Every solider grew to know that there life was a risk every single day. They would witness men all around them get wounded or killed. Constantly shots were fired and bombs were dropped by both sides. The noise was deafening and explosions of fire and debris came from all directions. Wounded men would be left to die in the space between the opposing trenches which came to be known as "no mans land"3. Soldiers quickly learned that the war wasn't glorifying or exciting it was devastating. The conditions in the trenches were terrible often very muddy and soldiers were always cold and wet. There were dead corpses everywhere disease was spread all through the rat invested trenches. Life on the frontline was said best by this passage from "All Quiet on the Western Front" shells, gas clouds and flotillas of tanks-shattering, starvation, death. Dysentery, influenza, typhus, burning-murder, death4. Life in the trenches had profound impacts on soldiers if they survived it changed the outlook of these men for the rest of there lives. .
The cost to be involved in a war of this magnitude was immense. Countries had to pour everything they had into the war effort continually producing weapons, ammunition, and sufficient food supplies to feed troops and civilians. For instance by the end of the war German soldiers were being feed with food made of mostly fill ins which caused many to become sick5. Before the war German food consumption per person was 3500 calories per day, by the end of the war because of rationing it was down to 1200 calories per day and some food was cut off from the population all together6. One example was milk because of its scarcity was only given to children under six years of age, nursing or pregnant women and the aged7. The cost of living in France during this time steadily increased with the realization of a long drawn out war. Even when workers would get pay raises the cost living would continue to rise leaving them worse off then they were before8.