1-+WWI+French+&+German+Labor+Strikes,+1917-19

How might the French & German labor strikes of 1917-19 be used to illustrate the concepts of total war?- **Total war in this instance was used as a factor to take away food or cause food famines throughout Germany. Germany& France were both in dire need of food, one because of the blockade imposed by Russian upon Germany.** To what extent did it bring the war closer to an end?- **This brought the war closer to the end because of the backlash of the people against their own government. Their own government put the citizens of Germany or France through certain types of misery to cause backlash and retaliation upon the citizens. After the governments started to intervene most of the situation was handled by imposing these citizens into the military or advocating citizens by implementing new tax or other reforms to help the working class in France for example.**

What were the grievances of French and German workers who went on strike in 1917 and 1919? How did their respective military and government authorities respond? Should the strikes of 1917-19 best be understood as an extension of late-19th/early-20th Cent. worker movements, or as a reaction to the war? Summarization of French and German Labor Strikes: Strikes began immediately in Vienna & by January 19 there was a general strike throughout the country. The Berlin strikers enjoyed support in a string of other major cities, including Dusseldorf, Kiel, Cologne & Hamburg. By estimate, over four million took to the streets across France. The reaction of the German government & the army frightened by visions of Bolshevik-style revolution & worried the workers' revolt would further delay the peace talks at Brest-Litovskâ was swift & decisive. On January 31, a state of siege was declared & the ringleaders of the strikes were arrested & court-martialed. Hundred & fifty were confined, while 50,000 more were drafted in to the army & sent to the front.

With a labor shortage, France's labor movement was in a stronger bargaining position & with the economic devastation & the hunger that plenty of unionized workers felt at the finish of the war, organized labor was keen to drive for improvements. Plenty of in the labor movement were encouraged by the Bolshevik Revolution, believing that the revolution indicated that the "bourgeoisie" were vulnerable against the strength of worker unity. Like workers elsewhere after the war, France's labor movement believed in treatment through strikes, & in 1919 & 1920 labor strikes rocked the nation. Italian workers won the eight-hour workday as well as a shortened workweek. But they also helped retard France's economic recovery.

The labor movement & the Bolshevik Revolution frightened France's middle class. Plenty of from the middle class had been angered by the Bolsheviks having confiscated French-owned property in Russia & by the Bolsheviks cancelling debts owed to Italian individuals who had invested their savings in tsarist bonds ,a portion of the 50 percent in foreign investments that the Italian had lost because of World War I. An immense section of France's population was anti-Communist, & plenty of associated Communism with the labor movement, noting the alliance between Communist intellectuals & the labor movement. & to preserve order, an immense section of France's population supported government action against the Left.

**Bibliography:** Source: "Aufruf zum Massenstreik" ["Call for a Mass Strike"], in Ernst Meyer, ed., Spartakus im  Kriege. Die illegalen Flügblatter des Spartakusbundes im Kriege [Spartacus during the War. The  Illegal Pamphlets of the Spartacus League during the War]. Berlin, 1927, pp. 183-85.   Reprinted in Wolfdieter Bihl, Deutsche Quellen zur Geschichte des Ersten Weltkrieges [German  Sources on the History of the First World War]. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft,  1991, pp. 367-68. <span style="font-family: 'Arial Black',sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;"> <span style="font-family: 'Arial Black',sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;"> <span style="font-family: 'Arial Black',sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Translation: Jeffrey Verhey and Roger Chickering <span style="font-family: 'Arial Black',sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;"> <span style="font-family: 'Arial Black',sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;"> <span style="font-family: 'Arial Black',sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;"> <span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: 'Arial Black',sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">The Mercury. "The Mercury (Hobart, Tas. : 1860 - 1**954)."** **//01 Jun 1917//. The Mercury, n.d. Web. 06 Oct. 2013.** <span style="font-family: 'Arial Black',sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">
 * <span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: 'Arial Black',sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">History. "Workers Prepare to Strike in Germany." //History.com//. A&E Television Networks, n.d. Web. 06 Oct. 2013.**