RESISTANCE MOVEMENTS
ANNA ROSE BENKESER AND CLAIRE LEE ADAIR
OPPOSITION IN GREAT
BRITAIN
CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTORS
1. Pacifists against war in general
2. Political objectors (German government wasn’t
the enemy)
3. Religious objections
•
•
Quakers
Jehovah Witnesses
4. Combination
CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTORS
• Ypres and Somme  vast casualties  fewer
volunteers  conscription
• Conscious clause
• The right to refuse if it went against their beliefs
• Partial participators & absolutists
• No Conscription Fellowship
• Socialist Independent Labour Party & Quakers
"Compulsory service is, I believe, as
distasteful to the nation as it is incompatible
with the conditions of an Army like ours,
which has such a large proportion of its units
on foreign service. I hold moreover, that the
man who voluntarily serves his country is
more to be relied upon as a good fighting
soldier than is he who is compelled to bear
arms.”
-Lord Roberts, British Commander in South
Africa
OPPOSITION IN THE UNITED
STATES
OPPOSITION IN THE UNITED STATES
• Opposition from:
•
•
•
•
German Americans
Irish Americans
Quakers
Parents
• Espionage Act of 1917
• Sedition Act of 1918
SOCIALISTS
SOCIALIST OPPOSITION
• Marx’s predictions coming true
• Capitalism caused the war
FRENCH MUTINY
MUTINY IN THE FRENCH ARMY
• April 17-June 30: ~250 mutinies
• Rarely refused to face the enemy
• Nivelle Offense of April 1917  many deaths
• Infantry regiments had enough
• 17 men from the 108th Infantry Regiment
abandoned their posts
• 12 sentenced to death
• Motivated by living conditions  trenches
• Rumors  conflict
STATISTICS FROM G. PEDRONCINI
• The French Army consisted of 112 Divisions and 68 were affected by
mutiny.
• Of these 68, five were “profoundly affected”’ six were “very seriously
affected”, 15 were “seriously affected”, 25 were affected by “repeated
incidents” and 17 were affected by “one incident only”.
• A total 35,000 men were involved in mutiny.
• 1,381 were given a “heavy prison sentence” of five years or more hard
labour. Twenty-three men were given life sentences.
• 1,492 were given lesser prison sentences, though some of these were
suspended.
• 57 men were probably executed (7 immediately after sentence and
possibly another 50 after they received no reprieve. There were 43 certain
executions (including the seven summarily executed) and 14 “possibly” or
“doubtfully”. Two more men were sentenced to death but one
committed suicide and one escaped (Corporal Moulin who was known to
be still alive after World War Two).
MUTINIES
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mOiadmX1D5Y
RUSSIAN REVOLUTION
MUTINY IN THE RUSSIAN ARMY
• Russia was not prepared for war
• Tannenberg and the First Battle of the Masurian Lakes  loss of
two armies
•
•
•
•
Poor conditions
Awful death rate
Food and munitions shortages
Soviets  propaganda to the war front  encouraged
mutiny
• Spread revolutionary ideas
• Many troops listened
• Tsar called loyal troops to put down March 1917
Revolution
• Few obeyed
1916 RUSSIAN REVOLUTION
• Home front life was strained
• Militarism of industry
• Food shortages
• Rumors about tsarina Alexandra and Rasputin
• 1,700,000 military dead and 5,000,000 wounded =
'stupidity or treason’?
• Soviet leaders did not support defensive war
• ‘Without annexations or indemnities‘  no one would accept
• April 1917: anti-war radicals& Bolshevik leader, Vladimir
Lenin  home from exile in Switzerland by German
General Staff
• 30 million marks  provoke disorder in Russia
• 1917 military coup  Bolshevik rise to power
ARAB REVOLT
(1916 – 1918)
OTTOMAN EMPIRE BEFORE THE ARAB
REVOLT
• Ottoman Empire had kept control over its multiple
ethnic groups because it had allowed them their
respective lifestyles of choice
• Directly before WWI  Ottoman Empire had shrunk (to
what is now Turkey, the Middle East, and the Arabian
coastline)  Pan-Turkic campaign
• 1908  Completion of Hejaz railway  infuriation of
Hashemite clan
• Anger among Arabs  Arab secret nationalist
societies
INTRO TO THE ARAB REVOLT VIDEO
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0B2JikABjA8
Emir Sharif Hussein bin Ali
ARAB REVOLT SPARKS
• Purpose: achieving independence for Arabs from ruling
Ottoman Turks  single unified Arab state
• The Hashemite cause seeks British support  Prince
Abdullah to Cairo – Lord Kitchener
• British reluctance and vague response at first
• Ottoman Empire joins WWI on side of the Central
Powers and pose threat of British access to Suez Canal
 Great Britain becomes a prime supporter of
Hashemite cause
ARAB REVOLT
• British ships begin to aid revolt by shipping weapons
and funds to Arabia
• Sharif Hussein bin Ali  tribal alliances; al-Fatat
nationalist movement
• June 5th, 1916  Arab Revolt begins – attack at
Medina of Ottoman garrison (General Fakhri Pasha)
• June 10th  Sharif Hussein bin Ali makes public
announcement of the revolt in Mecca
ARAB REVOLT
• Rebel clan attacks of ports along Red Sea
• Arab Regular Army
• ‘Lawrence of Arabia’  Leadership cooperation
between the British and the Arabs
• October 1916
• Attack of Hejaz railway
• Egyptian Expeditionary Force (EEF) – General Sir
Edmund Allenby
T.E. Lawrence recalls a Hejaz railway attack in
which he set off an electric mine that exploded
a locomotive: “We had a Lewis [machine gun]
and flung bullets through the sides. So they
hopped out and took cover behind the
embankment, and shot at us between the
wheels at 50 yards. Unfortunately for them, the
Lewis covered the open stretch. The whole job
took ten minutes, and they lost 70 killed, 30
wounded and 80 prisoner. I lost some baggage,
and nearly myself. I’m not going to last out this
game much longer: nerves going and temper
wearing thin….This killing and killing of Turks is
horrible.”
