Thesis (M.S.)--Wisconsin State University, La Crosse, 1971. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 25).

Inaug.-Diss.--Cologne. / Vita. Bibliography: p. 215-228.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Iowa, 1976. / Typescript. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 349-353).

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Conventional interpretations regarding the role of the Political Warfare Executive during the Second World War have concentrated almost exclusively on the propaganda output of the organisation. The role of the intelligence sections working for and within the organisation have been largely disregarded or overlooked in the existing history of Executive. This thesis offers a re-evaluation of the PWE which includes this `missing dimension', specifically here the intelligence work of the German Section of the Executive. This approach widens the scope of enquiry to include an exploration of the links between intelligence and propaganda, subversion and sabotage and considers the importance of this relationship for the way in which the PWE emerged. The examination of the Weekly Reports of the German Section identifies a different `type' of intelligence which can be described as `social political' intelligence, which provided the British government with a unique view of the social and political conditions in Germany throughout the duration of the war. The thesis concentrates on the period after the announcement of Unconditional Surrender in January 1943 to the early months on 1946, when the personnel and expertise of the German Section were transferred to the Foreign Office. The analysis of the intelligence reports of the German Section is focussed on three particular issues of interest to government at the time and to historians today. These are German resistance and public opinion, British occupational rule, and the emergence of the perception of the Russian `threat' in Whitehall which signalled the beginning of the Cold War. Taken together these illustrate the way in which the PWE incrementally expanded it's activities over this period of time, and provide the basis for the re- evaluation of the Executive.

Between January 1916 and March 1919 2,504,183 men were conscripted into the British army-representing as such over half the wartime enlistments. Yet to date, the conscripts and their contribution to the Great War have not been acknowledged or studied. This is mainly due to the image of the war in England, which is focused upon the heroic plight of the volunteer soldiers on the Western Front. Historiography, literary studies and popular culture all evoke this image, which is based largely upon the volumes of poems and memoirs written by young volunteer officers, of middle and upper class background, such as Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon. But the British wartime army was not a society of poets and authors who knew how to distil experience into words; nor, as mentioned, were all the soldiers volunteers. This dissertation therefore attempts to explore the cultural identity of this unknown population through a collection of diaries, letters and unpublished accounts of some conscripts; and to do so with the aid of a novel methodological approach. In Part I the concept of this research is explained, as a qualitative examination of all the chosen writings, with emphasis upon eliciting the attitudes of the writers to the factual events they recount. Each text-e.g. letter or diary-was read literally, and also in light of the entire collection, thus allowing for the emergence of personal and collective narratives concurrently. In Part lithe results of this method of research were used to create an extended account of the human experiences of these conscript soldiers-from enlistment through to daily life on the Western Front. The narrative is constructed out of their words, and written from their perspective, as a subjective account of their wartime existence. The result of this synthesis of attitude and experience is an explanation of these conscripts' cultural identity, as a conclusion to Part II.

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