Poetry during the First World War.

The First World War changed the way modern warfare was conducted. Not only was it the first time in Military History that the use of the Heavier than Air plane in a strategic role, but also was the introduction to modern warfare tactics. The war was triggered by pure coincidental fate and the people of Europe at the time were quite exited at the prospect of having a war that almost all of the male population in Europe signed up for service. Little did they know that the results of the "Great War" would destroy an entire generation of men in Europe as it ran its course. The outlook was quite grim by the time the first machine gun was mounted on to the front cowling of a Morane Sauliner.

I forget who the aviator was that said "If you score one kill you have done a great service for your country, two and you have taken the war to the Huns." The life expectancy for an aviator was not very long on the front lines and a lot of the squadron songs made light of the inevitable buying of the farm.

Equally in the trenches poets such a Wilfred Owen painted a grim picture that The Great War to end all wars was not a glamorous one. Death and decay was a constant reminder to the service men on the front that there was a very distinct possibility that the will not live to see their loved ones again.

"If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues -
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori."