Enemy Aliens Research Articles

Internment, immersive technology and historical empathy: Natal’s Fort Napier Camp (1914–1919) as a virtual reality experience

ABSTRACT The article presents a new way of reconstructing and representing the history of internment. It provides a critical academic framework for the authors’ virtual reality experience (VRE) Interned. Fort Napier Camp in South Africa held 2,500 civilians, mostly German ‘enemy aliens’, during the First World War. The VRE gives users an immersive experience of the camp and was produced through rigorous cross-sector collaboration between academia and industry. Based on user feedback, we argue that the empathy-related opportunities of VR create novel gateways to understanding experiences of minorities in wartime. Expanding the concept of ‘historical empathy’, we also argue that immersive technologies remain underused by historians.

Civis Americanus Sum: Mythmaking in the Movement to Reclassify Italian Alien Enemies During the Second World War

Abstract: This article analyzes the reworking of a variant of the myth of Rome, the Myth of an American Rome, by the principal reclassification movement actor, Luigi Rocco Antonini, during the Second World War. It explores the discursive origins, establishes historical context, and examines the construction and synthesis of plotlines. The significance as a political myth to mobilize the people of Italian descent in support of a singular loyalty to America and to reconcile the dilemma of fighting against Italy is evaluated. Although intended to function as a liberating force, the analysis reveals the potential was undermined by various constraints.

Enemy Aliens: internment and deportation policy in Great Britain, September 1939–June 1940

AbstractDuring the Second World War, Germans, Austrians and Italians living in Great Britain were designated as ‘enemy aliens’ and consequently interned. The worsening situation on the continent in May and June 1940 stirred up hysteria that spies and saboteurs could be amongst the Germans and Austrians. Mass arrests started in May 1940, and Italians were soon caught up in the detentions when Mussolini declared war on 10 June, thus filling internment camps to capacity. Canada and Australia agreed to take some of the ‘most dangerous characters’, facilitating the most controversial aspect of internment – deportation – which led to the ultimate tragedy when the SS Arandora Star was torpedoed and sunk on 2 July 1940. Building on previous scholarship that focuses on either German or Italian internment, this article examines both government policy towards and the internee experience of these two groups on an equal footing, thus furthering integration of the Italian narrative within internment historiography.

Montenegrins in the Ottoman Empire as ‘Enemy Aliens’ during World War I (1914–1918)

With the outbreak of World War I in 1914, the Ottoman Empire and Montenegro, which no longer shared a border due to the shifted territories following the Balkan Wars (1912–13), faced each other as belligerents in two different coalitions (the Entente and the Central powers). Throughout this process, Montenegrin citizens, both Muslim and non-Muslim, living in the Ottoman territories and working in various fields, suddenly found themselves as enemy subjects. This article analyses what it was like for Montenegrins living in the Ottoman territory during the war by assessing their legal status, naturalisation, internment and the security measures taken against them. In the light of Ottoman archival documents and within the framework of the concept of enemy aliens, this article examines just how the war affected these forgotten citizens of Montenegro – who have long been overlooked and overshadowed in scholarly works by the subjects of the Great Powers – and how the Ottoman administration treated them in the context of state security.

Deathscape, materiality and memorialisation: Arandora Star remembrance in Scotland

AbstractThis article progresses Second World War historiography of ‘enemy alien’ internment, especially of the SS Arandora Star, sunk in 1940 with a high loss of Italian civilian lives. Employing a new paradigm, that of the deathscape, defined as a topography of death and the practices that surround it, this investigation recontextualises Arandora Star remembrance in Scotland. Ambiguous loss, complicated grieving, disenfranchisements in mourning and absences in multiple layers of the deathscape form overarching themes that are explored in parallel to emotional-affective memory. The previously neglected study of individual memorialisation, both private and ‘official’, provides an important primary source in the fragmented materiality of the deathscape, allowing fresh insight on both cultural manifestations and political context. As the material and cultural apex of the deathscape, the Italian Cloister Garden and Arandora Star Memorial in Glasgow, created by Archbishop Mario Conti in 2011, are evaluated through the lenses of leadership, identity and heritage activism.

