Pre-war
1914
Outbreak of the war
1915
1916
1917
1918
End of the war
Post-war

Judith Fritz

Chapter

Managing the shortages

In October 1914, just a few months after the war began, shortages and scarcities could be felt everywhere. The authorities thus took the first measures in terms of rationing and intervention.

Chapter

Causes of the supply crisis

During the war, the civilian population came to endure a worsening of their living conditions in general. This affected the shortage in foodstuffs and consumer goods in a particularly drastic way, however, leading to a dramatic emergency.

Chapter

Truth from the clouds

It was not until the second half of the war that airborne leafleting was recognized as an effective instrument of psychological warfare. Mostly printed on one side only, these publications were dropped over the front in hazardous actions in an attempt to demoralize enemy troops.

Chapter

The war on the wall

The poster had been used as a medium of communication for commercial purposes well before the First World War, and advertising art had already become established as a separate branch of art production. With the advent of war the poster became a modern vehicle of political content.

Chapter

The battle for hearts and minds.

The First World War saw the creation for the first time of dedicated institutions of propaganda intended to generate a perception of the war that was as uniform as possible. Britain and the United States of America took a pioneering role in the development of psychological warfare. The Central Powers at first underestimated the opportunities offered by propaganda and only started to organize propaganda measures centrally as the war progressed.

Chapter

Propaganda: psychological warfare in the First World War

The First World War witnessed the wholesale mobilization of the masses to an extent that had never been seen before. As in all the belligerent countries, targeted propaganda became an important element of warfare in the Habsburg Monarchy. Men and women, young and old, the front line and the hinterland, were to form a common ‘front of opinion’.

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