This text comes from our book, Light to the Nations, Part II.
The British government thought its main task in the war would be to supply sea power to the French and Russians, who would do most of the fighting on land. Having the world’s largest navy, the British thought they easily could stop contraband (munitions, arms, raw materials, and other necessary items) from reaching the German army.
The British blockade was able to stop all German merchant vessels; but what was to be done about merchant ships from neutral countries, like the United States, that traded with Germany? The London Declaration, a 1908 agreement made by several nations (but not Great Britain), said belligerents could not treat certain specified goods shipped by neutral shipping to neutral ports as contraband. Such goods included forage for animals, fuel, lubricants, and food. But as early as August 20, 1914, the British began to block the shipment of materials protected by the declaration. Gradually the British blockade was keeping even food shipments from reaching Germany.
Since the German navy could not directly break the blockade (for it was no match for the British navy), it began laying mines off the coast of Britain and Ireland. Calling this indiscriminate warfare, the British declared the entire North Sea a “war zone” and began stopping all ships carrying goods destined for Germany. For their part, the German admirals called the British blockade a “war of starvation” against Germany’s civilian population. They convinced Kaiser Wilhelm II that the only way to fight the blockade was by unrestricted submarine warfare against all ships carrying on trade with Great Britain.
Since 1890, Germans had been perfecting the design of what they called the Unterseeboot (“Undersea boat,” shortened to U-Boot or U-boat). By the beginning of the war, Germany had 29 U-boats in service against enemy warships. On February 4, 1915, Germany said it would carry on unrestricted U-boat warfare on British merchant shipping in order to establish a blockade around Great Britain.
Though the British knew that a U-boat “blockade” at that time did not seriously threaten British shipping, it provided them an excuse to proclaim a complete blockade of Germany. Beginning March 11, 1915, British and French ships detained all neutral ships carrying even shipments of food destined for Germany. Because of her industrialization in the late 19th century, Germany, like Great Britain, did not produce all of her own food and had come to rely on foreign food to feed her population. The British blockade thus threatened to starve out not just the German army, but the German civilian population as well.
By mid-1915, however, Germany had been carrying on her own warfare against civilians, using aircraft. In September 1914, the Germans dropped small bombs from airplanes on Antwerp, killing six civilians in their homes. Before the war, however, Germany had developed what seemed to be a more formidable aircraft—the Luftschiff (“airship”) or dirigible. Developed by Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin, the Luftschiff had a large, cigar-shaped frame filled with many gas balloons and covered with fabric. Moved by propellers attached to the sides of the frame, and steered using four rudder fins, the Luftschiff could carry passengers on long air trips in a “gondola” attached to the belly of the ship.
Before the war, the German army and navy saw that the Luftschiff or “zeppelin” could be used for reconnaissance and for bombing raids on enemy targets. In response to the blockade, German navy leaders asked Kaiser Wilhelm to approve bombing raids over England. Wilhelm at first refused; but he then approved the raids, as long as the only targets were military and not civilian. But when French aircraft began making raids over German cities, the kaiser reluctantly agreed to allow zeppelin bombing raids over London, in part to terrify the civilian population. The first such raid was carried out on May 31, 1915, killing seven noncombatants and injuring 35 others. Zeppelin bombings continued over England and Paris throughout 1915. When it became clear that despite the terror they caused civilians, zeppelin raids caused little significant damage to the enemy, the attacks occurred less often.
As the war progressed, all sides began carrying out bombing raids on noncombatant targets—terrorizing the civilian population in order to weaken their resolve to carry on the war. By 1917, the Entente and Central Powers had developed long-range airplane bombers that were more effective than zeppelins in their destructive capability. Still, the noncombatant deaths caused by such bombing raids were few in comparison to the overall number of deaths from the war. By 1918, the number of noncombatants killed by German air bombing raids was 1,400–1,500, while about half that number had been killed by the Allies.
The number of deaths caused by such raids, however, does not tell the whole story. Under the influence of the Christian Faith, for over a thousand years, Europe had been developing a code of “civilized” warfare that specifically forbade the direct and intentional killing of noncombatants. Unlike ancient peoples who intentionally destroyed whole populations of men, women, and children, European soldiers were to spare the lives of noncombatants. The Great War’s targeting of noncombatants thus represented a departure from the code of ethics that had governed warfare in Europe for hundreds of years. It represented a rejection of civilization and a return to barbarism on the part of the “Christian” nations of Europe.