T.E. Lawrence – ‘Lawrence of Arabia’
INFORMATIVE WEBSITE ON T.E.
LAWRENCE
http://www.pbs.org/lawrenceofarabia/players/lawre
nce.html
ARAB REVOLT
• Lawrence  reconnaissance missions in Syria
• October 1917  EEF victory at the third Battle of Gaza
(Beersheba)
• September 1918  Battle of Meggido (final offensive)
• ‘Race to Damascus’
• Sykes-Picot Agreement
WORKS CITED
• August 1914, 'The People' Resisting the Call to Arms. N.p.: n.p., n.d. JPEG.
• Background to Quakers and Conscientious Objection in World War I & II.
N.p.: n.p., n.d. PDF.
• "Conscientious Objectors." History Learning Site. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 Dec.
2012.
• Consciousnesses Objectors. N.p.: n.p., n.d. JPEG.
• "Introduction to Northwest Antiwar History." Antiwar History: WWI. N.p., n.d.
Web. 05 Dec. 2012.
• "Mutiny in the French Army." History Learning Site. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 Dec.
2012.
• N.p., n.d. Web.
• "Russian and War." History Learning Site. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 Dec. 2012.
• "UK Socialists and WW1." World Socialist Party (US). N.p., n.d. Web.
• "War and Revolution in Russia 1914 - 1921." BBC News. BBC, n.d. Web. 05
Dec. 2012.
WORKS CITED
•
WWI Russian Statistics. N.p.: n.p., n.d. JPEG. Browne, O'Brien. "Creating Chaos: Lawrence of
Arabia and the 1916 Arab Revolt."
History Net. Weider History Group, 10 Aug. 2010. Web. 4 Dec. 2012.
<http://www.historynet.com/
creating-chaos-lawrence-of-arabia-and-the-1916-arab-revolt.htm>
•
History Learning Site. HistoryLearningSite, n.d. Web. 4 Dec. 2012.
<http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/conscientious_objectors.htm>.
Kimball, Charles Scott. "A History of Russia - Chapter 3: Soviet Russia - 1917
to 1985." The Xenophile Historian. Charles Kimball, n.d. Web. 4 Dec. 2012.
<http://xenohistorian.faithweb.com/russia/ru03.html>
•
•
Kindig, Jessie. "Labor Radicalism and WWI." Antiwar and Radical History Project.
U of Washington, n.d. Web. 4 Dec. 2012. <http://depts.washington.edu/
antiwar/pnwhistory_home.shtml>
•
"Map of Expansion and Decline of the Ottoman Empire." Naqshbandi. N.p., n.d.
Web. 5 Dec. 2012. <http://www.naqshbandi.org/ottomans/maps/>
•
Ministry for Culture and Heritage. "The Arab Revolt, 1916-18 - Ottoman Empire."
New Zealand History Outline. History Group of the New Zealand Ministry
for Culture and Heritage, 30 Aug. 2012. Web. 4 Dec. 2012.
<http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/war/ottoman-empire/arab-revolt>.
O’Brien Browne. T.E. Lawrence: The Enigmatic Lawrence of Arabia. Military History. October
2003.
•
QUIZ!!!
1) NAME AT LEAST 3 GROUPS THAT
OPPOSED THE WAR.
1)
2)
3)
4)
5)
6)
7)
Mothers
Socialists
Conscientious Objectors
Quakers
Jehovah Witnesses
Irish Americans
German Americans
2) WHAT WAS THE CONSCIOUS CLAUSE?
IN WHICH COUNTRY WAS IT APPLIED?
• Great Britain
• It allowed citizens refuse to participate in battle if
they had a "conscientious objection” to war
3) NAME ONE OF THE TWO ACTS PASSED IN THE
UNITED STATES THAT LED TO THE PUNISHMENT OF
PROTESTORS.
• Espionage Act of 1917
• Sedition Act of 1918
4) IN WHICH YEAR DID MUTINIES IN
THE FRENCH ARMY BEGIN?
• 1917
5) NAME THREE FACTORS THAT LEAD
TO RUSSIA MUNITIES.
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Poor conditions
Militarization of industry
Food shortages
High casualty rates
Munitions shortages
German provocation
Soviet provocation
6) WHICH SIDE DID THE OTTOMAN
EMPIRE JOIN?
• The Central Powers