Conclusion
Today, the Report is considered by some to be a "prime example of untruthful war propaganda." The report released by the committee was considered credible because of its use of professional structure and legal terms, but the lack of documented resources greatly injured the reputation of the committee for modern scholars.
The findings of the Committee on Alleged German Outrages show that war propaganda can be effective, even if it lacks both true and reliable sources. “The character of evidence helps explain how inaccuracies and exaggerations so frequently crept into the text.” While these exaggerations are most commonly seen in the witness accounts, the German diaries in actuality did not contain accounts “of the sexual-sadistic” scandals with women and children of Belgium. In a post-war report, the Belgian Commission proved that the main victims of the German war crimes were male adults, not women and children. Overall, modern scholars suggest that the committee's “Bryce Report slid from the factual into the symbolic.”
Despite its flaws, the four conclusions the Report comes to have been amply documented by recent historians: J. Horne and A. Kramer, German Atrocities 1914: A History of Denial (2001), L. Zuckerman, The Rape of Belgium (2003), and J. Lipkes, Rehearsals: The German Army in Belgium, August 1914 (2007). Lipkes endorses the Report’s analysis as well, while Horne and Kramer emphasize German paranoia.
Read more about this topic: Committee On Alleged German Outrages
Famous quotes containing the word conclusion:
“The chess pieces are the block alphabet which shapes thoughts; and these thoughts, although making a visual design on the chess-board, express their beauty abstractly, like a poem.... I have come to the personal conclusion that while all artists are not chess players, all chess players are artists.”
—Marcel Duchamp (1887–1968)
“I’ve heard the wolves scuffle, and said: So this
Is man; so what better conclusion is there
The day will not follow night, and the heart
Of man has a little dignity, but less patience
Than a wolf’s....”
—Allen Tate (1899–1979)
“No one can write a best seller by trying to. He must write with complete sincerity; the clichés that make you laugh, the hackneyed characters, the well-worn situations, the commonplace story that excites your derision, seem neither hackneyed, well worn nor commonplace to him.... The conclusion is obvious: you cannot write anything that will convince unless you are yourself convinced. The best seller sells because he writes with his heart’s blood.”
—W. Somerset Maugham (1874–1966)