German ‘enemy aliens’ in internment camps in South Africa in the Second World War

ABSTRACT After the Union of South Africa declared war on Germany in September 1939 approximately 5000 German men were interned as ‘enemy aliens'. Fears of a destabilisation of South Africa by German ‘fifth columnists’ were nurtured by the fractured social and political environment of the Union. The attempts made by Afrikaner nationalists to undermine the war effort of the Union reverberated with anti-Semitic and anti-British Nazi propaganda. Apprehensions about the disruptive effects of Nazi activities among Afrikaners and German residents also blended with the perpetual fears of the white minority about losing control of the black population. These challenges to domestic security convinced the Smuts government that the internment of German men suspected of subversion was urgent and justified. The internment of German civilian internees in South Africa has been briefly mentioned in some studies, but this article seeks to provide a more detailed analysis of their internment against the background of wartime South Africa. Based on South African and German archival and secondary sources, this article also constitutes a first attempt at exploring important aspects of the conditions inside the internment camps.

Allegiance in International Humanitarian Law: the duty of fidelity and the laws of armed conflict

Abstract Allegiance is a legal concept that seeks to regulate the duty of fidelity of individuals towards states. A particularity of allegiance is the fact that it has been repeatedly used in treaty provisions, as well as interpretation of rules, in the field of International Humanitarian Law. The fields in which it has been introduced are quite broad, from rules relating to Prisoner of War status, to defining the relationship between occupiers and occupied population, passing through rules on Protected Personal status for civilians, the internment of enemy aliens, rules on the conduct of hostilities, and deserters. The article analyses both the meaning of allegiance and how it has been used in International Humanitarian Law revealing some useful instances as well as a set of inconsistencies and potential perils for its use.

‘KULTURKRIEG’ BEHIND BARBED WIRE: GERMAN THEATRE IN AN AUSTRALIAN FIRST‐WORLD‐WAR INTERNMENT CAMP

ABSTRACTThis article is the first in‐depth study of the ‘Deutsches Theater Liverpool’, probably the most successful non‐English theatre ever on Australian soil, selling out daily performances and mounting a new production each week. The theatre's success was due in large part to its location inside the ‘German Concentration Camp’, the largest First World War (WWI) internment camp in Australia. In contrast to most WWI internment camps around the world, its almost six thousand ‘enemy alien’ internees were a mixture of civilians – most of whom called Australia home before the war – merchant sailors and naval personnel. For this diverse group of men, the theatre was more than entertainment; it was an important way to spend their time meaningfully. We argue that this meaning was strongly connected to the (re)negotiation of identity through theatre, allowing the internees to contribute to the war effort understood at the time in German public discourse as a ‘Kulturkrieg’, a battle for the survival of German culture. Theatre‐makers and audiences (re)engaged with their Germanness through ideas of ‘Kameradschaft’, German diligence and the joint duty of ‘durchhalten’ – ‘making do’. The critical importance of female impersonation in the achievement of the theatre's cultural aims rounds out our analysis of the D.T.L.

Camp Blanding as German Latin American Enemy Alien Internment Camp in 1942: Microcosm of Larger Diplomatic and Moral Conundrums

Abstract: Camp Blanding's Enemy Alien internment camp was only in existence between February and June of 1942. However, it presented its "German" Latin American civilian captives from Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Panama and their U.S. military captors with the larger diplomatic and moral problems that would confront the entire Enemy Alien internment program. Particularly troubling were the presence of "enemy aliens" who were deemed "enemies" of their Latin American homes and of the Colossus of the North, but who were really enemies of Hitler's Germany. Among the 200 internees at Camp Blanding were eighteen Jewish Germans, a Jewish Austrian, and a German priest. Deprived of their families and properties in the Latin American countries to which they fled from Europe, they faced the dangers of forced "repatriation" to a Nazi-ruled Germany in which Jews, self-described "Austrians," and outspoken Christians were declared "enemies of the Fatherland."

Получение российского гражданства подданными неприятельских стран в годы Первой мировой войны 1914-1918 гг.: этничность или лояльность

The article examines the conditions and features of the naturalization process in Russia of "enemy aliens" during the First World War. In Russian and foreign historiography since the 1990s, this issue has not been closely considered. The authors mainly pay attention to the mass expulsions of enemy subjects to remote provinces from front-line areas, accusations of the latter of espionage in favor of the enemy, restrictions on rights. The researchers conclude that the dominance of ethnic and religious criteria for admission to citizenship of the Russian Empire: the presence of Slavic origin or belonging to the Christian faith for citizens of the Ottoman Empire. Such conclusions are mainly based on an analysis of the laws and orders of the military and civilian authorities of the first months of the war. The purpose of the article is to reconstruct the process of granting citizenship not only on the basis of an analysis of the normative acts of the beginning of the war, but also documents of the subsequent period, which reflected the change in the positions of the ruling elite on the issue of Russian citizenship. The article uses petitions from "enemy foreigners", documents of the Council of Ministers and the Ministry of Internal Affairs to assess the course of discussion of petitions and the reasons for making positive or negative decisions. These are documents of the Russian State Historical Archive, the State Archive of the Russian Federation and the Central State Historical Archive in St. Petersburg. The analysis of the documents of the Fund of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (RGIA) based on the results of consideration of the petitions of enemy subjects allowed us to conclude about the number of positive decisions and provide new statistical data on the number of enemy subjects who received Russian citizenship in 1914-1915. The mass transfer of interned foreigners to remote Russian provinces created a huge number of problems for state bodies in the center and on the ground. Naturalization of "enemy foreigners" in the empire allowed tokeep valuable specialists at their jobs, to prevent the closure of enterprises owned by "hostile foreigners". The granting of Russian citizenship during the war increasingly depended on subjective factors: the personal support of officials. With the development of military operations, the granting of citizenship increasingly depends not on nationality, but on the loyalty of the Russian Empire confirmed by recommendations.

‘A whisperer for all Italians’

While considerable research has been undertaken on internment experiences during the World War II in Australia, little has focused on the thousands of ‘enemy aliens’, especially Italian-born women and Australian-born women of Italian descent, whose family members were interned. This article explores the ways in which the lives of three Queensland Italian women were impacted by the National Security (Aliens Control) Regulations 1939 (Cth). One of these three women was ultimately interned as a result of being perceived as a threat to national security. The experiences of each, documented in official records, highlight concerns about their treatment under the Regulations. How did the Regulations restrict the civil rights of Italian women and how did they respond? Examination of these three women’s particular circumstances shows that they each suffered hardship and isolation when loved ones were interned, yet two actively sought to improve their situation by appealing to the authorities. Their stories reflect the ‘war hysteria’ and suspicion, as well as isolation, discrimination and victimisation, that form a largely unacknowledged history of the wartime experience of ‘enemy alien’ women.

Industrial intelligence, reparations, and German expertise: the Australian Scientific and Technical Mission to Germany, 1945-1950

ABSTRACTAmong the multiplicity of missions that the Allied governments and armed forces sent to Europe towards the end and after World War II to document and exploit Nazi Germany’s wartime scientific and industrial progress was the Australian Scientific and Technical Mission to Germany. Composed of less than a dozen personnel, the Mission was a modest but important component in the Australian Commonwealth Government’s post-war foreign policy towards Germany and expansion of scientific and industrial development. Based at Australia House in London, the Mission worked in close cooperation with British Government departments, and was instrumental in the transnational transfer of German science and technology to Australia between 1946 and 1950 – initially under the auspices of the British Intelligence Objectives Sub-committee, and later through the Inter-Allied Reparation Agency and the Employment of Scientific and Technical Enemy Aliens scheme.

Perplexities Between Enemy Aliens and Their Motherland: The UK Government's Measures for British Civilians Stranded in the Far East, 1941–2011

This paper explores the British government’s measures for its civilian subjects stranded as ‘enemy aliens’ in Japanese-controlled areas in the Far East during World War II. The British government tried to protect the interests of these Far Eastern subjects during the war and in the immediate postwar period. Its manner of dealing with the latter’s redress movement from the late 1980s was initially reluctant but eventually became relatively adequate, thanks to the twin pressures of domestic public opinion and precedents set by other former Allied governments and the resolute struggles of the ex–Far Eastern subjects themselves.

Repatriated from Home as Enemy Aliens: Forgotten Lived Experiences of Japanese-Australians during the Second World War

ABSTRACT In contemporary Australian society, where nationhood has been built upon Western values, non-Caucasian people, including those with a Japanese background, have largely been treated as “others”. This attitude was particularly evident during the Second World War. When Japan joined the war in December 1941, some 97 per cent of civilians with a Japanese background living in Australia, including those who were born in Australia, were interned, and the vast majority of them were shipped to Japan after the war, even though they had no real connection to Japan. Based on my archival research, I argue that some of these “Japanese” who were thought to be others were, in fact, Australians, with strong loyalty to Australia. Official documents do not necessarily determine people's nationality, but instead a sense of belonging such as how they relate to a given society.

