei) in Nanzhen (Nanzhen Magazine), vol. 1,
no. 4, 1932, pp. 20–33.
Pan, Qilu, “Guojia zongdongyuan yu chanye zhi dingxing fenxi” (An Analysis of
National Total Mobilisation and Economic Categorisation) in Junshi zazhi (Nan-
jing), vol. 82, 1935, pp. 81–91.
Pei, Fen, “Shijie geguo guojia zongdongyuan de shili” (Examples of National Total
Mobilisation of the Nations) in Guonan banyuekan (National Calamity Bi-
weekly), First issue, 1932, pp. 54–63.
Ping, “Xizhaung yu guofang” (Tibet and National Defence) in Junshi huikan, vol.
18, 1935, pp. 49–66.
Ping, “Xizhaung yu guofang, cont”. (Tibet and National Defence) in Junshi huikan,
vol. 19, 1935, pp. 26–36.
Qian, Mao, “Ruhe shixing quanguo zongdongyuan” (How to Achieve National
Total Mobilisation) in Renmin zhoubao (People’s Weekly), vol. 59, 1933, pp. 2–3.
 All about national survival 133
Quan, Jingcun, “Xinbingqi yanjiang zhi sanze” (Three Speeches on New Weapons)
in Junshi yukan (Northeast Journal of Military Afairs), vol. 6, 1929, Comments
(lunshuo) Section, pp. 1–10.
Rong, Sheng, “Quanguo zongdongyuan de yiyi jiqi biyao” (The Necessity and Mean-
ing of National Total Mobilisation) in Renmin zhoubao, vol. 7, 1932, pp. 11–14.
Ru, Chunpu, “Fanqiuzhuji de jingshen yu jiuguo zongdongyuan” (Self-Refection
and Total Mobilisation for National Salvation) in Zhongxin pinglun (Central
Commentary), vol. 34, 1936, pp. 1–6.
Ruan, Ziwei, “Jianglai de kongzhan zhi guancha” (An Observation of Future Aerial
Warfare) in Junshi zazhi, vol. 19, 1930, pp. 78–83.
Sun, Baogang, “Zongdongyuan yu daxuesheng” (Total Mobilisation and University
Students) in Yuzhou (Cosmos), vol. 5, no. 1, 1936, pp. 11–16.
Sun, Fei, “Woguo gongye tongzhi de xuyao jiqi qiantu” (The Need for State Control
Over Our Country’s Industry and Its Future) in Guofang luntan, vol. 4, no. 9–10,
1935, pp. 31–34.
Susanne, Weigelin-Schwiedrzik and Zhu, Jiaming (eds.), Yizhan yu zhongguo: yizhan
bainian huiyi lunwenji (The First World War and China: A Collection of Papers
for the Conference of Centenary of the First World War) (Beijing: Dongfang chu-
banshe, 2015).
Tan, Yimin, “Jiburonghuan de quanguo zongdongyuan” (The Urgency of National
Total Mobilisation) in Xinmin (New People), vol. 1, no. 7, 1930, pp. 36–49.
Tianfu, “Duiyu ouzhan zhi ganxiang” (Thoughts on the European War) in Bingshi
zazhi (Military Afairs Magazine), vol. 53, 1918, pp. 1–4.
Wang, Huiqin, “Zongdongyuan quanguo minzhong de wojian” (My View on Total
Mobilisation of the Nation) in Shejiao yu kangzhan, vol. 1, no. 2, 1937, pp. 5–7.
Wang, Jun, “Guojia zongdongyuan zhi yanjiu” (A Study of National Total Mobilisa-
tion) in Junshi zazhi, vol. 78, 1935, pp. 1–9.
Wang, Zuhua, “Dierci shijiedazhan de nanmian jiqi yingfu” (The Inevitability of the
Second World War and Ways to Tackle It) in Yaguang (Asia Light), vol. 2, no. 3,
1936, pp. 3–7.
WangWu, Jingcheng, “Jindai guojizhan yu quanmin zongdongyuan” (Modern Inter-
national Wars and Total Mobilisation of the People) in Mingda (Mingda Maga-
zine), vol. 1, 1934, pp. 77–82.
Wu, Weiping, “Guonanqi zhong xinli zhi jianshe” (Psychological Build-up for
National Calamity) in Guofang luntan, vol. 3, no. 4, 1935, pp. 12–15.
Xu, Gongwu, “Guojia zongdongyuan” (National Total Mobilisation) in Jianguo
(Nation Building), vol. 9, 1928, pp. 13–16.
Xu, Hanwen, “Guofang yu xibei jianshe” (National Defence and the Development
of the Northwest) in Guofang luntan (National Defence Forum), vol. 4, no. 1,
1935, pp. 20–26.
Yang, Jie, Xiandai guofang de jiben tiaojian shi shenme (What Are the Basic Elements
of Modern National Defence), self-published pamphlet (Nanjing: Yang Jie, 1935).
Yang, Xingrong, “Zenyang caineng zhenzheng zongdongyuan quanguo minzhong
(How to Actually Mobilise the People) in Shejiao yu kangzhan (Social Education
and the War of Resistance), vol. 1, no. 2, 1937, pp. 1–2.
Yang, Zhengan, “Xinshenghuo yundong yu quanguo zongdongyuan” (New Life
Movement and National Total Mobilisation) in Xinyun yuekan (New Life Move-
ment Monthly), vol. 36, 1936, pp. 10–16.
134 Kwong Chi Man
Yue, Zhang, “Jinhou wu junren yu guomin zhi yanguang” (What Should Our Sol-
diers and People Focus on in the Future) in Bingshi zazhi, vol. 63, 1919, pp. 11–15.
Zhan, Naiqi, “Jingji de guofang dongyuan” (Economic Mobilisation for National
Defence) in Dushu shenghuo (Reading Life), vol. 4, no. 9, 1936, pp. 445–446.
Zhang, Gushan, “Guanyu jianglai zhanzheng jishu wenti” (Technological Dimen-
sion of Future Warfare) in Junshi huikan (Combined Journal of Military Afairs),
vol. 7, 1933, pp. 1–26.
Zhou, Nianxing, “Guofang yu jingshen jiuguo” (National Defence and Saving the
Country with Spirit) in Guofang luntan, vol. 2, no. 3, 1934, pp. 15–19.
Zhou, Yawei, Guofang lun (On National Defence) (Beijing: Jinghua yinshuju, 1926).
Zhu, Fakuan, “Woguo zongdongyuan yingyou de zhunbei” (Necessary Preparation
for Our Country’s Total Mobilisation) in Henan baoan yuekan (Henan Security
Monthly), vol. 2, 1935, pp. 27–30.
Zhu, Jianxiong, “Yuzhuren jiaoshou zhi guojia zongdongyuan jiangshou lu” (Direc-
tor Yu on National Total Mobilisation) in Junxiao xunkan (Military Academy
Bi-weekly), vol. 8, 1933, pp. 27–31.
Zhu, Sichen, “Fangkong  – Guomin ruhe zongdongyuan” (Air Defence  – How to
Achieve Total Mobilisation of the People) in Hanxue zhoubao (Sweat and Blood
Weekly), vol. 7, no. 17, 1936, pp. 324–325.
Zi, You, “Quanguo zongdongyuan yu guomin junshi jiaoyu” (National Total
Mobilisation and National Military Education) in Junxun (Military Training),
May 1932, pp. 6–8.
7 Not a secondary experience
The First World War in Japanese
mass media, ministerial bureaucracy
publications, elementary schools,
and department stores
Jan Schmidt1

For a long time, there was a persistent image in historiography that in Japan
the First World War was seen by the majority of its citizens, at the time, as
a “fre on the other side of the river”.2 But even though there was signif-
cantly less direct military involvement, it cannot be said that the First World
War was a secondary experience in Japan. It was just a diferent “space
of experience”, yet one that permanently altered what Reinhart Koselleck
calls “the horizon of expectation”.3 This chapter will argue that it is highly
misleading to assume that a more mediated participation in war cannot
become an experience in its own right in the case of “less(er)” militarily
involved societies. It will further argue that through an intricate web of
interpretation of the war by mediators, some of whom were direct witnesses
of everyday life in the European belligerent countries, a collective “space
of experience” was created. This space might have lacked the deep direct
impact on individuals and families sufering multiple deaths, mutilations,
destruction of property, as well as the associated trauma and mourning.
Therefore it makes no sense to follow Paul Fussell’s approach set out in
The Great War and Modern Memory for Japan or East Asia, but rather to
acknowledge, on the one hand, the existence of what Nakayama Hiroaki
has called the “shadow of the First World War” that altered for instance the
feld of Japanese literature, and, on the other hand, the agency of Japanese
mediators – similar to those in China, Latin America, Southern Europe, and
Africa discussed in this book.4 One should also follow Yamamuro Shin’ichi’s
keen observation that although the world, of course, existed in Japan and
East Asia as an idea, the war gave birth to a widespread new understanding
of being part of the same world and its simultaneity as something “utterly
real”.5 The social reach and impact of the interpretations of the war by
such mediators dispersed and discussed in these societies can always be
debated. Yet, it remains one of the hugely underestimated dimensions of
the war, that all around the globe the war was mediated and appropriated,
and as a consequence it impacted politics, entire societies, and a variety of
cultural phenomena in various fundamental ways in regions that have long
been neglected by the majority of research on the war. Mediators in Japan,
136 Jan Schmidt
whether in the mass media, ministerial bureaucracy, elementary schools, or
in department stores, (re)produced images – often literally visual images –
and interpretations of the war as part of ongoing long-term deliberations
about major dimensions of politics, society, economy, culture, and educa-
tion. Throughout, the war interpretations were accelerating and enlarging
certain discourses while slowing, or even shutting down, others, thereby
infuencing the foundations of the Japanese intellectual landscape of the
following interwar period.
In Japan, the war was not just passively “consumed” in the mass media,
but actively interpreted by a media system that had developed its own rou-
tine with modern wars already during the Sino-Japanese War (1894–1895)
and the Russo-Japanese War (1904–1905). Specialised illustrated war mag-
azines, as well as war correspondents sent to the theatres of war, not only
covered a great variety of topics, but they also produced numerous texts
and images of the war in which interpretation surpassed simple coverage.
This was epitomised by thousands of articles by Japanese public intellectu-
als, academics, entrepreneurs, politicians, and bureaucrats in newspapers
and opinion magazines who, throughout the war, moved from discussing
the more immediate foreign policy and military dimensions to deliberate
far-reaching questions regarding the future of civilisation, international and
regional orders, societal changes after years of “home front” mobilisation,
science, technology, economy, education, and gender relations, to name a
few.
In addition, the war was brought to pupils and students in schools and
universities by teachers and academics eager to explain what it meant to
Japan and the wider world, but also by the Ministry of Education which
had set up an entire temporary research commission that published major
reports and widely distributed photo albums and organised photo exhibi-
tions. At the same time, consumers were introduced to the war by photo
exhibitions and eyewitness accounts in department stores and their journals.
Through representative examples including the notes of a local elementary
school teacher recently discovered, this chapter will analyse key aspects of
this mediated experience that shaped not only the understanding of the war,
and of war in general, but also of a new world for decades to come.

The First World War in the Japanese mass media

Mass media in Japan had seen the same remarkable growth at the end of the
nineteenth century and in the frst decade of the twentieth as almost every-
where around the globe. And Japanese mass media was far from being inex-
perienced when it came to covering a modern war. The First Sino-Japanese
War (1894–1895) and the Russo-Japanese War (1904–1905) had func-
tioned as major catalysts for the media’s quick growth in modern Japan.6
Daily national and regional newspapers with their ever-rising circulation
numbers took the lead, while an increasing variety of magazines also started
 Not a secondary experience 137
to reach more and more readers, including more women. In 1915, for
instance the Ōsaka mainichi shinbun and the Ōsaka asahi shinbun had daily
circulations of 321,000 and 250,000 on average, while their counterparts
from Tōkyō, the Hōchi shinbun, the Kokumin shinbun, Tōkyō asahi shin-
bun, the Tōkyō nichi-nichi shinbun, and the Yomiuri shinbun had 240,000,
190,000, 158,000, 120,000, and 70,000 respectively.7 Media historian
Ariyama Teruo has extended this insight to the level of a village of about
990 households in Fukushima prefecture in north-eastern Japan to ascertain
whether the use of mass media in a rural area matched the developments in
the more urbanised parts of Japan. He established for this particular exam-
ple that from 1903 to 1914 the percentage of households which purchased
newspapers regularly rose from 21 to 51 per cent and of those which had a
fxed subscription from 5 to 15 per cent, with some even having a subscrip-
tion for more than one newspaper, usually for a national and a regional
daily. While these numbers might seem low – they were much higher in the
urban centres – with almost 50 per cent of the households in such a village
still not purchasing newspapers regularly, Ariyama found ample evidence
that newspapers were shared with more educated members of the commu-
nity informing their neighbours, so that the de facto readership was higher,
which is also suggested by other studies for diferent regions.8 Nagamine
Shigetoshi, a renowned expert on readership in urban areas, has determined
that magazine readership also saw a steep rise in the frst decade of the
twentieth century with even workers in urban slums gaining access to some
extent, often through a vibrant second-hand market, and he revised the
image that most magazines in the 1910s have to be seen only as elite media.9
In essence, it is safe to say that from the moment the “Guns of August”
opened fre in 1914, reporting on the First World War found its way into the
hands and domiciles of a vast number of Japanese who either purchased or
shared newspapers and magazines, or accessed them through the growing
number of libraries and reading rooms.10 This is an important observation
since one has to understand that Japanese newspapers and magazines did
report extensively on the war and journalists, public intellectuals, politicians,
and others regularly published editorials and opinion articles on an immense
variety of topics related to the war for its duration. The mediators discussed
in this chapter were in all cases, whether they be ministerial bureaucrats,
local school teachers, or academics publishing their observations from a trip
to wartime Europe in a department store house magazine, readers of news-
papers, and magazines. So, their own contributions were a part of a compli-
cated web of intertextuality and media echo chambers that in its entirety was
part of the collective, mediated experience of the war in Japan.
It should also not be forgotten that the war was visually present beyond
the ever-rising number of photographs and illustrations in newspapers and
magazines. In addition to the older media such as laterna magica projec-
tions and photo exhibitions which were frequently used in schools to intro-
duce aspects of the war, flm, the newest and rapidly expanding medium,
138 Jan Schmidt
introduced moving pictures of the war to a wider audience.11 War newsreels
shown in Japanese cinemas provided mainly by British, French, and Italian
institutions, and later in the war by the USA flm company Universal, were
a steady presence in Japan throughout the war years. Japan’s allies targeted
the Japanese cinema audience  – similar to those in neutral countries  – to
assure them of the military success of the Entente powers and their war
aims.12 Whether the audience was successfully infuenced can be debated,
but it is certain that by the end of the war moving pictures showing various
aspects of the war were so widespread that only “exciting” novelties could
arouse the interest of the Japanese audience. This is hinted at in a review
of war newsreels in the newspaper Yomiuri shinbun in which the unnamed
journalist remarked in September 1917 that a flm about the “Great Euro-
pean War was very similar to the previous ones but the activities of the tanks
which were shown relatively frequently” were a welcome “novelty”.13
A content analysis of newspapers and magazines between 1914 and 1919
reveals that not only was there constant reporting informed by news agen-
cies or sent via telegram by Japanese war correspondents, but already from
August 1914 Japanese journalists, intellectuals of all kind, politicians, mili-
tary ofcers, and members of the business world, all commented upon the
war and ofered manifold interpretations of virtually every aspect that one
could imagine.14 Although Japan fought on the Entente side, and Reuters
and Associated Press were the dominant news agencies throughout the war
years, there was also limited but constant access to news shaped by the Cen-
tral Powers via the United States of America and China which both stayed
neutral until 1917 and via Switzerland and Scandinavia up to the end of the
war. From early on, the stark contradictions in reporting on the same item
led to an insight on the part of Japanese commentators into the propagan-
distic character of news generated even by its allies.
It is not possible here to describe the trends of what was reported and
commented upon in greater detail, but some tendencies can be clearly seen:
frst, in the early months of the war most of the more elaborate commentary
on the war in Japan focused roughly equally on concrete military develop-
ments, on Japan’s direct participation when laying siege to the German-
leased territory around Qingdao in China and occupying the German island
colonies in Micronesia, as well as  – already – on the larger implications
for the future. An early example of the latter can be found in a special
on “Predictions for the Post-war Era” (Sengo no yodan) in the November
issue of the widely read magazine Chūō kōron (Central Review). In this,
fve renowned intellectuals discussed aspects such as the kind of military
preparedness Japan should have in the future, the general position it could
take in the new post-war order, what the future of the pacifst movement
might be worldwide, what tendencies in the world of ideas and in art could
be expected afterwards, and how the domestic political and social situa-
tion in the now belligerent states could develop in the post-war era.15 The
longer the war lasted and the larger its geographical coverage, the more a
 Not a secondary experience 139
discursive space for such elaborations of various dimensions of the post-
war future opened up. The results were thousands of articles and sometimes
book-length future visions, culminating in massive publication projects of
text collections written by politicians, bureaucrats, military ofcers, intel-
lectuals, journalists, businessmen, artists, and activists of all kinds, elaborat-
ing on their ideas of the post-war world, post-war Japan, post-war politics,
economics, culture, and every aspect, however remote – all based on their
evaluation of what the war would do to the feld for which they wrote their
post-war vision.16 Out of many of these texts rose a growing assumption
that the pre-war dominance of Europe might be broken. An early example
of this is the monograph Ōshū bunmei no botsuraku (The Decline of Euro-
pean Civilisation) by the biologist Endō Kichisaburō (1874–1921) – pub-
lished as a direct reaction to the war in late 1914, four years before the frst
volume of Oswald Spengler’s The Decline of the West.17
While thousands of texts seeking to interpret the war – and to mediate it
to the wider public – were written in this fashion by members of the func-
tional elites, one can also follow a steady rise in texts and public lectures
given on many social occasions by Japanese who had observed the develop-
ments within the belligerent countries themselves. Since Japan had declared
war on Germany and Austria–Hungary in late August  1914, these voices
were necessarily based on visits to either countries of the Entente or to neu-
tral countries. A particularly famous series of texts by a direct witness of
the mobilisation, frst of military forces, then of the entire society of France,
was written by the renowned novelist Shimazaki Tōson (1872–1943), who
happened to be staying in Paris when the war broke out.18 But within several
months the larger national newspapers sent war correspondents to Europe
who frequently cabled their reports to Japan.19 To their observations can
be added those of businessmen who travelled to Europe and to the United
States America and in increasing numbers, ministerial bureaucrats and aca-
demics who were sent to explicitly study the wartime societies and mobili-
sation eforts. Their texts were often published not only in newspapers and
established magazines but also in the illustrated war magazines such as Ōshū
sensō jikki (Authentic Accounts of the European War) and Taisen shashin
gahō (The Great War Pictorial) that were produced by major Japanese pub-
lishers who had already earned fortunes with similar products during the
Sino-Japanese and Russo-Japanese Wars.20 In general, it can be said that
these illustrated magazines, which collected photos, drawings, maps, and
texts related to the war from around the world, were similar to the broader
reporting and mediation of the war: over time the focus shifted from an
emphasis on the details of military developments to include everyday life in
the afected societies, including the colonies, and giving attention to socio-
economic developments, very often also explicitly commenting upon the
situation of women and children in the war efort. In short, the quantity
of text and images devoted to the home front rose steadily over time. And
although the war was often called the (Great) European War, it was also
140 Jan Schmidt
called World War or Great World War in Japan from early on, revealing a
perception of the war originating from and being driven by European coun-
tries, but also of having an impact on the entire world.21

The Ministry of Education “Research Commission for

Educational Sources on Current Afairs” and the war in
Japanese schools
Similar to the Imperial Japanese Army and Navy, the Japanese ministerial
bureaucracy, which had had a pivotal position within the process of build-
ing the nation state that had started with the Meiji Restoration in 1868, also
took a keen interest in the wider implications of the war.22 It is important
to note that the beginning of the war in 1914 occurred at a time when a
new generation of younger bureaucrats were no longer satisfed with their
education that had somehow ossifed in the patterns of the late nineteenth
century, while many of their superiors became very concerned about grow-
ing social unrest as a result of the rapid industrialisation and about anar-
chist and socialist tendencies not only in the growing working class but also
among the multitudes of tenant farmers.23 It was especially the bureaucrats
in the Home Ministry (Naimu-shō) and in the Education Ministry (Monbu-
shō) who were instrumental in starting the so-called chihō kairyō undō, the
“local improvement movement”, in 1909 in the aftermath of the Russo-
Japanese War of 1904–1905.24 One of the objectives of this campaign, aside
from strengthening production of regional goods, was the strengthening of
traditional moral values among the rural farmer and urban working-class
population. But around the time of the death of the Meiji Emperor and the
transition into the Taishō era in 1912, the ministerial bureaucrats as well
as the entire functional elite of Japan were caught in what Harry Haroo-
tunian famously dubbed “a sense of an ending” of an era of state-centred
growth and empire-building.25 This clearly was exacerbated by the uncer-
tainties regarding the future of the regional order in East Asia that origi-
nated from the Xinhai Revolution in China in 1911 and 1912, giving birth
to Asia’s frst republic and to domestic political instability in China, Japan’s
neighbour and a crucial economic market.26 On top of this came a massive
domestic political crisis after the successive fall of two cabinets; in the frst
case, the failed attempt of a third cabinet by Prime Minister Katsura Tarō
(1847–1913), a retired army general, facing a popular “movement to pro-
tect constitutional politics” when he tried to press for unpopular demands
such as the creation of two more army divisions, and in the second case, the
cabinet of former Navy Admiral Yamamoto Gonbē (1852–1933) becom-
ing engulfed in a corruption scandal in 1912–1913. Both prime ministers
originated in the so-called feudal domain cliques (hanbatsu) that stemmed
from the winners of the Restoration in the 1860s and 1870s whose political
networks had dominated the government and the ministerial bureaucracy
until the early 1910s.27
 Not a secondary experience 141
All of this should be considered when, in 1915, several Japanese ministries
launched well-stafed and well-funded Extraordinary Research Commissions
to investigate the changes the war would bring to their respective felds.
From the beginning there was a certain reformist atmosphere connected to
these large-scale eforts to study the war, as well as a keen understanding
that quickly developed among the younger bureaucrats and some of their
superiors that this war and the quickly increasing level of mobilising the
home fronts in the belligerent countries would bring fundamental changes.
That the Army and Navy Ministries as well as the Foreign Ministry created
such Extraordinary Research Commissions in the frst half of 1915 is not
surprising: the army and the navy naturally had a vital interest in following
the newest developments in warfare and although Japan was  – mostly –
not involved in any direct military action after the campaign to occupy the
German-leased territory around Qingdao, it was not yet clear if a much
larger deployment of Japanese forces could still occur during this war. Their
eforts would eventually lead to large-scale studies of “general national
mobilisation” (kokka sōdōin). This concept was also studied by the Chinese
military, which was partially inspired by publications of Japanese ofcers
who had been sent to Europe as part of the activities of the aforementioned
commissions.28 The Foreign Ministry employed a potent force of young dip-
lomats and lawyers for an in-depth study of the ongoing war and of the
legal situation of the territories occupied by Japanese forces in late 1914 to
prepare for the peace conference that was expected in the future. It is much
less known that the Japanese Ministry of Education established a sizeable
Research Commission for Educational Sources on Current Afairs (Monbu-
shō jikyoku kyōiku shiryō chōsakai) in 1915. This was only the beginning
of the involvement of nearly the entire Japanese Ministerial Bureaucracy
in studying the war: in 1917 in an even larger second wave, the Foreign
Ministry established a second body to study the war, the Foreign Ministry
Extraordinary Research Bureau (Gaimu-shō rinji chōsa-bu). The Ministry
of Finance, the Ministry of Postal Afairs, as well as the Ministry of Com-
merce and Industry created three more Extraordinary Research Bureaus (the
Ōkura-shō rinji chōsa-kyoku, the Teishin-shō rinji chōsa-kyoku, and the
Rinji sangyō chōsa-kyoku), while the Bank of Japan set up an Extraordinary
Research Commission (Nihon Ginkō rinji chōsa iinkai). The majority of
them sent young bureaucrats to Europe and the United States of America to
study the war and produced voluminous reports on their studies, some of
which would later be used to develop home front mobilisation during the
Second World War.29
The infuential Home Ministry did not create its own body for conducting
studies on the war, but by 1917 Home Minister Gotō Shinpei (1857–1929)
had grasped the fundamental changes the war might bring. Young bureau-
crats had already been sent abroad in peacetime as part of their education,
but he now drastically increased their number, explicitly giving them the
freedom to study every aspect related to the war that they deemed important
142 Jan Schmidt
for the future of the Empire of Japan.30 Through extensive reports, articles
in newspapers and magazines, as well as public lectures upon their return
from longer stays in the wartime countries allied with Japan, they contrib-
uted to the ongoing interpretation of the war from a privileged position as
“frst-hand” witnesses, in almost all cases putting an emphasis on the scale
and long-term efects of home-front mobilisation.31
The Regional Bureau (Chihō-kyoku) of the Home Ministry, additionally
published an extensive 15-volume series entitled “Regional Sources on the
Wartime Great Powers” (Senji rekkoku chihō shiryō) between 1916 and
1920, comprising 3,370 pages of analysis and translations of texts on items
ranging from “Regional Distribution and Labour in Wartime Germany”
(Vol. 1, December  1916), “Great Powers’ Wartime Food Supply” and
“Relief for Disabled Soldiers and Bereaved Families” (Vols. 2 and 4, March
and July 1917), “Support Projects by Women – Questions Regarding Wom-
en’s Work” (Vol. 7, May 1918) to “Population Problems of the Great Pow-
ers during Wartime and in its Aftermath” (Vol. 10, January 1919), “Labour
Problems of the Great Powers during Wartime and in its Aftermath” (Vol.
11, March 1919), “Problems Regarding Post-war Reconstruction in Britain
and Migration Policies in Post-war German Cities” (Vol. 12, July  1919),
“Social Services of German Towns” (Vol. 14, February  1920), as well as
“Questions Related to Housing” (Vol. 15, 1920).32 Many of these publi-
cations contained important administrative aspirations for social policies
implemented in the 1920s in Japan, with the Home Ministry establishing its
own Social Bureau (Shakai-kyoku) in 1920. They were later used from the
outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War in July 1937 in constructing a
system of wartime mobilisation lasting into the Second World War, largely
under the auspices of the very same bureaucrats who had studied the First
World War and were involved in these publications.33
The eforts by the Ministry of Education that started in early 1915 and
were of considerable scope are noteworthy because they had a much larger
reach within Japan than those of the Home Ministry. They difered in the
sense that fewer bureaucrats were actually sent to Europe and to the United
States of America to study wartime measures. Instead, most work was based
on a wide range of translations of texts originating from the belligerent
countries and on the collection of photos, other forms of illustrations, and
statistical materials on various aspects of the war. In the only publication in
Japanese on this matter to date, historian Ōuchi Hirokazu summarises the
goals of the Ministry of Education: to gather a large amount of material “to
utilise sources with regard to the total war from the various [belligerent]
countries for the creation of policy plans”.34
The eforts of the Research Commission for Educational Sources on Cur-
rent Afairs directly resulted in a series of 34 volumes entitled Jikyoku ni
kan suru kyōiku shiryō (Educational Sources on Current Afairs) totalling
7,548 pages published between June  1915 and March  1920. Until mid-
1916 these volumes mostly consisted of updated information on the status
quo of education in wartime Britain, France, Russia, Germany, and Italy,
 Not a secondary experience 143
introducing shorter texts published in the respective country and translated
into Japanese. In volume 8 (August 1916), for instance, under the general
title Senran ni tsuite, sen’i kōyō (On the War, Raising the Will to Fight),
texts by academics from Britain and Germany were assembled, such as one
by the rector of Berlin University, Ulrich von Wilamowitz-Moellendorf
(1848–1931), who was introduced as having written about Gunkoku-shugi
to kagaku (Militarism and Science). These texts were accompanied by news-
paper articles such as one by the German daily Frankfurter Zeitung on “The
War at the Home Front”. From then on, a shift to more topically focused
volumes can be observed. A rather massive “Special Volume” was devoted to
Rekkyō no shōnen giyūdan (Voluntary Youth Organisations in the [Wartime]
Great Powers) in November  1916, and another a month later on Gakkō
to sensō – Doitsu ni okeru jikyoku kyōiku tenrankai (Schools and War  –
Educational Exhibitions on Current [Wartime] Afairs in Germany). This is
of importance in relation to photo exhibitions that the Ministry organised
in Japan during the latter half of the war. The Ministry was inspired by the
information gathered from Germany about how the war was used in exhibi-
tions in schools, public buildings, and department stores there.35
These publications were not only distributed to schools but were also
made available to the wider public. The major daily Tōkyō asahi shinbun
published a positive review of the frst volume in July 1915 stating that:

Educational Materials on Current Afairs, No. 1

These are collected materials, which can reveal insights into educational
matters with regards to the belligerent states’ institutions, and their
infuence on the educational system, as well as other aspects of the war.
The Ministry of Education has especially formed a commission to com-
pile this corresponding material. This volume is divided into diferent
sections on the fve countries, Great Britain, France, Russia, Belgium,
and Germany, in which multiple problems of current afairs [of wartime
educational measures] are treated.36

When the two aforementioned special issues were published in late 1916,
they were clearly meant to reach an even wider audience, similar to a semi-
nal photo album on the war as can be discerned from the following adver-
tisement that the Ministry and the Imperial Education Association jointly
published in the same newspaper in January  1917, introducing all three
items:

Educational Materials on Current Afairs – Photo Album

on the European War
This album consists of reprinted photos and pictures that have been
collected as educational materials on current afairs from illustrated
144 Jan Schmidt
publications from Britain, France, Germany and Italy. They are espe-
cially suited to give a general impression of the war. They should be
compared to the already published volumes of Educational Materials
on Current Afairs.
– November 1916, Division of General School Afairs,
Ministry of Education

[The album] should not be absent from any teacher’s household or any
household of a leading person of our Youth Associations.  [.  .  .] Also
because naturally one can learn about the wartime leaders, the gener-
als, the weapons, the schools, the women in the [now] militarised states
and other issues, in short, about the reality of the European War in all
its facets.

Educational Materials on Current Afairs, Special Issue 1

(1916): Youth Volunteer Groups of the Great Powers
The volume comprises a collection of items regarding the organisation
and training of the youth associations of the six great powers Great Brit-
ain, the USA, France, Germany, Russia and Italy, and is therefore a good
tool for leaders of [our] Children and Youth Associations. In addition,
especially things like training methods [in the belligerent countries] should
be able to serve as a model for our Elementary and Middle Schools.

Educational Materials on Current Afairs, Special Issue 2

(1916): Schools and the War – Educational Exhibitions on
Current Afairs in Germany

This volume is the only handbook that, using this selection of articles
on educational exhibitions on current afairs [=the war] in Berlin in Ger-
many, one can use to inform oneself how the war was benefcially used
in German and Austrian elementary and middle schools. It is a publica-
tion that absolutely demands to be read by our teachers in primary and
secondary education.37

The advertisement for the three publications was placed in the centre of
the front page of the daily newspaper serving as one of the most expen-
sive and efective places to promote new commercial publications. This
emphasises the importance that the Ministry and the collaborating Impe-
rial Education Association gave to promoting these publications. The latter
already had an impressive reach since all communal educational facilities
and teachers within the Empire of Japan  – as of 1915, 27,004 institu-
tions from elementary schools to the Imperial Universities with 183,884
teaching personnel  – were associated. Together they were responsible for
the education of 7,867,995 female and male pupils and students.38 It may be
 Not a secondary experience 145

Image 7.1 “Wartime school”: teaching how to behave in case of a zeppelin attack
in an elementary school in London, a school for Belgian refugee children
and a classroom in a French school with the teacher explaining the situ-
ation at the Western Front.
Source: Monbushō (ed.), Jikyoku kyōiku shiryō: Ōshū sensō shashinchō (Educational Sources
on Current Afairs: Photo Album on the European War) (Tōkyō: Monbushō 1916) p.  6,
author’s collection.

impossible to empirically grasp how these materials introducing manifold

aspects of the war were used. But the following example of one teacher indi-
cates that, for instance, such publications, as the 1916 Photo Album on the
European War distributed by the Ministry with its 51 pages of photographs
and drawings introducing the trench and gas warfare, the tanks, airplanes
and submarines and also examples of mobilisation of women and children
and the rationing of food at the home front were met with enthusiasm to
serve as further mediators of knowledge and images regarding the war.

The war in Japanese schools: the war in the notes of a local

elementary school teacher
One of the recipients of the aforementioned publications was a man named
Chikamoto Kōgorō (1865–1923), the headmaster of an elementary school
146 Jan Schmidt

Image 7.2 “The fearsome poisonous gas”: trench warfare and the use of gas and
gas masks was depicted in several photos in this Ministry of Education
photo album.
Source: Monbushō (ed.), Jikyoku kyōiku shiryō: Ōshū sensō shashinchō (Educational Sources
on Current Afairs: Photo Album on the European War) (Tōkyō: Monbushō 1916) p.  18,
author’s collection.

on the outskirts of what today is Chikugo City in the northern part of

Kyūshū, one of Japan’s four main islands. His papers kept in the Archive
for Local History of Chikugo City contain a remarkable document entitled
Ōshū sensō – Nichiro sensō to no hikaku (The European War – Compared
to the Russo-Japanese War).39 The 22 handwritten pages include no date,
but from their content it is clear that he must have completed this text some-
time after July 1917 but before the October Revolution in Russia in early
November 1917. A closer examination leads to the conclusion that he wrote
this as a commentary on the First World War, most likely as notes to explain
the war either to his pupils or to the local population. The notes start with
four pages on which one can fnd data on basic aspects of both wars such
as the geographical scale of the war expressed in the length of the front line
in Eastern Europe, the Western Front, and in Italy, the number of soldiers
mobilised and killed or wounded to date, the number of pieces of artillery
 Not a secondary experience 147

Image 7.3 “German bread, butter and potato stamps”: food rationing and the state
issue of ration stamps was deemed important knowledge by the Japanese
Ministry of Education, as well as by Shiba Chūzaburō speaking at the
Mitsukoshi Department Store.
Source: Monbushō (ed.), Jikyoku kyōiku shiryō: Ōshū sensō shashinchō (Educational Sources
on Current Afairs: Photo Album on the European War) (Tōkyō: Monbushō 1916) p.  30,
author’s collection.

deployed, and capital ships involved by country.40 All numbers for the ongo-
ing war are written on the upper half of the page, while the numbers for the
same item during the Russo-Japanese War are written on the lower half.
From the use of direct comparison to Japanese geographical distances it
becomes more evident that these notes were meant to prepare a class or a
lecture in which his local Japanese audience would be helped to grasp the
enormous scope of the World War, for instance comparing the length of the
European fronts to distances in Japan, for the Western Front “from Tōkyō
to Okayama”.41 Later on, further handwritten additions in red ink seem to
have been added after the war, updating the number of killed and wounded
and the sums of the known expenditure for the war that were published in
its immediate aftermath. That hints at a reoccurring use of the manuscript
for lectures for which he wanted to keep the numbers updated.
148 Jan Schmidt
But his notes do not stop at introducing numbers: from about the sixth
page the notes switch to more interpretive observations regarding the war.
He introduces war crimes on the part of the “foreign armies”, which here
mainly meant the German Army, listing “the violation of neutrality, the
activities of submarines and rape of women”, which he connects to “the
example of the Mongol Invasions” of Japan in 1274 and 1281.42 He further
commented upon the domestic changes in the belligerent countries, with his
main example being “that women and girls work replacing men”.43 One of
the most fascinating parts consists of a number of bullet points on “the war
of the future” (kongo no sensō): “airplanes, zeppelins, and submarines will
be used – [it will be] a war of knowledge (chishiki no sensō)”.44 He then
added a concrete example, very likely to try to convey to his audience the
scale of what he saw unfolding in the ongoing war, by noting that the US
Congress had demanded a budget for the production of 22,625 airplanes, to
which he added that one airplane could be compared to the military value of
“1,000 infantry soldiers”.45 It is further noteworthy that he added his source
for these numbers as being “a July 13 editorial of the Fuku-nichi”, which
is shorthand for the local newspaper Fukuoka Nichinichi Shinbun. In the
actual editorial, which was printed at the top of the front page entitled “The
Aerial Units of America – A Big Build-up”, the unnamed journalist opened
the article by stating that the Allied armies, if advancing at the same slow
pace, would probably need more than another year to make any signifcant
gains, but the major build-up of airpower in the United States of America
and the deployment of it on the Western Front could tip the balance deci-
sively in their favour.46
He continued his deliberations on the war with a series of bullet points on
the “preparedness of the Japanese” (Nihonjin no kakugo), where he listed
“Russian female storm troops (10 June), the view on Japan by foreign coun-
tries, the current steep rise of foreign specie, expecting a future war”.47 It is
not clear what his intention was in mentioning the article, in the same local
newspaper, reporting on female combat units in the Russian Army. Most
likely  – especially when seen in relation to his points about future wars
and, here, that Japan should be prepared for such a war – he either wanted
to provocatively argue that Japan should consider using female combat
units in the future, or simply thought his Japanese local audience might
be bemused by the idea. The “foreign specie” he mentioned alluded to the
ongoing debate about the impact of vast sums of foreign currency pouring
into Japan because of its enormous rise in wartime exports to the Allied
countries of the Entente.48
He concluded his manuscript with a series of bullet points and comments
on three more subjects: the frst was “the plight of Belgium, whose neutral-
ity had been violated”, elaborating upon Belgian citizens forced into labour
by Germans, the international relief eforts for the Belgian population, the
abundance of pulmonary tuberculosis, and the far too-short lactation period
for newborns; all listed to demonstrate the harsh conditions under German
 Not a secondary experience 149
occupation.49 The second concerned “China, that is the great problem of the
world and for Japan a matter of life and death”.50 This refects an emerg-
ing trend when analysing Japan’s wartime mass media, where the future of
China, and the control of its vast market and of its natural resources, was
widely seen as the key to survival in what many Japanese commentators
coined the “post-war economic war”. By that he assumed that after the
restoration of peace, the necessity within the Western Great Powers for eco-
nomic reconstruction and high-growth rates would result in ferce competi-
tion over the Chinese markets, which had virtually been abandoned with
the transformation to wartime military production in Britain and France
and the exclusion of Germany through the naval blockade. As a means to
avoid confict, Chikamoto suggested that “Britain which is assisting the US
Monroe Doctrine should support a Japanese Asian-Monroe Doctrine” and
that Russia should become a “befriended country” to help Japan achieve its
aims. But in several additional sentences he explained that “after the Rus-
sian [February] Revolution”, British and USA capital would likely dominate
Russia.51
The idea of an “economic war” in peacetime that could easily evolve into
a military confict, pitting Japan against Britain and the United States of
America, was believed possible by the majority of the political and intellec-
tual spectrum in Japan. That Chikamoto, as a local teacher far away from
the political centre, was not free from this assumption can be seen in his last
major point which was followed by more comparisons of fgures and a con-
cluding short factual account of the February Revolution in Russia:52 “The
current European War is the harbinger for the next world war”.53 Under this
label he listed the following points: “Japan and Hawaii – clash of Japan and
the USA – clash of Japan and Britain – an Alliance of Germany and Japan”,
and in what seemingly was meant as an action plan for Japan: “1st: [Japan
as] supreme ruler over the East, 2nd: [two characters unreadable] to stir up
the national population and unite them, 3rd: to spread supremacy in the
Pacifc Ocean”. Written in late summer 1917 by a local schoolteacher this
might seem prophetic in the extreme, but it is a powerful reminder of how
far jingoistic tendencies and a feeling of supremacy, evolving out of what
historian Sandra Wilson has called the “discourse of national greatness”,
had spread in the late 1910s in Japan.54 Simultaneously, one senses tan-
gible anxiety of a potential future riddled with economic confict and a
more direct role in “the next world war”. Japanese historian of thought
Yamamuro Shin’ichi explained what the First World War meant for Japan:
the war resulted in a severe and long-lingering foreign policy confict with
the United States of America and also with Japan’s closest ally since the
conclusion of the 1902 Alliance, Great Britain, as well as with China,
which was increasingly hampering expansionist ideas in Japan.55 Although
Frederick Dickinson and others have in recent years argued against such
explanations, instead emphasising the strong pacifst and cosmopolitan
trends of post-First World War 1920’s Japan and the will for international
150 Jan Schmidt
cooperation, the example of Chikamoto ofers a glimpse into the widespread
suspicion of the United States of America and Great Britain that might have
lain dormant but was later easy to be mobilised by ultra-nationalist forces
from the late 1920s and early 1930s.56
Chikamoto’s motivation to explain the war to his pupils was not an indi-
vidual occurrence. This can be discerned from an article submitted by an
unnamed teacher in the Tōkyō capital area to the daily Tōkyō asahi shinbun
and published as early as 21 August 1914, using the following arguments to
appeal for the war to be “used” in primary education:

The children in elementary school might still have a small brain but
with this World War they could understand in which regions of the
world the war is waged and which country fghts against which. Espe-
cially because the youth, as soon as its insatiable curiosity is awoken,
simply wants to know more, it would be very promising to use the war
now and to let the pupils hear in simple language what the newspapers
write about the general conditions of the European War, about human
nature and about mores as well as about geography and history. The
purpose would be to cultivate patriotism [in them] that is essential for
the existence of [our] state [. . .] . In order to teach geography and his-
tory of the world, there is no better opportunity than this. Because we
[the teachers] have indeed in the meantime [reading the newspapers]
got to know [the war] in great detail, this is a splendid opportunity to
spread knowledge about such regions and locations as Serbia, Belgium
or, for instance, [in Belgium] Liege [. . .] . This could go so far that in
Tōkyō [. . .] blackboards could be put out in the schoolyards on which
together with further explanations, notes could be posted of where
fghting is occurring and which country just won [a battle]. Then, from
time to time, before the start of the actual classes the principal or a very
capable teacher could give a lecture about a certain event [in that war].57

This article appeared two days before Japan declared war on Germany
and a few weeks before Japanese troops were involved in heavy fghting
around the fortifed port city of Qingdao in China against its German and
Austrian–Hungarian defenders. It is remarkable that the author seems to
have seen it as the duty of elementary school teachers to explain to the
pupils the military movements in the war by making use of the daily news-
paper reporting. This method was, as seen earlier, used by Chikamoto in
his local school where he used articles from the local newspaper. What is
signifcantly diferent is that the author of the August 1914 article still per-
ceived the war as something distant and as a simple tool to teach European
geography and history, although his words already indicate more univer-
sal considerations over issues such as “human nature and mores” in times
of a cataclysmic war. Also, the image of simply keeping track of military
movements and reporting victories in battles indicates an understanding of
 Not a secondary experience 151
warfare that was still infuenced by the First Sino-Japanese War and partially
by the Russo-Japanese War, where – more in the case of the former than the
latter – a war of movements and of decisive military engagements had taken
place in a relatively short period of time. Chikamoto’s 1917 notes refect
an understanding of warfare that obviously was infuenced by the recent
mediatised Japanese experience of the fghting from 1914. That this was by
no means a secondary experience constructed via the passive consummation
of mass media can be discerned from his interpretations and remarks about
the impact of the war on the future. Images of the war were ubiquitous and
ofered material for (re-)constructing the world view of many Japanese  –
some of whom observed the war more directly than Chikamoto via news-
papers and materials sent by the Ministry of Education to the schools of
Japan. Even the latest temples of modernity, department stores, served as
hubs of such images and of direct witness reports – as will be shown in the
following pages.

The First World War in images and eyewitness reports

in a Japanese department store
An almost completely overlooked popular medium for obtaining images of
the First World War in Japan were commercially distributed photo albums.
A  review article of a comprehensive “Photo Album of the Great Euro-
pean War” published in December 1918, only weeks after the armistice in
Europe, states:

Photo Album of the Great European War (ed. by Toyoizumi Masuzō)

– Recently several hundred newly arrived photos received from the Brit-
ish, American, French, Italian and Belgian governments were publicly
exhibited at Mitsukoshi [Department Store]. One hundred of these
photos were selected and they form this photo album. It is not hard
to understand the high value of these photos at frst glance. Now that
the war is winding down to its end and that the people are longing for
the restoration of peace, is it by no means useless to look back at this
unprecedented Great War assisted by this album. As one is now brows-
ing through the album, there is the feeling that the reality of the Great
War is shown in detail by a long flm (frumu). Silently watching, a deep
interest is triggered. One has to call this a perfect publication.58

There are several important aspects contained in these lines. First, it reminds
one of the fact that although there is a large amount of evidence it was
not only the Japanese elite, such as the aforementioned members of the
ministerial bureaucracy, who were studying and interpreting the war, it
happened in more local scenarios and among the mass population as the
example of schoolteacher Chikamoto Kōgorō has shown. The fow of actual
images, here photographs, was often controlled by the governments of the
152 Jan Schmidt
belligerent countries, but the review article indicates that the selection was
undertaken by Japanese protagonists. Through the quantity of documenta-
tion and active interpretation of the war in the Japanese media, an album
like the one mentioned earlier with 100 selected photos could be viewed like
a flm documentary, providing a constant fow of images. But, as the review
article indicates, it also only reconfrmed a visual narrative of the war that
had already been established in Japan by late 1918 – and most likely in all
the world regions that were often considered “peripheral” in the historiog-
raphy of the First World War. It is also easy to overlook a crucial piece of
information here: the selection of the album was based on a much larger
photo exhibition at Japan’s most renowned department store, Mitsukoshi.
The exhibition had taken place from 18 to 25 October 1918 in the main
store in central Tōkyō. It is unknown how successful the exhibition was,
but the resulting photo album was well received by its reviewer and, given
the elevated position of Mitsukoshi, the Harrods of Japan, it is likely that
it drew a good attendance. In the November 1918 issue of the department
store’s house magazine Mitsukoshi, a photo is included showing how the
500 photos provided by the embassies of Entente powers and the United
States of America were mounted on long walls in a spacious room used for
temporary exhibitions.59
A systematic search through the magazines shows that the First World
War appeared frequently. This would, for instance, be in the form of articles
about changes of cosmetic products under the infuence of wartime mobili-
sation.60 A particularly noteworthy case is the transcript of a lecture entitled
“Wartime Europe” given by Shiba Chūzaburō (1872–1934), a professor of
the Mechanical Engineering Department of Tōkyō Imperial University, on
22 June 1917, in front of the Jidō yōhin kenkyūkai (Study Association of
Articles for the Use of Children) and published in the August issue.61 The
venue of the lecture might seem odd, but other issues of Mitsukoshi show
that lectures on world afairs were frequently given in the framework of
its “Study Associations” that centred around consumer articles of various
kinds and most likely were used as social salons for the upper class in the
Tōkyō area. The lecture details Shiba’s observations of a study trip to bel-
ligerent and neutral countries which had started on 31 July 1916 and lasted
several months. He and four other professors from Tōkyō Imperial Univer-
sity departed from Yokohama with the main purpose to study the impact of
the war on European wartime societies in their respective felds.62
Shiba’s itinerary led him to the USA, then to Great Britain, France, Swit-
zerland, Italy, back to Britain, then to Sweden, fnally Russia, and from
there back to East Asia via the Trans-Siberian Railway. It was not the frst
time Shiba had been to Europe though. He had studied in Germany, Britain,
and France between 1899 and 1901 and in general had enjoyed a privileged
education as the son of Shiba Shigeri (1843–1907), a high-ranking warrior
in the former feudal Kaga Domain, who became a baron in the new peerage
system established after the Meiji Restoration. While dozens of Japanese
journalists, as well as hundreds of businessmen and the aforementioned
 Not a secondary experience 153
ministerial bureaucrats, sent to study the wartime situation in Europe and
later the USA had given speeches on their observations or published them,
Shiba’s account stands out as one by a member of the academic and aris-
tocratic elites of Imperial Japan. In his detailed account that flls 13 pages
in the department store magazine, he tried to emphasise the things which
he saw most strongly deviating from his earlier peacetime study period in
Europe. He opened his lecture by evoking the emotional distress he and his
companions had felt when travelling by ship from the USA to Britain fearing
to be torpedoed by a German submarine.63 That this anxiety was not totally
unfounded is underlined by a newspaper clipping that he later obtained
when staying in Britain stating that 55 British and a number of French
vessels had been sunk in just one week.64 It is interesting that he tried to
corroborate the number of ships sunk from both sides and compared the
British to German newspapers that he could access later during this trip
in Sweden.65 His earlier engineering education had included thorough lan-
guage training in German, English, and French, which enabled him to read
the local newspapers almost the entire time while travelling through war-
time Europe. The fact that there were now passport controls and a constant
fear of espionage to be felt throughout the belligerent states, all allied with
Japan, drew his attention and he demonstrated it to his audience – and later
to the readers of the magazine – by providing a reproduction of a page of
his passport flled with stamps at borders and domestic control points of
several countries.66
Much of his report is devoted to the changes in everyday life imposed by
the war on the societies of belligerent and neutral states alike. He mentioned
the rationing of food time and again. This was illustrated in the later Mitsu-
koshi magazine publication with reproductions of ration cards and war
bond certifcates of several countries, which also seemed to have been on
display when he gave his lecture in the department store.67 He mentioned the
darkness of London at night as part of the air-defence measures, thus adding
to the new three-dimensional dread from below through submarines while
traversing the oceans the new dimension of the possibility of aerial attack on
civilians symbolised by the altered atmosphere at night.68 Aside from food
shortages and food rationing that he experienced in Britain’s capital, he
commented at length upon the vast numbers of women working in British
munitions factories and the ubiquity of wartime “industrial mobilisation”
which he deemed of “utmost interest and having the potential to become a
[future] model” for Japan. His opinions had been formed following visits to
Birmingham, Glasgow, Manchester, Shefeld, Newcastle and the surround-
ing areas.69 After travelling on to France he again witnessed the lack of
vital resources, obvious in everyday life in Paris and seemed to have been
especially impressed that, because of energy shortages and to make it more
difcult for German zeppelins to fnd their target for their nightly bombing
raids, there was almost no street lighting after 9 p.m. This ofered a remark-
able contrast to the “nightless city” that he had visited as a young man when
studying in Europe.70 For France, he reiterated his comment about French
154 Jan Schmidt
women supporting the war efort by replacing men in factories or as train
personnel.71
Passing through Switzerland, he argued that here the relative weakness of
neutral states against the economic impact of this new type of war became
visible and that the dependency on imports almost proved fatal in this situ-
ation.72 In general he felt everyday life in neutral countries resembled the
same hardships of those in the neighbouring belligerent countries, which he
illustrated for Sweden with a paper ration card for bread, which was also
reproduced for the publication in Mitsukoshi.73 He painted an especially
stark picture of severe conditions in Italy, with almost no iron or coal avail-
able in civil life, as well as a lack of essential nutrition, as he witnessed that
almost no butter, honey, or sugar was available.74 Being one of the relatively
few Japanese observers who passed through wartime revolutionary Russia
in early 1917, he warned against the precarious economic conditions sym-
bolised by high infation and distrust of the paper money that had been
issued by the Kerensky government.75 The lack of personal security that he
had felt due to the – in his perception – vast absence of policing only eased,
according to him, when he reached Harbin after taking the Trans-Siberian
Railway and thereby the Japanese-leased territory in Manchuria.76
In general, his account did not include any direct lessons for Japan. In this
regard it difers from many accounts of the Japanese ministerial bureaucrats
who had been sent to study the wartime societies of Europe and the United
States of America and who, similarly to Shiba, gave public lectures. Shiba
enriched his impressions with an eye for detail on the impact of the war on
everyday life in the cities and countryside he visited and an understanding
that the new kind of warfare the World War had ushered in would also
heavily impact on states that remained neutral. He did not glamorise the
European war experiences but rather depicted them as something similar
to the to-be-expected “new normal” in case of future conficts of similar
scope that might involve Japan militarily to a greater extent than the cur-
rent one. In this regard, his stance was not far removed from that taken
by the local schoolteacher Chikamoto Kōgorō. In contrast to Chikamoto,
Shiba belonged to a group of several hundred Japanese citizens who visited
Europe and the United States of America during the war years and whose
own accounts were made available to a wider audience. His keen compari-
son of British and German newspapers regarding the impact of German
submarine warfare demonstrates that this group had an important position
not only with regard to the fact that their experience was certainly not sec-
ondary but also that their accounts could counter the narratives of the two
wartime camps and their propaganda machines.

Conclusion
This chapter has demonstrated on several levels how diferent actors served
as mediators of images and interpretations of the First World War for
 Not a secondary experience 155
Japanese society. All of them contributed to the public sphere of the Empire
of Japan in a wider sense. The Japanese mass media not only constantly
reported news from the war, but journalists actively interpreted the war for
the Japanese public. The media further served as a platform for an enor-
mous number of texts and images, many of which were created or creatively
commented upon by politicians, bureaucrats, military ofcers, intellectu-
als, and businessmen. When summarising trends in the way the war was
depicted and interpreted in the mass media, the tendency for it to serve as a
point of departure for the creation of elaborate future visions about various
aspects of the post-war era stood out. If Reinhart Koselleck was right, then
such a mass production of new “horizons of expectations” points either to
a rupture with the hitherto established collective “space of experience” of a
society or at least to major modifcations of it. It can be argued that the First
World War opened a discursive space to imagine the  – post-war  – future
anew and to possibly also use this to pose demands in preparation for it.
An institution of the Japanese state that “experienced” the war by actively
studying it, was the Ministry of Education, which since the Meiji Period
(1868–1912) was an infuential part of the Japanese ministerial bureaucracy
that played a leading role in the building of a modern nation state and ulti-
mately the Empire of Japan. In 1915, at the same time as the Army and
Navy, the Ministry created a temporary Research Commission for Educa-
tional Sources on Current Afairs. This was part of two waves, in 1915
and 1917, that would ultimately encompass all Ministries and the National
Bank, in which similar temporary research commissions were formed to
study the war. One of their activities included sending young university-
educated bureaucrats to study the efects of the war on the Entente Pow-
ers, the United States of America and neutral states. Aside from collecting
materials and writing reports for a vast array of publications resulting from
their studies, many of them gave public lectures on their experiences of visit-
ing the belligerent countries in Europe or the United States of America. The
Ministry of Education mainly published voluminous reports on the infu-
ence of the war on education, especially in Great Britain, France, Russia,
Belgium, Germany, and later the USA. It could be shown that these publica-
tions, including a photo album containing images of actual warfare but also
from the ongoing mobilisation eforts on the home front, emphasising the
participation of women, were widely distributed and advertised.
The case of the elementary school teacher Chikamoto Kōgorō showed
that these types of publications fell on fertile ground even in remoter areas
of Japan. Handwritten notes from summer or autumn 1917 by Chikamoto
preserved in a local archive ofer a rare glimpse of how an elementary school
teacher appropriated and digested information about the war which he
received from the Ministry of Education and via newspapers. He chose a
comparison with the Russo-Japanese War that had occurred a decade earlier
as a means to illustrate the magnitude of the confict to his pupils and prob-
ably also to the local citizens. The notes clearly indicate that Chikamoto
156 Jan Schmidt
had more ambitions than just summarising numbers: he used his knowledge
about the war to deliberate the future of war and of the position of Japan in
the post-war world. As with his superiors in the Ministry of Education, he
also seems to have been impressed by the widespread active participation of
women in the war efort in Europe and in the USA. To the extent that it is
possible to reconstruct his thoughts from these rather sketchy notes, one can
also discern how common mistrust against the intentions of the United States
of America and Great Britain vis-à-vis Japan and East Asia must have been
at the level of an elementary school teacher. This culminated in his assump-
tion that in the future a confict between the USA and Japan was a possibility
and that Germany might become an ally of Japan. It is not always clear what
his thoughts were, but it is obvious that Chikamoto was not an ignorant
bystander to the war. He saw it as his educational responsibility – and prob-
ably also as an opportunity – to interpret the war creatively and to challenge
the worldview of his audience.
Another mediator of the war from a diferent stratum of Japanese soci-
ety was Shiba Chūzaburō, Professor of Engineering at Tōkyō Imperial Uni-
versity, who had been sent to Europe to study the impact of the war on
engineering. On his return, he gave a long lecture on “Wartime Europe”
to the “Study Association of Articles for the Use of Children”, organised
by the renowned Mitsukoshi department store. In this way, the war had
entered a modern consumption temple and as the house magazine of the
department store, Mitsukoshi, and newspaper articles show, this was not
a singular event. In October  1918, days before the armistice, Mitsukoshi
organised a major exhibition of photos of a variety of aspects of the war,
which were then published in a photo album and sold by the department
store. A  newspaper review of the album suggests that images of the war
had been so common throughout the war years that now that the album
appeared in December  1918, only weeks after the news of the armistice
had reached Tōkyō, browsing through it felt like watching a flm about the
stages of the war. This suggests that the eforts of the Ministry of Educa-
tion to study the war, those of Chikamoto to mediate it to his pupils, and
the activities of an elite department store in exhibiting the war can only be
meaningfully interpreted within the mediascape of the war years in Japan,
in which the war was constantly deliberated. Shiba, who, like many oth-
ers, had travelled to wartime Europe and experienced life on the mobilised
home front in belligerent countries and the situation in neutral ones, served
as a privileged mediator of the war in Japan. His account and the publica-
tion of it in the context of a department store magazine indicates that often
the war could well be consumed almost as a form of leisure at the alleged
“periphery”. However, the seriousness with which it was mediated and the
intricate web of references between all these mediators, with local society on
the one hand and the global impact of the war on the other, constituted in
sum a “space of experience” that cannot be reduced to the absence of major
military involvement nor a mere economic impact.
 Not a secondary experience 157
Notes
1 For bringing the personal papers of the elementary school teacher Chikamoto
Kōgorō to my attention I thank Akashi Tomonori (Kyushu University) and Kida
Kiyoshi (Shizuoka University). For providing access to her collection of copies
of the Mitsukoshi department store magazine Mitsukoshi I am grateful to Stef
Richter (Leipzig University). An exceptional term paper for a seminar on the
First World War and Japan in 2014 at Ruhr Universität Bochum written by
Nicola Przybylka (now lecturer in Sport Pedagogics and Sport Didactics at the
same university), brought the report of Shiba Chūsaburō’s observations in war-
time Europe used in this chapter to my attention. For help with this paper, my
gratitude goes to Maj Hartmann and Anne Samson.
2 Jan Schmidt and Naoko Shimazu, “Historiographical Turn. Evolving Interpre-
tations of Japan During World War I, 1914–2019” in Christoph Cornelissen
and Arndt Weinrich (eds.), Writing the Great War. The Historiography of World
War I  from 1918 to the Present (New York/Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2021),
pp. 338–367; Thomas Burkman, “Japan” in Dennis E Showalter and DS Higham
(eds.), Researching World War I: A  Handbook (Westport, CT: Greenwood,
2007), pp. 293–313.
3 Reinhart Koselleck, “ ‘Space of Experience’ and ‘Horizon of Expectation’: Two
Historical Categories” in Reinhart Koselleck (Transl. and w. Introduction by
Keith Tribe), Futures Past. On the Semantics of Historical Time (New York:
Columbia University Press, 2004), pp. 255–275.
4 Paul Fussell, The Great War and Modern Memory (Oxford/New York: Oxford
University Press, 1975); Nakayama Hiroaki, Dai-ichiji taisen no “kage”. Sekai
sensō to Nihon bungaku (The “Shadow” of the First World War. Japanese Lit-
erature and the World War) (Tōkyō: Shin’yōsha, 2012).
5 Yamamuro Shin’ichi, “The First World War in East Asian Thought: As Seen from
Japan” in Jan Schmidt and Katja Schmidtpott (eds.), The East Asian Dimension
of the First World War. Global Entanglements and Japan, China, and Korea,
1914–1919 (Frankfurt am Main/New York: Campus, 2020), p. 40.
6 James Hufman, Creating a Public. People and Press in Meiji Japan (Honolulu:
University of Hawai’i Press, 1997), pp. 199–223, 271–309; Frederic Sharf, Anne
Nishimura Morse, and Sebastian Dobson, A Much Recorded War: The Russo-
Japanese War in History and Imagery (Boston, MA: MFA Publications, 2005).
7 Hufman, Creating a Public, p. 387.
8 Ariyama Teruo, Kindai Nihon no media to chiiki shakai (The Media of Modern
Japan and Local Society) (Tōkyō: Yoshikawa Kōbunkan, 2009).
9 Nagamine Shigetoshi, Zasshi to dokusha no kindai (The Modernity of Maga-
zines and Readers) (Tōkyō: Nihon Editā Sukūru Shuppanbu, 1997); Nagamine
Shigetoshi, Modan toshi no dokusho kūkan (The Spaces for Reading in Modern
Cities) (Tōkyō: Nihon Editā Sukūru Shuppanbu, 2001).
10 Yamamoto Taketoshi, Kindai Nihon no shinbun dokusha-sō (The Newspaper
Readership Strata of Modern Japan) (Tōkyō: Hōsei Daigaku Shuppankyoku,
1981), pp. 204–214.
11 On laterna magica slide shows introducing the war to local audiences, see Kusa-
hara Machiko, “Gentō kara kami shibai e  – Taishū no eizō media to sensō”
(From Laterna Magica to Paper Street Theatre. The Illustrated Media of the
Masses and War) in Inui Yoshiko (ed.), Sensō no aru kurashi (Ways of Life Dur-
ing War) (Tōkyō: Suiseisha, 2008), pp. 101–129.
12 Ogawa Sawako, “The First World War and Japanese Cinema: From Actuality
to Propaganda” in Jan Schmidt and Katja Schmidtpott (eds.), The East Asian
Dimension, pp. 159–182; Jan Schmidt, “Nach dem Krieg ist vor dem Krieg – Der
Erste Weltkrieg in Japan: Medialisierte Kriegserfahrung, Nachkriegsinterdiskurs
158 Jan Schmidt
und Politik, 1914–1918/19” (Post-war is Prewar  – The First World War in
Japan: Mediatised War Experience, Post-war Interdiscourse and Politics,
1914–1918/19) (PhD Dissertation, Ruhr Universität Bochum, Bochum, 2013),
pp. 232–259.
13 Anonymous, “Shinchaku katsudō shashin no shisha” (Preview of Newly Arrived
Moving Pictures) in Yomiuri shinbun, 19 September 1917, p. 6.
14 Schmidt, “Nach dem Krieg”, pp. 130–301.
15 Chūō kōron 311, 29:12, 1914, pp. 96–112.
16 Jan Schmidt (Yan Shumitto), “Dai-ichiji sekai taisen-ki Nihon ni okeru ‘sengo-
ron’. Mirai-zō no tairyō seisan” (“Post-war Discourses” in Japan during the
First World War Period. A  Mass Production of Future Visions) in Yamamuro
Shin’ichi et al. (eds.), Gendai no kiten Dai-ichiji sekai taisen. 1 Sekai sensō (The
Origin of the Contemporary  – The First World War. Vol. 1: The World War)
(Tōkyō: Iwanami Shoten, 2014), pp. 155–178.
17 Endō Kichisaburō, Ōshū bunmei no botsuraku (The Decline of European Civili-
sation) (Tōkyō: Fuzanbō, 1914).
18 Steve Rabson, “Shimazaki Toson on War” in Monumenta Nipponica, vol. 46,
no. 4, 1991, pp. 476–479.
19 Nakayama, Dai-ichiji taisen no “kage”, pp. 86–110.
20 Kobayashi Hiroharu, Sōryokusen to demokurashī: Dai-ichiji sekai taisen – Shi-
beria kanshō sensō (Total War and Democracy. The First World War  – The
Siberian Intervention War) (Tōkyō: Yoshikawa Kōbunkan, 2008), pp. 96–156;
Schmidt, “Nach dem Krieg”, pp. 189–201.
21 Yamamuro Shin’ichi, “Dai-ichiji sekai taisen no shōgeki to teikoku Nihon” (The
Impact of the First World War and the Empire of Japan) in Wada Haruki et al.
(eds.), Iwanami kōza Higashi-Ajia kingendai tsūshi (Iwanami Lectures Survey
History of Modern and Contemporary East Asia) (Tōkyō: Iwanami Shoten),
pp. 95–97.
22 Shimizu Yuichirō (Transl. by Amin Ghadimi), The Origins of the Modern Japa-
nese Bureaucracy (London: Bloomsbury, 2019).
23 Shimizu Yuichirō, “Lessons Learned: Japanese Bureaucrats and the First World
War” in Schmidt and Schmidtpott (eds.), The East Asian Dimension of the First
World War. Global Entanglements and Japan, China, and Korea, 1914–1919
(Frankfurt am Main/New York: Campus, 2020), pp. 276–279; Sheldon Garon,
The State and Labor in Modern Japan (Berkeley: University of California Press,
1987), p. 43.
24 Kenneth Pyle, “The Technology of Japanese Nationalism: The Local Improve-
ment Movement, 1900–1918” in Journal of Asian Studies, vol. 33, no. 1, 1973,
pp. 51–65.
25 Harry Harootunian, “Introduction: A Sense of an Ending and the Problem of
Taishō” in Bernard Silberman and Harry Harootunian (eds.), Japan in Crisis.
Essays on the Taishō Democracy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press,
1974), pp. 3–28.
26 Shimizu Yuichirō, “Shingai kakumei to Nihon no hannō – kindai Nihon to
‘kukki suru Chūgoku’ ” (The Xinhai Revolution and Japan’s Reaction. Modern
Japan and the “Rising China”) in Kobayashi Michihiko and Nakanishi Hiro-
shi (eds.), Rekishi no shikkoku o koete: 20seiki Nitchū kankei e no shin-shiten
(To Overcome the Yoke of History: New Positions toward the Chinese-Japanese
Relations in the 20th Century) (Tōkyō: Chikura shobō, 2010), pp. 33–58.
27 Najita Tetsuo, Hara Kei in the Politics of Compromise. 1905–1915 (Cambridge,
MA: Harvard University Press, 1967), pp. 101–162.
28 On the Chinese military: see the chapter by Kwong Chi Man in this book, and
for First World War Studies of the Japanese military: Kudō Akira (Transl. by
 Not a secondary experience 159
Angelika Koch), “The Japanese Army’s Studies of Germany during the First
World War and its Preparations of a System of General National Mobilisation”
(Transl. by Angelika Koch) in Schmidt, Jan and Schmidtpott, Katja (eds.), The
East Asian Dimension of the First World War. Global Entanglements and Japan,
China, and Korea, 1914–1919 (Frankfurt am Main/New York: Campus, 2020),
pp. 291–311; Kurosawa Fumitaka, Taisen kanki no Nihon rikugun (The Japa-
nese Army in the Interwar Period) (Tōkyō: Misuzu Shobō 2000); Saitō Seiji,
“Kaigun ni okeru dai-ichiji taisen kenkyū to sono hadō” (The First World War
Studies of the Navy and Their Efect) in Rekishigaku kenkyū, vol. 530, 1984,
pp. 16–32.
29 Jan Schmidt, “Der Erste Weltkrieg als vermittelte Kriegserfahrung in Japan:
Mediale Aneignungen und Studien durch Militär und Ministerialbürokratie”
(The First World War as Mediated War Experience in Japan: Medial Appropria-
tions and Studies by the Military and the Ministerial Bureaucracy) in Geschichte
und Gesellschaft, vol. 40, 2014, pp. 239–265.
30 Shimizu, “Lessons Learned”, pp. 276–286.
31 Schmidt, “Nach dem Krieg”, pp. 344–371.
32 Ibid., pp. 353–363.
33 Janis Mimura, Planning for Empire: Reform Bureaucrats and the Japanese War-
time State (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2011).
34 Ōuchi Hirokazu, “ ‘Kokumin’ kyōiku no jidai” (The Era of the Education of
the “People”) in Komori Yōichi et  al. (eds.), Kanjō, kioku, sensō (Emotions,
Memory, War) (Tōkyō: Iwanami Shoten, 2002), pp. 95–124.
35 Schmidt, “Nach dem Krieg”, pp. 330–344.
36 Anonymous, “Shuppankai” (World of Publications) in Tōkyō asahi shinbun, 15
July 1915, p. 6.
37 Tōkyo asahi shinbun, 12 January 1917, p. 1.
38 Monbu-shō (Ministry of Education), Gakusei hyakunen-shi. Shiryō-hen
(100  Years History of the Education Order. Source Edition) (Tōkyō: Teikoku
chihō gyōsei gakkai, 1972), pp. 218–247.
39 Chikamoto Kōgorō, “Ōshū sensō – Nichiro sensō to no hikaku” (The Euro-
pean War – Compared to the Russo-Japanese War), 1917, 22-page handwritten
manuscript. Fukuoka-ken Chikugo-shi kyōdo-shi shiryōkan (Archive of Local
History of Chikugo City, Fukuoka Prefecture), Chikamoto-ke monjo (Chika-
moto Family Papers) B-92.
40 Ibid., pp. 1–4; due to a lack of pagination the count here starts with the cover
page of the manuscript.
41 Ibid., p. 1.
42 Ibid., p. 8.
43 Ibid.
44 Ibid., p. 9.
45 Ibid.
46 Anonymous, “Beikoku no kōkūtai – dai-kensetsu” (The Aerial Units of Amer-
ica – A Big Build-up) in Fukuoka Nichinichi Shinbun, 13 July 1917, p. 1.
47 Chikamoto, “Ōshū sensō”, p. 9.
48 On the wartime boom of the Japanese economy and its long-term efect, see
Nakamura Takafusa and Odaka Kōnosuke, “The Inter-war Period: 1914–37,
an Overview” in idem (eds.), The Economic History of Japan: 1600–1990. Vol.
3: Economic History of Japan 1914–1955. A Dual Structure, transl. by Noah
S. Brannen (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003), pp. 1–54; on the contem-
porary debate about the efect on the economic future of Japan, see Schmidt,
“Nach dem Krieg”, pp. 277–301.
49 Chikamoto, “Ōshū sensō”, p. 10.
160 Jan Schmidt
50 Ibid., pp. 11–13.
51 Ibid., pp. 12–13.
52 Ibid., pp. 15–22.
53 Ibid., p. 14.
54 Sandra Wilson, “The Discourse of National Greatness in Japan, 1890–1919” in
Japanese Studies, vol. 25, no. 1, 2005, pp. 35–51.
55 Yamamuro Shin’ichi, Fukugō sensō to sōryokusen no dansō. Nihon ni totte no
dai-ichiji sekai taisen (The Gap Between “Composite War” and Total War: The
First World War for Japan) (Kyōto: Jinbun Shoin, 2011).
56 Frederick Dickinson, World War I and the Triumph of a New Japan, 1919–1930
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013).
57 “Taisenran to shōgaku kyōiku. Sekai-teki chishiki wo atauru  – Muni no
kōkikai” (The Great War and Elementary School Education. To Convey Knowl-
edge About the World – A Good Chance That Will Not Come Twice) in Tōkyō
asahi shinbun (21 August 1914), p. 6.
58 Review article “Ōshū taisen shashin-chō” (Photo Album of the Great Euro-
pean War) in Yomiuri shinbun, 14 December 1918, p. 7. Reviewed: Toyoizumi
Masuzō (ed.), Ōshū taisen shashin-chō (Tōkyō: Mitsukoshi gōfukuten, 1918).
59 On Mitsukoshi and department store house magazines, see Stef Richter, “Kauf-
hausjournale als Quelle japanologischer Forschung zum ‘Alltag’ der 1920/30er
Jahre” (Department Store Magazines as a Source of Japanologist Research on
‘Everyday Life’ of the 1920s-30s) in Bochumer Jahrburch zur Ostasienforschung,
vol. 28, 2004, pp. 27–44.
60 Anonymous, “Sensō to keshōhin” (War and Toiletries) in Mitsukoshi, vol. 8, no.
9, 1 September 1918, pp. 12–13.
61 Shiba Chūzaburō, “Senji no Ōshū” (Wartime Europe) in Mitsukoshi, vol. 7, no.
8, 1 August 1917, pp. 19–31.
62 Anonymous, “Gakkai no shimei wo obite – Go-hakase honjitsu shuppatsu” (To
Bear the Mission of Academia – Five Doctors Depart Today) in Yomiuri shinbun,
31 July 1916, p. 5.
63 Shiba, “Senji no Ōshū”, p. 20.
64 Ibid., p. 29.
65 Ibid., p. 22.
66 Ibid., pp. 20–21, 24. For the reproduction of a page of his passport, see p. 23.
67 Ibid., pp. 27–29.
68 Ibid., p. 21.
69 Ibid., pp. 22–23.
70 Ibid., p. 25.
71 Ibid., p. 26.
72 Ibid., pp. 26–27.
73 Ibid., p. 29.
74 Ibid., pp. 27–28.
75 Ibid., pp. 30–31.
76 Ibid., p. 31.

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162 Jan Schmidt
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8 An Argentine reporter in the
European trenches
Lieut. Col. Emilio Kinkelin’s
war chronicles
María Inés Tato and Luis Esteban
Dalla Fontana

The outbreak of the First World War generated global interest, even in neu-
tral countries like Argentina. In this case, several factors reinforced curiosity
about the confict, from the presence of large European immigrant com-
munities  – reaching 27 per cent of the total population  – to strong trade
links with Europe, especially with the United Kingdom. Despite the state’s
neutrality in the war, society actively mobilised around it, an attitude that
can be qualifed as cultural belligerence.1 Public opinion split between sup-
porters of the Triple Entente – the so-called Aliadophiles – and the admirers
of Germany – the “Germanophiles”. Passionately, both settled their rivalry
in public spaces throughout the war.2
The press was crucial in the dissemination of interpretations about the
causes of the war and representations of the belligerents, which fostered
how public opinion aligned. As in other areas, the press tried to widen and
diversify its information sources to respond to the demands for news from
the battlefronts. The leading newspapers and magazines of the country sent
war correspondents to the European war theatres to obtain frst-hand read-
ings of the confict from an Argentine cultural perspective. Correspondents
served as cultural mediators between Argentine society and Europe at war,
decoding the confict and making it intelligible to their readers.
This chapter aims to analyse the contributions of Lieutenant Colonel
Emilio Kinkelin, war correspondent of the Buenos Aires newspaper La
Nación. His chronicles are signifcant for various reasons. In the frst place,
his professional training as a soldier provided him with the ideal tools to
observe the transformations introduced by the Great War. In the second
place, unlike other correspondents who had a limited geographical and
temporal range of action, Kinkelin had access to both the Western and the
Eastern fronts for almost the entire war. Finally, he transmitted an inter-
pretation of the confict and a representation of Germany which contrasted
with the pro-Allied disposition of the Argentine press and public opinion.
Considering that the morning newspaper La Nación had a national scope
and daily circulation of around 110,000 copies  – which placed it as the
second most read newspaper in Argentina – Kinkelin’s impressions reached
 Argentine reporter in European trenches 165
a vast audience and ofered a diferent – and polemical – perspective of the
war that shook the world.

An Argentine ofcer and correspondent

Emilio Kinkelin (1875–1943) graduated from the National Military College
in December 1896 as an Infantry Second Lieutenant. He had an excellent
command of German – and, to a lesser extent, French – which gained him
the approval and support of some superior ofcers of the Argentine army
openly afliated with the German Empire. He had acquired knowledge of
that language during his time as a student in the German School of Buenos
Aires.3 He was one of the frst students of the Superior War College, which
he had entered in 1900 (the year of its foundation) and graduated with a
Staf Certifcate. His knowledge of German and professional merits earned
him, in 1904, as First Lieutenant and after having served a few months in
the War Ministry, to be sent on commission to Germany “to carry out prac-
tical studies in an Army [infantry] corps”.4
Undoubtedly, this commission marked an extremely remarkable achieve-
ment in his career, since these opportunities were generally reserved for
graduates with the prestigious title of Staf Ofcer, unusual in Argentina.
The appointment, decreed by the President on 27 September  1904, con-
sisted of “leave to go to Europe for a term of one year”, which should
be understood as permission to continue his tasks abroad and not their
suspension, as might be understood by the term today. In fact, the appoint-
ment had all the characteristics of service activity for the national state since
during his stay he would enjoy “the salary, benefts and bonuses due to
his current position”, in addition to a supplement that doubled those three
stipends, paid one-time to “defray his travel expenses”.5
In Germany, he served in the 77th Infantry Regiment (2nd Hanover-
ian Regiment) with a garrison in the city of Celle, from February 1905 to
September 1906. He had the opportunity to observe and evaluate the pro-
cedures of instruction of the German ofcers and troops and gain an in-
depth knowledge of the military regulations in force in the imperial army.
Kinkelin performed his overseas assignments successfully. In the fnal report
written by the commander of the 40th Infantry Brigade – where the regi-
ment was located – it was especially noted that “he has got into the spirit
of German regulations to a degree that cannot be recognised enough”. The
senior ofcer highlighted his command of the language as perfect, “his inter-
est in service matters, as well as his excellent military and general educa-
tion”, which made his work praiseworthy.6 Major General von Pritzwitz,
commander of the brigade, also highlighted the excellent services that he
had provided as command ofcer of his staf during the training exercises,
“as well as during the manoeuvres, [frequently] leading the troops of an
alleged enemy [during the exercises]”. Thus, he gained the esteem, respect,
and consideration of the German ofcers with whom he lived during his
166 María Inés Tato and Luis Esteban Dalla Fontana
commission, standing out as a “good comrade [and showing his] many and
brilliant qualities”. As a corollary of his performance, he received the third-
class medal of the Royal Order of the Crown of Prussia, awarded by the
German emperor.7 That honour increased his prestige within the Argentine
army and resulted in him being commissioned again to Germany.
Back in Argentina at the end of 1906, Kinkelin was formally assigned to
the 12th Infantry Regiment but never performed functions there, remaining
within the sphere of the Army General Staf. He served a few months at
the Normal Shooting School and was later added to the Superior War Col-
lege. During that time, he presented several texts related to his activities
and studies carried out in Europe, taught classes in German, and cooper-
ated in the translation of the German regulations, earning the esteem of –
among others – Lieutenant Colonel José Félix Uriburu, director of the latter
institution.8
In April 1908, Uriburu sent a note to the Chief of the Army General Staf
explaining Kinkelin’s importance for the School, as a professor (“eight hours
a week”), interpreter of German, and assistant. He emphasised that he was
irreplaceable. He also requested Kinkelin’s exemption from “service with
the troops for some time”, due to his delicate health, afected by typhoid
fever. Uriburu added that the German professors had especially requested
Kinkelin to assist them in their classes and exercises.9 A few days later, he
was appointed at the Superior War College, where he continued developing
his teaching and research skills related to the imperial army.
In 1910, during the centenary of the May Revolution, Kinkelin was com-
missioned together with Uriburu to receive the military delegation from
Germany which would participate in the celebrations.10 At the beginning of
1911, already a major, he was included among the ofcers to be appointed
as heads of tactical units to command troops. This issue was central to the
arms profession. However, the same order exempted him – along with other
ofcers  – from such a transcendent activity “given the importance of the
services they currently perform”. Accordingly, he would be summoned in
1912.11
The call was postponed again. In September 1912, President Roque Sáenz
Peña decreed that Kinkelin should be part of the Armaments Commission in
Europe. He would travel there with his wife and four children.12 He would
not return to the country until 1919, generating suspicions and conjectures
about his real tasks and responsibilities in the Old World. The French diplo-
mats maintained that he acted as a de facto military attaché in the Argentine
Legation in Berlin. The British categorised him as a favourite of the political
party in ofce.13 Likewise, although there is no formal and documentary
designation of Kinkelin for that function, the Argentine Ministry of For-
eign Afairs referred to him as “former military attaché in Germany” in a
telegram sent in May  1919 to the London legation. The message caused
confusion, since between 1910 and the end of 1918 Major, later Lieutenant
Colonel, Basilio Pertiné held that position.14
 Argentine reporter in European trenches 167
The outbreak of the Great War caught Kinkelin fulflling his mission in
Europe. When he was ordered to return to Argentina in 1914, he requested
authorisation for special leave to stay in Germany, because one of his daugh-
ters was ill and could not travel:

The order to return to Argentina caught me in the most difcult circum-

stances. For around two months, my daughter has been afected by a
serious heart condition, which requires complete rest until the crisis has
passed. The specialists who treat her do not hide the fear that the sea trip
could become fatal for her. Therefore, I would have to return alone to
comply with the order, leaving my family in a country at war, whose com-
munications with Argentina can be completely cut of at any moment.15

Under the circumstances, the Ministry of War authorised his leave in the
frst days of December.16 The subsequent problem was how much and under
what conditions Kinkelin should be paid. A  decree by the President, in
February 1915, ordered that he should receive the salary corresponding to
his grade. Later he would be entrusted with the study of military aspects of
interest, although – according to him – his remaining in Europe as a “spec-
tator of the great war, [was] for obvious reasons” not mentioned in any
document.17 He faced many difculties in receiving his salary. This issue
infuenced not only the conditions of his stay but also his return and that of
his family.18 Lack of cash repeatedly prevented him from purchasing tickets.
In addition, the Allied governments denied or hindered his chances of travel-
ling and leaving Europe, despite the intervention of the Argentine military
attaché, the Foreign Ministry, and some neutral countries like Sweden, Den-
mark, Switzerland, and Spain.19
After being ordered to return immediately to the country in January 1917,
Kinkelin sent a telegram to the Minister of War telling that he would comply
with the order “when the current circumstances allow it since there are no
steamboats available at this time”. He also added that he needed tickets
and his overdue salary and supplements and authorisation from the French
government to cross to Spain, where he would leave for Argentina after
the reestablishment of a regular shipping service. Finally, he declared that,
because of the distressing European reality and “the dangers for my family
due to the current maritime situation, I am compelled to strongly request the
postponement of the order”.20
It was not until the middle of 1918 that he arrived in Switzerland, after
several orders to return and many other adventures, delays, and refusals to
travel. Trying frst from Spain, and later from Holland, he would undertake
his return to the country in mid-1919, almost a year after the war ended.
Once he arrived in Buenos Aires, he requested his retirement, authorised
through an Executive Power’s decree dated 29 July 1919. However, under
the laws in force at that time, he was granted full retirement only ten years
later, when he reached the requisite age.21
168 María Inés Tato and Luis Esteban Dalla Fontana
During the Great War, his contacts in the German army gave him privi-
leged access to the battlefelds as a correspondent. Germany was aware of
the need to win the support of neutral nations, especially in light of the infor-
mation restrictions implemented by the United Kingdom on the outbreak of
war.22 In efect, one of the frst measures undertaken by this country was cut-
ting the submarine cables of the telegraph services used by Germany, which,
added to the monopoly of the Allied news agencies, limited the dissemination
of the Central Empires’ views. Consequently, Germany decided to facilitate
the activity of correspondents from neutral countries to counter the efects
of this information monopoly. Allied governments were late in organising
propaganda tours to the frontline.23 However, the correspondents’ range of
action was limited to the rearguard zone, therefore lacking access to the bat-
tlefront and ignoring the capacity and efective performance of each side.24
Instead, Germany permitted the accredited press to advance into the com-
bat zone, thus having direct experience of the battles. The correspondents
selected for this experience needed discretion so they did not record sensitive
information such as the location and deployment of the units. For that rea-
son, the chronicles often did not indicate the name of the towns visited or
that of the ofcers interviewed. Likewise, correspondents were required to
sign a document assuming responsibility for any damage sufered as a result
of war action.25 In exchange, they received accommodation and transfers,
and an ofcer accompanied them on their incursions into the battlefelds.
Kinkelin was among the few journalists authorised to accompany the
German army in diferent theatres of operation, both on the Eastern and
Western Fronts. La Nación highlighted the preferential status enjoyed by
its correspondent, which enabled its readers to access an almost exclusive
source of information:

[O]ur correspondent in Germany  .  .  . is perhaps the only journalist

among all those on the campaign who was allowed to witness the most
terrible battles and follow operations on all fronts. . . . He also has . . .
many opportunities to be in contact with the commanders-in-chief of
the army corps and with the highest authorities of the general staf. . . .
having representatives in the German armies [is] very difcult, as evi-
denced by the fact that only three foreign journalists currently enjoy
that privilege.26

The Argentine ofcer used the unmediated knowledge of the war pro-
vided by his experience on the front as a statement of authority to validate
the opinions he transmitted in his telegraphic dispatches:

We, the few neutral journalists who are still here, are not taken to the
rearguard where the cannon is heard far away, and the boom of cham-
pagne bottles is very loud. We go to battle. We penetrate the area beaten
by the artillery; we go to the trenches. . . .
 Argentine reporter in European trenches 169
What I refer is based on ocular observations . . . The correspondent
of “La Nación” has been the dean of the neutral press in the Central
Empires for quite some time. At the same time, who has seen most of
the war. . . . I have had the pleasure of calculating the kilometres trav-
elled by rail and car during operations, and they have already passed
thirty-fve thousand. There has been no signifcant battle that I have not
attended on behalf of “La Nación”.27

Perspectives on the war and its transformations

Kinkelin’s contacts and his military status allowed him to observe and
transmit in detail the events in the theatres of operation. He discovered a
new kind of clash not included in the military doctrines he had studied at
the Military College and the Superior War College. On the one hand, he
was amazed by the surprising power of the weapons, their calibre, range,
and destructive power.28 On the other hand, he witnessed the depersonali-
sation caused by this technology and the system of deep trenches. “This
immense struggle of absentees . . . What an anguished solitude! . . . Men
have fallen silent; [only] screams of iron and fre [are heard] . . . Tons of
hatred and death pass over my head, groaning”, he wrote while witnessing
the battle of Verdun. He would reiterate these impressions in the last year
of the war when the frst actions leading to the fnal Allied ofensive had
begun.29
He was struck by the almost non-existent participation of the infantry
and the static fghts where only the exchange of heavy artillery projectiles
could be seen, without large movements of people or vehicles, except those
devoted to supply and evacuation, which sometimes became a tedious con-
stant refrain.30 He also perceived how the war transformed during his stay
in the German rearguard zone and on the Eastern Front. He explained that
in modern warfare – trench warfare – soldiers needed intense and special
preparation to face “the dreadful drama of a bombardment with large-
calibre cannons”.31 He observed the same with the battle of the Somme.32
His reports showed that nineteenth-century traditions were buried in each
engagement, in each massive or individual clash:

The current war has peculiar characteristics that had not been suspected.
It is the war of darkness, the silent struggle of large groups of peoples
who in the underground of the felds look for their throats to strangle.
Battles in the sun have disappeared. In those battles, the sabres of the
charges, the fash of the cannon or the strident cry of the bugle gave the
slaughter something sublime that made the heart beat with courage.
Epic poets will no longer fnd inspiration [in the Great War]. The impul-
sive bravery, the heroic gesture of other times, worth nothing.33
Man kills. Man is crushed, sufocated with gases, or burned alive
with scalding liquids. . . . It is difcult to look into the general thinking
170 María Inés Tato and Luis Esteban Dalla Fontana
behind this massacre. Only traces of the ideals that pushed people to the
battlefeld remain. Nowadays, one kills for killing.34

In narrating his experience with a gas mask, he wrote: “I  was afraid.
I  confess it sincerely. [Inside that mask] you think, and you feel fear and
disgust of men. I  wish I  could summarise in two lines the thoughts that
overwhelmed my mind in those few minutes”.35
In other words, the classic crushing pressure of the German ofensive and
the French doctrine of attacking at any cost had faded in practice, barely
two months after operations began. They were replaced by a set of proce-
dures that until recently were almost denigrated in military classrooms and
tactical books: defending from fortifed positions was the only resource.36

Nowadays, the system is totally diferent. The quality of the troops and
the elasticity of the lines are opposed to the efect of the artillery masses
from another fundamental point of view: the economy of men at the
expense of the feld.37

Kinkelin found that the reality of the stinking and tortuous trenches con-
ficted with the teachings on the war of movement that he had practised dur-
ing his frst stay in Germany. For this reason, he afrmed that the German
withdrawal to the north in 1914 was a “strategic defence”. It resulted from
the stalemate caused by the inability of Germany’s enemies to defeat it in the
open feld. Likewise, the British, aiming to protect the ports of the “English”
Channel, the internal channels, and the purposefully fooded areas, had con-
tributed “to form the line of trenches”, which stopped the armies of both
adversaries.38
The Argentine correspondent witnessed how both sides were bleeding
to death in useless fanking attacks towards their respective western areas,
causing the so-called race to the sea. These manoeuvres had established a
line from the French–Swiss border to the English–French Channel, which
became an intricate system of positions, wells, decks, and barbed wire that
led to a new combat technique, bulwark or bastion warfare.39 Everyone
talked about this new confict method, developed over more than three
years, mainly on the Western Front. It implied that the defensive criteria
prevailed, with sporadic and bloody attacks which only led to consider-
able losses. In Argentina, the military looked on, bewildered at how events
impacted established doctrines. They afrmed that the war of positions
“seemed to intend to become an axiom on future wars”.40
On the one hand, his astonishment at the failure of Schliefen’s ideas
would drive him to justify the German defeat at the Marne and their subse-
quent withdrawal to the north bank of the Aisne river.41 On the other hand,
in mid-1917, when the war reached its climax in cruelty and exhaustion,
he afrmed that “[the] new principles have given an excellent result. War
statistics prove that a large percentage of attacks in wars of positions are
 Argentine reporter in European trenches 171
unsuccessful. And a repelled attack results in huge losses”. However, he
recognised that in this way it would not be “possible to break through the
lines . . . the only way to end the war with a purely military victory”.42
The new style of confrontation forced the military to devise new sys-
tems and practices, which never ceased to surprise Kinkelin. Everything, he
afrmed in 1917, including

[T]he fundamental principles of tactics and shooting  .  .  . have been

turned upside down.  .  .  . The rules considered most elementary and
immutable . . . have not only been set aside but have been working to
violate them, it might be said.43

Finally, he acknowledged that the war had come to an impasse due to the
techniques and procedures adopted in fghting from bastions and trenches.44
In line with that thought, he commented on the modifcation of mili-
tary regulations, the new approaches that emerged on the battlefeld, and
the predominance of the technological factor in the race to fnd the most
destructive weapon. On several occasions, he referred to heavy artillery,
the 420-millimetre Krupp mortar, with which the Germans had destroyed
the fortress at Liege and the 305-millimetre Skoda, manufactured by the
Austrians, as powerful as the frst. Likewise, he analysed armoured vehicles
on tracks and the increasingly constant and massive use of aircraft. The
frst time he saw them in action, he did not appreciate their signifcance and
detracted from their decisive infuence on modern warfare.

The aeroplanes . . . have not lived up to the hopes of their efectiveness

as an ofensive weapon. A too-small percentage of their bombs was able
to cause certain damage. [Although] they have been praised as elements
of exploration and inspection.45

On this, he shared the views of most European military leaders who

doubted or frankly disbelieved the efects that this technological innovation
could have on modern warfare. General Falkenhayn (Chief of the German
High Command after Moltke’s replacement) and General Foch (promoter
of the doctrine of the ofensive at all costs, and later supreme Allied com-
mander) initially sustained these nineteenth-century ideas. Both stated that
planes achieved little or directly, were useless, and only ft for sport.46 Kin-
kelin narrated some episodes where pilots and their aircraft played a lead-
ing role, but never recognised their importance as a weapon. These texts
highlighted curious anecdotes about air and anti-aircraft combat, forced
landings, and crashed aircraft in or near the battlefelds.47
To a lesser extent, he had a similar view about the tank, which was a
completely new invention, unlike aircraft which had been tested before the
outbreak of the Great War. For example, in Argentina there had been sev-
eral attempts to use planes efectively before 1914. During the years of the
172 María Inés Tato and Luis Esteban Dalla Fontana
confict, many studies on the subject led to aircraft being included in the army
organisation, creating the Military Aeronautical Service.48 The tank tread was
an unprecedented development that also ended up revolutionising military
theory. However, Kinkelin hardly wrote about the new armoured vehicles and
usually mistrusted their actual value in modern warfare. “No one’s afraid of
them anymore. The efectiveness they had in the early days has passed to leg-
end. Machine guns have special ammunition that runs through their shells”.49
In addition to the operational procedures and technological aspects, Kin-
kelin reiterated two issues he considered part of the transformation of war:
humanitarian afairs and the masterly organisation of the German armies for
the development of operations. His comments on these topics were framed
in the purest Clausewitz theory and the doctrine of the nation in arms:

Although “war is the continuation of politics by other means”, as soon

as Germany resorts to those means, politicians shut up. . . . And a coun-
try that proceeds like this . . . when it concerns its existence, will not be
guided by other points of view than those directly afecting the triumph
of its armed force. . . . The armies will advance as far as it suits, not one
more step. The diplomatic cabinet will not impose on them an objective
unaligned with the capacity of the war instrument employed.50
It is essential to check the national military spirit of the total popula-
tion of the state. It is the entire population of Germany that fghts. . . .
The army and the people in arms are synonymous with Germany.51

Kinkelin shared his impressions on the efects of a war, expected to be

swift, short, and defnitively decisive, on the combatants and peoples across
Europe. As months passed, he came to recognise the absolute futility of the
cruel and ruthless actions he witnessed in the combat zones.52 He questioned
the purpose of the war. His doubts led him to an apparent double discourse
regarding events. He did not refer to either one or the other adversary as
guilty or responsible for the massacre. Still, he tried to reduce the war to a
consequence of human nature and circumstantial diferences between the
belligerents, who were trying to solve them through arms.
He subtly referred to the result of attacks and defensive blockades in the
Alsace region, trying to show that Germans had not been cruel.53 While
marvelling at what the German troops and weapons achieved in a battle in
Poland, he spared no details about the brutality of the clashes.54 However,
he alluded to the aberrant actions carried out by the Russians on the Eastern
Front, which violated the international law as applied to armed conficts.55
In an interview, a German captain told Kinkelin that, on both sides, “the
troops have paid their blood tax, they want to collect blood as well”. Dur-
ing an assault on an enemy position,

[W]e continue fring at point-blank range. The men who stood with their
arms raised . . . kicked the ground, shouted; their eyes were excessively
 Argentine reporter in European trenches 173
open, terrifed. Sorry, sir! Don’t kill us! My goodness!  .  .  . But what
could we do? Kill them. We had no other recourse as long as the fre
didn’t shut up. In the clamour of the struggle, the instinct of the victori-
ous man does not know what pity is. . . . out here in the death camps,
everything is diferent.  .  .  . How many times I  have heard of cruelty!
There, in the café, the most sapient strategists, the tactical balancers,
and above all the “moralists” believe that in battle a man preserves the
heart. What do they know! Here they kill us, or we kill them.56

As hostilities progressed, allusions to the humanitarian issue and their

violation by the adversaries became more frequent in his chronicles, includ-
ing the explicit condemnation of the war.57 However, despite the conster-
nation facing the horror of battles, Kinkelin explained the episodes as the
efects of a high-intensity confrontation fought for the survival of the home-
land.58 Even more remarkable was his stance on this issue when actions clas-
sifed as aberrations by the rules of warfare came from the German forces.
For example, when in May 1915 a German submarine torpedoed and sank
the Lusitania, he acknowledged that Germany would not declare it had
been “an act contrary to the law of nations”, as required by the United
States of America. He admitted that in this struggle “for the existence of the
nation new problems of international law had emerged, which are of vital
interest”, but that they should be resolved when the war ended, not during
the confict. If the Kaiser’s government accepted that demand, “it would be
deprived of a weapon that allows it to efectively injure in the economic feld
an adversary superior at sea”. Perhaps, he claimed, playing down the death
of more than 200 people in the shipwreck, a likely agreement would have
been possible if the Allies ensured that their merchant ships did not carry
weapons or fy the fags of neutral countries.59
Similarly, justifying German acts, he referred to the unrestricted subma-
rine warfare as a weapon used by the High Command:60 due to the siege and
threatened with hunger, Germany sharpened its wits and “found a weapon
capable of reverting intentions. The submarine became as perverse as the
unrestricted blockade”. Although he felt the ships were “much more inhu-
mane because it hurts us, the neutrals, which have nothing to do with this
issue”, the Germans had to fght and eat. “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a
tooth. This is the war cry that radiates from the Central Empires”.61
In his chronicles, Kinkelin accounted for the mastery of the Germans to
mobilise, supply, and locate their forces and to carry out manoeuvres suc-
cessfully. He emphasised their efciency to fght and defeat the French and
the English, who also fought as good soldiers.62 In the early months of the
war, he described his admiration for “the unsurpassed talent of organisa-
tion and tenacity of this army, which prepares everything, and knows no
difculties capable of pushing it back”.63 Kinkelin narrated that facing each
bridge or railway destroyed intentionally to hinder their advance, German
soldiers immediately undertook their reconstruction. In a few hours, the
174 María Inés Tato and Luis Esteban Dalla Fontana
vehicles, troops, and trains were running again with an anthill rhythm; the
paralysed factories and power stations resumed their activities. “It is the
German tenacity, which, despite the great drama in which it is the main pro-
tagonist, continues to prevail even on enemy territory. It makes everything
ordered, complete and thorough”. The Argentine correspondent referred to
the destructive capacity of German weapons and the respect to not target
places. He was amazed at the troops’ and operators’ accuracy to manage the
transport services in the rearguard zone like clockwork. He also observed
the Germans’ use of a modern French hospital, integrated into their own
health system.64
In the Argentine academies, Kinkelin had studied the combat support
services, but he had never seen them deployed in operations: the swarm
of people going back and forth; the wounded arriving from the frontlines;
surgeons and nurses trying to save lives; the storage and transport of food;
the repair of armaments; soldiers marching to replace the fallen in combat.
At the same time, he observed the drama from positions close to the battle-
feld and shared his impressions about a war where technology and industry
made their appearance at every instance. This led to a dichotomy: to mourn
the disaster while being fascinated by what he saw in that “unchained hur-
ricane”, while writing that “war is beautiful, terribly beautiful”.65
With professional judgement and a little perspective derived from the
proximity of facts, he considered that, although “the initiative of the French
command knew how to save a desperate situation” during the battle of the
Marne in 1914, the Germans had not operationally failed on that occasion.
However, he claimed that this event represented “the failure of strategic
thinking”,66 stressing that Germany faced two mighty armies in the west
and the Russians on the Eastern Front. The 1914 East Prussia campaign
led him to compare Hindenburg to Napoleon and Frederick II “the Great”,
emphasising Hindenburg’s victories in the battles of Tannenberg and the
Masurian Lakes, where he managed to defeat two vast Russian armies. Kin-
kelin highlighted the titanic efort of facing an army almost four times supe-
rior, using an interior line strategy, one of the most difcult at that time in
military doctrine.67
When he was back in Poland in early 1915, Kinkelin wrote about the dif-
ferences between the Russians and the Germans in terms of planning and
development of manoeuvres in modern warfare. The former lacked every-
thing their opponents had: updated intelligence, discipline, organisation,
and operational skills.68 Kinkelin attributed the German conquest of the
enormous fortresses of Nowo Georgiewsk, Ivangorod, Grodno, and Riga,
which caused a change of opinion regarding the theatre where the fnal vic-
tory would be achieved, to the “psychological state of the German people
in arms, together with its wonderful organisation. . . . Every day I am more
convinced . . . that arms will not subdue the German army”.69
In the campaign against Romania, he was dazzled by the troops moving
with all their logistics through mountainous areas, swamps, and marshes,
 Argentine reporter in European trenches 175
crossing rivers and overcoming all obstacles.70 When the Germans retreated
to the Hindenburg Line, in 1917, he considered masterful the combination
of rearguard movements and future counterofensives with massive armies,
with their supply trains, livestock, and armaments.71 However, later he
found no validation of his strategic assessments. Germany’s situation had
changed rapidly since the expansion of the British Empire’s fghting forces
and the entry of the United States of America and other countries on the
Allied side. With a certain triumphalism and a lot of expression of desire,
he recognised that Germany had to exert maximum efort. “The world will
then see the bloodiest battle ever waged in history. . . . Germany is invin-
cible. Its military triumph on the continent is an obvious and indisputable
fact”.72 But in his last report, he reiterated the most signifcant lesson learnt
from the war: “Someday, this insane Europe will calm down. Then, we must
take our children to those ossuaries of the Somme. There, in that picture of
sad but wise teachings, future generations will learn to hate war”.73

A Germanophile voice in the Argentine cultural landscape

Kinkelin’s chronicles had a particular profle that distinguished them from
the dominant expressions in the Argentine journalistic and cultural felds.
As in other Latin American countries, since the nineteenth century, Argen-
tine elites professed an intense devotion to France, their political paradigm
and cultural beacon.74 Consequently, after the outbreak of the Great War,
both intellectuals and the press openly aligned with the French cause and,
by extension, that of the Allies and reproduced the arguments of the Triple
Entente’s propaganda. According to it, Germany was an authoritarian,
aggressive, and expansionist power responsible for the outbreak of the war
and the atrocities on the Western Front. In short, Germany embodied the
barbarity that threatened the civilisation represented by France.75
In this context, Kinkelin ofered his readers an alternative perspective of
the war. Allied diplomatic representatives repeatedly denounced his strong
pro-German inclination,76 which led him to “abandon the reserve to which
all ofcers belonging to a neutral army and added to a neutral legation must
observe”.77 The French community press even considered that their journal-
istic collaborations violated Argentine neutrality and openly disobeyed the
resolution of the Ministry of War prohibiting the military from expressing
opinions on the confict.78
Kinkelin’s identity as a pro-German was not arbitrary. He not only explic-
itly stated on numerous occasions his admiration for “all members of the
great Germanic family”,79 but adopted the role of spokesman of the German
interpretation of the war. Invoking his status of a direct observer of war
events, he claimed to be:

[T]he only one who is in a position to tell his compatriots the truth . . .
to ask them not to be fooled by many fantasies divulged by the
176 María Inés Tato and Luis Esteban Dalla Fontana
country’s enemy agencies . . . Germany cannot defend itself; it is totally
isolated from the world, and that fact explains the false accusations
advanced.80

Thus, his contributions to La Nación aimed to refute the German stereo-

type spread by the Allied propaganda mentioned earlier.
Like many of his Latin American contemporaries, Kinkelin frequently
expressed his bewilderment at the war that shook the Old Continent, until
then the epitome of civilisation.81 His horror at the extreme violence, dehu-
manisation, and misery unleashed by the confict led him to question the
meaning of the Great War:

Contemplating that “massacre”, performed in the name of an ideal,

I wonder if that ideal, call it Zar, Kaiser or Patria, can fnd satisfaction
in so much disgrace.82
The ruthless slaughter in Europe has lost its distinctly military objec-
tive. Today it is not, in my view, anything other than useless bloodshed.83

Although condemning the war experience, Kinkelin justifed German

intervention, thus supporting the siege theory adopted by the country
according to which the Allied nations had sought to besiege Germany, forc-
ing a defensive response.84 In this way, Germany’s expansionist motivation
was denied as the source of the confict, and the responsibility for its out-
break was placed on its enemies.
Kinkelin also explored the legitimacy of German participation in the
confict attributing to Germany a civilising mission. Accordingly, German
troops “carry at the tip of their bayonets an ideal of race, of high civilisa-
tion”.85 For example, in his time with the Polish campaign, the Argentine
ofcial found that “in all manifestations of life in towns and felds, the order
and disciplined tidiness of the Prussians has transformed primitive habits”.86
Thus, he attempted to deny the dichotomy between civilisation and bar-
barism spread by Allied propaganda, which identifed the former exclusively
with the nations of the Triple Entente. Another element to refute the accusa-
tion of barbarism was Germany’s high literacy rate compared with those of
its enemies. In addition to stating that “Germany is the country with fewer
illiterate persons and more university students”, Kinkelin argued that “for
every illiterate German there are 8,400 Italians. In France, 30% of the popu-
lation can’t read. In England, the proportion is 10% and in Russia 67%.
What is civilisation then?”87
Besides these factors, which would show Germany’s rational nature, the
Argentine correspondent sought to deny the war crimes attributed to the
country:

The truth must be said, once and for all . . . I am willing to guarantee
with a gentleman’s solemn word of honour, if necessary, that I have not
 Argentine reporter in European trenches 177
seen blameworthy acts anywhere, either from the law or humanitarian
sentiment perspective.88

Kinkelin considered that the troops involved in the invasion and occupa-
tion of Belgium and northern France, from Wurtemberg and Bavaria, “who
enjoy a reputation as impulsive”, acted with moderation.89 Although he dis-
missed the possibility of excesses during the invasion of Belgium, he justifed
them as retaliation and exemplifying punishments against Belgian snipers,
an argument used continuously by Germany to exculpate her troops from
accusations of atrocities:90

If my homeland once entrusted me with the nation’s armed forces to

bring them into battle, and the enemy population threatened to make
the campaign fail, I would sacrifce that population to save my home-
land. . . . who commands troops cannot and should not have any goal
but the victory of his weapons, regulated by war law. And there is a law
that punishes the sniper with death if taken in fagrant action.91

Regarding German atrocities, Kinkelin categorically denied the destruc-

tion of Reims Cathedral, one of the most poignant episodes of the campaign
in northern France.92 Moreover, he stated that in both Belgium and France,
the German authorities had adopted a tolerant attitude towards the occu-
pied population.93 He provided an idyllic picture of the occupation. Order,
tidiness, and an abundant supply of food prevailed.94 There were no requisi-
tions. Cordiality prevailed in the relations between the invading forces and
the civilian population: “people have been losing fear for these ‘barbarians’
whom the enemy press continues to defame, and whom they have come to
know as humane and kind people”.95
In contrast, the Argentine correspondent spread reports of the acts of
violence committed by Russian troops on the Eastern Front, which instead
were much less known to Western public opinion.96 Among the crimes com-
mitted by the Russians recorded by Kinkelin were summary executions of
civilians, dismemberments, house fres, looting of shops, and the rape of
hundreds of women.97 The so-called Russian atrocities called into question
the identifcation of the Allies with the cause of civilisation, justice, and
respect for international conventions.
While Allied propaganda condemned German authoritarianism, Kinkelin
highlighted the country’s democratic character, as exemplifed by the organi-
sation of the imperial army. In the words of a German ofcer he quoted:

[T]he German army is, after all, the most democratic army in the world.
In the seventh company of my regiment, there is a member of the Reich-
stag who is a simple soldier. In the same unit, a sergeant, before the war,
earned his living cleaning chimneys. Do you think that in the armies of
our adversaries there is only one intellectual, a single politician, who
178 María Inés Tato and Luis Esteban Dalla Fontana
does not hold a position in the military hierarchy or any humble worker
who has at his command men of prominent position?98

While the Allies pointed to German militarism as a defect, Kinkelin

extolled it as the key to German superiority in the confict. In the context
of total war, Germany enjoyed the competitive advantage of a rooted mili-
tarised society, willing to sacrifce and mobilise:

The army and the people in arms are synonymous in Germany. They
are so because the army is the most beloved and respected institution;
because it is the cause of the Empire’s greatness. . . . The helmet and
sabre have been the game of children for two or three generations.
Every woman dreams of the greater happiness of marrying an ofcer.
Every mother accepts the greatest deprivation to provide her son with
the necessary means to follow a brilliant arms career.99

In sum, “the national military spirit of the state’s total population” con-
stituted a virtue “grafted into blood, from parents to children, from school
to barracks, and from here to battle”.100 On the contrary, Germany’s oppo-
nents needed an additional efort to insufate in civil society an identifca-
tion with their armies to mobilise it.101
Finally, Kinkelin resorted to a propaganda topic widely employed by
Germany at various levels: the encouragement of irredentism. During the
war, the empire ofered Mexico a military alliance in exchange for the resti-
tution of the territories of Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona lost to the
United States of America. This proposal, contained in the “Zimmermann
telegram”, led to the American entry into the war.102 In Spain, German
propaganda circulated versions that promised the eventual recovery of
the Strait of Gibraltar and Tangier in the event of the German victory.103
In the Argentine case, German propagandists frequently appealed to the
sovereignty dispute with the United Kingdom over the Falkland Islands and
the possibility of their restitution to Argentine hands if Germany won the
war. Kinkelin insisted on this argument in his interview with Alberto Bal-
lin, director of the Hamburg–America navigation company. The Argentine
ofcer asked him if a victorious Germany would be willing to ofciate as
a “negotiorum gestor” of the Argentine claim. Although his interviewee
was reluctant to pronounce himself on this possible intermediation, he
considered it could be possible.104 In another article under the signature
of “Correspondent”, Kinkelin referred to a speech by German Chancellor
Georg von Hertling in the Reichstag, who mentioned the Falklands among
the territories under British rule to liberate after the war.105 The author
inferred from it Germany’s willingness to support the Argentine demand.
Thus, Kinkelin contributed to the German propaganda campaign, which
sought to neutralise the pro-Allied consensus prevailing in Argentine public
opinion. To this end, he recovered the secular demand for sovereignty over
 Argentine reporter in European trenches 179
the archipelago and presented Germany as an ally of nations oppressed by
British imperialism.

Conclusion
The Great War, as a global phenomenon, had an intense impact on both
belligerent and neutral countries. Far from being a distant phenomenon, the
“suicide of Europe” provoked a keen interest in public opinion of nations
which, like Argentina, had adopted a neutral diplomatic stance. The press
responded to the thirst for news from the European battlefelds through
various sources. Among them, war correspondents were crucial in circulat-
ing information about the war that nurtured the polarisation of society,
mediating between the war events and local public opinion.
The chronicles of Lieutenant Colonel Emilio Kinkelin were part of the
extensive media coverage granted to the war by the Argentine press. His
case stands out, however, among other journalists. Kinkelin developed his
mission in a broad temporal and geographical framework and was one of
the few correspondents who accompanied the German army to the front-
lines, becoming a privileged and direct witness to the main battles of the
Great War.
Moreover, his professional training gave his dispatches an additional
value. His experience in a German regiment before the war and at the Supe-
rior War College provided him with a practical vision and knowledge to
decode the facts. He interpreted the confict within the framework of the
doctrines and theories in force and compared them with the unexpected
transformations imposed by reality. Ideas that had been repeatedly disquali-
fed by military theorists gained unseen importance. Defence had overtaken
ofensive action in the strategic leaders’ decisions; attacks had proved use-
less as means to achieve defnitive success. Kinkelin recognised that the will
to conquer had become the will to resist, that the pre-eminence of static
defence over bayonet assaults made modern warfare a war without infantry,
which was his speciality.
Similarly, he found that the industrialisation of armies led to the pre-
eminence of the technological factor in countries’ decisions and investments.
At the same time, his astonishment at destructive weapons and his dismay at
the consequences of their use made him doubt the efectiveness of war as an
instrument for solving political problems. His refections dealt with oppos-
ing aspects related to humanitarian law and the operational prowess of Ger-
man arms. These contradictions led him to admit that future generations
would hate war. His last article dates from early 1918, so it is not possible
to know his opinions after the German defeat in November, when the war’s
logical outcome seemed to restore the doctrines and theories to a place lost
in the military principles at the time.
Finally, his afnity with German culture distinguished his collaborations
from those of his peers, who broadly expressed a favourable inclination
180 María Inés Tato and Luis Esteban Dalla Fontana
to the cause of the Allies. Kinkelin not only expressed his professional
admiration for German troops but also refuted the accusations against
Germany. In this sense, he operated as a de facto pro-German propagan-
dist, trying to reverse the negative image prevailing in Argentine public
opinion. To this end, he denied the veracity of the reductionist antagonism
between civilisation and the barbarism of Allied propaganda. Ultimately,
he sought to connect his readers with the German cause by presenting
the empire as an eventual strategic ally for the recovery of the Falkland
Islands.
Kinkelin’s chronicles form a valuable corpus of frst-hand testimonies that
illuminate various facets of the Great War, such as the direct experience of
fghting on the frontlines, technical and strategic innovations, and percep-
tions about belligerents. As such, they brought the tragedy of war closer to
a neutral and distant Argentina.

Notes
1 On the concept of belligerence applied to cultural mobilisation, see Olivier Com-
pagnon and Pierre Purseigle, “Géographies de la mobilisation et territoires de la
belligérance durant la Première Guerre mondiale” in Annales, Histoire, Sciences
sociales vol. 71, no. 1, 2016.
2 On the social impact of the war in Argentina, see María Inés Tato, La trinchera
austral. La sociedad argentina ante la Primera Guerra Mundial (Rosario: Prohis-
toria, 2017).
3 Argentina, Buenos Aires, Archivo General del Ejército (AGE), Legajo 6439, f. 9.
The director of the German College of Buenos Aires certifed on 7 Febru-
ary 1895 that Kinkelin had a very good performance in German reading, gram-
mar, and style. As Second Lieutenant, he applied for the course taught at the
Superior War College, and there he also served as interpreter for two German
professors. He was praised for this task, considered having a “particular apti-
tude” by the assistant principal of that institute, Lieutenant Colonel José Rojas
(Legajo 6439, f. 34).
4 AGE. Legajo 6439, f. 33.
5 AGE. Legajo 6439, f. 33.
6 AGE. Legajo 6439, f. 34.
7 AGE. Legajo 6439, fs. 34, 35, 74.
8 AGE. Legajo 6439, fs 38, 46. One of these works was entitled “Organization of
regional service and its accessories in the German Army”.
9 AGE. Legajo 6439, f. 49
10 AGE. Legajo 6439, f. 56; Boletín Militar 97, 6 May  1910 and 225, 12
October 1910.
11 AGE. Legajo 6439, f. 76; Boletín Militar 4, 5 January 1911.
12 AGE. Legajo 6439, f. 92; Boletín Militar 3367, 25 September 1912.
13 France, Paris, Ministère des Afaires Étrangères – Centre des Archives Diploma-
tiques de La Courneuve (MAE-CADLC), Dossier 191, Note 24.466 de l’État-
Major de l’Armée au Ministère des Afaires Étrangères – Direction des Afaires
Politiques et Commerciales, París, 25 August 1917.
The British plenipotentiary in Argentina, Sir Reginald Tower, noted that Kin-
kelin was under the ofcial protection of the former Minister of War, General
Gregorio Vélez (until February 1914) and his successor (1910), General Ángel
 Argentine reporter in European trenches 181
Allaria (United Kingdom, London, The National Archives (TNA), FO 118/351,
“Report from Sir Reginald Tower to H Montgomery”, 28 January 1915).
See also AGE Legajo 6439, f. 153.
14 AGE. Legajo 6439, f. 153; Legajo 14432 (Basilio Pertiné), fs. 132, 390.
15 AGE. Legajo 6439, f. 190.
16 AGE. Legajo 6439, fs. 188–190.
17 AGE. Legajo 6439, f. 188.
18 AGE. Legajo 6439, fs. 195, 106, 114, 123, 135, 136, 137, 151.
19 AGE. Legajo 6439, fs. 114, 123, 131, 132, 138, 139, 140–142.
20 AGE. Legajo 6439, fs. 104–106.
21 AGE. Legajo 6439, fs. 128, 161.
22 David Welch, Germany, Propaganda and Total War, 1914–1918 (New Brun-
swick: Rutgers University Press, 2000), pp. 24–25; HC Peterson, Propaganda for
War. The Campaign Against American Neutrality, 1914–1917 (New York: Ken-
nikat Press, 1968), pp. 12–14; Terhi Rantanen, When News Was News (Chich-
ester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009), pp. 54–55.
23 Michael Sanders and Philip M Taylor, British Propaganda During the First
World War 1914–1918 (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1982), p. 30.
24 Emilio Kinkelin, “La batalla de la Champaña, 1 October 1915” in Mis corres-
pondencias a La Nación durante la guerra europea, vol. I (Buenos Aires: Gui-
llermo Kraft, 1921), p. 263.
25 Emilio Kinkelin, “Con los ejércitos de Hindenburg en Polonia”, December 1914,
in Mis correspondencias . . . , vol. 1, p. 68.
26 Anonymous, “ ‘La Nación’ en los frentes” in La Nación, 27 March 1917.
27 Emilio Kinkelin, “El esfuerzo militar de los aliados en Francia”, June 1917, in
Mis correspondencias . . . , vol. II, pp. 280–282.
28 Emilio Kinkelin, “Desde las líneas alemanas”, 16 October 1914, in Mis corres-
pondencias . . . , vol. I, pp. 15–16.
29 Emilio Kinkelin, “Verdun”, 27 March 1916, in Mis correspondencias . . . , vol.
I, pp. 372, 378; “Radiograma a Madrid”, March 1918, vol. II, p. 398.
30 Emilio Kinkelin, “En Noyon, a la vista de la torre de Eifel”, August 1916, in Mis
correspondencias . . . , vol. II, p. 95.
31 Emilio Kinkelin, “Hacia el frente Oriental”, June 1915, in Mis corresponden-
cias . . . , vol. I, p. 146.
32 Emilio Kinkelin, “Sobre el Somme”, 22 July 1916, in Mis correspondencias . . . ,
vol. II, p. 65; “La batalla británica del Somme”, 12 August 1916, vol. II, p. 108.
33 Emilio Kinkelin, “Las guerras ocultas y la vida en las trincheras”, 17 Octo-
ber 1914, in Mis correspondencias . . . , vol. I, p. 36.
34 Emilio Kinkelin, “La batalla Británica del Somme”, pp. 108, 109, 123.
35 Emilio Kinkelin, “La batalla británica del Somme”, 13 August  1916, in Mis
correspondencias . . . , vol. II, p. 125.
36 Emilio Kinkelin, “El esfuerzo militar de los aliados en Francia”, p. 281.
37 Ibid., pp. 292–293; “El avance y retroceso de los franceses hacia el oriente a las
órdenes de Jofre”, June 1916, vol. II, p. 27.
38 Emilio Kinkelin, “En Noyon, a la vista de la torre de Eifel”, p. 95.
39 Martin Gilbert, Atlas de la Primera Guerra Mundial (Madrid: Akal, 2003),
p. 92; Arthur Banks, A Military Atlas of the First World War (Barnsley, South
Yorkshire: Pen & Sword Books, 2010), pp. 58, 64–67, 83, 134.
40 Luis Esteban Dalla Fontana, “La Gran Guerra y los escritores militares argenti-
nos” in María Inés Tato; Ana Paula Pires and Luis Esteban Dalla Fontana (eds.),
Guerras del siglo XX. Experiencias y representaciones en perspectiva global
(Rosario: Prohistoria, 2019), p. 49.
41 Kinkelin, “El avance y retroceso de los franceses”, pp. 22–26.
182 María Inés Tato and Luis Esteban Dalla Fontana
42 Kinkelin, “La batalla de la Champaña”, pp. 281–288, 291, 293; “Los aliados
en el frente occidental en 1915”, no date, vol. I, p. 243; “El esfuerzo militar de
los aliados en Francia”, pp. 293–295; “Sobre el Somme”, pp. 88–89; “El salto
atrás de Hindenburg”, March 1917, p. 260; “Una entrevista con el Ministro de
Guerra general von Stein”, May 1917, vol. II, p. 275.
43 Kinkelin, “El salto atrás de Hindenburg”, pp.  246–247; “Nuevamente en el
frente francés”, 13 March 1917, vol. II, p. 234.
44 Kinkelin, “El esfuerzo militar de los aliados en Francia”, p. 306.
45 Kinkelin, “Desde las líneas alemanas”, pp. 17–18; “Los aliados en el frente occi-
dental en 1915”, p. 244.
46 Luis Esteban Dalla Fontana, “¿Operaciones conjuntas durante la Primera
Guerra Mundial? – Primera Parte” in Revista de la Escuela Superior de Guerra,
vol. 587, 2014, pp. 14–21.
47 Kinkelin, “Aeroplanos bajo el fuego”, 16 October  1914, in Mis correspon-
dencias . . . , vol. I, p. 15; “Dos aviadores salvados milagrosamente”, 18 Octo-
ber  1914, vol. I, pp.  40–41; “El esfuerzo militar de los aliados en Francia”,
pp. 286–287.
48 Dalla Fontana, “¿Operaciones conjuntas. . . ?” pp. 16–19.
49 Kinkelin, “El esfuerzo militar de los aliados en Francia”, p. 286.
50 Kinkelin, “Ivangorod”, 25 August 1915, in Mis correspondencias  . . . , vol. I,
pp. 233–234.
51 Kinkelin, “Verdun”, p. 386; “La toma de Nowo Georgiewsk”, 20 August 1915,
vol. I, p. 209.
52 Kinkelin, “Por radiograma a Madrid, y desde ese punto por telégrafo a Buenos
Aires”, 24/5/1917, in Mis correspondencias  . . . , vol. II, p. 275; “La toma de
Riga”, 8 September 1917, vol. II, p. 362.
53 Kinkelin, “Desde las líneas alemanas”, pp. 9–14.
54 Kinkelin, “Con los ejércitos de Hindenburg en Polonia”, pp. 60–63.
55 Kinkelin, “Hacia el Frente Oriental. La gran ofensiva de Mackensen”, June 1915,
in Mis correspondencias . . . , vol. I, pp. 156–157.
56 Kinkelin, “Hacia el Frente Oriental”, pp. 160–162.
57 Kinkelin, “La caída de Przemysl”, June 1915, in Mis correspondencias . . . , vol.
I, pp. 187–188; “Una excursión desde Varsovia”, 20 August 1915, vol. I, p. 190.
58 Kinkelin, “Una excursión desde Varsovia”, p. 191.
59 Kinkelin, “Radiograma”, in Mis correspondencias . . . , vol. I, 1915, p. 239.
60 Erich von Falkenhayn, El Comando Supremo del Ejército Alemán, 1914–1916 y
sus decisiones esenciales (Buenos Aires: Biblioteca del Ofcial, 1920), pp. 58–60;
Winston S Churchill, La crisis mundial, 1911–1918 (Barcelona: Los Libros de
Nuestro Tiempo, 1944), pp. 383–391; John Terraine, The Great War (London:
Wordasworth Editions Ltd, 1998), pp. 167–300; Banks, A Military Atlas  . . . ,
pp. 246–254, 262, 266, 269; David Stevenson, 1914–1918. Historia de la Prim-
era Guerra Mundial (Buenos Aires: Debate, 2014), pp. 167, 356–365, 433–435.
61 Kinkelin “El esfuerzo militar de los aliados en Francia”, pp. 308–309. See also
Stevenson, 1914–1918, pp. 343–352.
62 Kinkelin, “Desde las líneas alemanas”, pp. 10–13.
63 Kinkelin, “Desde las líneas alemanas”, II, 17 October 1914, in Mis correspon-
dencias . . . , vol. I, p. 23.
64 Kinkelin, “Desde las líneas alemanas”, II; III, 18 October  1914; IV, 19 Octo-
ber 1914, in Mis correspondencias  . . . , vol. I, pp. 24, 25, 30, 34, 49, 50, 52;
Kinkelin, “En el teatro occidental de la guerra”, II, 9 May  1915, Mis corres-
pondencias . . . , vol. I, pp. 129–143; Kinkelin, “Por los campos de batalla de los
Vosgos”, 17 December 1915, vol. I, pp. 305–307.
65 Kinkelin. “Con los ejércitos de Hindenburg en Polonia”, pp. 62–63.
 Argentine reporter in European trenches 183
66 Kinkelin, “Radiograma. El avance y retroceso de los franceses hacia el oriente a
las órdenes de Jofre”, 3 April 1916, in Mis correspondencias . . . , vol. II, p. 23.
67 Kinkelin. “Con los ejércitos de Hindenburg en Polonia”, II, diciembre de 1914,
in Mis correspondencias . . . , vol. I, pp. 70–83.
68 Kinkelin, “De regreso de Polonia. Un almuerzo con Hindenburg”, 30
January 1915, in Mis correspondencias . . . , vol. I, pp. 114–120; “Hacia el frente
Oriental. La gran ofensiva de Mackensen”, pp. 144, 154–156.
69 Kinkelin, “La toma de Nowo Georgiewsk”, pp. 204–209; “Ivangorod”.
70 Kinkelin, “Romania Mare”, 29 October 1916, in Mis correspondencias . . . , vol.
II, pp. 179–180.
71 Kinkelin, “Nuevamente en el frente francés”, pp. 230, 233.
72 Kinkelin, “Berlín, 21 de febrero de 1918. Despacho transmitido radiotelegrá-
fcamente de Berlín a Madrid y enviado por correo de Madrid el día 24”, 21
February 1918, in Mis correspondencias . . . , vol. II, pp. 378–379.
73 Kinkelin, “Radiograma a Madrid”, 31 March  1918, in Mis corresponden-
cias . . . , vol. II, pp. 395, 398.
74 Olivier Compagnon, L’adieu à l’Europe. L’Amérique latine et la Grande Guerre
(París: Fayard, 2013); Stefan Rinke, Latin America and the First World War
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017); Tato, La trinchera austral. . 
75 On German propaganda in Argentina, see María Inés Tato, “Luring Neutrals.
Allied and German Propaganda in Argentina During the First World War” in
Troy RE Paddock (ed.), World War I and Propaganda (Leiden/Boston: Brill Aca-
demic Publishers, 2014); María Inés Tato, “Fighting for a Lost Cause? The Ger-
manophile Newspaper La Unión in Neutral Argentina, 1914–1918” in War in
History vol. 25, no. 4, 2018.
76 TNA, FO 118/352, “Report no 112 from Sir Reginald Tower to Mr  Edward
Grey”, 24 April 1915; FO 118/384, “Report no 93 from Sir Reginald Tower to
Mr Edward Grey”, 23 February 1916.
77 MAE-CADLC, Fond Guerre 1914–1918. Amérique latine, Dossier 191, “Note
no 24.466 du Ministère de la Guerre pour le Ministère des Afaires Étrangères”,
25 August 1917.
78 Boletín Militar 3932, 24 August 1914, pp. 738–739; TNA, FO 118/427, “Report
no 53 from Sir Reginald Tower to Mr Balfour”, 28 February 1917.
79 Kinkelin, “La caída de Przemysl”, p. 179.
80 Kinkelin, “Desde las líneas alemanas”, 16 October 1914, pp. 12–13.
81 Compagnon, L’adieu . . . , pp. 195–210.
82 Kinkelin, “Con los ejércitos de Hindenburg en Polonia”, pp. 92–93.
83 Kinkelin, “En Noyon, a la vista de la torre de Eifel”, p. 106.
84 Kinkelin, “Desde las líneas alemanas”, November 1914, in Mis corresponden-
cias . . . , vol. I, p. 59.
85 Kinkelin, “Desde las líneas alemanas”, 18 October 1914, in Mis corresponden-
cias . . . , vol. I, p. 40.
86 Kinkelin, “Con los ejércitos de Hindenburg en Polonia”.
87 Kinkelin, “A través de los campos de batalla en los Vosgos”, p. 328.
88 Kinkelin, “Desde las líneas alemanas”, pp. 10–11.
89 Ibid., p. 11.
90 John Horne and Alan Kramer, German Atrocities, 1914. A History of Denial
(New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2001).
91 Kinkelin, “El avance y retroceso de los franceses”, p. 34.
92 Kinkelin, “El esfuerzo militar de los aliados en Francia”, pp. 302–303.
93 Kinkelin, “En el teatro occidental de la guerra”, 8 May 1915, in Mis correspon-
dencias . . . , vol. I, p. 134.
94 Kinkelin, “En el teatro occidental de la guerra”, 8 May 1915, pp. 124–126.
184 María Inés Tato and Luis Esteban Dalla Fontana
95 Kinkelin, “Desde las líneas alemanas”, p. 10.
96 Alan Kramer, “Combatants and noncombatants: atrocities, massacres, and war
crimes” in John Horne (ed.), A Companion to World War I (Chichester: Black-
well Publishing, 2010), pp. 190–193.
97 Kinkelin, “Hienas bípedas”, 21 August 1917, in Mis correspondencias . . . , vol.
II, pp. 320–334.
98 Kinkelin, “Desde las líneas alemanas”, p. 112.
99 Kinkelin, “Verdun”, p. 386.
100 Ibid., pp. 385–386.
101 Ibid., pp. 387–388.
102 Friedrich Katz, La guerra secreta en México (México: Ediciones Era, 2013).
103 Javier Ponce, “Propaganda and Politics: Germany and Spanish Opinion in
World War I”  in  Troy RE Paddock, World War I  and Propaganda (Leiden/
Boston: Brill), pp. 299, 307.
104 Kinkelin, “Una entrevista con Ballin”, December 1915, in Mis corresponden-
cias . . . , vol. I, pp. 303–304.
105 Corresponsal, “Las islas Malvinas” in La Nación, 31 January 1918. This arti-
cle was not included in Mis correspondencias. 

