---
title: Was England will! (What England Wants!)
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/was-england-will-1918/
description: Squadrons of aircraft with British roundels fill a burning sky over blast furnaces and factory chimneys under the headline 'What England wants!' The only…
section: Collection
---

[Collection](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/)

[![Was England will! (What England Wants!)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/was-england-will-1918.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/was-england-will-1918.jpg)

# Was England will! (What England Wants!)

Squadrons of aircraft with British roundels fill a burning sky over blast furnaces and factory chimneys under the headline 'What England wants!' The only evidence is one quoted politician, William Joynson-Hicks, labelled 'the English labour leader', so a single speaker's call to bomb the Rhineland stands in for a nation's intent while the image supplies the catastrophe.

- **Date:** 1918
- **Period:** [First World War](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#era=wwi)
- **Made by:** German home-front publicity (sponsor not named on the poster); artist Egon Tschirch
- **Region:** [Western and Central Europe](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#region=western-central-europe)
- **Country:** [German Empire](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#country=german-empire)
- **Medium:** [Poster](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#medium=poster)
- **Issuer type:** [Mixed](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#actor=mixed)
- **Regime:** [German Empire](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#regime=german-empire)
- **Leader:** [Wilhelm II](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#leader=wilhelm-ii)
- **Audience:** [Domestic public](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#audience=domestic-public)
- **Purpose:** [Mobilize or secure compliance](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#purpose=mobilize-comply)
- **Themes:** [War and the military](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#theme=war-military), [Home front](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#theme=home-front)
- **Event:** [World War I](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#event=world-war-i)
- **Techniques:** [Fear appeal](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/fear-appeal/) [Card stacking](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/card-stacking/)
- **Source:** Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- **Source:** [Library of Congress](https://www.loc.gov/item/2004666106/), retrieved September 27, 2026
- **Rights:** Public domain in the U.S. (published before 1931) Tschirch, Egon, 1889-1948, artist; Rehse Archiv für Zeitgeschichte und Publizistik, DLC, former owner. 1918. Library of Congress, LC-USZC4-12309.

## Text on the object

Original (German) · read from the image, not independently checked

```
Was England will!

Der englische Arbeiterführer Joynson-Hicks (Daily Telegraph vom 3.1.18)

„Man muß die rheinischen Industriegebiete mit hundert Flugzeugen Tag für Tag bombardieren, bis die Kur angeschlagen hat!“

Druck: Selmar Bayer, Berlin S.O. 36
```

English translation (machine translation by Claude, not verified by a fluent reader)

```
What England Wants!

The English Labour leader Joynson-Hicks (Daily Telegraph of 3 January 1918)

"The Rhenish industrial districts must be bombed day after day with a hundred aircraft, until the cure has taken effect!"

Printed: Selmar Bayer, Berlin S.O. 36
```

Set in blackletter (Fraktur) type; the compound-word break markers typical of the script are rendered as ordinary hyphenation here. Artist credit ('Egon Tschirch 1918') is signed in script at lower left of the illustration and is not included as running text.

[← Victory Bonds will help stop this. Kultur vs. humanity (Canada)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/victory-bonds-kultur-vs-humanity-canada-1918/) [Za naši samostatnost! Hrr na vraha! Za demokracii! Československá armáda (For our independence! Charge at the murderer! For democracy! Czechoslovak Army) →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/za-nasi-samostatnost-1918/)

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- [Der Warner (broadsheet lampoon on the Jesuits after Breitenfeld and Rain)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/der-warner-anti-jesuit-broadsheet-1632/) (1632 · Scapegoating, Fear appeal)
- [Sans-Culottes, feeding Europe with the Bread of Liberty (James Gillray)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sans-culottes-bread-of-liberty-gillray-1793/) (Jan 12, 1793 · Fear appeal, Name-calling)
- [豬叫取胎圖 (Picture of the Pig Sect Extracting a Foetus), from Reverently Obeying the Sacred Edict: A Complete Picture Gallery to Repel Heterodoxy](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/pig-cry-taking-foetus-hunan-1891/) (1891 · Fear appeal, Name-calling). Content note: Colour woodblock caricature depicting foreign Christians as members of a 'pig' sect and showing them cutting a foetus from a woman; violence against a woman and derision of Christianity.
- [The Radical Programme, No. 4: Dismemberment of the Empire (Gladstone & Co. auction India), St Stephen's Review Presentation Cartoon](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/radical-programme-selling-india-st-stephens-review-1891/) (Oct 31, 1891 · Fear appeal, Scapegoating)
- [En posesión de su presa (In Possession of Its Prey)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/en-posesion-de-su-presa-el-diablo-1894/) (Jun 2, 1894 · Fear appeal)
- [劉永福懸賞抓拿日本奸細告示 (Liu Yongfu's notice offering rewards for capturing Japanese spies), Taiwan](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/liu-yongfu-reward-notice-japanese-spies-1895/) (1895 · Name-calling, Fear appeal)
- [Sífilis: Curación absoluta y radical en el Sanatorio para sifilíticos (Syphilis: Absolute and Radical Cure at the Sanatorium for Syphilitics)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sifilis-sanatorio-abreu-1900/) (1900 · Fear appeal)
- [時局圖 (The Situation in the Far East / Map of the Present Situation), newer version with English labels](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/situation-in-far-east-tse-tsan-tai-1900/) (1900 · Fear appeal)