Neutral Switzerland and the Great War

Prewar, This Was the Point Where Switzerland,
Germany, and France Had Their Borders Touch. During Hostilies, the German/French Border Would Move East

As a neutral country, Switzerland was not involved in the devastating military conflicts of 1914–18. Nevertheless, concerning the economy, communications, diplomacy, secret services and war propaganda, it was intensely entangled with the “Great War.” From August 1914 onward, the Swiss authorities governed with extra-constitutional emergency law, which was called a “plenipotentiary regime.” The government, in line with export-oriented companies, was guided by the goal of benefiting from the advantages of a continent at war.

Mobilization

In 1914, Switzerland had a militia army based on the principle of compulsory military service. Members of the liberal middle class and conservative families from central Switzerland dominated the officer corps. At the outbreak of war, some 220,000 men (approximately one eighth of the working population) were conscripted for active service; some 45,000 horses (about a third of the population) were also enlisted. The mobilized men served an average of 500 to 600 days in the army. Receiving little pay, and with no system to compensate for loss of earnings until the start of World War II, it spelled financial crisis for many lower-class families. The labor market struggled with the loss of some 100,000 migrant workers, called up by their national armies when the war broke out. By 1920 migration out of Switzerland had risen to at least 228,000, while the net immigration was 72,000—including 42,000 demobilized soldiers. When the war ended, Switzerland closed its borders to prevent an influx of demobilized soldiers from the Central Powers and to protect the “national workforce.” Swiss men returned straight to their workplaces. In parallel, the women who had been employed during the war to counteract the labor shortage in the war industries were swiftly “phased out,” returning the proportion of women in industry to prewar level by 1920.

Guarding the Borders

A Swiss Outpost Guarding a Pass to Italy

Since Switzerland was a neutral country, its frontiers had to be guarded to prevent the warring armies crossing them, deliberately or accidentally. However there were occasions when the border was crossed. The start of the war was one of the points at which there was the greatest fear amongst the Swiss of invasion, in case the French or Germans tried to gain an advantage by outflanking their enemy through Switzerland. The frontiers were guarded by the Swiss army. Above: the frontier at Basel, blocked at the start of the war.

In places the frontier had considerable defenses, including bunkers and barbed wire, similar to those used by the opposing sides in combat. However as this image shows, in places away from the fighting little separated the Swiss and their neighbors. Although Switzerland is a small country, the frontier was 1,400 km (870 miles) in length and could not be guarded in great strength everywhere! There are said to have been some 1,000 violations of the frontier during the war.

A Swiss Guard and German Soldier Chat at the Border

The Swiss strictly enforced their frontier. Under international law, troops from the belligerents who crossed the Swiss border (for whatever reason) had to be interned. While such internments were perceived as a humanitarian gesture by a strategically important neutral nation, they also helped save the Swiss tourism industry.  Between January 1916 and August 1919, nearly 68,000 wounded or sick officers and men were interned in Switzerland; 37,515 French, 4,326 Belgians, 21,000 Germans and 4,081 British, enlivened otherwise deserted resorts. Germans were interned in German-speaking regions, particularly around Davos. French and Belgians were scattered mainly throughout the francophone areas. When the British soldiers arrived, at the end of May 1916, they were concentrated in areas popular with English speaking tourists before the war, the main centers being Chateau d’Oex and Mürren but with smaller groups in other communities according to employment, education and medical needs.

Switzerland Was the  Place to Be Interned

French, German, Italian, British or American aircraft also sometimes accidentally crossed onto Swiss soil. In certain cases the plane landed because the airmen did not realize they had crossed the frontier, while other times injuries to the crew meant they had to land immediately. Very occasionally, Swiss territory was actually attacked, most frequently through being bombed by aircraft. The town of Porrentruy was bombed several times. It was located in a small section of Swiss territory that projected out into France, and was only about 12 km or 7 miles away from the point where the Western Front (the French and German front lines) met the Swiss frontier. This seems to have meant that there was potential for either side to make a navigational error and drop bombs on Swiss land.    

On 7 October 1918, Swiss neutrality was infringed in an attack that caused great public controversy in Switzerland. An observation balloon tethered between Miécourt and Cornol (near Porrentruy, around 2-3km (1.5 miles) over the border into Switzerland) was shot down by a German aircraft. The burning balloon fell to earth and the Swiss soldier acting as observer, Lieutenant Walter Flury, was killed. Some Swiss newspapers questioned whether the attack was really an error or had been planned, since the balloon was clearly marked as Swiss. Below is a balloon similar ​to the one that was shot down. Such apparently direct attacks were very rare, however.

The Wartime Economy

Switzerland's 1913 GDP per capita was the highest in the world. Its  economy would be strongly affected by the First World War, negatively as well as positively. On the one hand, the import of foodstuff and raw materials deteriorated towards the end of the war and inflation reduced the purchasing power of a large part of the population. Predictably, the important  tourism sector suffered from enormous losses. On the other hand, many exporting industrial firms enjoyed a strong demand for their products during the first half of the war, those selling strategic war material registered profits even until the end of the war. According to one estimate, both real GDP and GDP per capita declined by 11 percent between 1913 and 1918. Real wages deteriorated during the war but caught up in the postwar period.

Being neutral and contiguous to both Germany and France and their allies, the Swiss managed to trade with both countries throughout the war, although the balance was much in favor of the Allies. Here's one interesting example. Due to their long experience in precision instrumentation, the Swiss made the world's best artillery fuses. Also, Swiss businessmen were "world class" at evading government attempts to keep the German trade and Allied trade  compartmentalized.  This led to the incongruous situation where German coal and steel helped produce 25 million artillery shell fuses for the British, as well as over 121 million components used in assembling other fuses all used in artillery shells fired at the Germans.  

World War I did cause a general strike in Switzerland, however. See our article HERE.

A Swiss Observation Balloon

Host to a Noted Troublemaker and Some Very Eccentric Artists

Lenin spent the early part of the war in Zurich.  He left Austria for neutral Switzerland in 1914 following the outbreak of the war and remained active in Switzerland until 1917. Following the 1917 February Revolution in Russia and the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II, he left Switzerland on a sealed train to Petrograd, where he would shortly lead the 1917 October (Boklshevik) Revolution in Russia. 

Meanwhile, in the same neighborhood, a group of politicized artists was founding another radical movement. While the Dada art movement was also an anti-war organization, Dadaists used art to oppose all wars. The founders of the movement had left Germany and Romania to escape the destruction of the war. At the Cabaret Voltaire in Zürich they put on performances expressing their disgust with the war and with the interests that inspired it. By some accounts Dada coalesced on 6 October 1916 at the cabaret. When World War I ended in 1918, most of the Zürich Dadaists returned to their home countries, and some began Dada activities in other cities. See our article on DADA HERE.

Sources: The most comprehensive site on Switzerland in the war is Switzerland1914-1918.net (If you are interested in more information on the subject click HERE; 1914-1918 Online; Wikipedia; Global-Geneva