Room 40 and German intrigues in Morocco: re-assessing the operational impact of diplomatic cryptanalysis during World War I

During World War I, Germany sought to provoke numerous insurrections throughout the British and French Empires. Examining the influence of signals intelligence within one of these colonial settings provides an opportunity to measure the operational importance of wartime cryptanalysis. Through a careful analysis of the original intercepts, this article reconstructs the responses of Room 40, the Admiralty’s cryptology department, to Germany’s Moroccan intrigues and highlights the development of intelligence practices. It argues that strategies to deploy diplomatic intelligence emerged gradually, but that Germany’s enduring support for Moroccan dissidents suggests diplomatic cryptanalysis only secured modest results within an operational context.     

“Editorials at a Glance”: Cultural Policy,Gender, and Modernity in the World War I Bureau of Cartoons

Cultural policy during the Great War, rather than radiating from the central government, evolved from contemporary culture—propaganda, movies, and mass media. The state was a player, but quasi‐public organizations such as propaganda agencies, non‐state actors like the YMCA, and “public opinion” played important roles. The Committee on Public Information (CPI)—the government's propaganda committee—influenced Americans through books, advertisements, posters, and cartoons. This essay examines two of the CPI's efforts: the Bureau of Cartoons and the Division of Pictorial Publicity. In these materials, we can see the intersection of class‐based notions of gendered idealism and a developing media state's use of a sentimental culture of the Victorian middle‐class to represent and motivate the nation. With staff drawn primarily from advertising agencies and newspapers, the Committee's work shows how the formulation of cultural policy is the result of complex negotiated processes involving state interests, cultural liaisons, and ideological assumptions.