By autumn 1916, two years into the First World War, the British army had lost over a quarter of a million soldiers. As more and more men were drafted into frontline duty, the vital supply-lines they had manned started drying up leaving the allies teetering on the brink of defeat. At this crucial point in the war a distant ally sent a secret army of 140,000 men to the western front – that army was Chinese. Secret History: Britain’s Forgotten Army, Channel 4 2017
China was ready to support the Allies in the hope they would receive a sympathetic hearing in their bid for sovereignty. ibid.
Conditions were so poor that over 700 died from sickness and disease on the journey. ibid.
The labourers were recruited as civil contractors and not military personnel. ibid.
‘In that year the contribution of the Chinese was far more important than the American contribution.’ ibid. military expert
‘They painted over the far-East Allies.’ ibid. art expert
Of all the clashes between the British and German Navy, the Battle of Jutland during the First World War was the biggest and the deadliest. Secret History s16e3: Jutland, Channel 4 2016
Germany wanted to break the stranglehold and on May 31st 1916 her Navy sent looking for a fight. ibid.
The intention was to bombard the entire Germany line with literally millions of shells. Secret History s16e10: The Somme, Channel 4 2016
The First World War was a catastrophe of such magnitude that even today the imagination has some difficulty grasping it. In the year 1916, in two battles (Verdun and the Somme) casualties of over 1,700,000 were suffered by both sides. Carroll Quigley, Tragedy & Hope: A History of the World in Our Time
World War I early 1918: The German army launches a mighty offensive in a final bid to win the bloodiest war of all. Their ferocious attacks stuns the allied ranks. 100 Days to Victory I: The Spring Offensive, BBC 2018
After three and a half years and more than three million lives lost Germany has a bold new plan to win the war. ibid.
Allied planes take to the air and enter a whirlwind of fire. ibid.
The Germans smash a hole 16 kilometres wide in the Allied lines and advance more than 60 kilometres in just three days. ibid.
The Allies launched their great counter-offensive. ibid.
‘I never thought there were so many shells in the world.’ ibid. soldier
Spring 1918: A ferocious German offensive pushes the Allies to the brink of defeat. Their relentless attack stuns the Allies. With their backs against the wall, Allied commanders dramatically change their approach … They manage to halt the German offensive but they’ve lost huge areas of French territory. 100 Days to Victory II: The Fightback
Now they face the supreme challenge: victory. ibid.
The Germans still have four million men on the Western front. ibid.
Despite the success of the Australians and the Canadians, the Allies still have ten kilometres of hard pounding fighting before they even get to the most formidable defensive line in history – the Hindenburg Line. ibid.
The War itself will be over in 30 days. ibid.
On 8th November 1918 three men met in a railway carriage in the woods in northern France. They were there to negotiate the end of the First World War. Their meeting lasted three days. At stake were hundreds of thousands of lives. World War I: The Final Hours, BBC 2018
Erzberger’s next move was to point to a peace proposal laid out by the American president Woodrow Wilson: the proposal set out a New World Order and was known as the Fourteen Points. It’s aim was to place all countries on equal footing. ibid.
First they wanted the German weapons … Then they wanted their Navy … The Allies wanted land … And they wanted money. ibid.
Armed protesters took to the streets of Berlin … A huge mob descended on the Reichstag. ibid.
Erzberger signed on behalf of Germany. ibid.
News of the Armistice travelled quickly around the globe. ibid.
Reparations they had to pay combined with the naval blockade led to a humanitarian disaster. ibid.
Erzberger’s assassins were formal German naval officers who were still bitter about being forced to hand over their ships by the Armistice. ibid.
I gave every part of my youth to do a job and to go through a savage war. They Shall Not Grow Old, BBC 2018
We were all instilled with that idea that this was war and that we’ve got to kill the Germans and this is how we looked at the thing. ibid.
Daddy, what did YOU do in the Great War? ibid. poster
Everybody thought it would be a civilised war. ibid. soldier
So I entered my age as 19 year old, three years older than I really was. ibid.
You were never issued with the materials to clean buttons; you had to buy them yourself. ibid.
It was just a matter of doing what we were told. ibid.
It was one of the most desolate looking places in the whole world. ibid.
Oh, lice was a terrible problem. ibid.
And you were always hungry. ibid.
The difficulty was frostbite. Our gumboots filled with water. ibid.
I’ve seen men sinking into the mud and dying in the slime. ibid.
The Prussians were cruel bastards. ibid.
The next morning, every man had to be spick and span. ibid.
You laughed at the slightest things. ibid.
Machine gun bullets came at us like hailstones. ibid.
I dissolved into unconsciousness with no pain, but with millions of golden stars in a dark blue heaven. ibid.
What a fantastic exhibition of anatomy. ibid. re dead dissected German solider
None of them thought we ought to be fighting each other. ibid.
German troops were very brave and very stubborn. ibid.
We were too far gone, too exhausted, to enjoy it. ibid.
You weren’t wanted. ibid.
We were a race apart from the civilians. ibid.
It was all really rather horrible. ibid.
November 11th 1918: All across the Western Front the clocks that were lucky enough to escape the four years of shelling chimed the eleventh hour. And with that, the First World War came to an end. The Corbett Report: The WWI Conspiracy, James Corbett online 2018
World War I was an explosion, a breaking point in history. In the smouldering shell-hole of that cataclysm lay the industrial era optimism of never-ending progress. ibid.
What was World War I about? How did it start? Who won? And what did they win? ibid.
Three of the most important men of the age …. The group that springs from this meeting will go on to leverage the wealth and power of its members to shape the course of history, and 23 years later will drive the world into the truly global war. Their plan reads like outlandish historical fiction: they will form a secret organisation dedicated to the ‘extension of British rule throughout the world’ … William T Stead … Reginald Brett … and Cecil Rhodes … This secret society was not a secret at all. ibid.
It is to this clique, not to the doings of any conspiracy in Sarajevo, that we can attribute the real origins of the First World War … For this cabal, 1914 was just the start of the story. The Corbett Report: The WWI Conspiracy II: The American Front
Across the Atlantic, the next chapter in this hidden history was just getting underway … The Secret Society’s years-long campaign to draw the United States into World War I. ibid.
House, the Milner Group, the Pilgrims, the Wall Street financiers and all of those who had worked so diligently for so many years to bring Uncle Sam into the War had got their wish. The Corbett Report: The WWI Conspiracy III: A New World Order
The First World War tore apart all the verities of the Old World leaving a smouldering wasteland in its wake, a wasteland that could be shaped into a New World Order. ibid.
Control of the economy, control of populations, control of territory, control of information, World War I was a boon for all of those who wanted to consolidate the control of the many in the hands of the few. ibid.
The very same conspirators that had brought about this nightmare were already converging in Paris for the next stage of their conspiracy: there, behind closed doors, they would begin their process of carving up the world to suit their interests, laying the groundwork and preparing the public consciousness for a new international order, setting the stage for even more conflict in the future. ibid.
From the theatre of War to the theatre of myth: along the old frontline but also in every parish back home are the now familiar monuments to the dead of 1914-18. Every year we observe solemn and moving rituals. But for those of us now who didn’t live through the Great War, what are we remembering? David Reynolds, Long Shadow I, BBC 2018
We have become stuck in the trenches. Our view of 1914-18 is now a caricature. ibid.
Different countries remember the Great War in different ways. ibid.
The Great War has cast shadows over the whole century since 1914. ibid.
720,000 dead; 1.5 million wounded: and yet the reality of warfare remained distant and obscure. ibid.
Memory was cloaked in remembrance. ibid.