:War and Citizenship: Enemy Aliens and National Belonging from the French Revolution to the First World War

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Daniela L. Caglioti, War and Citizenship. Enemy Aliens and National Belonging from the French Revolution to the First World War. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press 2020

Daniela L. Caglioti, War and Citizenship. Enemy Aliens and National Belonging from the French Revolution to the First World War. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press 2020

The Oxford Handbook of Elizabeth Anscombe edited by Roger Teichmann, (Oxford; Oxford University Press, 2022); pp. 520, £ 97.00, hbk

The Oxford Handbook of Elizabeth Anscombe edited by Roger Teichmann, (Oxford; Oxford University Press, 2022); pp. 520, £ 97.00, hbk

Daniela L. Caglioti, War and Citizenship: Enemy Aliens and National Belonging from the French Revolution to the First World War

Daniela L. Caglioti, War and Citizenship: Enemy Aliens and National Belonging from the French Revolution to the First World War

Threat of Dissent: A History of Ideological Exclusion and Deportation in the United States

Threat of Dissent explores the United States’ history of excluding or deporting individuals (particularly non-citizens) that held ideological beliefs the US government viewed as threatening to American society. It shows how recent events have a long history that extends further back than the Red Scares of the twentieth century. Kraut's work details America's attempts to restrict or punish citizens, non-citizens, visitors, and residents who the US government deemed radicals.Beginning with the Alien Friends Act in the 1790s and concluding with the War on Terror in the 2000s, Threat of Dissent examines case studies of these ideological exclusions throughout different periods of American history. Organized chronologically, Kraut's book opens with the Alien Friends Act, Alien Enemies Act, and Sedition Act to show how Congress's creation of a Board of Special Inquiry, created to hear deportation cases, set the stage for later restrictions on immigration. Although restricting immigrants based on their health or wealth was already common, the Board introduced the idea of restrictions based on a person's beliefs. Kraut argues that President McKinley's assassination was a turning point that led to bans on anarchists entering the United States and anti-anarchist suppressions of speech such as the case of Emma Goldman, who lost her US citizenship. Wars or the threat of war also produced restrictive legislation; the 1924 Johnson-Reed Act was followed by the 1952 McCarran-Walter Act with both laws containing ideologically restrictive elements. The threat of Communism was another important factor that Kraut discussed, both in the wake of World War I as well as in the 1930s during the Great Depression. Kraut concludes her study by bridging the gap between the Cold War and the September 2001 terrorist attacks, with her final chapter discussing the War on Terror and its aftermath. Threat of Dissent brings the discussion to the present by highlighting the Trump administration's attempts to bar certain individuals from entering the country, particularly with the creation of a travel ban.Contributing an important piece to the historiography of both immigration studies and exclusions and deportations, the book achieves its stated goal to “explore the constitutionality of ideological restrictions” and the “intersection of American immigration and First Amendment law and history” (p. 9). Threat of Dissent was not written to provide a survey of restrictions throughout American immigration history, nor does it attempt to address discrimination based on non-ideological factors. Yet the work strongly demonstrates the author's historical knowledge of both the fields of legal and immigration history; Kraut holds a law degree from American University Washington College of Law and a PhD in History from New York University.The book's eight chapters each investigate a different ideological restriction presented to the US courts. While the information itself may not be new, the author's careful archival work is impressive in her recounting of each case study. The chapters themselves are also well organized, and students in particular will find the detailed conclusions at the end of each chapter a welcome addition. The author's clear, concise writing and her success at connecting the past to the present are major strengths of the work.Historians and experts in the field of legal or immigration studies will appreciate the book's careful scholarship, while students and the public will find Threat of Dissent accessible. The author's writing is free of jargon; whenever Kraut does use legal terminology, she includes definitions in parentheses. Additionally, the presence of at least one image per chapter—photographs, political cartoons, pamphlets, and posters—helps the reader visualize the actors involved with the different case studies. This book is engaging and well suited for undergraduate or graduate legal history courses, immigration and ethnicity courses, or as selected readings for either US history survey.

Daniela L. Caglioti. War and Citizenship: Enemy Aliens and National Belonging from the French Revolution to the First World War.

Daniela L. Caglioti’s new book, War and Citizenship: Enemy Aliens and National Belonging from the French Revolution to the First World War, is the third English-language academic study in as many years to tackle the subject of enemy aliens in the First World War from a global perspective, following monographs by myself and Stefan Manz and Panikos Panayi. An extensive, two-volume German-language account covering both world wars has meanwhile also been written by Arnd Bauerkämper. After decades of relative neglect, this has indeed become a thriving field. The distinctive features of Caglioti’s contribution are twofold. First, she takes the story back to the French Revolution and the early American republic, and in doing so pays particular attention to questions of (popular) sovereignty, citizenship (including legal, political, and gendered dimensions), migration, and incidents before 1914 of internment and (more commonly) expulsion of foreign nationals, both in times of war and peace. Second, in respect to the 1914 to 1920 period itself, she goes beyond discussion of administrative detention and forced removals to include a detailed analysis of state seizures of enemy property.