References
Anonymous, Guía periodística argentina (Buenos Aires: F Antonio Le Rose y Mont-
masson, 1913).
Banks, Arthur, A Military Atlas of the First World War (Barnsley, South Yorkshire:
Pen & Sword Books Ltd, 2010).
Compagnon, Olivier, L’adieu à l’Europe. L’Amérique latine et la Grande Guerre
(Paris: Fayard, 2013).
Compagnon, Olivier and Purseigle, Pierre, “Géographies de la mobilisation et ter-
ritoires de la belligérance durant la Première Guerre mondiale” in Annales, His-
toire, Sciences Sociales, vol. 71, no. 1, 2016.
Churchill, Winston S, La crisis mundial, 1911–1918 (Barcelona: Los Libros de
Nuestro Tiempo, 1944).
Dalla Fontana, Luis Esteban, “¿Operaciones conjuntas durante la Primera Guerra
Mundial? – Primera Parte” in Revista de la Escuela Superior de Guerra, 2014,
p. 587.
Dalla Fontana, Luis Esteban, “La Gran Guerra y los escritores militares argentinos”
in Tato, María Inés; Pires, Ana Paula and Dalla Fontana, Luis Esteban (eds.),
Guerras del siglo XX. Experiencias y representaciones en perspectiva global
(Rosario: Prohistoria, 2019).
Falkenhayn, Erich von, El Comando Supremo del Ejército Alemán, 1914–1916 y sus
decisiones esenciales (Buenos Aires: Biblioteca del Ofcial, 1920).
Gilbert, Martin, Atlas de la Primera Guerra Mundial (Madrid: Akal, 2003).
Horne, John and Kramer, Alan, German Atrocities, 1914. A History of Denial (New
Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2001).
Katz, Friedrich, La guerra secreta en México (México: Ediciones Era, 2013).
Kinkelin, Emilio, Mis correspondencias a La Nación durante la guerra europea (Bue-
nos Aires: Guillermo Kraft, 2 vols, 1921).
Kramer, Alan, “Combatants and Noncombatants: Atrocities, Massacres, and War
Crimes” in John Horne (ed.), A Companion to World War I (Chichester: Black-
well Publishing, 2010).
 Argentine reporter in European trenches 185
Peterson, HC, Propaganda for War. The Campaign against American Neutrality,
1914–1917 (New York: Kennikat Press, 1968).
Ponce, Javier, “Propaganda and Politics: Germany and Spanish Opinion in World
War I” in Paddock, Troy RE (ed.), World War I and Propaganda (Leiden/Boston:
Brill Academic Publishers, 2014).
Rantanen, Terhi, When News Was News (Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009).
Rinke, Stefan, Latin America and the First World War (Cambridge: Cambridge Uni-
versity Press, 2017).
Sanders, Michael and Taylor, Philip M, British Propaganda During the First World
War 1914–1918 (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1982).
Stevenson, David, 1914–1918. Historia de la Primera Guerra Mundial (Buenos
Aires: Debate, 2014).
Tato, María Inés, “Luring Neutrals. Allied and German Propaganda in Argentina
During the First World War” in Paddock, Troy RE (ed.), World War I and Propa-
ganda (Leiden/Boston: Brill Academic Publishers, 2014).
Tato, María Inés, La trinchera austral. La sociedad argentina ante la Primera Guerra
Mundial (Rosario: Prohistoria, 2017).
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Unión in Neutral Argentina, 1914–1918” in War in History, vol. 25, no. 4, 2018.
Terraine, John, The Great War (London: Wordsworth Editions, 1998).
Welch, David, Germany, Propaganda and Total War, 1914–1918 (New Brunswick:
Rutgers University Press, 2000).
9 Covert wars in Spain
(1914–1918)
Belligerent agency and local
impacts
Carolina García Sanz

It is the belligerent powers that strive to unbalance our neutrality and

approach Spain because the country has not approached them.1

Historical narratives of how governments and societies perceived neutrality

in a global confict like the First World War have tended to be pervaded by
interpretations based on how the status of neutrality should have worked
and not of how it really worked. Whereas neutral countries’ relations with
belligerent powers could hardly be restricted to the Hague Convention, the
role of neutrals was as pivotal to belligerent war aims as warring agents’
mediation to their domestic afairs.2 The inevitable extension of the confict
to neutral arenas thus demonstrates one of the most complex and multifac-
eted challenges for combatant states and non-combatant societies between
1914 and 1918. For instance, belligerent interference was decisive for the
Iberian Peninsula periphery maintaining a neutral position. In fact, Spain,
declaring itself neutral on 4 August 1914, was the only country to remain
neutral in that area until November 1918 while, at the same time, paradoxi-
cally strengthening its diplomatic and economic ties with the Allied side.
From this perspective, old-fashioned ideas of so-called peripheral expe-
riences of the confict need to be reconsidered by fully understanding the
grassroot efects of relations between belligerent and neutral actors, while
simultaneously fnding more imaginative and accurate ways of connecting
global warring processes with their myriad impacts beyond the hotspots.
This would indeed prove useful to exemplify transnational adaptations
to changes in political and socio-economic confgurations during the First
World War. This chapter, in order to assess the intensity of belligerent impact
on processes unfolding the length and breadth of Spain between 1914 and
1918, frst discusses legitimacy for such interference, posing domestic defni-
tions of war and neutrality and; second, analyses external agency focusing
on Allied intelligence and consular services meddling in a neutral country’s
internal afairs. For many Spaniards, the armed confict ultimately interfered
with their daily lives. The body of this chapter will consequently be devoted
to showing who was responsible for pushing the country towards war and
 Covert wars in Spain (1914–1918) 187
the driving forces behind them. With these two aims in mind, we will take
well-known case studies regarding Spain and the war and reconsider them
in the light of new secondary sources and archival material.

Broken neutrality
Neutrality would soon become uncomfortable dividing Spain into two
opposing ideological sides, pro-Ally (consisting of the politically  margin-
alised groups, so-called the real Spain) and Germanophile (those identify-
ing with the establishment, the so-called ofcial Spain), whose stark rivalry
would give rise to the well-known “civil war of words”.3 While conservative
Germanophiles defended strict neutrality from the onset of war, the left-
oriented pro-Allies considered the July Crisis of 1914 an international afair
in which, given the weakness of the state, the country had no say. Nonethe-
less, the press, which acted as a mouthpiece for liberals and radicals, took
a pro-Allied stance (for example El Liberal,  El Socialista,  El Heraldo de
Madrid, El Sol, El Diario Universal). Their political target would not be so
much calling for the country’s direct participation in the European war as
it would be whipping up national support for French and British systems as
models for a future regenerated Spain. In the end, pro-Allied supporters still
hoped that international circumstances would force a change in the political
system. Their newspapers had to welcome “painful” neutrality imposed by
“ofcial Spain” as the “lesser evil”:

All countries, in spite of their alliances and idealisms, if war comes, face
difcult decisions, fear ruin, because they know very well that the most
victorious war also breaks the victor for many years. Fluctuations in
stock market prices force neutrality much more than street demonstra-
tions. Let us hope, therefore, that in this case the lesser evil will occur,
nonetheless beforehand and despite being a lesser evil, it grieves us for
many other reasons.4

Had the country any real possibility of territorial expansion, would Span-
ish neutrality have been more discursively challenged? In the summer of
1914, Count Romanones and his liberal opposition followers thought war
to be a chance for retribution in Morocco given Spanish traditional alli-
ances in the region. They did not understand how the conservative Eduardo
Dato could suddenly have dismissed “what had (previously) been the for-
eign policy designed by conservatives and liberals in countless diplomatic
speeches and documents”; “that policy should not be ignored in neutrality
statements”.5 However, contrary to what the old liberal leader argued, the
country had no actual reason to be dragged into a war. The Spanish position
in Morocco never depended on a formal alliance with the Entente powers.6
Indeed, a rival group of liberals under the leadership of Manuel García Pri-
eto (Marquis of Alhucemas) would also endorse the conservative cabinet’s
188 Carolina García Sanz
policy as “most sensible and patriotic . . . as well as the most suitable for
national realities”.7 Prieto’s group made clear that Spaniards should stay
away from their liberal opponents’ deluded perceptions:

In good faith, but entailing pernicious efects, they are wearing helmets
and throwing their spears as heroes of the past when the imagination
ran wild and we had to come back to pragmatism, very late and pain-
fully broken.8

As the intellectual and reformist Luis de Zulueta suggested in España,

the country’s decision would struggle amidst national ideals and patriotic
dreams. Conquering both would require sacrifces beyond Spain’s ability.
The nation was obliged to trust others’ agency:

Is it a true national ideal or a patriotic dream?

A benevolent and conciliatory attitude towards the Gibraltar ques-
tion would be a credit to England at the time of future peace. From
this war may emerge a new international spirit, more legal and more
human. England, as her statesmen say, has raised the sword to defend
a small state, and must not raise it against peoples who do not depend
on force, but on justice.
Is all this only a dream?9

Spain was thus in an inferior position compared with the belligerent pow-
ers. The success of neutrality depended upon Anglo-French power in the
Mediterranean as it was emphasized by pro-Allied views:

As much as I have written on military matters or military policy – and

God forgive me – I have always tried to convince those who are below
and above that we should have a military organization that being fnan-
cially supportable, in times of crisis, would make neutrality not rest on
our geographical position and inner political situation nor on the bel-
ligerents’ goodwill or powerlessness.10

When pro-Allied opinion makers looked in the Belgian mirror, they could
only see the image of British power. Unarmed and neutral Spain therefore
entrusted its defence to the greatest empire. Indeed, in August  1914 the
Spanish pro-Allied newspaper El Liberal acknowledged British maritime
power and sang retaliation praises. England would soon win the European
war by giving a decisive blow to German naval trade.11 Conspicuous Anglo-
philes would develop the thesis of the superiority of the British civil empire
as a model of “peace and progress” in a new world order.12
Specifcally, the escalation of confict proved the reality of those perceptions
of national helplessness before the great belligerent powers and particularly
the British. To begin with, uncertainty in the international markets initially
 Covert wars in Spain (1914–1918) 189
had a huge negative impact on the Madrid Stock Exchange. Datos’ cabinet
had to place an export ban on basic commodities to stave of the spectre of
domestic shortages.13 In 1915, the national infation rate was 7.5 per cent, by
1918 it had dangerously exceeded the 20 per cent mark. While war would
ultimately be “a fabulous period” for some export-oriented companies giv-
ing rise to “an authentic orgy of profts”, galloping infation and shortages
dangerously widened the gap between the two “Spains”.14 Additionally, the
national shipping tonnage would be one of the most afected by the German
U-boat campaign which targeted Spanish trade with the Allies, putting the
loss at about 60 ships and one hundred lives, probably an underestimated
fgure. From February 1917, the civil governors had to instruct newspapers’
editors to desist from publishing naval news relating to the movement of
German submarines in Spanish territorial waters to avoid political cam-
paigns around it fostered by pro-Allied sectors. Furthermore, that year the
pro-Allied political cause also sufered a serious setback, as the sinking of
the San Fulgencio hastened the fall of the government of Count Romanones
in April. While conservatives summoned tens of thousands of neutralists to
a meeting hosted at the Madrid Bullring that same month, a few weeks later
about 25,000 people attended a pro-Allied meeting at the same venue.
Despite the mammoth eforts of the censors, it was impossible to avoid
certain submarine-related news from being leaked to the public, as hap-
pened in the military port of Cádiz (La Carraca) between June and Octo-
ber 1917. Neutrality consequently started to appear a mere subterfuge used
by discredited politicians who systematically rigged elections to keep social
control. In the midst of great political instability and social upheaval, there
would be another three diferent cabinets before 1917 ended.15 Moreover,
expectations on the political changes brought about by the war attracted
conservative attention in the last months of the confict. The Germanophile
New Right, represented by the young followers of Antonio Maura, would
take centre stage with an interpretation of a new post-war era in terms of
political counter-revolution. After the Russian Revolution, the “red peril”
would need to be dealt with in Spain. Maura’s national cabinet provisions of
“absolute power to guarantee Spain’s neutrality” (9 July 1918), the so-called
Law against Espionage – even as an authoritarian subterfuge to impose cen-
sorship against the “real Spain” press  – would be a late example of the
extent to which outsiders had destabilised the country. In fact, despite inter-
nal debates and political interpretations of war, Spanish neutrality had been
challenged from the outset by the direct interference of the warring parties,
undermining on many occasions the country’s integrity and sovereignty.

The Spanish alibi for belligerents’ mobilisation

Staf of the belligerents’ consular services would be early eyewitnesses and,
ultimately, players in the far-reaching changes that the confict soon pro-
duced in neutral Spain. Well-established consular agents understood, before
190 Carolina García Sanz
and better than anyone else, that their national interests could turn this neu-
tral territory into a hotspot.16 Already in 1914, foreign consular networks
consisted of more than a hundred vice-consulates and consular agencies all
over Spain. There were fve main consular districts coinciding with ports
and important areas of business, where foreign merchant communities had
traditionally been based: Seville, Malaga, Barcelona, Bilbao, and Vigo. From
those posts, trade agents enjoyed privileged observation posts, which in war
conditions proved extremely useful for extracting ground-level information
and interacting with local societies to extend their countries’ economic infu-
ence. As a British consul noted in relation to Spanish customs data in 1916:

It cannot, however, be too often impressed upon British merchants that

commercial matters in this country difer from those elsewhere, and that
personal efort, personal relations, personal friendship and sympathetic
dealing, are all important for those who wish to work with proft and
harmony in Spain. This, of course, includes due recognition of unwrit-
ten trade customs of the country, consideration for rendering and conf-
dence in those with whom it is proposed to deal. . . . In fact it is difcult
to cultivate good trade relations in Spain by persons at a distance, unless
they themselves occasionally study the situation on the spot, or employ
sympathetic agents prepared to live in this country, and learn to appre-
ciate and understand the qualities of their neighbours. It is my opinion
that personal knowledge acquired on the spot is essential for success.17

Starting with the Germans, they were a relatively small but infuential
community of 80,000 residents. In the pre-war period, German Naval intel-
ligence had already established a commercial service in the Spanish zone of
infuence in Morocco.18 Barcelona was also an important centre of activ-
ity where powerful companies like the Banco Transatlántico Alemán and
Siemens Schukert had been long established. When German Ambassador
Prince Max von Ratibor arrived in Madrid in 1912, he was already aware
of the need to promote German business and counteract the overwhelming
infuence that the French and British had on local economic afairs. Between
1910 and 1913, Spanish imports by country of origin came from France
(15.80 per cent), Great Britain (17.70 per cent), and Germany (9.90 per
cent).19 So, when the war broke out, a full-on propaganda war began in the
Spanish capital and other major cities with branches of Allgemeine Elek-
tricitäts-Gesellschaft (AEG) participating. In October 1914, more than 400
Spanish journalists cooperated to some degree with the Germans, as subsidies
for conservative newspapers started to be the rule. Generally, newspapers
representing the interests of conservatism and the church expressed sympa-
thies with the Central Powers (ABC, Nueva España, El Correo Español, El
Debate, etc.).
On the one hand, daily allowances and supplies (to be repaid after the
confict) from local German consulates would support national residents’
 Covert wars in Spain (1914–1918) 191
activities against extensive Allied economic interests.20 On the other, the
German Imperial Navy ofcer Lieutenant Commander Hans von Krohn was
appointed to a special mission in Madrid in September 1914. Together with
Major Arnold Kalle, who had undertaken the position of military attaché
in April 1913, they used connections amongst the ruling elite to win favour
with the Spanish conservatives. So, whereas German propaganda won the
support of several infuential Spanish newspapers in Madrid, the secret
organisation fostered by both military men was committed to hindering
Allied supplies by sabotaging companies working for the Allies in the south
and northern hinterlands of Spain.21 As a French report would pose in 1916:

The German propagandists were raising sympathies for their cause,

popularizing the German truth of war and protecting the German com-
mercial position in the Peninsula. The division of labour in their organi-
zation was perfect with eforts made by diferent services focused on
information and publicity tasks.22

The long shadow of German aggression against long-standing Franco-

British interests in Spain had called for Allied mobilisation at an early stage
of the war. It is estimated that the British and French represented on their
part four times the German population in the country. Next to the Brit-
ish enclave of Gibraltar, the traditional key to the Mediterranean whose
defence was immediately reinforced by the British, there were other eco-
nomic “Gibraltars” to protect in Spain. In the north, important frms such
as Altos Hornos, Sota y Aznar, or Orconera Iron Ore would soon be sup-
plying the British army. In the south, the main consortiums involved in
ferro-pyrite mines were in British hands (Peña de Hierro Copper Mines, San
Miguel Company, and the United Alkali Company). Moreover, the French
had an important stake in the Spanish railway business and banking system.
They would later control Spanish lead production through Société Minière
et Métallurgique de Peñarroya. So, the extensive networks they had woven
around the ports and places of Spanish business gave the Allies a consider-
able head start. According to commercial data, during the confict German
imports were reduced to 0.90 per cent.23

The British “hawkish approach” (1915)

High-ranking British naval ofcials were frst to react against political impli-
cations of German covert operations in a supposedly pro-Allied country like
Spain.24 The Director of Naval Intelligence, Admiral Reginald “Blinker”
Hall, sponsored a cohort of young ofcers eager to move on from naval pas-
sive defence to aggressive attack in neutral arenas. They were the so-called
Young Turks “in mental revolt” against what they considered a timid policy
of the Board of Admiralty towards German breakthroughs.25 But, starting
from a primarily defensive approach, over time their goals moved towards a
192 Carolina García Sanz
more ofensive position fuelled by “sentiments of patriotism and that com-
mon hatred of the German . . . which have passed by the British communi-
ties in other places”.26
Lt Commander Joseph Kenworthy (Admiralty War Staf), a “Young
Turk” himself who served at Gibraltar at the time, described in his memoirs
the mental maps of those bold ofcers, resembling modern “Machiavellis”,
“the most brilliant of their day”.27 This group frequently criticised their own
national command who longed for decisive battle [tactical victory] “while
German trade was allowed to continue in neutral and through neutral
ports”.28 The naval propagandist and Member of Parliament Thomas Gib-
son Bowles, who used to spend his holidays in Algeciras and pay frequent
visits to Gibraltar, had long embraced that same idea.29 His famous military
study, Gibraltar a National Danger (1901), already focused on Spain as a
potential national threat in case of its alliance with an ultimate enemy of
England.30 Also in the pre-war period, the pacifst Norman Angell, who
represented the exact opposite of Bowles’ thinking on the British political
spectrum, had already conjectured that Spain, in a future war, despite being
a friendly economic country, would do nothing to help Great Britain against
Germany.31 Not surprisingly in November  1914, in a letter published in
The Times, Bowles fully vindicated the much-reviled principle of “might
is right”: “Lord Fisher knows what war really is. He is now happily in a
position to rescue the Navy”.32 The publicist had been one of the major crit-
ics of the London Declaration of 1909 and stood out against “intolerable
restrictions on British enforcement of belligerent rights”.33 In his new view,
stronger was the country “better adapted for the environment”, as Britain
was in that regional theatre.
Ultimately, a member of the “Young Turks” school, Major Charles Julian
Thoroton RMLI (Royal Marine Light Infantry), was chosen by Admiral
Hall to lead the British secret service in Spain. Members of the consular
service, colonial ofcials, insurance agents Lloyd’s of London, and fellow
countrymen were all called to report trade movements and German espio-
nage suspects to him. Captain Richard Webb, in charge of the Trade Divi-
sion (Admiralty War Staf), later acknowledged: “at no port abroad have
contraband matters been handled more efciently than at Gibraltar . . . I can
safely say that the work of this port has been excellent”.34 But Thoroton’s
target was not only blockading German trade from the Spanish seaboard.
Intelligence duties expanded on lines not anticipated until war experience
showed the necessity, including writing ofcial press bulletins, intercepting
messages, and personal investigations.35
In 1915, German funds available for sabotage plots against British interests
in Spain reached as much as 800,000 pesetas. Moreover, Pro-Allied media
also echoed fghts revolving around British economic power in the region:36

Rio Tinto is a region of 70,000 inhabitants turned into a foreign com-

pany’s own private fefdom, which makes the issue twice as irritating.
 Covert wars in Spain (1914–1918) 193
As a private company, it performs all the arbitrariness that its formida-
ble wealth permits; as a foreign company, it annually exports 2,500,000
tons that have to be transformed, turning into varied products in foreign
factories, which then give a large quota to our national importation . . .
Spanish laws do not apply here, nor do they apply in the rest of the
country. Under arbitrary laws made in London, English capitalists have
invaded the entire region from Rio Tinto to the sea. Agricultural wealth
has tragically died from calcination; Huelva, which could be a large
industrial city, has become an immense deposit of minerals for foreign-
ers; and as the greater or lesser industrial activity of a people depends
on freedom, culture and progress, all this agonizes in the English Com-
pany’s clutches.

In the spring of that year, the German submarine campaign in the North
Atlantic afected the pyrite cargo shipped from the ports of Huelva and
Seville. The fear of sabotage was then very real. After all, Spanish employees
in Allied mines would not fnd it difcult to inform the German organisation
in Spain about dates of shipping, boats, and sea routes. The British novelist
AEW Mason, who joined Thoroton’s organisation, became deeply involved
in the Spanish counter-intelligence scene in 1915:

He appeared to have no connection with the War; he was just one of

these Englishmen – locos ingleses – enjoying himself in his yacht, at the
risk of running across a German mine, or being torpedoed from a Ger-
man submarine if the Germans cared to waste ammunition on this crazy
millionaire in his beautiful yacht.37

Another most important source of on-the-ground information for the

British was the Spanish tycoon Juan March. It is not clear how Thoroton
came across him. Four names have been suggested as mediators in that fruit-
ful relationship: the head of the Spanish secret police in Barcelona, Ramón
Carbonell; Bibi Carlton, “Thoroton’s old friend”, who had many acquaint-
ances in Morocco from where March ran his tobacco smuggling network;
Walter Harris, The Times correspondent in Morocco; and even General
Louis-Herbert Lyautey, French Resident General of Morocco.38 Moreover,
March’s infuential partners, like José Juan y Domine, a liberal member of
the Spanish senate and owner of the Compañía Valenciana de Vapores de
África, also ofered assistance to the British secret organisation.39
Thoroton actually called March “my pirate” since the contrabandist
acted as a double agent and reported on cases of cooperation between Span-
ish customs ofcers and the Germans:

Juan March as their chief provided with all the stock in trade for
unlawful trafc, such as complete local knowledge of covers and hiding
places, connivance of authorities, motor feluccas, with lawless crews,
194 Carolina García Sanz
and motors. These smugglers, through Juan March have already been
working for Germany. Though many of their boats are registered at
Gibraltar and fy the British fag, they have been employed in running
German reservists across to Italian territory. The further step – the sup-
ply of submarines – would arouse no scruples. . . . My informant from
Majorca is incredibly convinced that the smugglers are forming depots,
or caches of petrol at three or four spots. The petrol is despatched in
lots.40

However, not all Allies in Spain welcomed the Spanish contrabandist’s

cooperation. On 18 August 1915, the Italian consul in Gibraltar informed
the Italian Foreign Ofce in Rome that the Spanish seaboard was under
Thoroton’s surveillance due to his personal liaison with Juan March, who
had control of over 240 motor boats and monoplanes. However, the details
of the agreement between March and the British Admiralty had not been
revealed to the French.41 March was certainly pro-British but was he pro-
French too? In December  1915, First Lieutenant  Robert de Roucy was
appointed French Naval Attaché in Madrid. His mission was to promote
a secret organisation in Spain modelled on that of the British. So, members
of the greater French community – consuls, business managers, directors of
banks and mining companies – would start to pass information on the naval
service following the British example. In Barcelona, the French Consul Gen-
eral, Fernand Gaussen, would work in conjunction with the Naval Ofce
based in Toulon.

The “Cinderella service” (1916–1917)

In 1916 the Allies were operating diferent intelligence units in Spain and
they did not always work together harmoniously. Germany began to inten-
sify its submarine campaign in the Mediterranean, establishing, at the
same time, in Spanish ports, secret organisations for supplying or transmit-
ting information to U-boats. From March to December, 15 Spanish ships,
amounting to 33,000 metric tons, were sunk. Despite the French delay
in ofcially establishing a centralised information structure, their service
was in fact able to mobilise its own resources relatively quickly, including
local branches of the Crédit Lyonnais. However, diplomatic and consular
services continued to carry some weight when the French intelligence com-
munity mobilised on Spanish soil. Boundaries between units were not as
clearly defned as in the case of their British allies. According to the latter,
“New Rules for the Secret Service” passed in January that year, employ-
ment in consular posts became a “defnite disqualifcation” for intelligence
tasks.
British informants and feld agents were not to be publicly linked to diplo-
matic representation.42 On the one hand, Joseph Kenworthy remarked that
diplomatic and naval services in Spain “hated each other like poison”.43 On
 Covert wars in Spain (1914–1918) 195
the other, Arthur Keyser, Consul General in Seville would complain bitterly
about what he considered naval intrusions in his district:

Are these strange agents to expect transmission by the Consuls of all

their messages, blindly, without informing them of their contents, or
inviting opinion on their truth or authenticity? Should the agent accept
the Consul’s suggestion or advice, or is the Consul to place himself
unreservedly at his disposal, see him employ possibly doubtful persons,
and repeat in cipher all that he chooses to bring? Is the Consul to remain
silent if the stranger agent does what he believes to be compromising or
injudicious?44

Consuls and vice-consuls were reluctant to lose their personal powers in

the information feld to intelligence “professionals” or naval ofcers. They
claimed they knew better than anyone else the local feelings about the war
and trade. In Vigo and Barcelona, consuls also expressed strong objections
to being subordinate to the Gibraltar organisation. They had played a key
role in removing pro-Germans from British companies as well as in organis-
ing and developing channels for propaganda in their districts. They had also
cooperated with shipping companies like MacAndrews & Co. to distribute
propaganda in local ports. Furthermore, compiling blacklists had been one
of their most arduous tasks since February 1916. Consular networks were
ultimately responsible for local units of Uniones interaliadas, which were
very useful in fundraising at social events for the war wounded and POWs.
Overall, as Henry Montagu Villiers, consular representative in Malaga,
observed:

Undeniably the consular service gives one a pleasant opportunity of

getting to know the charms of various places and peoples. The local
language having been once thoroughly acquired, one can begin to
understand the great diference that nationality makes – their diferent
points of view on all great economic questions, commercial problems
and methods, etc. The average insular Briton seems to fnd it almost
impossible to realise these diferences, or at any rate to act, either in
politics or commerce, as if he were duly allowing for them. Usually he is
far too trustful. He expects all foreigners “to play cricket”. They do not.
It was this local knowledge and often local infuence that made Consuls
so exceptionally useful during the late Great War.45

Indeed Villiers, who would be promoted at the end of the war to head the
British trade mission in Spain and Portugal, considered that all “failure in
result has been the want of link at home, namely a strong organization to
guide, instruct, inform and connect consuls and the merchant community”.46
However, that lack of understanding between services did not extend to
the entire Allied scheme in Spain. For example, cooperation among members
196 Carolina García Sanz
of consular services tended to be the rule in diferent districts, especially
concerning propaganda activities; a work that proved to be dramatically
challenging from 1915:

With regard to propaganda, I can only repeat what I have on other occa-
sions written to the Foreign Ofce, i.e. that if such work is to bear good
fruit in Spain it must deal far more particularly, briefy and pointedly
with those aspects of the war which touch Spain and Spanish interests
both now and in days to come. No other sides of the question appeal
to them at all. Also it should be shown in what manner this German
made war afects the Roman Catholic religion. There should be given,
too, if they exist, all proofs of the alleged intention of the German army
to invade Spain in order to attack Gibraltar. Such works might really
result in positive good.47

In the spring of 1916, Albert Mousset, an expert in Spanish history, ran a

French propaganda bureau while the British operated through the Agencia
Anglo-Ibérica, directed by John Walter, connected to The Times. Although
the French were generally more successful in propaganda, their academic
and intellectual initiatives left a broad spectrum of local societies beyond
reach. Colonel Joseph Denvignes, appointed to a military mission at the
Madrid embassy, explained in October 1916:48

The Bulletin d’Informations has a reduced circulation. It is specially

addressed to an audience of intellectuals, professors, journalists and
parliamentarians. . . . The Spanish understood at frst glance that our
propaganda was aimed at intelligent, cultured minds, and that we did
not come to beg for sympathy.

Pierre Imbart de la Tour had been behind the visit of a group of French
academics to Spain with the aim of promoting the moral, intellectual, and
scientifc superiority of France.49 Henri Bergson was one of the star profles
of the French delegation that year, which also included other scientists and
academics. The tour began in San Sebastián and arrived in Madrid, where
after a high-profle conference the students invited Bergson to a reception
at the Residencia de Estudiantes, which Antonio Maura, Eduardo Dato,
and García Prieto, among others, attended. The tour later passed through
Seville, Valencia, Salamanca, and Oviedo. In many respects, the Allied appa-
ratus of persuasion aimed at sectors naturally and vocationally supportive
of the Allied cause: precisely where action was not so necessary.
This kind of elitist initiative would reveal Anglo-French faws in the strat-
egy as well as prejudices against the major section of the Spanish audience:50
“The wall of ignorance, and lack of knowledge or habit of reading, on the
part of the greater portion of the population, cannot be broken down by any
 Covert wars in Spain (1914–1918) 197
propaganda either for or against the allies”. The British Consul General in
Seville had been particularly hard on this point:

In the South of Spain, people read little during the war, and that lit-
tle was generally strictly confned to the particular newspaper which
the spiritual advisers allowed. Thus accurate knowledge of current
events was limited. As the only local newspaper then permitted to
be seen inside the homes of the upper classes was openly reported to
be edited by the German Consul, the narrowness of its views can be
imagined.51

Despite particular views, more Allied commitment to propaganda would

be vital to catch up with enemy initiatives in the Spanish feld from 1916.
First, the main stumbling block continued to be its fnancing, much lower
than that of their rivals. It was estimated that the monthly expenditure by
Germany on propaganda reached the astronomical fgure of one million
pesetas.52 Second, more efective tools had to be promoted locally such as
flm production, speeches, and meetings. The Inter-Allied Unions proved to
be ideal channels in business circles and casinos to guide the diferent activi-
ties, due to their dynamism and versatility in towns, providing the added
advantage of their ofcial independence from the consulates.
The confict also served to highlight the contribution of women activists
residing in the colonies of the warring nations. For instance, the Junta de
Damas Aliadas (Junta of Allied Ladies) had been very active, with Brit-
ish archaeologist Ellen Whishaw, in fundraising at the children’s parties for
peace for the child welfare institutions, Gota de Leche, the war wounded,
and POWs.53
War flms started to be the most efective instrument of propaganda such
as The Battle of the Somme shown from late 1916. The Battle of Ancre and
Letters from the Front would also become popular with the Spanish public.
Consular agents kept a record of the flms that had a more favourable impact
on the audience. The Cercle Interallié de Propagande Cinématographique
even rented one of the main theatres, the Teatro Benavente, in the Span-
ish capital. Due to the widespread reach of the French distribution house
Pathé Fréres, 23,000 metres of flm roll were projected in Madrid, Barce-
lona, Bilbao, Valencia, Seville, Almeria, Cartagena, Gijon, San Sebastian,
and Salamanca.54 However, as a form of propaganda it had limitations. In
the summer of 1917, flms would be shown in public alamedas and squares,
but it was challenging for exciting and dramatic flms to compete with
“the exhibition of serious subjects, even if it were either dignifed or in good
taste to mix the terrible realities of war with frivolous amusements of the
people”.55
Nonetheless, the autumn of 1917 and the winter of 1918 coincided with an
impulse for the distribution of war flms. The Allies saw a clear opportunity
198 Carolina García Sanz
to counterbalance the overwhelming German supremacy in that feld. But
there would be a debate about charging admission or entrance fees:

There is often however a tendency, on the part of the entrance paying

public, to favour dramatic and sensational subjects, and to expect a
constant change of programme. On the other hand, when the public get
their shows for free they are usually interested and satisfed with what
is provided.56

American belligerency would bring the activities of their Public Informa-

tion Committee (CIP) to Madrid in 1918.57 In January, the frst proposal to
amalgamate Allied propaganda services was discussed. Two meetings were
held in the Spanish capital with this aim, but the Americans decided not
to join the Allied scheme. They reached an agreement with the distributor
Pathé Fréres, releasing a batch of flms that had no connection to the war
but reserving their control over most of their own war propaganda produc-
tion. However, this flm propaganda scheme was severely challenged by the
reinforcement of Spanish censorship in 1918 due to the country’s political
crisis. In Madrid it began to prove difcult to show flms connected with the
war and, in the provinces, it depended on the regional governor and local
authorities’ sympathies for the Allies.

Spies against revolutionaries (1918–1919)

During the crisis of 1917, the war had “rushed in and invaded the streets
with its spies, smugglers, and gunmen”, and “with the accompanying social
and economic unrest, it began to shape a new Spanish scenario”.58 In the
summer of that year, military, political, and social conficts broke out simul-
taneously. The military movement (Juntas Nacionales de Defensa) formed
in opposition to the privileges of the Moroccan section of the Spanish army,
the challenge in Barcelona to parliament being in Madrid (Asamblea de
Parlamentarios), and the revolutionary general strike had serious efects
on Allied strategy. In August, Lieutenant Commander Aristide Bergasse du
Petit-Thouars replaced Roucy as head of the French secret service. A Span-
ish Freemason plot came to light and the French secret service had appar-
ently been a participant.59 Moreover, a wave of industrial strikes posed a
serious threat to Allied supplies of pyrite and oxides.
In particular, the neighbourhood of Gibraltar was crucial to German
operations. More than 8,000 Spanish workers daily crossed the border to
work at the dockyards in the colony. Coalmen and stevedores on strike
jeopardised the logistics of the naval convoy system implemented to coun-
teract unrestricted submarine war since May 1917. While Gibraltar ofcers
infltrated workers’ rallies and strikes, the Spanish Dirección General de
Seguridad identifed possible instigators.60 There was a shared interest in
fghting subversives who were disturbing public order. However, the close
 Covert wars in Spain (1914–1918) 199
cooperation of the Spanish police chief in Barcelona, Manuel Bravo Portillo,
with German naval espionage showed the extent to which the Germans
exerted leverage over the Spanish administration through bribery and cor-
ruption. Bravo Portillo’s dealings with the captain of the port of Palamós
were revealed in June 1918 by the anarchist paper Solidaridad Obrera. Both
Spaniards were considered responsible for the sinking of the Joaquín Mum-
brú which, after leaving Barcelona in December 1917, was torpedoed in the
Atlantic. It caused public feelings of anger and major political scandal, while
Maura’s return to power at the head of a government of national unity coin-
cided with the last months of war. The old Majorcan politician, who had
maintained an ambivalent attitude towards the system, would become com-
mitted to the “moral superiority of an authoritarian government of elites”
in view of the impending “red peril”.
In this climate, the French sought to distance themselves from British
counter-espionage methods combined with repressive acts by the Spanish
police. Basically, they had a distinctive view of the social unrest. The French
thought that repression was far from being the only, and most suitable,
means of solving the problem. Persuasion was also considered essential to
counteract strikes. The battle against Germany had to be waged against their
propaganda too. Until 1917 there had been a predominantly aristocratic
component in the Allied propaganda strategy. The “natural” recipients of
their joint propaganda had been prominent fgures of the local aristocracy
and bourgeoisie. In the words of a British vice-consul, its target had been
the “most intelligent members of the general public”.61 In addition to that,
Arthur Keyser had written to the Foreign Ofce warning about British indif-
ference to the local audience:

It has recently been my duty to report on the efect of our propaganda

in Spain, relating what I believe to be the efect of the distribution of
various books and pamphlets which have been provided for that pur-
pose. Any good which I and others may have been fortunate enough to
accomplish by such means, is easily outbalanced by articles quoted from
the English papers similar in tone to that which has now attracted my
attention. And this is only one among many others. To those of us who
are earnestly engaged in an attempt to win sympathy for the Allies, this
unnecessary blow from our country is disheartening indeed. It is more
than probable that even patriotic writers in English papers, and their
editors, do not readily realise that sentences framed for the perusal of
London readers may take harmful efect when translated for the wider
circle which is awaiting them in a neutral country.62

The French propaganda service realised the error of that approach

which explained the stunning German propaganda success in Spanish
anarchist circles. The Spanish state of domestic dissatisfaction and agi-
tation, involving public demonstrations, had much deeper and complex
200 Carolina García Sanz
roots in Spanish political, economic, and social structures far beyond war
antagonisms. Overall, the war of words radically changed after 1917 and
not only because of the new strategies implemented by France in propa-
ganda channels. Naturally, the general state of insecurity at sea, together
with the loss of Spanish lives and tonnage had a huge impact on the work
done at the ground level. For its part, France undertook a restructuring
of its press service, linking it with naval intelligence. With the support of
the consular staf the publication of articles or episodes was encouraged,
refecting the full extent of the cruelty of submarine warfare. But if we
assess the impact of this new activity, it is clear there was no setback of
the Central Powers. On the contrary, their services advanced a convincing
argument, which had a broad impact on the Spanish press: Spain was suf-
fering submarine attacks because it was lending the whole of its national
shipping to Allied trade:

The Spaniard, from the moment he embarks on an English ship, is

regarded as such; he loses all his rights and freedoms, he is no longer his
own man, nor does he know where he is going or on what seas he will
be sailing; . . . if he embarks in a Spanish port, until he returns there,
he does not only cease to be Spanish, but also a man, and becomes an
automat.63

Infation rates and shortages were direct consequences of that anti-patriotic

trade with the Allies. This argument was a basic point in the digressions
from Spanish neutrality between spring 1917 and autumn 1918. Already
in 1916, the liberal Santiago Alba tried to introduce a tax on war profts.
This initiative met with opposition from the Catalan and Biscay MPs who
defended their respective shipping and mining interests in parliament. Alba’s
tax programme included a “project of national reconstitution”, an idea that
the conservative Augusto González Besada would unsuccessfully resuscitate
during the political crisis at the end of the war.64
Late in the war, in November  1918, external interference on the part
of the Allied powers had little impact on promoting their cause among
workers’ circles. The consul general who replaced Keyser in Seville, Lucien
Jerome, pointed fngers at some of his fellow-countrymen’s actions. The
famous painter and naval ofcer during the war, Gerald Kelly, arrived in
Jerome’s district, the latter complaining that:

[H]e does not understand how to handle men and has made a host of
unnecessary enemies, which would not matter if it did but afect him-
self, but most of his enemies, when foreigners are made into potential
enemies of the cause.65

Admiral Hall had asked Kelly, who knew Spanish, to go to Seville where
he had lived for some years before the war. But, according to Jerome, he
 Covert wars in Spain (1914–1918) 201
was too arrogant in his relations with the Spaniards and that caused much
trouble.
In contrast, the French network focused its attention on the foundation of
the Federación Regional Obrera (Regional Workers Federation). In Decem-
ber 1918, 21,500 workers had joined the new organisation. Many German
agents had infltrated and campaigned for the movement. They had even a
newspaper La Nueva Andalucía. A French agent reported that the situation
was acutely worsening:

It is believed that this movement in the countryside can become very

dangerous. The ground is indeed very propitious for that, because the
land is in very few hands, and the Andalusian peasants are in a situation
rather similar to which the Russian peasants were in.66

By then, the Central Powers had lost the war. Despite that, they had sur-
prisingly won many of the battles waged for Spanish opinion.

Conclusion
This chapter has shown how, across diferent strategic, economic, political,
and social felds, belligerent interference not only challenged the conficting
ways in which war and neutrality were experienced and interpreted by the
two “Spains”, but more importantly how they shaped them. Events such as
the La Canadiense strike and the lockouts in Barcelona in February 1919,
in addition to the outbreak of the “Bolshevik Triennium”, underlined yet
again the sensation of post-war economic derailment and social unrest prev-
alent in the country. The political and social transformation anticipated by
the old warring nations of Europe also opened the Spanish door to processes
that ultimately would deeply impact on the local landscape.

Notes
1 Spanish journalist, Luis Bello would comment upon the war period in 1920: L
Bello, España durante la guerra. Política y acción de los alemanes, 1914–1918
(Madrid: Editorial Europa, 1920), p. 8.
2 Essay collections which explicitly focus on neutrality during the First World War
in a global perspective: Johan den Hertog and Samuël Kruizinga (eds.), Caught
in the Middle. Neutrals, Neutrality and the First World War (Amsterdam, the
Netherlands: Amsterdam University Press, 2011); JL Ruiz Sánchez; IC Olivero
and C García Sanz (eds.), Shaping Neutrality Throughout the First World War
(Seville: Seville University Press, 2015).
3 GH Meaker, “A Civil War of Words: The Ideological Impact of the First World
War on Spain, 1914–1918” in Hans A Schmitt (ed.), Neutral Europe between
War and Revolution, 1917–1923 (Charlottesville: Virginia University Press,
1988), pp. 1–66; FJ Romero Salvadó, Spain 1914–1918: Between War and Rev-
olution (Routledge, 1990).
4 El Liberal, 27 July 1914, p. 1.
202 Carolina García Sanz
5 A. Figueroa, Notas de una vida (Madrid: Marcial Pons, 1999), p. 379.
6 In 1914 Spanish colonial ambitions revolved around Tangier and the hope that
the French would ofcially recognise a Spanish protectorate in Morocco, to
which Paris governments had frmly been opposed since 1912. Until then, the
Spanish had only achieved a mere acknowledgement of a “zone of infuence”
in the North of Africa. But contrary to what the liberal Count of Romanones’s
propaganda argued, the meeting between Edward VII and Alfonso XIII in Carta-
gena in April 1907 had only proven that “Spain had friends but not allies”. See F
García Sanz, “Between Europe and the Mediterranean Spanish-Italian Relations,
1898–1922” in Raanan Rein (ed.), Spain and the Mediterranean Since 1898,
(London: Routledge, 2013), p. 37.
7 La Mañana, 23 August 1914, p. 1.
8 Ibid.
9 España, 16 April 1915, p. 2.
10 El Liberal, 9 August 1914, p. 1.
11 El Liberal, 5 August 1914, p. 1.
12 España, 18 June 1915, pp. 2–3.
13 Gaceta de Madrid, 7 August 1914, p. 219.
14 M Martorell Linares, “It was Not Only a War, It Was a Revolution España y la
Primera Guerra Mundial” in Historia y Política, vol. 26, 2011, p. 24.
15 Manuel García Prieto from April to June; Eduardo Dato from June to Novem-
ber; and García Prieto once again in December 1917. The latter led a government
of national unity, a forerunner of that which Antonio Maura would preside from
March to November 1918.
16 Previous Spanish works addressing that question: C García Sanz, La Primera
Guerra Mundial en el Estrecho de Gibraltar (Madrid: CSIC, 2011); C García
Sanz, “British Blacklists in Spain During the First World War: The Spanish
Case Study as a Belligerent Battlefeld” in War in History, vol. 21, no. 4, 2014,
pp. 496–517.
17 The National Archives, Kew (TNA), FO 185/1320, Seville, 12 December 1916.
18 P Vickers, Finding Thoroton. The Royal Marine Who Ran British Naval Intelli-
gence in the Western Mediterranean in World War One (Southsea, Hants: Royal
Marines Historical Society, 2013), p. 14.
19 A Tena, “El sector exterior en la economía española” in A Carreras and X Tafu-
nel (eds.), Las Estadísticas Históricas de España siglo XIX y XX (Bilbao: Fun-
dación BBVA, 2005), pp. 615, 621.
20 TNA, Foreign Ofce, FO 902/35.
21 A Rosenbusch, “Guerra total en territorio neutral: actividades alemanas en
España durante la Primera Guerra Mundial” in Hispania Nova, vol. 15, 2017,
pp. 369–370.
22 Service Historique de l’Armèe de Terre (SHAT) 7N1201, no 82, Madrid, 14
October 1916.
23 Tena, “El sector exterior en la economía española”, pp. 615, 621.
24 Regarding early British retaliation against neutral trade in the south of Europe
see: C García Sanz, “Aliados en Guerra. Gran Bretaña y el comercio neutral
(1914–1916)” in Ayer, vol. 94, 2014, pp. 147–173; García Sanz, “British Black-
lists in Spain During the First World War”, pp. 495–517.
25 JM Kenworthy, Sailors, Statesmen and Others. An Autobiography (London:
Rich & Cowan, 1933), p. 58.
26 TNA, FO 833/18.
27 Kenworthy, Sailors, Statesmen and Others. An Autobiography, pp. 58–63.
28 Ibid., p. 62.
29 Archivo Histórico Nacional (AHN) Madrid, Ministerio de Asuntos Exteriores,
Primera Guerra Mundial, H3029.
 Covert wars in Spain (1914–1918) 203
30 Thomas Gibson Bowles, Gibraltar. Un peligro nacional: traducido del ingles por
A O’Neill de Tyrone (Madrid: Est. Tipográfco El Trabajo, 1901), pp. 12–29.
31 N Angell, The Great Illusion. A  Study of the Relation of Military Power in
Nations to Their Economic and Social Advantage (Lewes, DE: Heinemann,
1910 [2007]), p. 22.
32 AHN, Ministerio de Asuntos Exteriores, Primera Guerra Mundial, H3029.
33 JW Coogan, The End of Neutrality. The United States, Britain, and Mari-
time Rights 1899–1915 (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1981),
pp. 125–126.
34 Vickers, Finding Thoroton, p. 75.
35 TNA, ADM 116/1842, Reorganisation Intelligence Organisation 1918–1926.
36 España, 5 March 1915, p. 5.
37 C Andrew, Secret Service. The Making of the British Intelligence Community
(London: Penguin, 1985), p. 119.
38 Vickers, Finding Thoroton, pp. 143–144.
39 García Sanz, La Primera Guerra Mundial, pp. 239–240.
40 TNA, FO 185/1236, no 99, Barcelona, 19 April 1915.
41 Archivio del Ministero degli Afari Esteri Rome (AMAER), busta 80.
42 TNA, FO185/1302, “New rules regarding the Secret Service Work”, 29
January 1916.
43 Kenworthy, Sailors, Statesmen and Others. An Autobiography, p. 144.
44 TNA, FO185/1302, “New rules regarding the Secret Service Work”, 29
January 1916.
45 H Montague Villiers, Charms of the Consular Career (London: Hutchison,
1924), pp. 183–184.
46 TNA, FO 185/1430, no 202, Malaga, 12 November 1917.
47 TNA, FO 185/1241, no 70 514/15, Seville, 23 August 1915.
48 SHAT 7N1201, no 82, Madrid, 14 October 1916.
49 P Soulez, “Les missions de Bergson ou les paradoxes du philosophe véridique et
trompeur” in P Soulez (dir.), Les Philosophes et la Guerre de 14 (Paris: Presses
Universitaires de Vincennes, 1988), pp. 65–81.
50 Ibid.
51 A Keyser, Trifes and Travels (London: Dutton & Company, 1923), p. 257.
52 TNA, FO 185/1440, J Walter “A  short report on propaganda in Spain
March 1916-March 1917”.
53 Whishaw would raise 200,000 pesetas, Mundo Gráfco, 3 April 1918, p. 21.
54 TNA, FO 185/1419, no 35 (17/17) Cinematograph War Films.
55 TNA, FO 185/1424, no 106 (17/17), Seville, 8 June 1917.
56 TNA, FO 185/1464, 18.122, Madrid, 11 February 1918.
57 JA Montero, “Imágenes, ideología y propaganda: la labor del Comité de Infor-
mación Pública de los Estados Unidos en España (1917–1918)” in Hispania, vol.
228, 2008, pp. 211–238.
58 JA Lacomba, La crisis de 1917 (Madrid: Ciencia Nueva, 1970), p.  15. See
also recent accounts of belligerent meddling in F García Sanz, España en la
Gran Guerra. Espías, diplomáticos y trafcantes (Barcelona: Galaxia, 2014); E
González Calleja and P Aubert, Nidos de espías. España, Francia y la Primera
Guerra Mundial (1914–1919) (Madrid: Alianza, 2014).
59 García Sanz, España en la Gran Guerra, vol. 76, pp. 269–270.
60 Gibraltar Archives (GA), Miscellaneous Files War Diaries.
61 TNA, FO 185/1315, Marbella, 23 July 1915.
62 TNA, FO 185/1242, no 79, 534/15, Seville, 28 August 1915.
63 TNA, FO 185/1424, Seville, June 1917.
64 F Comín, “El período de entreguerras (1914–1936)” in F Comín (ed.), Historia
económica de España, siglos XIX–XX (Barcelona: Critica, 2002), pp. 285–329.
204 Carolina García Sanz
65 TNA, FO 185/1478, Seville, 27 November 1918.
66 SHM, SSQ60, no 324, Mennées Germano-Bolchevistes, 20 December 1918.

References
Andrew, Christopher, Secret Service. The Making of the British Intelligence Com-
munity (London: Penguin, 1985).
Angell, Norman, The Great Illusion. A Study of the Relation of Military Power in
Nations to Their Economic and Social Advantage (Lewes, DE: Heinemann, 1910
[2007]).
Bello, Luis, España durante la guerra. Política y acción de los alemanes, 1914–1918
(Madrid: Editorial Europa, 1920).
Bowles, Thomas Gibson, Gibraltar. Un peligro nacional: traducido del ingles por
A O’Neill de Tyrone (Madrid: Est. Tipográfco El Trabajo, 1901).
Comín, Francisco, “El período de entreguerras (1914–1936)” in Comín, Francisco
(ed.), Historia económica de España, siglos XIX–XX (Barcelona: Crítica, 2002),
pp. 285–329.
Coogan, John W, The End of Neutrality. The United States, Britain, and Maritime
Rights 1899–1915 (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1981).
den Hertog, Johan and Kruizinga, Samuël (eds.), Caught in the Middle. Neutrals,
Neutrality and the First World War (Amsterdam, the Netherlands: University
Press, 2011).
Figueroa, Álvaro, Notas de una vida (Madrid: Marcial Pons, 1999).
García Sanz, Carolina, La Primera Guerra Mundial en el Estrecho de Gibraltar
(Madrid: CSIC, 2011).
García Sanz, Carolina, “Aliados en Guerra. Gran Bretaña y el comercio neutral
(1914–1916)” in Ayer, vol. 94, 2014, pp. 147–173.
García Sanz, Carolina, “British Blacklists in Spain during the First World War: The
Spanish Case Study as a Belligerent Battlefeld” in War in History, vol. 21, no. 4,
2014, pp. 496–517.
García Sanz, Fernando, “Between Europe and the Mediterranean Spanish-Italian
Relations, 1898–1922” in Rein, Raanan (ed.), Spain and the Mediterranean Since
1898 (London: Routledge, 2013).
García Sanz, Fernando, España en la Gran Guerra. Espías, diplomáticos y traf-
cantes (Barcelona: Galaxia, 2014).
González Calleja, Eduardo and Aubert, Paul, Nidos de espías. España, Francia y la
Primera Guerra Mundial (1914–1919) (Madrid: Alianza, 2014).
Kenworthy, Joseph Montague, Sailors, Statesmen and Others. An Autobiography
(London: Rich & Cowan, 1933).
Keyser, Arthur Louis, Trifes and Travels (London: Dutton & Company, 1923).
Lacomba, Juan Antonio, La crisis de 1917 (Madrid: Ciencia Nueva, 1970).
Martorell Linares, Miguell, “No fue aquello solamente una guerra, fue una revolu-
ción España y la Primera Guerra Mundial” in Historia y Política, vol. 26, 2011,
pp. 17–45.
Meaker, GH, “A Civil War of Words: The Ideological Impact of the First World War
on Spain, 1914–1918” in Schmitt, Hans A (ed.), Neutral Europe between War
and Revolution, 1917–1923 (Charlottesville: Virginia University Press, 1988),
pp. 1–66.
 Covert wars in Spain (1914–1918) 205
Montero Jiménez, José Antonio, “Imágenes, ideología y propaganda: la labor del
Comité de Información Pública de los Estados Unidos en España (1917–1918)” in
Hispania, vol. 228, 2008, pp. 211–238.
Romero Salvadó, Francisco J, Spain  1914–1918:  Between  War and Revolution
(London: Routledge).
Rosenbusch, Anne, “Guerra total en territorio neutral: actividades alemanas en
España durante la Primera Guerra Mundial” in Hispania Nova, vol. 15, 2017,
pp. 369–370.
Ruiz Sánchez, José Leonardo, Olivero, Inmaculada Cordero and García Sanz, Caro-
lina (eds), Shaping Neutrality Throughout the First World War (Seville: Seville
University Press, 2015).
Soulez, Philippe, “Les missions de Bergson ou les paradoxes du philosophe véridique
et trompeur” in Soulez, Philippe (dir.), Les Philosophes et la Guerre de 14 ((Paris:
Presses Universitaires de Vincennes, 1988) pp. 65–81.
Tena, A, “El sector exterior en la economía española” in Carreras, A and Tafunel, X
(eds.), Las Estadísticas Históricas de España siglo XIX y XX (Bilbao: Fundación
BBVA, 2005).
Vickers, Philip, Finding Thoroton. The Royal Marine Who Ran British Naval Intel-
ligence in the Western Mediterranean in World War One (Southsea, Hants: Royal
Marines Historical Society, 2013).
Villiers, Henry Montague, Charms of the Consular Career (London: Hutchison,
1924).
10 Portuguese humanitarian
eforts during the First
World War1
Ana Paula Pires and Rita Nunes

When the writer Aquilino Ribeiro fnally published his war diary in 1934,
he looked back declaring it would be absurd to try to humanise his vision
of the First World War as he had recalled it.2 Aquilino had lived in Paris
between 1908 and 1914, where he attended the Sorbonne and was a student
of George Dumas, Lévy-Bruhl, and Émile Durkheim and never attempted
to hide his disgust over what he termed a “horrendous attack of univer-
sal epilepsy”.3 Aquilino’s wartime experience, published two decades after
the outbreak of the 1914–1918 war, although mediated by the passage of
time, continued to express the division that characterised Portuguese society
between those in favour of an intervention in Flanders and those against it.
Having married the German Grete Tiedmann in 1913, he refused to perceive
the war as a confrontation between civilisation and savagery, rejecting a
stereotyped enemy. The social and cultural complexity of the emotions that
his diary encapsulated reveal an inhuman essence associated with war simi-
lar to that also present in the writings of Bernardo Soares, a pseudonym of
Fernando Pessoa, who stated that the confict had led to a “world of those
who do not feel”.4 Despite its dehumanised features, the horror produced
by industrial warfare was, however, able to mobilise support, and, like any
other confict, the Great War was capable of intensifying collective emotions
and building on “a moral economy of feelings and attitudes”5 and to lay
foundations for the construction of “new approaches to wartime humani-
tarian relief”.6
The Great War introduced brutality and human cruelty on an unprece-
dented scale. The confict was the frst among the industrialised global pow-
ers; it blew away faith in progress and unveiled a dehumanised violence that
engulfed soldiers and civilians alike on a global scale. Horror and despair
haunted civilian populations as fear, uncertainty, and carnage provoked by
modern warfare technologies transformed battlefelds into killing felds.
This period also witnessed the most important military deployment by Por-
tuguese troops outside the country’s borders throughout the frst half of the
twentieth century.
This chapter analyses humanitarian mobilisation in support of Portugal’s
participation in the First World War in order to disclose the eforts made
 Portuguese humanitarian eforts during WWI 207
by individuals and institutions to mediate sufering between the battlefeld
and the home front and into the peripheries of a networked and global world.

The pain of others

The 1914–1918 confict created the world’s frst “liquid society”7 as it intro-
duced insecurity and uncertainty on a global scale. On the eve of the First
World War, despite the growing rush to arms, it was still believed that the
contraction of the globe, a consequence of increasing interconnected net-
works of ideas, people, capital, and goods, would in itself prevent the out-
break of confict involving the great European powers. Communications
(terrestrial and “voice”) had acquired a new dimension and throughout
the second half of the nineteenth century became the main instrument in
the construction of an internationalism powered by steam and telegraph,
which shortened the distances between London and India or Oporto and
the United States of America.8 By bringing simultaneity of experience into
the lives of people separated by vast distances, this “shrinkage” played a sig-
nifcant role in shaping, between 1914 and 1918, the idea of an endangered
homeland, which helped build a narrative able to mobilise divided societies
such as that of Portugal.
Portugal was then a rural country, with a majority illiterate population,
dealing with a complex economic and fnancial situation and furthermore
dependent on the exterior for the supply of foodstufs (cereals) and energy
resources (coal). The Portuguese Republic had not yet turned four when
the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, Franz Ferdinand, and his wife,
the Duchess of Hohenberg were assassinated by Gavrilo Princip in Sara-
jevo. The country had undergone a change in political regime in 1910 with
the toppling of the monarchy. The declaration of a republic was a politi-
cal transformation that remained far from consensual with the new regime
striving to modernise and convert a Catholic nation into a secular and patri-
otic society with entrance into the First World War perceived by republicans
as one way of fulflling their ambitions. The republicans were, however,
divided among themselves over the entrance of Portugal into the war: the
interventionists, led by the leader of the Democratic Party, Afonso Costa,
defended the need for the country to join the side of the Entente Cordiale,
while the non-interventionists maintained that Portuguese troops should
be dispatched exclusively to the African colonies. Republican Francophilia,
however, determined the sympathy of much of the population towards the
Entente.9 Nevertheless, the Socialist Party and the anarchist and syndicalist
movements expressed opposition to any intervention in the confict right
from the outset.
This polarisation of Portuguese society was nevertheless accompanied
by increasing attempts to provide aid and relief assistance to those troops
mobilised for deployment in Africa immediately in the summer of 1914.
These eforts were to combine with an overwhelming desire to humanise the
208 Ana Paula Pires and Rita Nunes
confict and so render it compatible with being “civilised”.10 Desires to assist
were present in initiatives such as that shown by the Luso-American writer,
John dos Passos who, alongside Ernest Hemingway, embarked for France
right at the beginning of the war to serve as an ambulance driver for the
American Red Cross.11 Such behaviours demonstrated that the motivation
to assist was not only an independent sentiment but also one of social and
collective action; a position that this chapter hopefully conveys. However, it
raises the questions: what made sufering so appealing? And, how was this
able to cultivate compassion in a fragile, political, and social reality as that
experienced by Portugal?
Ana de Castro Osório provides another example. When war broke out in
the summer of 1914, Ana de Castro Osório, a writer, considered the confict
would represent a major opportunity for republican women to demonstrate
their abilities and initiative. With this objective, in conjunction with a group
of other intellectuals, she founded the Feminine Commission for the Moth-
erland (Cruzada das Mulheres Portuguesas), designed to encourage women
to engage in voluntary service, whether making clothing or gathering dona-
tions for the soldiers and victims of the war. Service was very much the
motto and hence rendered difcult any distinction in the language adopted;
whether placing the emphasis on the patriotic or the humanitarian. How-
ever, the main objective of this intellectual group was certainly to foster a
progressive civil society and correspondingly strive for a series of political
and social reforms within which the right of female sufrage was very much
a leading issue.12 The sufrage issue assists in revisiting questions around
motivation to assist the war efort, as the Commission worked simultane-
ously to promote a female identity through its contributions to improving
humanity.13
The intercontinental telegraph not only pushed the global economy for-
ward but also created a sense of global sufering upon which notions of
international humanitarian action developed, laying the ground for media-
tors, such as the Red Cross, to operate for the frst time as truly interna-
tional movements. This, in turn, helped to shape understandings of peace
and war for the wider population/public, such as the Portuguese.14 In fact,
as John Horne has recently stressed: “The Great War was not just the frst
mass event of the twentieth century but also the frst to be lived in real time
by most of the world’s population”,15 just as the confict had itself imposed
homogeneous time with wristwatches becoming “standard military equip-
ment”.16 The sufering of the French and Belgians was thus no longer some
distant reality, and it was this same notion of proximity that became the
driving force behind the founding of an Anglo-French-Belgian committee
in Lisbon with the purpose of collecting donations in Portugal and sending
them to the wounded undergoing treatment in the temporary hospitals set
up in France. In Luanda, this also extended to the organisation of parties
and events in order to raise funds and collect donations to “help the Bel-
gians”.17 This new “proximity” further underpinned the origins of the frst
 Portuguese humanitarian eforts during WWI 209
transnational actor to operate during the confict: the International Com-
mittee for the Red Cross. In addition, as early as summer 1914, the Portu-
guese Red Cross was expressing its availability to treat in Lisbon “up to a
thousand wounded arriving from the Atlantic, the Mediterranean or West
Africa”.18
The relationship between war and humanitarian action has frequently
stimulated a debate in the arts, law, and the political sciences despite having
only recently become a subject that historians have started to investigate
systematically.19 In fact, even if it was the global society which we all live
in that placed human sufering at the centre of its concerns, it was the First
World War that marked a watershed in the professional development of
humanitarian actions.20 When the war broke out in 1914, the International
Committee of the Red Cross had no strategic plan, and it reacted to humani-
tarian needs only on an ad hoc basis.21
On 1 August 1914, the Portuguese Minister of Foreign Afairs, Freire de
Andrade, telegraphed the Minister of Portugal to London, Teixeira Gomes,
to request that he clarify with the Foreign Ofce what position Portu-
gal should take towards the confict. The following day, Teixeira Gomes
informed the Portuguese head of diplomacy that the Under-Secretary of
State, Sir Eyre Crowe, understood that Portugal should remain neutral
without, however, making any formal declaration in what was to be a clear
violation of the resolutions of the Second Hague Conference of 1907, which
explicitly stated that in any situation of war, a state might only declare its
neutrality or its belligerence. As early as 15 August, the Red Cross adver-
tised in the press for “all qualifed male and female nurses, who do not
have hospital commitments and wish to be part of the staf at a unit for the
wounded that would eventually be set up in Lisbon, to please present their
diplomas to the Red Cross ofce”.22 A few days later, the Lisbon newspapers
were swift to publish a circular received from the International Committee
of the Red Cross that stated all “resources should be frstly dedicated to
sanitation services for national troops”.23
Portugal and the First World War provides a good basis or foundation
for studying the relationship between humanitarian aid and empire: on 21
August 1914, Prime Minister Bernardino Machado authorised the organisa-
tion and despatch of two mixed deployments (mountain artillery, cavalry,
infantry, and machine-gunners) to Angola and Mozambique. In the legisla-
tion’s preamble, the government recognised the essential nature of, “in the
current circumstances, duly supplying some of the southern border posts
in the province of Angola and in the North of Mozambique”.24 The British
Ultimatum of 1890 – by which London demanded the removal of the mili-
tary forces commanded by Major Serpa Pinto from the territory that links
Mozambique to Angola25 – was an example of the global reach of European
imperialism during the late 1800s; it would also eventually force Portugal
into having to fght to preserve its place in the political geography of both
Europe and Africa.26
210 Ana Paula Pires and Rita Nunes
In the initial phase of the confict, the International Committee of the
Red Cross kept its focus more on the combat taking place on the Western
Front; in fact, following the declaration made by Bernardino Machado, the
Portuguese Red Cross afrmed it was receiving at its headquarters “the dec-
larations of civil doctors and qualifed nurses . . . in order to enlist in that
patriotic service”,27 while registering a preference for all nurses who had
attended the training course taught by that institution. In addition to having
launched a contribution subscription targeting all the municipal councils in
the country, the President of the Portuguese Red Cross Society, Domingos
Tasso de Figueiredo, wrote to the President of the Municipal Council of
Lisbon requesting the donation of an ambulance to the Society for deploy-
ment in Angola.28 Furthermore, some reformed military personnel, such as
nurse and First Corporal Jorge Parreira, volunteered to join the Portuguese
Red Cross medical mission destined for southern Angola refecting not only
how humanitarian action was seen as a form of civic diplomacy but also
the importance of empire to the prevailing Portuguese culture and politics.29
Portugal was head of a multi-ethnic empire that despite its distance from the
daily life of the metropole formed an indelible part of the national identity.
In practice, the African empire was present in the lives of Portuguese through
an imagery of heroic proportions leveraged by the myth of the “historical
mission of the Portuguese nation” for colonising other people, a myth that
helped stage a pluri-continental expansion of a “Portuguese world”. The
country thus provides a good basis for analysing the relationships between
the local, national, and international discourses of Red Cross Societies, as
well as establishing and building bonds of solidarity.
This contact between people, ideas, and practices clearly emerges in the
testimony of Américo Pires de Lima, a doctor who joined one of the expedi-
tions to Mozambique and who wrote in his memoir:

One of the most difcult memories that I retain of the expedition is the
spectacle of the arrival at the Palma hospital of the injured and sick . . .
a great number of them, on being questioned about the disease afict-
ing them, would respond soberly: “it’s just hunger, Doctor!” And on
not rare occasions they would collapse onto the hard foor of the ofce
before I was able to attend them . . . That’s how there passed before
my bewildered eyes, ten, twenty, one hundred, four hundred wretched
individuals! This was no court of miracles, no entrance of pilgrims with
their tent for medicants, with their miseries wisely put on display to
infuse piety and horror, which gives a far distant idea of the spectacle
that, throughout that day, for hours and hours, paraded before my eyes.
And Portugal did not experience the war. . . . And here there was, this
battalion of human rags that Lisbon wished to push into some bloody
combat . . . as if those ruined bodies might be able to give up the blood
able to satisfy the fraternal desires of Lisbon.30
 Portuguese humanitarian eforts during WWI 211
During the war, however, it was the printed press that performed a fun-
damental role in mediating and giving meaning to the human sufering
that would later be portrayed by Pires de Lima.31 The pages of newspapers
served for the advertising of open subscriptions, such as that of O Africano,
in Lourenço Marques, organised to gather donations in favour of the sol-
diers who had been taken prisoner by German forces in Angola following
the fghting in Naulila.32 Throughout the years of confict, Portugal was also
able to draw on donations from Sao Tome and Principe, Guinea Bissau,
where the inhabitants of Farim staged their own collection,33 from Macau
where a commission led by the wife of the governor gathered “four thou-
sand pieces of clothing, coats and bandages”,34 and from Cape Verde, the
archipelago where, courtesy of the initiative of the resident British commu-
nity, a concert was held at the Mindelo Municipal Council.35 Such initiatives
further demonstrate the existence of an ethical polity among the diferent
parts of the empire.
In October 1914, the delegation of the Red Cross in Lourenço Marques
was founded and the “Varietá” theatre hosted an event “in honour of the
expeditionary forces, with part of the revenues from the spectacle reverting
in favour of the victims of war and the Delegation of the Red Cross in this
Province”.36 The presence of British and South African citizens was signif-
cant, notably in the ports of Beira and Lourenço Marques, with the British
population living in the Mozambican capital mobilising to this end and rais-
ing funds to support the Portuguese troops: this included organising a party
at the Maritime Institute from which 15 per cent of the revenue reverted to
Portuguese soldiers wounded during the battle of Naulila.37 Furthermore, it
was due to a British initiative that the city of Beira also launched the Beira
British Relief Fund and held two recitals and a cinematographic session in
favour of the Red Cross.38 In Lourenço Marques, set up with the objective
of collecting donations to assist the troops on campaign in eastern Africa,
there emerged the Female Aid Commission for Portuguese Soldiers,39 and
another commission, of mixed-race persons from the regions of Manica
and Sofala, “took the initiative to monthly, and throughout the duration of
the war, collect from their compatriots, the amounts that they are able to
bestow, destined for a support fund for the Portuguese Red Cross delegation
in Lourenço Marques”.40 It should be stressed that racial prejudice played
an important part in the modes of colonial governance of the European
empires, and Portugal was no exception, therefore the groups selected as
recipients of aid were, in their majority, white soldiers. They constituted a
moral priority because “the Portuguese, throughout the centuries of their
occupation of East Africa, have never viewed him [the African] in any but a
proper and practical light: for them is frst and last the mão de obra (labour-
ing hand)”.41
The humanitarian mobilisation in Lourenço Marques was refected in the
colony of Angola where, in the capital of Luanda, there was popular backing
212 Ana Paula Pires and Rita Nunes
for a national subscription raised by the Lisbon newspaper O Século with
the funds raised going to those injured by the war.42 By the end of the year,
the Luanda-based Grémio Pátria Integral Association had raised 238.69
Portuguese escudos destined for the war wounded.43
The Red Cross was responsible for almost the entire clinical and nursing
services for the military columns deployed in the south of Angola even while
transport difculties made it difcult for volunteers to get out of Moçame-
des – the port city where they docked on arrival from Lisbon – and head to
Lubango, where the fag of the Convention of Geneva was unfurled over a
hospital building that contained two wards for whites and one for blacks.
Aurélio Belo and Eduardo Schultz were the doctors contracted to serve
there,44 with their team managing to treat 325 patients in just 45 days, a
feat that was duly praised by the Red Cross.45 Meanwhile, in Benguela, the
former photographer of the royal household, José Pedro Passaporte, who
had been living in Angola since 1911, took the initiative to found a Red
Cross branch in this Angolan city.46 From the start, the branch organising
commission agreed to accept the enlistment of several females for the medi-
cal teams in keeping with how the British and French had, since the late
nineteenth century, begun perceiving women as important members of the
“civilising mission of the colonial enterprise”,47 an example that Passaporte
seemed to closely align with. These were not, however, autonomous com-
mittees but colonial institutions under the auspices of the Portuguese Red
Cross Society.48
Late 1914 also saw the launching of the “Volunteer Battalion of Ben-
guela” on the initiative of the owners of “Hotel Paris”, who correspond-
ingly staged a cinema session to raise funds for the Red Cross.49 Present at
this mediation of the confict between Europe and Africa was the idea that
the war would be short, which led even the Red Cross to declare that the
military operations then ongoing in the south of Angola would be “termi-
nated there during the month of August or in early September. Hence, we do
not see the need to request the Government to rent a property for a private
Red Cross hospital”.50
However, this reinforced the state of development that then character-
ised the two main Portuguese colonies in Africa at the time war broke
out: there was only a small white Portuguese population present (around
11,000 in Angola and 20,000 in Mozambique), the lack of administra-
tive staff was renowned, the transport networks were sharply lacking,
and some areas, especially in Angola, had neither been entirely pacified
nor had their respective borders been defined.51 In particular, shortcom-
ings in the transport network, especially the railways, jeopardised the
capacity of the Portuguese government both to control distant regions
and to get necessary supplies and materials to the troops leaving them
dependent on the service of porters, which in turn reflected the limits of
the Portuguese authorities in terms of occupying and fostering the devel-
opment of these African territories. Furthermore, there was difficulty
 Portuguese humanitarian eforts during WWI 213
obtaining enough electricity to maintain devices such as x-ray equip-
ment, with this posing a general obstacle to economic, political, and
social penetration, thus hindering any understanding of the totality of
the experience and humanitarian mobilisation in these two Portuguese
African colonies.52
The founding of the Red Cross in Lubango led to Viegas, Marrecas Fer-
reira, and Tamagnini Barbosa donating to the military the revenue from a
fado song that they composed, entitled “Fado of the Expeditionary Solider”,
with the company Cinematográfca Ervedosa & C.ª also staging a perfor-
mance with the revenues, totalling 19.43 Portuguese escudos, reverting to
the same cause.53 The appeals for aid for the Portuguese military forces were
also directed at banks, factories, and companies.54
However, within the “moral landscape” of humanitarianism in Angola,
there was the initiative by the wife of the colony’s governor who founded
the Portuguese Women’s Crusade with the goal of undertaking “the great
altruistic concern of aiding the men who are fghting and their families”.55
The Crusade managed not only to ensure the participation of the majority
of associations, centres, clubs, and newspapers of Luanda, but also to estab-
lish the foundations for the involvement of inhabitants in Amboim, a loca-
tion some 250 kilometres from the capital, in raising funds for Portuguese
victims of the Great War.56
It is also interesting how this mobilisation involved sport as one of the
means of fundraising, including a show-jumping competition organised by
the Portuguese Equestrian Society which involved Cavalry Regiment 4 and
two pelotons of lancers.57 Indeed, the Red Cross would later honour the
Riding Society with its First Class Cross. Furthermore, the takings from
the inauguration of the Lisbon velodrome in late 1914 also reverted to the
troops mobilised for combat in Angola.58 Children, too, participated in
sport-related fundraising: students in the Casa Pia Orphanage of Lisbon
were asked by the Red Cross to put on a performance of gymnastic exercises
held in the Zoological Garden,59 while students from schools across the
country produced 1,292 pieces of clothing for the Portuguese soldiers then
deployed in southern Angola.60
In Lourenço Marques, a festival of sport was held with the funding raised
going to the Portuguese and British Red Cross organisations and the Female
Commission for Aid to the Portuguese Soldier. This event was described by
the press as not being “a festival of charity . . . but in compliance with a
duty” given that:

[T]he state cannot overcome all of the lack of comforts nor above all is
it an entity that may dispense caring, the essential moral support. . . .
The state complies with its duties, handing out cartridges and marching
orders; the nation complies with its duties by providing to those who
stand up on its behalf the manifestation of its pride, the extent of its
care.61
214 Ana Paula Pires and Rita Nunes
It was above all, the moral value of the civil society’s contributions, which
also conveys how contemporaries viewed their own actions.62 In fact, the
war in the Portuguese colonies of Africa was indissociable of a transna-
tional fow of money and material goods (cloths, medication, books, and
cigarettes) from Portugal and Europe to Angola and Mozambique, with
examples including, in addition to the British Relief Fund, the subscription
raised by the Boma Societé des Militaire et Anciennes Militaires in the Bel-
gian Congo.63

Mediating sufering
When Germany declared war on Portugal, on 9 March 1916, Maria Antónia
Pinto Basto was 64 years old. This monarchist was a member of the Portu-
guese Assistance to the Victims of War and one of the frst women to register
for the nursing courses that the Portuguese Red Cross launched in the wake
of the declaration of war with the main goal of providing comfort to the
thousands of Portuguese, sick and injured, whose lives had been interrupted
by the country’s involvement in the European war. However, Maria Antónia
was, above all, the visible face of a divided society as regards national par-
ticipation in the war and who found in the Red Cross the only opportunity
to be sent to France given that the Republic had reserved for the Portuguese
Assistance to the Victims of War, of which she was a member, only acts of
charity.
For republican women, the confict represented a unique opportunity
for their public afrmation: the Portuguese Women’s Crusade, founded on
27 March 1916, at the instigation of the wife of the Republic’s President,
Bernardino Machado, and with its founding members including a core of
wives and daughters of ministers who described their goal as “a patriotic
and humanitarian institution, set up to provide material and moral assis-
tance to those in need on account of the state of war with Germany”,64
this association, clearly a government partner in mobilising humanitarian
aid for the war, furthermore excluded monarchists and Catholics from its
nursing courses, which thus also excluded Maria Antónia Pinto Basto. The
Crusade eventually founded the Portuguese Military Hospital of Hendaye,
in the southwest of France and correspondingly distant from the frontlines.
Indeed, in the post-war period, in the report presented during the Tenth
International Conference held in Geneva, the Portuguese Red Cross criticised
the position taken by the country in terms of its humanitarian mobilisation:

While in all of civilised Europe, these eforts gathered around the fag
of the Red Cross, while the belligerent and neutral Red Cross countries
gathered up all such initiatives, in Portugal each preferred to do their
own personal work while forgetting that union brings strength in order
to selfshly think of the itching desire to advance and stand out the
most.65
 Portuguese humanitarian eforts during WWI 215
Involved in a campaign to mobilise funds for the war in Africa since 1915,
the Portuguese Red Cross nevertheless appeared reluctant “that it would
have to struggle with a lack of resources . . . because it believed that these
friends would become tired of helping”,66 but which nevertheless launched
a subscription in which the appeal went out to “the humanitarian feelings
of co-citizens”67 and ended up as the frst Portuguese institution to send
nurses to France. There is further interest in the ways the international com-
munities resident in Portugal became involved in these eforts and the means
found to raise the awareness of the population as regards the need to make
donations, including the Geographic Society of Lisbon hosting a war pho-
tography exhibition on the initiative of British citizen Garland Jayne, owner
of the Portuguese registered Garland transport frm.68 Images served to raise
both public awareness and funds to alleviate human sufering; in Oporto,
the French nurse Renée Labbe organised, in conjunction with her sister
Berthe, a Fine Arts student in Nancy, a book which was profusely illustrated
with pictures of the joint war efort between the Portuguese and the French.
The sales of this book raised a total of 1200.00 Portuguese escudos, which
was donated to the Oporto Delegation of the Red Cross.69
Dispersed throughout the country, there were festivals and theatrical
recitals: the French Berthe Baron, who was a member of a Portuguese oper-
etta company, split the revenues from a performance in Lisbon between the
Portuguese Red Cross and the French Red Cross. Similar to the case of the
mobilisation of resources for Africa, the Portuguese Equestrian Society held
festivals with their proceeds going to the Portuguese campaign in France,70
a group of British citizens also organised a game of football with the rev-
enues divided between the Portuguese and British Red Cross societies. At
the end of the war, there was then another series of diferent sporting activi-
ties to raise funds for those left injured and mutilated by the war, with the
most important being a football match that competed for the War Mutilated
Cup.71
In France, the Portuguese troops also counted on the support of the Por-
tuguese Red Triangle, a national branch of the international, evangelical
type organisation, the YMCA, which, with support from its British and
North American peers, set up a pavilion in which it was able to loan games
(billiards), musical instruments, and books to soldiers and that also ran a
canteen for the Portuguese Expeditionary Corps,72 despite its activities only
receiving recognition from the government towards the end of the confict.73
Maria Antónia Pinto Basto was called up in April 1917 to join a medical
mission sent to Flanders with the objective of opening a Portuguese hospital
in Ambleuteuse but ended up negotiating with the representative of the Brit-
ish Red Cross. In keeping with how hospital installations would take a year
to be completed, she arranged for the Portuguese nurses to serve in British
hospitals, so they could care for the Portuguese soldiers receiving treatment
there and who, in their majority, could not speak English.74 These nurses
mediated encounters between doctors and patients, in a feminised space,
216 Ana Paula Pires and Rita Nunes
as multilingual competence was still associated with a certain social status.
There was, in addition, some prejudice expressed towards these Portuguese
soldiers, visible from the outset in the way British nurse Dorothea Crewdson
described in her diary: “Nobody likes the Pork and Cheeses and they are
very poor type of men, consumptive and weakly and most of the injuries
they come in with are suspiciously like self-inficted wounds”.75 Testimonies
like this allow us to revisit interactions between local, national, and interna-
tional languages and the spaces (hospital facilities) in which those narratives
took place.76
The mission also contributed towards consolidating the image of the Red
Cross in an otherwise divided country. Along with Maria Antónia Pinto
Basto, the institution sent João Paulo Freire to France “in his mission as
a journalist to undertake the propaganda necessary to the services of this
Society through constantly reminding all the Portuguese . . . of the existence
of our War subscription”.77 The reports that he subsequently produced, as
well as the correspondence he maintained with his colleagues, family, and
friends made the war, and the Portuguese efort to fght in it, better known
across Europe and Latin America.78
At the time of the armistice, the Portuguese Red Cross was already run-
ning 43 branches, whether located on mainland Portugal, its archipelagos,
or in Africa with the institution able to, during the years of confict, train,
create infrastructure, and handle hundreds of volunteers across four focal
points: the home front, Flanders, Angola, and Mozambique. Portugal’s
humanitarian mobilisation relied heavily on the donations it was able to
raise to a greater or lesser extent worldwide, with its actions allowing us to
examine the country’s involvement in the Great War in terms of a linguistic
community which crossed oceans, tied together by a multitude of bonds
of varying strengths;79 the same community capable of uniting Aquilino
Ribeiro and John dos Passos.

Creating a global afective community

The Great War in general, and the humanitarian mobilisation in particular,
provided a moment of unity for the Lusophone community; Portuguese in
Brazil and in the United States of America self-mobilised to support their
homeland.80 This sense of belonging determined the ways in which this Por-
tuguese diaspora was able to “feel” and experience the confict, develop-
ing what Filipe Ribeiro de Meneses considered “a common response to the
experience of a world at war”,81 constituting the framework in which we
can analyse the initiatives carried out by the Portuguese community resident
in New Bedford, which gathered and sent to the Red Cross funds for aiding
children and widows of soldiers killed in the war,82 the subscriptions raised
in California and Hawaii, as well as the donation made to the Portuguese
Red Cross by Mathilde Massé, the frst French-Canadian, who held a doc-
toral degree in medicine from the University of Boston, to practise military
 Portuguese humanitarian eforts during WWI 217
medicine on the frontline,83 or the volunteering by the private secretary of
the scientist Guglielmo Marconi who made himself available to “launch a
propaganda movement in favour of the Portuguese Red Cross Society in
North America”.84
Like Portugal, Brazil was a relatively young republic to which thousands
of Portuguese had been emigrating since the late nineteenth century and
who were integrated into strong and dynamic associative and philanthropic
networks that swiftly mobilised on the German declaration of war against
Portugal in March 1916. According to the General Consul of Portugal, the
Portuguese of Brazil

[c]onsider themselves to be, due to their spontaneous mobilisation, the

most distant but most active rear guard of the Portuguese army in its
campaign. While our soldiers fght and die, we are here working for
them, to care for the wounded and the prisoners, to aid the widows and
orphans – to have the right to mourn and honour our dead.85

The outbreak of the confict, in 1914, came as a shock to belle époque Rio
de Janeiro, where the poet and journalist Olavo Bilac pointed to the lack
of patriotism that characterised the Brazilian national identity, and his col-
league Álvaro Bomilcar asserted that one of Brazil’s gravest problems was
that “it was the product of Portuguese colonialism”.86 These two contrary
visions of the nation prevented, as early as 16 March 1916, a Portuguese
community itself politically divided over the regime change in Portugal,
mobilising and establishing the Great Commission For the Nation (Grande
Comissão Pró-Pátria). This Commission, having set out to be “an autono-
mous organisation, without subjection to other, already founded organisa-
tions, destined to alleviate or relieve one of the greatest misfortunes caused
by the war . . . was accommodated in the hall of the Jornal do Comércio
newspaper, where under the leadership of Viscount of Morais it was respon-
sible for distributing the donations made by the Portuguese emigrant com-
munity in Brazil.87 This transatlantic link was already present, however, in
1915 when the Portuguese Republican Centre of Sao Paulo took the initia-
tive to set up a branch of the Portuguese Red Cross in Brazil.88 Before the
end of the war there would be other branches not only in Rio de Janeiro but
also in Buenos Aires, the capital of neutral Argentina.89 The Rio de Janeiro
branch, founded in July 1918, on the initiative of the Portuguese colony of
Petrópolis, was chaired by Albino Sousa Cruz,90 the Vice President of the
aforementioned For the Nation Commission.
The frst commission subscription was launched in March 1916, with its
backers receiving support from the Ambassador of Portugal and the Portu-
guese consular networks, as well as making recourse to the Portuguese asso-
ciations and stores of Rio de Janeiro to then spread the initiative across all
of Brazil. This latter option involved identifying the trading companies with
Portuguese owners who were requested to make monthly contributions for
218 Ana Paula Pires and Rita Nunes
the duration of the war, which would indeed arrive from the distant Por-
tuguese community of Manaus, in Amazonia, or from the initiatives of the
Portuguese employees of the Cervejaria Brahama brewery.91 According to
intellectuals such as Carlos Malheiro Dias or Pedroso Rodrigues, the Great
War represented an opportunity “for the frst time, the Portuguese colony in
Brazil to engage in real and efective action in the life of the metropolis”.92
Throughout the following two years, holding performances and festivals,
including highlights such as an event in honour of Camões or an event held
in the Municipal Theatre in which the Royal Portuguese Gymnastics Club
performed, provided for the collection of funds that enabled the commission
to make donations to the Portuguese Red Cross and set up a commission for
the purpose of raising donations for Religious Assistance to the Portuguese
Army in Deployment, even while its most signifcant project was the Assis-
tance of the Portuguese Colony of Brazil to the Orphans of War, which set
up in Coimbra, an Institute destined to provide

[t]he clothing, education and instruction of these orphans according

to the criteria appropriate to their social conditions and in order for
the salutary infuence of the education that they receive be exercised in
keeping with the social class they come from.93

Although the buildings would only be completed in 1930, the Viscount

of Morais wrote to the commander of the Portuguese Expeditionary Corps
to inform him of its prospective launch early in 191894 when the founda-
tions for its organisation, drafted by the writer Carlos Malheiro Dias, were
launched symbolically in the Portuguese Royal Reading Ofce in Rio de
Janeiro on 16 March. In Lisbon, a branch was set up and nominated the
banker Cândido Sotto-Mayor, the business owners António Maria da Costa
and Bento da Rocha Cabral, all former emigrants to Brazil to be responsi-
ble for implementing in Portugal the deliberations of the Commission For
the Nation.95 All these initiatives were covered by the Brazilian press, with
the Rio de Janeiro newspaper O País from 1917 including a “Portuguese
Supplement”, thereby simultaneously seeking to force the intervention of
Brazil into the war on the side of the Entente Cordiale and to interest the
city’s population in the war eforts undertaken by Portugal in an attempt to
strengthen the ties between the two countries.
The For the Nation Commission also interacted with the Portuguese
Committee to the Secours aux Militaires et Civils Prisoniers de Guerre
organisation, headquartered in Lausanne, which was provided with the
resources necessary to aid 163 Portuguese prisoners of war who were “each
sent three diverse packages monthly. . .,96 as well as founding, in order to
communicate with the Portuguese Women’s Crusade, the Sub-Commission
of Ladies of the Great Commission For the Nation”.97 Its ofce would also
take receipt of requests for initiatives from the Patriotic Junta of the North
and the Portuguese Delegation of the Red Star Alliance, which had the
objective of caring for animals wounded in the war. The commission thus
 Portuguese humanitarian eforts during WWI 219
appeared, in the words of the writer Carlos Malheiro Dias, to be “a militant
army of altruism and labour, and not of death and destruction; those who
do not have to get soaked in blood; those who are also essential to victory,
to whom the mission of reparation is entrusted”.98
The actions of this commission also hold interest in terms of how one
member proposed that the institution should be “encouraging the Portu-
guese to boycott German products”.99 The commission furthermore ruled
that it would lend its support only to events generating revenues reverting to
the Red Cross.100 In May 1918, at a time when the two countries were still
at war with the Central Powers, the head of the Propaganda Services Com-
mission of the Portuguese Red Cross, João Paulo Freire, held a conference in
the República Theatre in Rio de Janeiro where he expressed his thanks for
the involvement and contributions of the Portuguese community resident
in Brazil to the war efort. Freire also travelled to the neutral countries of
Uruguay and Argentina where he met with representatives of the resident
Portuguese communities.101 In his role as director of Portuguese Red Cross
propaganda, by emphasising global interconnectedness, he ultimately estab-
lished connections between diferent actors and communities through his
transnational propaganda mission contributing to the consolidation of an
efective global community stretching across the Atlantic.

Conclusion
This chapter has dealt with death, violence, sufering, and hope. It revealed
the impact of global industrialised killing and of humanitarian altruism to
combat the sufering caused by the First World War. We all conceptualise
the war before really knowing about it, with its imagery forming part of
our mental universe, especially in terms of its greatest abstractions: heroism,
fame, and glory are terms that render this war familiar. War is a distinctive
reality in which men feel and act in diferent ways, with the Great War being
the largest military operation in which Portuguese troops participated in the
frst half of the twentieth century.
Proclaimed at the time of a persistent and multifaceted crisis, the First Por-
tuguese Republic constituted a period generically characterised by height-
ened and protracted political instability. Participating in the Great War only
served to worsen the prevailing imbalanced and irregular economic growth
which led to low levels of progress. The hour of triumph came with the sign-
ing of the armistice and, as reported in the pages of newspaper A Capital,
was welcomed with jubilation in the city of Lisbon; streets were flled with
garlands and bunting, bands played, and the population flled with uncon-
tained pleasure, despite the level, scale, and intensity of the battles Portugal
would still have to face before the peace accord was signed.
The great challenge posed by the war to interventionist republicans was
that of having to win over a poor country, with a poorly prepared and
equipped army, and a majority illiterate population. For the intervention-
ists, joining the war would represent but a small sacrifce which would
220 Ana Paula Pires and Rita Nunes
present opportunities for Portugal to embark on a process of economic
and social modernisation capable of competing with the rest of developed
Europe. This was, indeed, the argument repeatedly deployed by the Demo-
cratic Party of Afonso Costa to justify the need to send an army to France.
Additionally, there was the issue of how, in March 1916, the Allied armies
were in an extremely delicate position on the Western Front, with a need for
more manpower to ofset the rising casualties on the battle front.
At a conference held in Rio de Janeiro, with its takings reverting in
favour of the Portuguese Commission For the Nation, the Brazilian writer
Júlia Lopes de Almeida depicted the First World War as a transformative
moment.102 The 1914–1918 confict was the frst mass event of the twentieth
century, it created a world unrecognisable for those in power in 1914, and
caused one of the greatest ruptures in modern history; in the humanitarian
feld, mass death and industrial destruction were responsible for the creation
of extensive forms of interconnectedness and, as this chapter hopefully has
shown, with these transformations revealed a wide network of humanitar-
ian relations emerging in Lisbon, Cape Verde, Hong Kong, Honolulu, or Rio
de Janeiro, which exposed the impact both of mass mobilisation and altru-
ism to combat the sufering caused. The horrors that the confict produced
therefore had a tremendous infuence on individual engagement with aid
initiatives, laying the foundations for a “Lusophone” response to the war’s
impact and levels of destruction. The expansion of confict allowed for an
analysis of the war in terms of humanitarian mobilisation within the frame
of a truly “global Portuguese” world. The opening of this age marked by
catastrophe and insecurity triggered a “humanitarian revolution” in which
small and peripheral countries such as Portugal took part, playing roles as
humanitarian brokers in multi-ethnic contexts.
The end of the First World War diversifed the scope and variety of vic-
tims afected not only by the confict but also by its consequences, providing
national Red Cross Societies with a new feld of intervention, pushing them
to charter their way forward as humanitarian organisations responding to
this “brutalization of violence” through the provision of aid – medical assis-
tance  – to local populations caught between almost daily confrontations,
and to the mutilated, gassed, and crippled soldiers returning home from
Angola, Mozambique, and Flanders. Furthermore, the reintegration of the
combat veterans involved the philanthropic actions of many of the institu-
tions that were on the frontline during these years of confict, including the
Portuguese Red Cross, the Portuguese Women’s Crusade, the Patriotic Junta
of the North, and the Great Commission For the Nation.

Notes
1 The authors hereby disclose receipt of the following fnancial support for the
research, authorship, and publication of this article: This work was funded by
national fnancing through the FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia,
 Portuguese humanitarian eforts during WWI 221
I.P., under the Transitory Norm, DL 57/2016/CP1453/CT0075 and the Instituto
de História Contemporânea, UID/04209/2019.
2 Aquilino Ribeiro, É a Guerra (Lisbon: Bertrand Editora, 2014), pp. 144–145.
3 Ibid., p. 296.
4 Bernardo Soares; Richard Zenith (ed.), O Livro do Desassossego (Lisbon: Assírio
e Alvim, 2014); Joanna Bourke, What It Means to Be Human: Refections from
1791 to the Present (London: Virago, 2011).
5 Ute Frevert, “Wartime Emotions: Honor, Shame, and the Ecstasy of Sacrifce”
in Ute Daniel, Peter Gatrell; Oliver Janz; Heather Jones; Jennifer Keene; Alan
Kramer and Bill Nasson (eds), 1914–1918 Online. International Encyclopaedia
of the First World War (Berlin: Freie Universitat, 2014); Ute Frevert, Emotions in
History – Lost and Found (Budapest: Central European University Press, 2011),
pp. 178–179.
6 Julia F Irwin, “Taming Total War: Great War-Era American Humanitarianism
and Its Legacies” in Diplomatic History, vol. 38, 2014, p. 764.
7 Zygmunt Bauman, Liquid Times: Living in an Age of Uncertainty (Cambridge:
Polity, 2006).
8 Stephen Kern, The Culture of Time and Space 1880–1918 (Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press, 1983), pp. 213–214.
9 See Ana Paula Pires, “The Iberian Peninsula and the First World War: Between
Neutrality and Non-Belligerency (1914–1916)” in War in History, 2020, p. 1;
Maria Fernanda Rollo, Ana Paula Pires and Filipe Ribeiro de Meneses, “Por-
tugal” in Ute Daniel; Peter Gatrell; Oliver Janz; Heather Jones; Jennifer Keene;
Alan Kramer and Bill Nasson (eds.), 1914–1918-online. International Encyclo-
paedia of the First World War (Berlin: Freie Universitat, 2017); Maria Inès Tato,
“Identities in Tension. Immigrant Communities in Argentina and the Challenge
of the Great War” in National Identities, 2020, p. 1.
10 Martin Schulz, “Dilemmas of ‘Geneva’ Humanitarian Internationalism: The
International Committee of the Red Cross and Red Cross Movement, 1863–
1918” in Johannes Paulmann (ed.), Dilemmas of Humanitarian Aid in the
Twentieth Century (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016), pp. 36–37.
11 James McGrath Morris, The Ambulance Drivers. Hemingway, Dos Passos and
a Friendship Made and Lost in War (Boston: De Capo Press, 2017), p. 10.
12 Natividade Monteiro, “Mulheres Portuguesas em Tempo de Guerra (1914–
1918)” in Nação e Defesa, vol. 145, 2016, p.  114. See also Ana Paula Pires;
Fátima Mariano and Ivo Veiga (coord.), Mulheres e Direito de Voto (Lisbon:
Almedina, 2019).
13 Michael Barnett, Empire of Humanity. A History of Humanitarianism (Ithaca/
London: Cornell University Press, 2011), p. 35.
14 Peter Walker and Daniel Maxwell, Shaping the Humanitarian World (New
York: Routledge, 2009), p. 24.
15 Cf. John Horne, “End of a Paradigm? The Cultural History of the Great War”
in Past and Present, vol. 242, 2019, p. 160.
16 Kern, The Culture of Time and Space 1880–1918 . . . p. 288.
17 Santos Ferreira, “Para a Bélgica” in A Província, 30 June 1916, p. 1.
18 Arquivo Histórico da Cruz Vermelha Portuguesa (AHCVP), Sociedade Portu-
guesa da Cruz Vermelha, Copiador no. 2–1914, letter sent by the Red Cross
Secretary General to Júlia Maria de Brito e Cunha.
19 Branden Little, “An explosion of New Endeavours: Global Humanitarian
Responses to Industrialized Warfare in the First World War Era” in First World
War Studies, vol. 5, 2014, p. 1.
20 Heather Jones, “International or Transnational? Humanitarian Action during
the First World War” in European Review of History, 2009, p. 97.
222 Ana Paula Pires and Rita Nunes
21 David P Forsythe, The Humanitarians. The International Committee of the Red
Cross (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), p.  32. The Committee
consisted of only nine members grouped around the President, Gustave Ador.
22 Diário de Notícias, 15 August 1914.
23 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, Copiador, no. 2, 1914.
24 Ordem do Exército, vol. 19, I Série, 21 August 1914.
25 It demanded the withdrawal of troops from Mashona and Matabeland (Rhode-
sia) and the Shire-Nyasa region (Malawi).
26 Ana Paula Pires, “The First World War in Portuguese East Africa: Civilian and
Military Encounters in the Indian Ocean” in e-journal of Portuguese History,
vol. 15, no. 1, June 2017, p. 83.
27 AHCVP, Participação em catástrofes internacionais  – Documentos Manuscri-
tos 1893–1935, circular dated 26 October  1914 sent to all municipalities not
already members of the Red Cross.
28 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, Copiador no. 1 – Janeiro a
Março de 1915, letter dated 7 January 1915 sent by the Portuguese Red Cross
President, Domingos Tasso de Figueiredo to the President of the Municipal
Council of Lisbon, Henrique de Vilhena.
29 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, Copiador no. 1 – Janeiro a
Março de 1915, letter dated 5 January 1915 sent by the Red Cross President,
Domingos Tasso de Figueiredo to the Minister of War. See also Emily Baughan,
“The Imperial War Relief Fund and the All British Appeal: Commonwealth,
Confict and Conservatism within the British Humanitarian Movement, 1920–
25” in The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, vol. 40, no. 5,
2012, p. 848.
30 Américo Pires de Lima, Na costa d’África. Memórias de um expedicionário
(Gaia: Edições Pátria, 1933), p. 53.
31 See Johannes Paulmann, “Humanitarianism and Media: Introduction to an Entan-
gled History” in Johannes Paulmann (ed.), Humanitarianism & Media 1900 to the
Present (New York/Oxford: Berghahn, 2019), p. 24. See also Iriye Akira, Global
Community. The Role of International Organizations in the Making of the Con-
temporary World (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002), p. viii.
32 Santos Ferreira, “Para os Heróis de Naulila” in O Africano, 18 September 1915,
p. 1.
33 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, Correspondência Geral,
Setembro a Dezembro de 1917, letter dated 6 October  1917 sent by the Red
Cross Secretary General to the Governor of Guiné Province.
34 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, Copiador no. 2, Abril a
Junho de 1915, letter dated 24 April 1915 sent by the Red Cross Secretary Gen-
eral, Santos Ferreira, to Berta de Castro e Maia.
35 AHCVP. Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, General Correspondence
36 Santos Ferreira, “No ‘varietá’ ” in O Africano, 17 October 1914, p. 1.
37 “Cruz Vermelha. Uma festa simpática. Bazar de caridade” in O Africano, 18
September de 1915, p. 1.
38 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, Copiador no. 2, Abril a
Junho de 1915, letter dated 23 April 1915 sent by the Portuguese Red Cross to
Amélia Fonseca Pery de Lind. See also, AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz
Vermelha, General Correspondence, January 1918 to 18 April 1918, letter dated
17 January 1918 sent by the Red Cross Secretary General to the Treasurer of the
Great Commission for the War Funding of Beira.
39 Anonymous, “Obra Patriótica. Comissão feminina de auxílio ao soldado portu-
guês” in O Africano, 27 May 1916, p. 1.
40 “Carta da Beira” in O Africano, 31 May 1916, p. 1.
 Portuguese humanitarian eforts during WWI 223
41 Santos Ferreira, A Manual of Portuguese East Africa (London: His Majesty’s
Stationery Ofce, 1920), p. 129.
42 Anonymous, “Para os feridos da guerra” in A Província, 22 October 1914, p. 1.
43 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, Copiador no. 3–1914, letter
dated 18 December  1914 sent by Santos Ferreira to the President of Grémio
Pátria Integral, Miguel do Sacramento Monteiro.
44 Santos Ferreira, Relatório e Contas da Formação Sanitária da Cruz Vermelha em
serviço junto da coluna de operações no Sul de Angola (Lisbon: Tipografa de
Adolfo de Mendonça, 1916), p. 5.
45 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, Copiador no. 3, Julho a
Dezembro de 1915, note dated 20 July 1915.
46 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, Copiador no. 1 – Janeiro a
Março de 1915, letter dated 25 de Janeiro de 1915 sent by the Red Cross Secre-
tary General, Santos Ferreira, to José Pedro Braga Passaporte.
47 Alison S Fell, “Nursing the Other: The Representation of Colonial Troops in
French and British First World War Nursing Memoirs” in Santanu Das (ed.),
Race, Empire and First World War Writing (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2011), p. 158.
48 A similar example had been practised by the British during the Second Anglo-
Boer War. See in particular: Rebecca Gill, “Networks of Concern, Boundaries of
Compassion: British Relief in the South African War” in The Journal of Imperial
and Commonwealth History, vol. 40, no. 5, 2012, p. 835.
49 Santos Ferreira, “Letter dated Benguela” in A Província, 8 December 1914, p. 2.
50 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, Copiador no. 3, Julho a
Dezembro de 1915, letter dated 21 July 1915 sent by the Portuguese Red Cross
to Máximo Brou, Delegate of the Red Cross on the medical mission in southern
Angola.
51 Maria Cândida Proença, A Questão Colonial no Parlamento (Lisbon: Publi-
cações Dom Quixote, 2008), p. 12. In January 1916, a Portuguese mission was
nominated to defne the southern border of Angola: “Delimitação do Sul de
Angola” in A Província, 22 January 1916, p. 1.
52 Richard Rathbone, “World War I and Africa: Introduction” in Journal of Afri-
can History, vol. XIX, 1978, p. 4.
53 Anonymous, Relatório e Contas da Formação Sanitária da Cruz Vermelha em
serviço junto da coluna de operações no Sul de Angola (Lisbon: Tipografa de
Adolfo de Mendonça, 1916), p. 11.
54 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, Copiador no. 1 – Janeiro a
Março de 1915, request for donations sent out on 13 January 1915 by the Por-
tuguese Red Cross Society President, Domingos Tasso de Figueiredo, to banks
and commercial frms.
55 Anonymous, “Portugal na Guerra e a cooperação de Angola” in A Província, 30
July 1916, p. 2.
56 “Portugal na Guerra e a cooperação de Angola” in A Província, 22 August 1916,
p. 2.
57 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, Copiador no. 1 – Janeiro a
Março de 1915, letter dated 15 January 1915 sent by the Portuguese Red Cross
Society President, Domingos Tasso de Figueiredo to Commanding Colonel of
Cavalry Regiment no. 4.
58 Anonymous, “A União aprova o programa inaugural” in A Capital, 24 Novem-
ber 1914, p. 2.
59 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, Copiador no. 2, Abril a Junho
de 1915, letter dated 21 April 1915 sent by the Portuguese Red Cross Society to
the Director da Casa Pia Orphanage of Lisbon, Aurélio da Costa Ferreira.
224 Ana Paula Pires and Rita Nunes
60 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, Copiador no. 3, Julho a
Dezembro de 1915, letter dated 9 July 1915 sent by the Red Cross President to
the Secretary General of the Ministry of Public Instruction.
61 Anonymous, “Festa Sportiva” in O Africano, 2 June 1917, p. 1.
62 Rebecca Gill, “Networks of Concern, Boundaries of Compassion: British Relief
in the South African War” in The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth His-
tory, vol. 40, no. 5, 2012, p. 831.
63 Boletim da Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, August 1918, p. 263.
64 Portuguese Women’s Crusade, Estatutos da Cruzada das Mulheres Portuguesas
(Lisbon: Imprensa Nacional, 1916).
65 The Portuguese Red Cross, Boletim Ofcial da Cruz Vermelha Portuguesa
(Fevereiro a Março de, 1921), p. 35.
66 The Portuguese Red Cross, Boletim Ofcial da Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz
Vermelha (Lisbon: Tipografa – Casa Portuguesa, 1918), p. 83.
67 Ibid., p. 85.
68 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, General Correspondence, 17
January to 13 May 1917, letter dated 28 May 1917 sent by the Portuguese Red
Cross President to the President of the Geography Society of Lisbon.
69 Livro de Arte (Oporto: Delegação do Porto da Cruz Vermelha, 1917). See also,
Manuel Pinto, A Delegação do Porto da Cruz Vermelha Portuguesa (s/l, Inova
Artes Gráfcas, s/d), pp.  61–62. See Heide Fehrenbach and Davide Rodogno
(eds.), Humanitarian Photography. A History (Cambridge: Cambridge Univer-
sity Press, 2015), p. 42.
70 Boletim da Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, April 1918, p. 128.
71 Anonymous, “Quem ganhará a Taça Mutilados da Guerra que brevemente
se disputará entre os nossos primeiros ‘teams’ de futebol” in A Capital, 28
June 1918, p. 3.
72 See Arquivo de História Social (AHS), PT-AHS-ICS-AHSilva-GUE-TRV-1–04,
Regulamento dos Pavilhões do Triângulo Vermelho Português, ver também
Organização e Serviço da Cantina Depósito do Quartel General da Base (Lis-
bon: Tipografa Palhares, 1917).
73 Anonymous, “O Triângulo Vermelho Português” in Boletim da A.C.M., 12 Sep-
tember 1918, p. 1.
74 Natividade Monteiro and Maria Antónia Ferreira Pinto, “Aristocrata e tenente
do exército português na I  Guerra Mundial” in Faces de Eva, vol. 38, 2017,
p. 192.
75 Richard Crewdson (ed.), The Diaries of a First World War Nurse – Dorothea’s
War (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2013), pp. 235–236.
76 Kevin O’Sullivan; Mathew Hilton and Juliano Fiori, “Humanitarianisms in
Context” in European Review of History, vol. 23, no. 1–2, 2016, p. 2.
77 AHCVP, Sociedade da Cruz Vermelha, General Correspondence, 17 January to
13 May 1917, letter dated 21 August 1917 sent by the Portuguese Red Cross
President to the Minister of War.
78 João Paulo Freire, Em Serviço da Cruz Vermelha. Notas d’um Comissário (Lis-
bon: Edição da Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, 1919).
79 Filipe Ribeiro de Meneses, “Introduction: The Lusophone World at War, 1914–
1918 and Beyond” in e-Journal of Portuguese History, vol. 15, no. 1, 2017,
pp. 1–2.
80 Ibid., p. 2.
81 Ibid.
82 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, General Correspondence, 17
January to 13 May  1917, letter dated 8 August  1917 sent by the Red Cross
Secretary General, Santos Ferreira, to João Nunes da Cunha, Joaquim Santos
Cunha and César Ribeiro.
 Portuguese humanitarian eforts during WWI 225
83 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, General Correspondence,
17 January to 13 May de 1917, letter dated 15 May 1917 sent by the Red Cross
President to the Consul of Portugal in Boston.
84 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, General Correspondence,
January 1918 to 18 April 1918, undated letter sent by the Red Cross President
to the Viscount of Alte, Ambassador of Portugal to the United States of America.
85 Boletim da Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, February 1917, p. 140.
86 Lúcia Lippi Oliveira, “World War One and Brazilian Cultural Life” in e-Journal
of Portuguese History, vol. 15, no. 1, 2017, p. 78.
87 Anonymous, Grande Comissão Portuguesa Pró-Pátria relatório apresentado à
grande assembleia dos subscritores em 16 de Março de 1918 (Rio de Janeiro:
Tipografa do Jornal do Comércio de Rodrigues & C.ª, 1918), p. 119.
88 AHCVP, Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, Copiador no. 3, Julho a
Dezembro de 1915, letter dated 29 July 1915 sent by the Red Cross Secretary
General to the Board of the Portuguese Republican Centre of São Paulo.
89 Boletim da Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, July 1918, p. 218.
90 AHCVP, Delegações 17.3.1916–4.12.1916, letter dated 26 April 1916 sent by
Tasso de Figueiredo to the Minister of Foreign Afairs and Sociedade Portu-
guesa da Cruz Vermelha, General Correspondence, 24 de Setembro a 24 de
Dezembro de 1918, letter dated 16 October 1918 sent by the Red Cross Sec-
retary General, Santos Ferreira, to Albino Sousa Cruz, President of the Rio de
Janeiro Delegation of the Portuguese Red Cross.
91 Boletim da Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, February 1917, p. 136.
92 Ibid., p. 153.
93 A Luís Manuel Neves Costa, “Assistência da Colónia Portuguesa do Brasil,
1918–1973” in História, Ciências, Saúde-Manguinhos, vol. 21, 2014. See
also Grande Comissão Portuguesa Pró-Pátria relatório apresentado à grande
assembleia dos subscritores em 16 de Março de 1918 (Rio de Janeiro: Tipogra-
fa do Jornal do Comércio de Rodrigues & C.ª, 1918), pp. 8–9.
94 Anonymous, Grande Comissão Portuguesa Pró-Pátria relatório apresentado à
grande assembleia dos subscritores em 16 de Março de 1918 (Rio de Janeiro:
Tipografa do Jornal do Comércio de Rodrigues & C.ª, 1918), p. 130.
95 Relatório da Assistência da Colónia Portuguesa do Brasil aos órfãos da Guerra
1918–1920 (Rio de Janeiro: Papelaria Ribeiro Ouvidor, 1921), p. 10.
96 AHCVP, I Guerra Mundial. Comissão Portuguesa dos prisioneiros de guerra/
Agência Internacional de Prisioneiros de Guerra CICU, Livros correspondên-
cia. Subscrições. Participação das delegações Pietás (1914–1920), vol. I.
97 Anonymous, Grande Comissão Portuguesa Pró-Pátria relatório apresentado à
grande assembleia dos subscritores em 16 de Março de 1918 (Rio de Janeiro:
Tipografa do Jornal do Comércio de Rodrigues & C.ª, 1918), p. 94.
98 Ibid., p. 87.
99 Ibid., pp. 61–62.
100 Ibid., p. 91.
101 João Paulo Freire, Em Serviço da Cruz Vermelha. Notas d’um Comissário (Lis-
bon: Edição da Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, 1919).
102 Boletim da Sociedade Portuguesa da Cruz Vermelha, Fevereiro de, 1917,
p. 135.

