Jon Loftus

Throughout the Second World War, the Allies and Axis both relied on propaganda to control and manipulate their populations. The most common visual propaganda were the ubiquitous posters that were produced by the thousands in each country. This thesis is a comparative study of how historical imagery was used in posters produced by Britain, the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. It shows the common visual language shared by these artworks,  and analyses how history was used as a tool of persuasion.

In mid-1919, almost exactly a century ago, the British Government dispatched No. 47 Squadron of the Royal Air Force to South Russia to fight against the Bolsheviks. They were the only British military personnel sent explicitly to fight in the Russian Civil War.  As foreign outsiders looking in, they experienced the Russian Civil War from a unique perspective.  The Squadron, equipped with modern fighter and ground-attack planes, were sent to assist the White General Anton Denikin’s counter-revolution against the Bolshevik central government, pushing north towards Moscow from South Russia. These airmen were a mixture of decorated fighter aces, young pilots and ground crew, all of whom had fought in the First World War and volunteered to go to Russia. The volunteer contingent replaced enlisted personnel who were initially sent in 1918, as per the British government policy of not sending conscripted troops overseas after the end of the First World War.  47 Squadron was led by the formidable Major Raymond Collishaw, a Canadian RAF pilot with 60 victories over the Western Front, the 3rd ranking Commonwealth fighter ace in 1919. In concert with an RAF training mission and a detachment from the Tank Corps, the British Military Mission’s goal was to provide training and assistance in using their new technology to Denikin’s army. However, the Squadron took an active part in the fighting as soon as they were equipped. Forward elements arrived in April 1919, and soon after 47 Squadron began flying combat and reconnaissance missions over the front. They were able to attack ground targets with impunity and dominate the sky, achieving air superiority. The Squadron were very successful from June to November 1919, when Denikin was advancing. They were forced to withdraw in late October 1919, the Red Army broke through White lines at Orel and began a rout of the Volunteer Army, that lead to total collapse of the front and a frantic exodus southwards. This research essay reconstructs the key facets of their experience

The various European East India Companies that pillaged Asia in the eighteenth century are now largely recognised for the exploitive machines of imperialism that they were. This paper reconstructs the exact process and mechanisms by which the English EIC expropriated capital out of India and back to London. Through use of military force, both old fashioned plundering and tactical support of coups, Lord Clive and the EIC managed to aquire a vast pool of capital, long term revenues and effective control of the Bombay region. The importance of military force to Britian's Indian endeavour cannot be underestimated; as I show, force was vital to establishing the British Empire in India, and doubly important to keeping it profitable.

In 1943, RAF Bomber Command and the United States Eighth Air Force virtually destroyed the French Biscay Port towns of Lorient and St. Nazaire through a concerted day and night campaign, devastating them with heavy area bombing raids comparable to attacks on German cities. Unlike Allied raids on Germany, the unfortunate French civilians who resided in these towns were not the target, rather the facilities being used by the Nazi occupiers. The Allied bombing of France does not feature heavily in British popular memory of the war, and as such the ethical and military considerations around it are largely absent from modern discourse. This dissertation clealry establishes the relevant chain of command, and shows how the decision to destroy Lorient by Area Bombing was taken personally by Winston Churchill, urged on by the Lords of the Admiralty, and against the recommendations of the Chiefs of the Air Staff (Charles Portal and Archibald Sinclair) and Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden.