ABSTRACT
During the First World War, all the larger cities of Germany put up wooden statues of Hindenburg, into which donors of a small contribution were allowed to drive an iron nail. The change of regime brought about a number of other changes, some of a very drastic nature. Of even greater importance is the place the General Staff began to occupy in the national life as a whole, and the steady extension of its activities for the General Staff was already concerning itself with such matters as the press, films, general propaganda, armaments and food. Whatever his views on military dictatorship, there were no bounds to Ludendorff’s enthusiasm for War Socialism—the Belgian workers might have given it another name—and that, too, was understandable, for War Socialism involved the ruthless exploitation of all human and material resources, and this was wholly in tune with Ludendorff’s conception of war.