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Index

Note: Towns, cities, regions and provinces are included in country references.
ABC 190 Barroetaveña, Francisco Antonio 50, 59
A Capital 219 Basel Mission 84
Africa [incl. colonies, African] 1–2, Bassols, Narciso 105
4–6, 9, 55–56, 73–85, 135, 193, Basutoland [Lesotho] 73, 74
202n6, 207, 209–216 Bechuanaland [Botswana] 73
Agencia Anglo-Ibérica 196 Beiyang government 112
Alba, Santiago 200 Belgium/Belgian 5, 17, 19, 51–53, 55,
Alberini, Coriolano 57 73, 79–80, 82, 103–104, 114, 143,
Albert of Belgium 104 145, 148, 150–151, 155, 177, 188,
Alemann, Theodor 57 208, 214
Algeciras 192 Belo, Aurélio 212
Alhadef, Vic 85 Bergson, Henri 196
Allen & Unwin 34 Berne Convention for the Protection of
Allgemeine Elektricitäts-Gesellschaft Literary and Artistic Works 35,
(AEG) 190 36, 41
Alma Femenina 104, 109n56 Bernhard, Friedrich von 116
Almafuerte [Palacios, Pedro B.] 59 Beruti, Josué A. 57
Altos Hornos 191 Beyer, CF 84
Álvarez del Castillo, Jesús 97–98 Bian, Zongmin 123
Angell, Norman 192 Bianchi, Alfredo A. 49
Angola 73, 79, 208–214, 216, 220 Bilac, Olavo 217
Arévalo, Francisco José 58 Bittencourt, Liberato 60
Argentina/Argentine 2, 5, 7–8, 49–54, Boda, Chen 122
56–60, 107n12, 164–180, 217, 219 Bomilcar, Álvaro 217
Armistice/Versailles/peace 80–81, 93, booksellers 31–34, 36–37, 39
114, 149, 151, 156, 216, 219 Boshin War (1868) 33
Asher & Co 34, 37 Botha, Louis 77, 85
Asia 1, 8–9, 26, 53, 55–56, 75, 135, Bowles, Thomas Gibson 192
140, 149, 152, 156 Bravo Portillo, Manuel 199
Associated Press 138 Brazil/Brazilian 50–51, 54, 57–58, 60,
Athens 50 63n35, 216–220
Austria-Hungary/Sarajevo/Austrian 8, Brecht, Bertold 3
83, 104, 139, 144, 150, 171, 207 Britain/Great Britain/England/United
Kingdom/UK/British/English/Anglo
Ballin, Alberto 178 [incl. Scotland and London] 3–5,
Banco Transatlántico Alemán 190 6, 8, 13–21, 24–26, 32–39, 50–52,
Barbosa, Rui 60 56, 73–85, 98, 99, 104, 107n30,
Barbosa, Tamagnini 213 117, 119, 123–124, 138, 142–144,
 Index 229
149–156, 164, 166, 168, 170, Colmo, Alfredo 57
173, 175–176, 178–179, 180n13, Colombia/Colombian 50, 52, 55, 58
187–188, 190–197, 199–200, Colonial Nursing Association 79
207–208, 209, 211–216 Combined Journal of Military Afairs
British East Africa [Kenya] 73, 74, 80 (Junshi huikan) 116–117
Bulawayo Chronicle, The 74, 81, 83 Comisión Pro-Argentinidad 59
Bulletin d’Informations 196 Comité Argentino 59
Comité Nacional de la Juventud 59
Cai, E 116 Commonwealth War Graves 25
Cameroons 78–79; see also Compañía Valenciana de Vapores de
Kamerun/Cameroons Africa 193
Cândido Sotto-Mayor 218 Confucian 20, 22
Cape Verde 211, 220 Congo (Belgian) 73, 80, 214
Caras y Caretas 60 consuls/consulates/consular agents 8,
Carbonell, Ramón 193 38–39, 55, 83, 186, 189–190, 192,
Careta 60 194–197, 199, 200, 217
Caribbean 74 Contreras Medellín, Micaela 103–105
Carlton, Bibi 193 Cormack, George E. 24
Carrancista government/Carranza 58, Cornejo, Mariano H. 51
96, 101 Coronel Fix see Cavalcanti de
Carrasquilla Mallarino, Eduardo 50 Albuquerque, Pedro
Castañeda y Castañeda, Ramón 97 Correio da Manhã 60
Catholic 52, 57, 94–98, 105, 196, Costa, Afonso 207, 220
207, 214 Cox Méndez, Ricardo 58
Cavalcanti de Albuquerque, Pedro Crédit Lyonnais 194
[Coronel Fix] 58 Crewdson, Dorothea 216
censorship 5, 7, 31, 76, 79, Crowe, Eyre A. 38, 209
189, 198 Cruz, Albino Sousa 217
Central African Times, The 74 Cruzada das Mulheres Portuguesas 208
Central News Agency 84 Cunningham, William 34
Central Powers/Empires 59, 95–96, 138, Curzon, Lord 80
168–169, 173, 190, 200–201, 219
Cervejaria Brahama brewery 218 da Costa, António Maria 218
Chaplin, Charlie 15 Dai, Li 124
Chen, Cheng 117 da Rocha Cabral, Bento 218
Chen, Duxiu 112 da Rocha Lima, Henrique 58
Chen, Fuguang 117 Dato, Eduardo 187, 189, 196, 202n15
Chen, Lifu 121, 123 de Almeida, Júlia Lopes 220
Chiang, Kai-Shek 113, 117, 122–123, de Andrade, Freire 209
125–126, 127n14 de Bunsen, Maurice 37
Chikamoto, Kōgorō 145, 149–151, de Castro Osório, Ana 208
154–156 de Figueiredo, Domingos Tasso 210
Chile/Chilean 49, 51–52, 54, 56, 58 de Graça Aranha, José Pereira 60
Chilembwe, John 76–77, 82 de la Tour, Pierre Imbart 196
China/Chinese 2, 4, 7, 13–27, 111–126, de Lima, Américo Pires 210, 211
135, 138, 140–141, 149–150; art 4, de Medeiros e Albuquerque, José 51
20, 23–27; labourers 13–18, 20–21, Dempster, John 83
23, 24, 25, 26, 27; poetry/songs/music Denmark 167
4, 16, 19–23, 122, 125 Denvignes, Joseph 196
Christian missionaries 15, 74, 76–77; de Reuter, Herbert 84
see also Catholic de Roucy, Robert 194
Chūō kōron 138 Deutsche La Plata Zeitung 54, 57
Cinematográfca Ervedosa & C.ª 213 Deutsche Zeitung für Chile 58
Clausewitz, Carl von 172 de Zulueta, Luis 188
Clemenceau, George 24 Dias, Carlos Malheiro 218–219
230 Index
Diéguez, Manuel M. 93–94 51, 53, 55–56, 59, 64n38, 73, 76,
Dirección General de Seguridad 198 78, 80–82, 92–95, 102, 105–106,
dos Passos, John 208, 216 109n66, 111–113, 115, 118–119,
Drifeld Times 77–79 135–156, 164–167, 169–172,
Du, Yaquan 112 175–176, 179, 187–188, 201, 207,
Duan, Muzhang 116 209, 210, 211, 212, 214, 216, 220
Dumas, George 206
Dunshee de Abranches Moura, João Falkands/Malvinas/Falkland Islands 56,
58, 60 178, 180
Durkheim, Émile 206 Falkenhayn, Erich von 171
Dushu Shenghuo 122 Federación Obrera Argentina 60
Federación Regional Obrera 201
EA Lohmann & Company 83 flm/cinema 40, 50, 56, 122, 137,
East African Standard 74, 76, 78, 82, 138, 151–152, 156, 197, 198, 211,
83, 84 212, 213
Eckardt, Heinrich von 95, 97 Fisher, Lord 192
Eco Alemán 58 Fletcher, ABW 17
Ecuador 55 Foch, Ferdinand 171
education/educators/academies/teachers/ Fon-Fon 60
universities 1, 7, 31, 33, 35–37, France/French 3–5, 8, 13, 15, 17–19,
39, 40, 43n15, 51, 74–75, 82, 94, 21–24, 26, 32–34, 36, 49–51, 54,
104–105, 112, 115–117, 120, 57, 59, 79–80, 83, 94–95, 98, 103,
122–125, 136–137, 139–144–147, 104, 107n17, 138–139, 142–145,
149–156, 165, 166, 170, 174–175, 149, 151–153, 155, 165–167, 170,
196, 216, 218 173–177, 187–188, 190–191,
Egypt/Suez 73, 74, 77, 81 193–194, 196–201, 202n6, 208,
El Correo Español 190 212, 214–216, 220
El Debate 190 Frankfurter Zeitung 143
El Demócrata 92 Franz Ferdinand 207
Elder Dempster Line 83 Franz Joseph 83
El Diario de Occidente 95 Freire, João Paulo 216, 219
El Diario Universal 187 Fukuoka Nichinichi Shinbun 148
El Heraldo de Madrid 187 Fukuzawa, Yukichi 33
El Informador 6, 92–105 Fuller, John Frederick Charles 115
Eliot, TS 15
El Liberal 187–188 Gaika, SS 83
El Occidental 95–97 Gallardo (lawyer) 58
El Porvenir 95 Gallardo Rojas, Cástulo 102
El Socialista 187 Gálvez, Manuel 60
El Sol 187 Gambia 73, 78
El Tiempo Nuevo 58 García Calderón, Ventura & Francisco
El Universal 92, 98, 105 51, 54
El Zorro 53 García Prieto, Manuel (Marquis of
Endō, Kichisaburō 139 Alhucermas) 187–188, 196
Engelenberg, FV 82 Gaussen, Fernand 194
Entente Cordiale/Entente/Allied 4, 6, Geneva Convention/Protocol 112, 119,
13, 50, 53–57, 61, 92–93, 97–99, 212, 214
101–105, 138–139, 142, 148, George V 15–16
152, 153, 155, 164, 167–169, 171, German-Chilean Bund 58
175–176, 178, 180, 186–189, German East Africa [Tanzania, Ruanda,
191–193, 195–200, 207, 218, 220 Burundi] 78–81, 83–84
España 188, 190 Germany/German 3–8, 13–14, 26,
Europe/Western Front 1–5, 7–9, 32–40, 43n15, 49–61, 67n76, 73,
13–15, 17, 19–27, 31–36, 38, 49, 76–84, 92–99, 101, 103–104,
 Index 231
108n35, 109n64, 114–115, Italy 5, 50, 114, 118, 123, 138, 142,
117–120, 122–123, 138–139, 144, 146, 151–152, 154, 176, 194
141–144, 147–150, 152–156, Iwe Ihoren 74
164–180, 187–199, 201, 206, 211,
214, 217, 219 Japan 2–5, 7, 13, 31–45, 56, 111–117,
Gibraltar 178, 188, 191–192, 120–123, 125–126, 135–156; book
194–196, 198 trade 5, 31–33, 40–41, 42n15
Giusti, Roberto F. 49 Javanjee, AM 74
Globe, The 77–81, 84 Jayne, Garland 215
Gold Coast [Ghana] 73, 74, 76, 82–84, Jerome, Lucien 200
89n35 Jikyoku ni kan suru kyōiku shiryō
Gold Coast Leader 76, 82, 83, 84 142–143
Gold Coast Nation 83, 84 Joaquín Mumbrú (steamer) 199
Gomes, Teixeira 209 Jones, Roderick 84, 85
Gómez, Laureano 58 Jornal do Comércio/Commercio 53, 58,
González Besada, Augusto 200 60, 217
Gota de Leche 197 Juan y Domine, José 193
Gotō, Shinpei 40, 140 Junta de Damas Aliadas 197
Grémio Pátria Integral Association 212
Guerrero, Jenaro 58 Kalle, Arnold 191
Guinea Bissau 211 Kamerun/Cameroons 73, 77,
78, 79
Hague Convention 6, 80, 186, 209 Kanehara 37
Hall, Reginald “Blinker” 191–192, 200 Katō, Takaaki 40, 44n30
Hamburg–America navigation Katsura, Tarō 140
company 178 Keiper, Wilhelm 57
Hamburg Institute of Tropical Kellogg-Briand Pact (1928) 115
Medicine 58 Kelly, Gerald 200
Harris, Walter 193 Kenworthy, Joseph 192, 194
Havas intelligence service 50, 55 Kerensky government 154
Hayford, Joseph Ephraim Casely [Ekra Keyser, Arthur 195, 199, 200
Agiman] 82 Kinkelin, Emilio 7–8, 57, 164–180
He, Sui 118, 120 Kipling, Rudyard 16–17
Hemingway, Ernest 208 Kokumin shinbun 137
Henry Sotheran & Co 37 Königsberg, SMS 84
Heraldo Conservador 58 Krohn, Hans von 191
Hertling, Georg von 178
Hindenburg, Paul von/ Line 174–175 Labbe, Renée & Berthe 215
historiography 1, 6, 135, 152 La Chispa 95
Hōchi shinbun 137 La Época 95, 96, 97, 98
Hohenberg, Duchess of 207 Lagos Standard 81, 82
Hong Kong 220 La Nación 7, 8, 51, 57, 164, 168–169,
Horikiri, Zenjirō 33 176
Hu, Sheng 122 La Palabra 95–96
Latin America 1, 5, 8, 49–60, 67n84,
Ibarguren, Carlos 60 94, 101–102, 105, 135, 175, 176, 216
Iberia/Iberian Peninsula 1, 8, 9, 186; La Tribuna 53
see also Europe/Western Front La Unión 8, 57, 58
Illustrated London News, The 78 La Verdad 58
India 78, 80, 83, 207 Lavisse, Ernest 98
Inoue, Katsunosuke 36–37 League of Nations 112, 114–115
Instituto Osvaldo Cruz 58 Leselinyana la Lesutho 74
Ireland [incl. Dublin] 26, 77 Lettow-Vorbeck, Paul von 81
Isigidimi Sama Xhosa 74 Levy-Bruhl, Lucien 206
232 Index
Li, Erkang 115, 121, 122 Micronesia 138
Li, Gongpu 125 Miki, Kiyoshi 35
Liang, Ji 119 Military Afairs Magazine (Bingshi
Liang, Qichao 116 zazhi) 114
Liberia 74 Mitsukoshi Department Store/magazine
Library of Leuven 5, 52 147, 151–154, 156
Liga Patriótica pro Neutralidad 59 Mongolia/Mongol Invasion (1274,
Liga pelos Alliados 60 1281) 111, 148
Lin, Qianhu 123 Monroe Doctrine 101, 149
Livingstone, David 23 Monteiro Lobato, José Bento 58
Lloyd’s of London 192 Morais, Viscount of 217–218
Locarno Treaty 112 Morocco/Moroccan 187, 190, 193,
London Declaration (1909) 34, 192 198, 202n6
Lu, Qi 125 Motono, Ichirō 38
Ludendorf, Erich 118 Mousset, Albert 196
Ludlow, WR 21 Museo del Palacio de Bellas Artes 1
Ludw. Deuss & Co. 83 Muslim 74
Lugard, Frederick 81
Lugones, Leopoldo 59 Nakamura, Shigehisa 36, 39
Lusitania 52, 79, 82, 173 Nankōdō 37
Lyautey, Louis-Herbert 193 Napoleon 174
Netherlands/Holland/Dutch 34, 39,
MacAndrews & Co. 195 104, 167
Macau 211 neutral/neutralistas 2, 5–6, 8, 34–35,
Machado, Bernardino 209, 210, 214 38, 49, 51, 52, 54–60, 73, 79, 84,
Machado, Irineu 51, 52, 60 94, 97, 99, 101–104, 138–139, 148,
Mackenna, Alberto 51 152–156, 164, 167–169, 173, 175,
Mafeking Mail 81 179–180, 186–192, 199–201, 209,
Malan, DF 82 214, 217, 219
Manchuria 113, 115–116, 120, 154 New Life Movement 124
March, Juan 193–194 newspapers/press/magazines/journals
Marconi, Guglielmo 217 5–8, 19, 31–33, 35, 38–39, 49,
Marco Polo Bridge 117 50, 52, 53, 55, 57–60, 74–79–85,
Marons 83 92–99, 102–105, 112, 114, 116,
Maruzen (Yokohama Maruya Shōsha) 136–139, 142–144, 148, 150–156,
33–40 164, 168, 175, 177, 179, 187–192,
Marx, Karl 53 197, 200–201, 209, 211–213,
Mason, AEW 193 217–219
Massé, Mathilde 216 Nicaragua 53
Más y Pi, Juan 59 Nietzsche, Friedrich 53, 116
Maura, Antonio 189, 196, 199, 202n15 Nigeria 73, 81, 83
Mayer, Dora 109n64 Nigerian Chronicle 83
McCormick, A. 14, 17, 20 Nijhof, Martinus 34, 39
media/mediatisation 5, 40, 49, 51, Nosotros 49, 59
59, 75, 93, 95–98, 135–137, 149, Nyasaland [Malawi] 73–74, 76, 77,
151–152, 155–156, 179, 192 82–83
mediators/mediation 1–9, 32, 39, 49, Nyasaland Times 81, 83
74, 76, 92–93, 135–137, 139, 145,
154, 156, 164, 168, 178–179, 186, O Africano 211
193, 206–208, 211–212, 214–215 Obregón, General Álvaro 93
Meiji era (1868–1912) 4, 5, 31–34, 41, Ogley, PE 18
42n6, 140, 152, 155 Ōkuma, Shigenobu 35, 36, 38, 40, 44n30
Merriman, JX 76 O País 218
Mexico 1, 2, 6, 56, 58, 92–106, 178 Orconera Iron Ore 191
 Index 233
Ōsaka asahi shinbun 137 Restauración 95
O Século 212 Reuters 55, 74, 84, 85, 138
Ōshū sensō jikki 139 Revista Argentina de Ciencias
Ottoman consul/Turkey 83 Políticas 59
Oyaizu, Kaname 33–38, 40 Revista Contemporánea 95–96
Revista del Pacífco 58
Palacios, Alfredo L. 59 Rhodesia [Zambia, Zimbabwe] 73, 74,
Palacios, Pedro B. see Almafuerte 78, 81, 85
Palermo 51 Ribeiro, Aquilino 206, 216
Panorama 58 Río de la Plata 52
Paraguay/Paraguayan 53–54, 57 Rivera, Diego 1
Parreira, Jorge 210 Rodó, José Enrique 51
Passaporte, José Pedro 212 Rodrigues, Pedroso 218
Pathé Fréres 50, 197–198 Rojas, Ricardo 59
Payró, Roberto 51 Roldán, Belisario 57
Pegasus, HMS 78 Romania/Romanian 104, 174
Peña de Hierro Copper Mines 191 Romanones, Count 187, 189, 202n6
Pérez Triana, Santiago 52 Russia [Soviet Union] 56, 104, 116,
Pertiné, Basilio 166 117–123, 142–144, 146, 148–149,
Peru 51, 54 152, 154–155, 172, 174, 176–177,
Pessoa, Fernando [Bernardo Soares] 206 189, 201
Phipps, GH 38 Russo-Japanese War (1904–1905) 31,
photos/photographs/exhibitions 7, 24, 136, 139–140, 146–147, 151, 155
50, 52, 136, 137, 139, 142–147,
151–152, 155–156, 215 Sáenz Peña, Roque 166
Pinney, Norman W. 14 Sánchez, Pedro 6, 102, 103, 105
Pinto Basto, Maria Antónia 214–216 San Fulgencio 189
Pinto, Serpa 209 San Miguel Company 191
Plaatje, Sol 75 Sao Tome and Principe 211
Poland 117, 172, 174, 176 Sarajevo/Serbia/Serbian 8, 104,
Portugal 2, 8, 9, 73, 195, 206–220 150, 207
Portuguese East Africa [Mozambique] Saunders, Nicholas 26
73, 80, 84, 209–212, 214, 216, 220 Scandinavia 138
Portuguese Red Triangle 215 Schaerer, Eduardo 57
Press Association 74, 84 Schliefen, Alfred von 170
Princip, Gavrilo 207 Schultz, Eduardo 212
Pritzwitz, Major General von 165 Shiba, Chūzaburō 147, 152, 156
propaganda 5–7, 49–61, 73, 84, Shiba, Shigeri 152–154
95–96, 98–99, 101, 104, 113, Shidehara, Kijūrō 39
120–122, 138, 154, 168, 175–178, Shimazaki, Tōson 139
180, 190–192, 195–200, 202n6, Siemens Schukert 190
216, 217, 219 Sierra Leone 73–74, 83
publishers 1, 5, 9, 31–42, 57, 75, 139 Sierra Leone Weekly 83
Punch magazine 19 Sino-Japanese Wars (1894–1895,
1937–1945) 31, 111, 116, 117,
Quan, Jingcun 119 125–126, 136, 139, 142, 151
Quesada, Ernesto 57 Smuts, Jan 76–77, 85
Social Darwinism 116
Ramos, Juan P. 57 Société Minière et Métallurgique de
Rathenau, Walther 120 Peñarroya 191
Ratibor, Max von 190 Solidaridad Obrera 199
Red Cross 208–220 Sota y Aznar 191
Reimer, Josef Ludwig 54 South Africa, Union of 2, 73–76, 78,
Renacimiento 95–96 79, 81–85, 211
234 Index
South West Africa [Namibia] 73, 77, Van Walleghem, Achiel 19
78, 79, 81, 82, 85 Venezuela 54
Spain/Spanish 2, 8, 52, 55, 56–58, 94, Vergara, Ernesto 57
105, 167, 178, 186–201, 202n6 Vial Solar, Javier 58
Spanish-American War (1898) 49 Villiers, Henry Montagu 195
Spengler, Oswald 139 Volksblad, Die 82
Suárez, Marco Fidel 55, 58
submarine 23, 34, 79, 145, 148, Walter, John 196
153, 154, 168, 173, 189, 193–194, Wang, Jingwei 120, 122
198, 200 Washington Conference/Treaties 116, 119
Sun, Baogang 121 Webb, Richard 192
Swaziland 73 Western Front battles: Aisne, Liege,
Sweden 152–154, 167 Marne, Somme, Verdun 150,
Switzerland/Swiss 17, 57, 138, 152, 169–170, 171, 174–175, 197;
154, 167, 170 Flanders 19, 206, 215–216, 220
Whishaw, Ellen 197
Taisen shashin gahō 139 Whymant, Neville J. 20
Taishō period (1912–1926) 32, 41, 140 Wilamowitz-Moellendorf, Ulrich
Tan, Yimin 115, 123 von 143
Tangier 178, 202n6 Wilhelm II, Kaiser 53,
Thoroton, Charles Julian 192–194 173, 176
Tiedmann, Grete 206 Will, Eugen 56
Times, The 192–193, 196 Williams, GA 82
Tjarks, Hermann 57 Wilmart, Raymond 53
Togoland 73, 76, 78–79, 82, 84 women/female 22, 26, 50, 52, 59, 76,
Tokugawa period (1603–1868) 4, 31 79, 103–105, 109n56, 112, 137, 139,
Tōkyō asahi shinbun 137, 143, 150 142, 144–145, 148, 153–156, 177,
Tōkyō Imperial University 33, 39, 197, 208–209, 211–214, 218, 220
43n15, 152, 156 Woods, Joseph M. 26
Tōkyō nichi-nichi shinbun 137
Toyoizumi, Masuzō 151 Xinhai Revolution 140
“Trading with the Enemy Act” 34, 35,
37, 38 Yamakawa, Kenjirō 39, 40
Transocean/Transozean GmbH 55, 58 Yamamoto, Gonbē 140
Trans-Siberian Railway 152, 154 Yang, Jie 115–116
Treaty of Paris (1856) 34 Yang, Xingrong 124
Tripartite Pact 117 Yokohama Specie Bank 36, 44n36
Tsala ea Batho 75 Yomiuri shinbun 137–138
Young Men’s Christian Association
Uganda 73, 82–83 (YMCA) 15–16, 21, 24, 215
Uganda Herald 82, 83 Yuan, Shikai 112
Ugarte, Manuel 52, 60
United Alkali Company 191 Zambezi Sugar and Salt 83
United States of America/USA/ Zanzibar 73–74, 78, 84
American/Yanks 3–6, 9, 13, 15, Zeballos, Estanislao 60
31, 33, 49–53, 55, 76, 79, 82, 93, zeppelin 81, 84, 145, 148, 153
98–99, 101, 104, 111, 113, 115, Zhang, Junmai 118, 121
119, 123–124, 138–139, 141–142, Zhang, Naiqi 120, 124
144, 148–150, 156, 173, 175, Zhang, Shichao 112
178, 198, 207, 208, 215, 216, 217; Zhou, Nianxing 124
Honolulu 220 Zhou, Yawei 115, 121, 124
Uriburu, José Félix 57, 166 “Zimmermann telegram” 178
Uruguay 51, 55, 57, 219 Zimmern, Alfred 3