Remarks as prepared for the Armistice Day observance in Iowa City on Nov. 11, 2024.

Thank you for joining us during this observance of Armistice Day. My name is Paul Deaton. I was a founding member of the Iowa Chapters of Veterans for Peace. When we organized the chapter, we had veterans from every armed conflict going back to World War II. Some of our members have died, and I ask for a moment of silence in their honor.

I intend to keep my remarks brief. Some of you who know me may realize how difficult that will be for me. Nonetheless, let’s get started.

In World War I we find the beginnings of the misinformation and disinformation that became so prevalent in our society. There are 5 things I would like to say about that.

Point 1: There were conspiracy theories about the war.

Was World War I a hoax? No, yet conspiracy theories were prevalent. During the War, the American home front was awash with them alleging internal German enemies were intentionally spreading disease among both human and animal populations, most egregiously during the 1918 influenza pandemic. While false, these stories nevertheless revealed Americas’ shifting relationships to the environment, warfare, and the federal state. They channeled immediate fears over what type of war, and what type of enemy, the nation faced, as well as deeper, Progressive-era anxieties related to the dramatic expansions of government and scientific expertise in American life. It underlines how the war permitted individuals to discuss, denounce, and contest state and scientific authority at this moment in the early twentieth century. In my view many of the conspiracy theories we hear today have their roots in this.

Point 2: Allied Propaganda

Propaganda was used by both the allies and the Germans during the World War.

Allied governments launched propaganda efforts in the days after the invasion, pushing out terrifying, often untrue tales, published in newspapers, fliers, and pamphlets. There were stories of bayoneted babies, mass rape of girls, and old men who obediently turned over useless rifles, and were shot on the spot by heartless “barbarians.” No doubt the intent was to stoke the fire of support for the war.

Point 3: German propaganda.

For the Germans, the goal of propaganda was to make the war seem less devastating than it was. More soldiers were needed at the front, so government officials downplayed the number of casualties to recruit them. The truth about the scale of casualties – an estimated 40 million civilian and military personnel dead and wounded – could only be kept secret using propaganda. The total number of deaths includes more than 9 million military personnel. The civilian death toll was between 6 and 13 million. Disease, including the influenza pandemic, took about a third of these lives. World War I ranks among the deadliest conflicts in human history. Suppression of this fact was a goal of German propaganda.

Point 4: The Armistice.

I visited the Glade of the Armistice while I lived in Europe. It’s in the French Forest of Compiegne where the Germans and Allied Supreme Commander signed the Armistice we commemorate today. They used a rail car for the ceremony. Years later, in 1940, Hitler used the same rail car to accept the French surrender. Hitler had obvious propaganda reasons for doing so. I saw a similar rail car in France while I was there, although not the same one used in 1918. The original disappeared after the Nazis took possession of it. I remember how quiet it was in the forest that day. It was a day filled with meaning.

Point 5: Living History

Veterans of World War One are deceased. The veteran I knew was my Grandfather who never spoke to me of the war. We were more concerned with his black lung disease contracted during decades of coal mining in Illinois. Family lore is Grandfather arrived in France shortly before the Armistice and did not see conflict. He was there six months waiting to return to Illinois. If you have a memory of the war and its veterans like mine, today is a day to remember.

As living memory fades let us hope and pray that the World War I dead shall not have died in vain.

In conclusion, I’d like to read a poem used by the allies to recruit soldiers. The idea was for new people to take up arms to replace the fallen. You may know this one. In Flanders Fields is by Canadian physician John McCrae, published December 8, 1915.

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
    That mark our place; and in the sky
    The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
    Loved and were loved, and now we lie,
        In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
    The torch; be yours to hold it high.
    If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
        In Flanders fields.