Demoralization (warfare)
Demoralization methods are military tactics such as hit-and-run attacks, such as snipers disturbing the enemy with less-lethal weapons and incapacitating agents, and intimidation such as display of force concentration.
[1]: 88 High morale can directly contribute to "an economy of food, textiles, fuel, and other commodities, and to stimulate recruiting, employment in war industries, service in relief work, and the purchase of bonds".
[2]: 163–177 An important precursor to successful demoralization is an effort to deny the target the ability to project frustrations and hatred upon a common enemy.
[2]: 162 As a result, frustrations will build until it is necessary to divert them elsewhere, and seeds of doubt are then sown in the minds of the citizenry who now question the capability of their leadership in identifying the most ominous threat.
[2]: 162–163 The operations of the German Gazette des Ardennes, published in occupied areas of France during World War I, are an example of this aspect of strategic demoralization.
[2]: 161–162 The Gazette des Ardennes regularly published propaganda articles that sought to deny the French of a German enemy image.
[2]: 163 Articles that attempted to justify German unrestricted submarine warfare as an unavoidable consequence of the Allied blockade of Germany are also examples of defense by admission and justification.
[3]: 153 Real and conscious threats that normally inspire disquiet and fear can be made to cause anxiety and borderline neurosis through the use of such propaganda tools as fables and rumors.
[3]: 153–155 The newly-onset anxiety places mass groups of individuals on the border of neurosis and can make them feel conflicts inherent within society or their past.
[3]: 153–155 The pivotal moment of a successful demoralization campaign is when the target is doubt-ridden and anxious, the point at which individual members of a citizenry or group are detached from their current loyalty to their state or cause, and they are then able to be focused in another direction more suitable to the antagonist's needs.
[3]: 189 If successfully implemented, the leadership of a cause can be made sufficiently troublesome to inspire revolution when there will be insufficient capacity to exercise active hatred towards the external enemy.
With the implementation of modern warfare in World War I and all its associated stresses, "every belligerent took a hand in the perilous business of fomenting dissension and revolution abroad, reckless of the possible repercussions of a successful revolt".
[2]: 169 Examples from World War I included German forces providing revolutionary literature to Russian prisoners of war that were expected to return through exchange or release, French use of propaganda leaflets to demonstrate how unaffected by war the Kaiser and his family were, technical encouragement and amplification of national dissent, Wilsonian propaganda stressing peaceful settlement terms, British planting of stories attesting to underground German resistance movements and their subsequent oppression by the German government, propaganda deflecting war guilt, propaganda exposing or exaggerating the desired postwar peace terms, and the promotion of the belief that infidelity was rampant among soldiers and their families back home.
The Central Powers likewise tried to encourage Ukrainian, Irish, Egyptian, North African, and Indian secessionist movements, but all efforts ultimately failed.
[1]: 88 As noted by Angello Codevilla, the clearest indicators that morale can withstand a demoralization campaign are also hallmarks of a well-led organization, and can be explained through five main questions:
