A Plan to Avoid a Two-Fronted War
At the start of the 20th century, Germany had a strategy for fighting a war in Europe. It was called the Schlieffen Plan.
The strategy had originally been developed in the 1890s by Count Alfred von Schlieffen. After Schlieffen’s retirement as Chief of Staff in 1906, it was updated by his successor, Field Marshal Helmuth von Moltke. German politicians expected that, in the event of war, France and Russia would support each other against Germany. That would lead to a war on two fronts, dividing Germany’s military resources.
“Germans think it’s going to take about two weeks for the Russian army, once mobilization is declared, that the big bear will roll their forces toward the German frontier in German Poland. So, how are you going to win the war in two weeks? If you invade France not through Alsace-Lorraine because you’re going to run into fortifications. So, how are you going to invade France? The only way you can defeat them, and a guy called Schlieffen, whose name I wrote in what I sent around to you, is that you have to invade Belgium, and, from his point of view, the Netherlands, though Moltke, his successor, takes the Netherlands out of the equation.
Belgium had been declared independent and neutral in 1831. If you go into Belgium the idea is you invade Belgium. You get through the big fort at Liège. You get through the kind of rough country, which is not too much. Then you hit theplat pays, the flatlands, and you roll toward the English Channel. The last thing Schlieffen reportedly said on his deathbed was, “The last soldier, his right arm should touch the English Channel.” Then you turn down and you put Paris in a headlock, and they will sue for peace and you will beat them in two weeks before the big bear can come moseying along slowly. That’s why mobilization was tantamount to an act of war, because it starts the timetable. They’ve got to defeat them in two weeks.
What happens if you go through Belgium? From the point of view of the British, it’s bad enough to have the sneaky French across the Channel. But what if you’ve got the Germans in Ostend eating moules frites? What if you have the Germans across the Channel? Big-time enemies a very short, choppy boat ride away. What’s this going to do? It’s going to reaffirm the alliance. Sir Edward Grey, the one who said most famously, and he got it right, “Lights are going out in Europe. They will not be relit again in our lifetime.” At this point, the British hesitate. The French said, “Will the word ‘honor’ be struck from the English dictionary?” The French ambassador is chasing around a high official in the czarist regime in Russia saying, “You must back us all the way.
So, the invasion guarantees that the worst nightmare of Bismarck will come true, that they will be à trois. The fact that it doesn’t work out, for a variety of reasons, the way the German high command intended, and the way Schlieffen intended, and von Moltke, means that they don’t, for reasons I’ll come back to, can’t get Paris in that headlock, force them to sue for peace, and the race to the sea begins to try to outflank — as in a football game, to make a ridiculous analogy — the outside linebacker. They end up at the sea. Then shovels, and defensive weapons like barbed wire and machine guns, become the weapons of the war. That explains why there wasn’t and subsequently could never be a knockout punch, and why millions of people died in and around those trenches.”
To avoid that situation, Schlieffen planned to attack France first, while Russia was still mobilizing. Through swift action, the Germans would outflank their enemies through the Low Countries (Belgium and Luxembourg), force France to surrender, and then turn to fight Russia.
General Moltke watered down the plan. Since its inception, the Russians had improved militarily and therefore demanded more military on the east front. And he did not want to have them invade Germany while he fought France. Therefore, his adjustment left more German forces in the east.
He also decided to avoid invading the Netherlands, hoping to keep the British out of the war. It meant sending the entire flanking force through Belgium, a greater logistical challenge.
Kluck’s Misjudgement
Then General Alexander von Kluck, commander of the German First Army, made a critical error.
First, look at the Schlieffen Plan. Kluck’s army sat on the far right of the German invasion force. Its role was to advance deep into France and attack Paris from the back or west side, with Bulow’s second army to sweep Paris from the east side, thereby, cutting the French capital and any forces based near it from the rest of France and quickly capture it.
Fighting in late August caused General Karl von Bülow, commander of the Second Army, serious problems. He contacted Kluck and asked for help. Kluck agreed.
Without checking with his superiors, Kluck swung his forces southeast during the First Battle of Marne 5-12th Sept, 1914. They were marching east of Paris instead of going west or the back side of Paris which resulted in both the First and the Second Armies going east of Paris. The plan to encircle the city went awry.
Since there was no force coming from the back side of Paris, the French and British forces had to fight the German First and Second armies only on the east side.
Kluck believed it was a safe move as he knew of no significant concentrations of enemy troops near Paris.
He was wrong. There were troops around Paris, and they were about to punish him at the Battle of Marne for not sticking to the plan.
Map of the troop positions before and after the First Battle of Marne (Sept 6–12, 1914)
The First Battle of Marne was all about the French and Britain defending Paris against the First and Second Armies of Germany
The Germans, on the 5th Sept 1914, have completely crushed French and captured the entirety of northern France. But, on the same token, the German army was dog tired of 33 days of constant running almost without rest.
On the 5th September, the German First Army was at Meaux, within 30 miles (48 km) of Paris.
On the Sept 4th, the German first army was on the south bank of river Marne.
On the Sept 9th, at 9:02 AM, the German first and second armies began to withdraw from the south bank of Marne
That gave the Allies a huge victory and with German’s forced back on the south of Aisne, gave them a lot of space to defend Paris.
From now the theater of war would shift to River Aisne.
Strategically, the goal of conquering Paris quickly is now a figment of imagination. From Sept 9th, 1914, the German army was forced to fight two wars simultaneously: one on the east with France and England and one on the east with Russia.
This is the area where the German military would build their trenches and dig in. So, they would fight from those trenches that are hard to access by hand grenades unless you were close. You could not use your rifles effectively against them.
The chivalrous French army did not dig trenches because they thought doing so is not in keeping with the unwritten code of warfare.
The Germans, over the next four years would try to capture Paris without ever doing it.
Setback for Kluck’s Misjudgement
Now, look at what happened to the troop positions on the 9th September, 1914, right after the Battle of Marne here.
You see that both Kluck’s First Army and Bülow’s Second Army are on the east side of Paris. You should remember that according to the Schlieffen Plan, the First Army should have been on the west or the back side of Paris.
The Allies won the Battle of Marne. As you can see, the German troops were pushed back. It was as much a military victory for the Allies as it was a moral one as it helped the Allied force the much needed confidence to fight the German Army.
Also see the opposing positions between 5 September (dashed line) and 13 September (bold line). This indicates the effect of the Battle of Marne. The German’s were driven back from the south side of River Marne to well north of the north bank of Marne. While the Allies suffered as heavily as the Germans, they gained a huge strategic victory. Kluck and Bülow retreated in the face of the unexpected setback. The rest of the German forces had to fall back to the south of Marne to keep in line with them.
Moltke then ordered a German withdrawal toward the River Aisne, yielding more ground to the Allies. The retreat signaled the end of any hope of completing the Schlieffen Plan.
Following the German retreat from the Marne, Moltke allegedly reported to the Kaiser, “Your Majesty, we have lost the war.”
“Whether General von Moltke actually said to the Emperor, “Majesty, we have lost the war,” we do not know. We know anyhow that with a prescience greater in political than in military affairs, he wrote to his wife on the night of the 9th, “Things have not gone well. The fighting east of Paris has not gone in our favour, and we shall have to pay for the damage we have done”.
— Churchill
Moltke’s health broke down as a consequence of German defeat at the first battle of the Marne, and on 14 September 1914, he was succeeded by Erich von Falkenhayn.
The First Battle of the Aisne
So, we have French and British win the most crucial war of the WW I – the First Battle of Marne. Now, the German First and Second armies are retreating from river Marne to river Aisne. The French and British are chasing them to drive them further north. The Germans, while retreating, are destroying everything, creating gaping holes on major roads to slow the Allied armies down.
The River Aisne runs more or less due west from Soissons, and its tributary
the Vesle runs west-north-west from Rheims to join it near Conde.
The allies sought to convert success on the Marne into strategic triumph twenty-five miles further north, in a month-long series of clashes which became known as the Battle of the Aisne. The slow-flowing river Aisne lies in a valley, behind which a wooded hill rises steeply for three hundred feet. The largest town is Soissons, famous for its 12th Century cathedral. The north bank has steep hills standing like a wall. Northwards beyond the ridge crest is open farmland, climbing gently
The German armies had chosen for their stand the crest of the hills about two miles beyond the north bank on river Aisne. For the allies, crossing the Aisne in pursuit was a difficult task. Practically all the bridges were down, and since the Aisne is fully 15ft deep, the only means of crossing was to construct pontoons.
The 13th September saw the beginning of the crossing of the Aisne. and, at the end of the 13th, the BEF had crossed the river at most points allotted to them on a 15 mile front, and had entrenched on the northern slopes.[Refer 1]
The Battle of the Aisne: Phase 2
18th September may be taken as the last day of the battle in its strict sense. It marked the end of the allies’ attempt to break down the German line by full frontal assault. For the next 3 weeks the forces were too evenly matched to produce anything other than stalemate. Trench warfare began. Sporadic attacks had to be faced, especially at Troyon, and there were many counter-attacks, but trench warfare and endless artillery barrages became established.
The Germans dug in on the high ground of the Chemin des Dames ridge on the north bank of the Aisne. In mid-September, they defeated a number of attempts to dislodge them. The Allies then attempted to outflank the Germans to the north. This started what is known as The Race to The Sea.
The Race to The Sea
This set in motion a period of fighting from late September to the end of November 1914 that is often called the ‘Race to the Sea’. Both sides attempted to outflank — meaning Germany taking control of Allies right side and vice versa — each other, which pushed the battles gradually northwards towards Nieuport on the French-Belgian coast as shown above.
There were many battles starting from the Aisne. The last and most important one in the race was the Battle of Ypres. But the Germans failed to gain control of channel which meant the ports were saved which kept the British participation in the war going.
In 1914 he was given command of the Indian Corps in France. He was appointed Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St Michael and St George (GCMG) in the 1915 Birthday Honours and was promoted General in May 1915, but resigned in September 1915 after friction with Sir Douglas Haig, who commanded the First Army.
Oct 9, 2014: Germans entered Antwarp. Belgians retreated to Dixmude.
The Allies were now in a bad state, and a parlous position – they were overwhelmingly outnumbered by the German forces, all along the near 100 miles of this front. The fall of Antwerp had destroyed the hopes of holding the line of the river Schelde;
Ypres had for centuries sat at the centre of trade routes criss-crossing the flat terrain of Flanders. he beautiful Cloth Hall dated from the 12th Century, and along with St. Martin’s Church, formed the centre piece of the proud Flemish town. It was to become a focal point of bitter action throughout all years of the war. Like Verdun at the other end of the western front, it almost comprised a bookend for the stalemate and intermittent carnage that continued in between. If the third battle for Ypres (Passchaendale) involved the infamous and most grisly slaughter; and the second held the horrors of the gas attack, it was the first that was perhaps the most important and significant for the entire war. Had Ypres been lost in 1914, Falkenhayn’s alternative strategy – control of the Channel ports – would likely have succeeded, and changed the entire course of events.
Battle of the Yser
October 16, 1914 — Belgian and French troops under Colonel Alphonse Jacques successfully defended the Belgian town of Diksmuide against the advancing German army despite heavy losses. Jacques’ leadership during the day’s battle became so respected he was later awarded the title “de Dixmude”
Oct, 18: A German offensive overran Allied troops from the coastal town of Nieuwpoort, Belgium south to Arras in France.
Battle of Ypres (19th October – 22nd November 1914)
Oct 28: Responding to costly failures of the German 4th and 6th armies to punch through the Allied line in western Belgium, German commanders ordered holding attacks while a new force was assembled to press an attack towards Ypres and Poperinghe.
Oct 30 — German forces attacked the left flank of the British Expeditionary Force at Gheluvelt, Belgium but were repulsed, while a motley command of French and British troops rallied to retake key villages British lost to the offense
On the morning of 29th Oct 2014, the British intercepted a German wireless message, and became aware of the huge assault force about to break all over them. The next week produced the most severe carnage of the whole of the Ypres 1 phase, characterise by desperate Allied defence against overwhelmingly superior numbers and weaponry. Kaiser Wilhelm was with the German army at the front, and had told the Bavarian army that winning control of Ypres would determine the war. He expressed the wish to stay in Ypres that day (30th Oct).
Haig ordered a retirement to the west of Hooge and to hold the line there, although apparently he did not believe it would hold, and was sure they would have to abandon Ypres. At this point almost by a miracle, it seemed, the German advance paused. The explanation was not clear for several months afterwards, but the reason was the arrival of the 2nd Worcesters Regiment, part of 2nd Division. By nightfall, the German advance west of Gheluvelt had been halted, and the British line given breathing space to stabilise and strengthen.
November brought more strong attacks, but the crisis had passed, and generally the British line was able to hold.
The following five days were mild in comparison – exchange of artillery fire and skirmishing, and on 5th November the line was adjusted to prepare for a further German onslaught, that was expected. This came on 11th November. By the 15th their attacks were waning. Similarly on the southern end, a great assault was made on 16th, and again on 17th, but these failed to break through.
The shelling of central Ypres continued until the Cloth Hall and Church of St. Martin were in ruins. Presently, further French reinforcements did arrive, and at last the British troops were relieved from the trenches they had held for four stubborn weeks. The weather changed to high winds and snow blizzards, and First Ypres died away.
Ypres was a decisive victory that achieved its purpose, albeit at terrible losses. The Allied line stood secure from the Oise to the sea as the year drew to a close.
Americans Drive Germans Back Over Marne: Take 1,000 Prisoners and Check Big Drive: German Attack on a 60-Mile Front Fails
By Edwin L. James, Special Cable to The New York Times
With the American Army on the Marne, July 15, 6 P. M. — The Germans launched their expected offensive this morning on a front extending from north of Chalons, in the Champagne, westward beyond Chateau-Thierry.
The enemy’s drive fell upon American troops east of Rheims, east of Chateau-Thierry, and west of Chateau-Thierry.
After the battling for many hours the American troops in a magnificent counterattack threw a whole division of Germans back across the Marne River in the curve of the river west and southwest of Jaulgonne. There are now no Germans across the Marne in front of our troops. At 10 o’clock this morning there were 15,000 of them.
We inflicted heavy losses on the enemy, many of whom were drowned in the swollen stream. We took 600 prisoners.
[Other advices say that the number of prisoners taken is 1,000 to 1,500, including an entire brigade staff. While the correspondent speaks of a division of Germans being driven back across the Marne. It is evident that he means men to the number of a division. The Germans usually attack with a division to each mile of front, and the front here referred to is from five to seven miles long. The 15,000 Germans who had got across the Marne were the survivors of the large masses who tried to cross on pontoons and were badly cut up in the attempt. It is probable, therefore, that the result of the day’s battle on this sector was the defeat by the Americans of a German force of at least five divisions.]
The strategic gains on the Marne marked the beginnings of a series of Allied victories that were in 3 months to bring the German army to its knee.
Tomorrow we are to take part in the greatest and most important battle that we have yet been in, for we are to assault the Hindenburg Line, the famous trench system which the Germans have boasted is impregnable.
–Diary entry, Captain Francis Fairweather, 28 September 1918.
On 29 September 1918, after a 56-hour-long bombardment, Allied forces breached the so-called Hindenburg Line, the last line of German defenses on the Western Front during World War I.
Since Germany was fighting the war on two fronts, their army was stretched to thin on that long Western Front. So they started planning for a shorter line from the middle of 1916. Their plan was to move back or retreat a little bit from the current front and move to a shorter line so that their army could adequately hold on to it.
That plan was spearheaded by Genreral Hindenburg. The new line, built between 9 February and 20 March 1917, was called The Hindenburg Line.
“In 39 days the Germans withdrew from a 1000 mi² (2,590 km²) area, more ground than they had lost to all Allied offensives since 1914.[Operation Alberich] The cautiously following Allies also had to cope with booby traps, some exploding a month later. The new front was 42 km (26 mi) shorter freeing-up 14 German divisions.”
The Hindenburg Line was a heavily fortified zone near the border of France and Belgium. By middle of 1918, the formidable system consisted of six defensive lines, forming a zone some 6,000 yards deep, ribbed with lengths of barbed wire and dotted with concrete emplacements, or firing positions. Though the entire line was heavily fortified, its southern part was most vulnerable to attack, as it included the St. Quentin Canal and was not out of sight from artillery observation by the enemy.
The Allies would use these vulnerabilities to their advantage, concentrating all the force built up during the “Hundred Days Offensive”—kicked off on August 8, 1918, with a decisive victory at Amiens, France—against the Hindenburg Line in late September. Australian, British, French and American forces participated in the attack on the line, which began with the marathon bombardment, using 1,637 guns along a 10,000-yard-long front. In the last 24 hours the British artillery fired a record 945,052 shells. After capturing the St. Quentin Canal with a creeping barrage of fire—126 shells for each 500 yards of German trench over an eight-hour period—the Allies were able to successfully breach the Hindenburg Line on September 29.
The offensive was driven ahead by Australian and U.S. troops, who attacked the heavily fortified town of Bellicourt with tank, aircraft and artillery support. After four days of battle, with heavy losses on both sides, the Germans were forced to retreat. An attack on 5 October was to be the last in which Australian troops would take part. The last brigade fought and took Montbrehain village.
5 October 1918
Montbrehain was the last action by Australian troops on the Western Front. Sixth Brigade succeeded in occupying the village and in the process took 400 German prisoners, but lost 430 casualties in the process.
By this time, Australian troops had been fighting for six months without rest, resulting in 11 of the 60 battalions being disbanded due to heavy casualties and low numbers of reinforcements.
With Kaiser Wilhelm II pressured by the military into accepting governmental reform and Germany’s ally, Bulgaria, suing for an armistice by the end of September, the Central Powers were in disarray on the battlefield as well as the home front. The Allies, meanwhile, pressed their advantage on the Western Front throughout the month of October, which would turn out to be the final month of World War I.
H. H. Asquith, PM,
Sir Edward Grey,
Winston Churchill
———————————————————
Germany
Wilhelm II
Theobald Hollweg, chancellor,
Gottlieb von Jagow,
Prince Lichnowsky,
General Helmuth von Moltke, the Commander-in-Chief of the German army
———————————————————
France
President Raymond Poincaré,
Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau
René Viviani,
Joseph Joffre,
Marshal Ferdinand Foch
———————————————————
Russia
Emperor Nicholas II
Sergei Sazonov, the Russian foreign minister.
———————————————————
Note that, on the eve of World War I, Britain was the world’s greatest naval power, and Germany, the world’s greatest land power. They were each other’s largest trading partners also. Moreover, the two nations shared a religion—the majority in both was Protestant—and family ties, right up to their respective monarchs. But all that did not translate into friendship. Quite the contrary.
Even the blood ties between the German and the British royal families, which might have been expected to ameliorate these mutual antipathies, did quite the opposite. Kaiser Wilhelm, that strange and erratic ruler, hated his uncle King Edward VII, “the arch-intriguer and mischief-maker in Europe,” who, in turn, dismissed his nephew as a bully and a show-off.
Treaties and Alliances Prior to the War
Because these empires were starting to industrialize and create arms races, there were several treaties and alliances that were formed prior to World War I that played a significant role during and after the war:
1839 – Treaty of London – Britain to protect the neutrality of Belgium
1879 – Dual Alliance – Germany and Austria-Hungary to protect each other if Russia attacks
1892 – Franco-Russia Military Convention – Military assistance is given in event either is attacked.
1904 – Triple Alliance – Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Italy to protect each other against any attacks.
In 1908, when Austria-Hungary enraged Serbia by annexing Bosnia (Bosnian crisis of 1908), where some 44 percent of the population were Serbs, Germany forced Russia, Serbia’s protector, to back down. Tsar Nicholas II wrote to his mother: “It is quite true that the form and method of Germany’s action—I mean towards us—has simply been brutal and we won’t forget it.”
He didn’t.
And when the crisis of 1914 erupted, Tsar Nicholas, a weak man who had until then preferred peace to war, was determined, like most of his ministers, that this time Russia would not give in to pressure from Germany or its ally Austria-Hungary.
June 28, 1914 – The heir to the Austria-Hungary throne, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, and his wife, are assassinated in Sarajevo by Gavrilo Princep, a young Bosnian-Serbian nationalist. Gavrilo Princep and the young Serbs who [lanned this assassination were inspired by Nietzsche and Bakunin, just as their Russian and French counterparts were.
July 28, 1914 – Austria-Hungary declares war on Serbia and Russia mobilize its troops.
August 1, 1914 – Germany declares war on Russia.
August 3, 1914 – Germany declares war on France.August 4, 1914 – Germany invades Belgium and the British declare war on Germany. Remember, the Treaty of London in 1839? Britain is to protect the neutrality of Belgium. Belgium is the bridge between Germany, France, and the U.K.
2. Description
The Western Front was for all practical purposes a front from the Alps to the North Sea. The major wars were mostly confined to a stretch comprising a 400-plus mile stretch of land where currently the A26 highway is.
Start with the Reims on A26; Move northwest along on A26 La Fere to Arras and then all the way to Calais on the Channel. And then follow route A4 from Reims to Verdun on Google map.
This part — from Calais to Verdun — bore the brunt of the German war machine’s attack and most of the war was fought right on that stretch not that far from Paris. This was the decisive front during the First World War. Whichever side won there – either the Central Powers or the Entente – would be able to claim victory for their respective alliance. Despite the global nature of the conflict, much of the world remembers the First World War through the lens of the Western Front. Verdun(Fort Douamont) , Belfort, Toul had great forts in 1914.
Main cities affected by war: Ypres, Calais, Cambrai, Amiens, Compiegne, Reims, Verdun
3. List of wars on the Western Front from 1914-1918
The war on the Western Front began on 3 August 1914 with Germany aggressively marching into Belgium and Luxembourg.
The Battle of the Frontiers
This was the beginning of the Great Retreat—two excruciating weeks from August 24 to September 5 when French and British troops fell back 150 miles in front of the onrushing Germans. Private Frank Richards of the Royal Welsh Fusiliers recalled: “Bread we never saw; a man’s daily rations were four army biscuits, a pound tin of bully beef and a small portion of tea and sugar… We never knew what it was to have our equipment off and even at night when we sometimes got down in a field for an all-night’s rest were not allowed to take it off.”
An American journalist, Frederick Palmer, described the strange sights of Paris dark and abandoned:
You might walk the length of the Champs Elysees without meeting a vehicle or more than two or three pedestrians. The avenues were all your own… The moonlight threw the Arc de Triomphe in exaggerated spectral relief, sprinkled the leaves of the long rows of trees, glistened on the upsweep of the broad pavements, gleamed on the Seine. Paris was majestic…
If there was a silver lining in all this, it was the fact that as the Allied armies retreated their pursuers were forced to make the same exhausting round-the-clock marches, and German troops were also on the point of collapse. On September 2, an officer in the German First Army confided in his diary that “Our men are done up,” and Julius Koettgen, a German infantryman, recalled growing discontent in the ranks:
We had to march on and on. The captain told us we had been ordered to press the fleeing enemy as hard as possible. He was answered by a disapproving murmur from the whole section. For long days and nights we had been on our legs, had murdered like savages, had had neither opportunity nor possibility to eat or rest, and now they asked us worn-out men to conduct an obstinate pursuit.
Over the next week Entente forces continued to push into the gap, threatening to split the German forces and separating Alexander von Kluck’s (1846-1934) First Army from the rest of the German forces. The Germans had no choice but to retreat, stopping at a line behind Verdun, Reims and Soissons. This is shown by the blue arrow in the picture.
Coming to power in September 1914 after the mental collapse of his predecessor, Helmuth von Moltke, (the grand-nephew of the brilliant Prussian strategist of the same name) Erich von Falkenhayn (1861-1922) inherited a difficult strategic position.
Falkenhayn knew that he did not have enough forces to pummel the French into submission or to push the British back into the sea. The staggering losses the French suffered in 1915 were well understood by German strategists. It was here that Falkenhayn placed his hopes. If he could force the French to attack with the same ferocity and lack of success as they had in 1915, the French Republic could prove incapable of bearing the burden and be forced to sue for peace.[13] Such a peace would rob Britain of its operating bases in France and likely compel them to sue for peace in their own time (or at least remove the threat posed by the growing British army). This would free up German forces to fight Russia in Eastern Europe, where they stood to annex enormous tracks of land: the Lebensraum that would tantalize extremist German strategists in both world wars.[14] The trick was to put German forces in a position where the French would have no choice but to attack and to continue to attack, whatever the cost. Falkenhayn deduced that the ancient fort of Verdun would be just the spot.
Having existed in various forms since Roman times, the fort at Verdun had been France’s bulwark against the “Germans” for centuries before either nation existed in its modern form. It was supposedly a national symbol that the French could not let pass into German hands (although this interpretation has become increasingly contentious). Counting on this, Falkenhayn launched his attack on 21 February 1916. This was a strategic offensive that relied on the strength of the tactical defensive. The French and German armies grappled for the next ten months in the longest land battle in history: the Battle of Verdun.
Verdun, known as the “Meuse Mill” for the river next to which the battle was fought, remains emblematic of the war on the Western Front. From a German perspective the battle, at least as originally conceived, had but one purpose: to kill as many French soldiers as possible. This was attrition, conceived in its purest form. The casualties were enormous, although fewer than one might expect from such a battle. Ultimately some 300,000 soldiers from each army were killed or wounded. The battlefield conditions were barbaric. Troops were fed mechanistically into an ever-grinding machine of fire, steel, mud, and death. French troops felt that the battle was a futile waste of lives. They expressed what they felt was the obvious lack of value placed on their lives by bleating like sheep being led to the slaughter as they marched into the Verdun salient; a bone-chilling foreshadowing of the widespread mutinies that would wrack the French army in 1917.
The situation for German forces was hardly better. Whereas French forces were rapidly and aggressively rotated in and out of the front, ensuring that troops did not have to endure more than a few days at the hellish front, German units were frequently left at the front for weeks on end.This horrific treatment, partially a response to overstretched German logistics but also based on the belief that German troops could handle it, severely sapped German morale and fighting power. Nevertheless, the Germans very nearly pushed the French to the breaking point. Philippe Pétain, in charge of the Battle of Verdun from 26 February 1916, demanded that a strong offensive be launched elsewhere in order to draw German forces away from his beleaguered troops. That battle became notorious in its own right: the Battle of the Somme.
Contrary to popular belief that the Somme was purely a reaction to Verdun, the battle had in fact been agreed upon as a joint Anglo-French battle in December 1915, months before the German attack at Verdun changed the strategic dynamic of the Allied forces.[18] The Battle of the Somme was an opportunity for the rapidly expanding British army, swelled with volunteers raised in part by the efforts of the Secretary of State for War, Lord Horatio Herbert Kitchener (1850-1916) – giving them the appellation “Kitchener’s Army” – to finally commit troops to battle on a truly continental scale. Although initially planned as another French-led battle, the Battle of the Somme became the first British-led effort. This was in large part due to the fact that the French forces were worn down in the fighting around Verdun. The only problem was that the British army, and its leader, Douglas Haig (1861-1928), did not feel ready to attack. Worried about the hurried manner in which these “New Armies” were trained and unwilling to commit his forces to combat before they were ready, Haig ideally wanted to wait until August.[19] Unfortunately, armies are forced to make war as the must, not as they would like; the attack began on 1 July 1916.
Verdun was the longest battle on the Western Front in 1916, but the Somme was the bloodiest; it sent nearly twice as many men to their graves in half the time as at Meuse Mill. In many ways the Somme was the archetypal Western Front battle. Many of the persistent myths and stereotypes of the First World War come from the battle (or are at least attributed to it). The image of British soldiers crossing No Man’s Land at a walking pace are largely inspired by the actions of some British units on 1 July 1916. For many Britons, the war is symbolized by the Somme; it was a microcosm of the mud, blood and horror that the war is remembered for. The battle, however, was never meant to be led by the British. Its initial form, roughly sketched out at the Chantilly Conference in 1915, foresaw forty French divisions supported by twenty-five British. As was true of the battles in 1915, it was French-led, with British support.
This version of the Battle of the Somme was quickly chewed up on the banks of the Meuse. By the time the battle actually began, the French contribution was a mere twelve divisions, and it was the British army that acted as the senior partner. This not only marked an important change in the relationship between the two allies (Britain could thereafter rightfully demand more independence), but it was also a chance for the British army and its new commander-in-chief, Douglas Haig, to establish their reputations. General Henry Rawlinson (1864-1925), at the head of British Fourth Army, had tactical command of the battle. In practice, however, Haig found it difficult to avoid micro-managing him (keenly aware that his own reputation was in Rawlinson’s hands).
Haig’s overreach in 1916 reaped the single worst day in British military history.
At 7:30 am on 1 July 1916, some 55,000 French and British troops went over the top in the initial wave of the assault across a sixteen-mile front, signalling the start of the Battle of the Somme.[24]Their success was variable. In the southern sector French and British troops advanced rapidly, captured their objectives, and solidified their positions at minimal cost. To the north, British formations were mown down, capturing very little and sustaining heavy casualties. With concentrated machine gun fire, effective pre-sited artillery barrages, and barbed wireemplacements that were frequently still intact, the Germans in the northern part of the battlefield easily repulsed British attacks. The persistent cultural myth of British soldiers slowly walking across No Man’s Land in serried ranks only to be mown down by enemy fire are largely a faint memory of the sad reality some units faced on 1 July 1916 on the Somme. Attacking battalions in front of Serre suffered over 50 percent casualties, an absolute catastrophe.
Secondary waves faced deadly fire before even reaching the British front line. Forced to march over open terrain due to the communication trenches already clogged with the dead and dying, they made easy targets for German artillery and machine guns, which sometimes engaged British infantry at ranges of over half a mile. It is easy to understand why the First World War is seen as futile when recounting incidents like these.
By the end of the day, British forces had suffered 56,882 casualties, including 19,240 dead.
Of course, the Battle of the Somme was far larger than the events of a single day. The French and British continued to attack vigorously through to December. All told the battle claimed around 1.2 million casualties, roughly 600,000 from the German army and a combined 600,000 from the Entente (roughly 400,000 British and 200,000 French). Through this great blood-letting, the British learned hard lessons in modern warfare.
The Somme set the stage for the string of impressive battlefield successes the army achieved in 1917 and 1918. Tanks were first used at Flers-Courcelette on 15 September 1916, forever changing the face of warfare. French troops twice broke through the German lines and for a brief moment found themselves with no immediate obstacles between their position in the fields of Picardy and Berlin. However, these local successes – the result of a relentless, methodical, operational hammering at the German lines – led to nought. If the Allies were to beat Imperial Germany, it was going to have to happen some other way.
1917 was in many ways a desperate year for both the Allies and the Germans. Faced with continued encirclement, a biting blockade and struggling allies, German war-leaders needed to knock at least one of the Great Powers out of the war as quickly as possible to stand any chance of even a conditional, negotiated victory. Hindenburg and Ludendorff chose to continue operations in the theater of war where they had earned their fame: the Eastern Front. Russia was by far the weakest of the three major Entente powers and Germany had already pushed Russian forces deep into their own territory. Peace with Russia would free up millions of German soldiers who might be able to tip the balance in Germany’s favour on the Western Front. Such an attack would require concentrated manpower from an already-overstretched German army. To help free up men for the coming offensives, Hindenburg and Ludendorff withdrew forces to the so-called Hindenburg Line (Siegfriedstellung) around the Noyon Salient in France in early 1917. This new line of fortifications both shortened the length of the frontage Germany had to man and was well protected by concrete bunkers and well-planned out defensive arrays. These further economised on manpower and were quite difficult for the Entente powers to break through. In the short to medium term the Hindenburg Line solved a number of important strategic and tactical issues the Germans faced in the immediate aftermath of the Battle of the Somme.
The battle of Chemin des Dames, which led to the largest mutiny in modern military history.
The battle, fought on a barren ridge less than two hours from Paris by modern road transport, is seared into French collective memory and has fascinated historians as the moment when man said “no” to the machine gun.
The military story is horrific, if not unusual for World War I. At 6 a.m. on April 16, 1917, General Robert Nivelle sent an army of 1.2 million men into a battle roughly 130 kilometers, or 80 miles, northeast of Paris that would be France’s go-for-broke gamble to end World War I.
The result was catastrophe. Underestimating the German advantage of entrenched hilltop positions, Nivelle found his offensive blocked. Still, he refused to let up, and at least 30,000 were killed in the first 10 days.
Then the soldiers mutinied. They did not retreat, but they refused to obey orders for further attack. Many officers had been killed, and their replacements were green. Amid a breakdown of hierarchy, the troops cursed their commanders, drinking and singing seditious songs in the trenches, according to published memoirs. Haunting questions persist about this dark chapter.
What is known is the following.
In April 1917, all the basic ingredients for mutiny were present: three years of mud, rats, and lice in the trenches; mild spring weather; political revolt in Europe; and a classic tale of hubris.
Nivelle, a hero of Verdun the previous year, wanted a quick breakthrough, and he did not relent, even when nearly all signs pointed to defeat.
Meantime, revolution was in the air in 1917. The czar had abdicated a month earlier, and units of allied Russian soldiers scattered through the Chemin des Dames were restive, singing “The Internationale.” Labor movements were also afoot in Paris, something hardly lost on soldiers rotating on home leave.
But these factors were true for other sectors of the 450-kilometer front. So what set off the mutiny?
It was simply the massive disappointment of the troops,It was simply the massive disappointment of the troops. You have to consider their expectations. They had been told this would be the final offensive for victory and peace, and it became quickly clear that this was not the case.
Fearing what would happen if the Germans learned of the French indiscipline, the French became desperate for a British attack to ensure that the Germans were preoccupied elsewhere.
For the first time in the war, in 1917 Britain acted as the senior partner on the Western Front. The British launched a series of independent battles in 1917, starting with the Battle of Messines (7-14 June 1917), and ending with the Battle of Cambrai in November-December 1917.
Read: France commemorates a dark chapter in World War I history By RICK SMITH
Utterly unbeknownst to the high command sitting on either side of the Western Front trenches, 1918 would be the last year of the First World War. Of the two sides, the Germans were more keenly aware of the seriousness of their predicament. Despite Russia’s collapse after the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917 and the subsequent Treaty of Brest-Litovsk on 3 March 1918, the Germans were still set to lose the war if it continued for much longer.
The French and British remained in the field in the millions. Worse yet, the United States had joined the war on their side earlier in April 1917. Although the Americans took a long time to enter the field, by war’s end they had, on paper, an army of 4 million men: more than 1 million more than Germany had marched to war with in 1914.
Ludendorff and Hindenburg, the leaders of the German armed forces (and in many ways the political masters of a German state increasingly under military control), knew that if they were going to get a favourable peace, they would have to force the Allies’ hands sooner rather than later. They led one last-ditch gamble to try to win before their armies were ground out of existence by the sheer weight of the industrial, economic, and demographic superiority of their opponents.
Operation Michael, also known as the Ludendorff or Spring Offensive, was launched on 21 March 1918 by a very desperate German army. Ludendorff selected as his battlefield an eighty-kilometer front from La Fère to Arras — currently on Route A26 — defended by the British army. The brunt of the offensive fell on Portuguese and British forces stationed north and east of the old 1916 Somme battlefield. The Germans hoped to drive these troops northwards, away from the main body of the Allied forces and into the sea. Ludendorff hoped that if he could defeat the British Army, he could negotiate a peace favourable to Germany. Initially it looked as though Operation Michael might work. The Allied line crumbled under the German “hurricane” bombardment (which included prodigious amounts of poison gas) and rapid storm troop tactics. Pétain, as commander-in-chief, rushed units northward to shore up the beleaguered British, Portuguese and Belgians. At the same time, he privately told General Fayolle, commander of the Reserve Army Group of over fifty divisions, that if it looked like the Germans were going to be successful, he should fall back to Paris and leave the British to their fate.[45] Pétain became increasingly pessimistic, and began openly voicing his opinion that the war was lost. In the end the Allies were saved by strategic mistakes made by Ludendorff and by Foch’s foresight and intuition.
After the Second Battle of the Marne, the Germans no longer were on the attack and seeking victory, but on the defensive, trying to stave off defeat.
The Second Battle of the Marne continued into early August (15 July–6 August). Two days after it finished the Allies launched one of their most successful operations of the war: the Battle of Amiens and the Battle of Montdidier. These battles, using sophisticated “all-arms” methodology, were so successful that they caused Ludendorff to have a serious mental breakdown (he later referred to 8 August as the “black day” of the German army, although careful examination of his writings shows that he had actually used the term to describe several different days at various points in his life.
These battles signalled the start of what we now call the “Hundred Days”, the final three-plus months of the war in which the Allies made startling advances and eventually pushed the German army to the point where peace was their only option.
The Second Battle of the Marne continued into early August (15 July–6 August). Two days after it finished the Allies launched one of their most successful operations of the war: the Battle of Amiens and the Battle of Montdidier. These battles, using sophisticated “all-arms” methodology, were so successful that they caused Ludendorff to have a serious mental breakdown (he later referred to 8 August as the “black day” of the German army, although careful examination of his writings shows that he had actually used the term to describe several different days at various points in his life).[55]
These battles signalled the start of what we now call the “Hundred Days”, the final three-plus months of the war in which the Allies made startling advances and eventually pushed the German army to the point where peace was their only option. The Allies were able to do this by attacking with a speed that the Germans could not match.[56] Whereas the Allies had previously picked a single spot to attack and had continued attacking there for months at a time, the Hundred Days saw attacks lasting little more than a couple days before being moved laterally somewhere else down the line. This meant that the former German strategy of rapidly bringing in reinforcements no longer worked. Instead of shoring up their numerical inferiority by judiciously moving reserves into the battle space, the Germans were now under attack everywhere at once. The reserves could not get to a battle before the battle had ended and moved elsewhere. Demoralised and isolated, German troops began to surrender in staggering numbers.
This problem was significantly worsened by the arrival of some 2 million American soldiers in France over the course of 1918. Led by General John J. Pershing (1860-1948), American forces were green and led by officers with little relevant pre-war experience. Trained by British and French advisors, they nevertheless fought the war firmly under the wing of the French army, receiving substantial support in the planning and execution of their attacks (especially regarding the use of artillery).
As a result, the Allies were able to capitalise on the advantages conferred by imitative tactics and relative surprise; in just over three months they rapidly wore down the German army. The Germans went from having nearly thirty fresh reserve divisions in August 1918 to fewer than four in October. Contrary to the propaganda of the National Socialists, the Western Front was won militarily, in the field. By 1918 the German army could no longer effectively defend itself. Had the German government insisted that it continue to do so, the Allies would have invaded Germany, an act that risked throwing the nation into civil war (a subdued form of which raged throughout Germany after the Great War ended).[58] In the end, the grotesque arithmetic of attrition eventually caught up with the Germans: they still had plenty of machine guns, shells, and artillery, but they no longer had the men to fire them.
Killed or Wounded in the WW I
Russia
6,650,000
British Empire
2,998,000
France
5,624,000
Germany
6,056,000
Austria-Hungary
4,543,000
Italy
1,416,000
United States
256,000
Ottoman
725,000
Conclusion↑
The war on the Western Front was the decisive theatre in the First World War. Despite Germany’s success in the Balkans and on the Eastern Front, it was ultimately its inability to defeat the Allied powers fighting in France and Flanders that determined the war’s outcome. Throughout the war there was substantial disagreement about “how” to best fight (and hopefully “win”) the war on the Western Front. The Entente powers vacillated between policies of slow, methodical battles that gradually pushed back the enemy, and grand, “general offensives” that sought to win major strategic victories over the course of a few days, rather than several months. The Germans also tried different, albeit similar policies of outright attrition (Verdun) and pushing for grand strategic victories in the field (the Ludendorff Offensives of 1918). Ultimately, it was a combination that proved successful: Foch’s “bataille generale”, a long series of short, sharp attacks up and down the front that not only won ground, but also balanced the bloody ledger of attrition in favour of the Entente. The Hundred Days proved that the Western Front could in fact be won if the right methodology and technology were used. It was a fitting, unceasing, mechanistic finale to a grand and horrible industrial war.
Declarations of war against Russia by Germany
At midnight on 31 July – 1 August, 1914 the German government sent an ultimatum to Russia and announced a state of “Kriegsgefahr” during the day; the Turkish government ordered mobilisation and the London Stock Exchange closed. On 1 August the British government ordered the mobilisation of the navy, the German government ordered general mobilisation and declared war on Russia. Hostilities commenced on the Polish frontier, the French government ordered general mobilisation and next day the German government sent an ultimatum to Belgium, demanding passage through Belgian territory, as German troops crossed the frontier of Luxembourg.
Military operations began on the French frontier; Libau in Russia was bombarded by a German light cruiser SMS Augsburg and the British government guaranteed naval protection for French coasts.
On 3 August the Belgian Government refused German demands and the British Government guaranteed military support to Belgium, should Germany invade. Germany declared war on France, the British government ordered general mobilisation and Italy declared neutrality.
On 4 August the British government sent an ultimatum to Germany and declared war on Germany at midnight on 4/5 August, Central European Time. Belgium severed diplomatic relations with Germany and Germany declared war on Belgium. German troops crossed the Belgian frontier and attacked Liège.
England Declares War on Germany: British Ship Sunk: French Ships Defeat German, Belgium Attacked: 17,000,000 Men Engaged in Great War of Eight Nations: Great English and German Navies About to Grapple: Rival Warships Off This Port as Lusitania Sails
State of War Exists, Says Britain, as Kaiser Rejects Ultimatum; MUST DEFEND BELGIUM
King George Issues Call to Arms and Thanks the Colonies for Their Support
London, Wednesday, Aug. 5– War is on between England and Germany. An ultimatum to the German Government that the neutrality of Belgium must be respected was rejected by the Kaiser’s Government and the British Foreign Office announced last night that a state of war existed.
Belgians Rush to Arms: Parliament Acclaims King’s Appeal and Votes $40,000,000 for National Defense: French Border Clashes: Stronger German Forces Crossing the Border Near Marsla-Tour and Moineville: Russians Attack Memel: Seacoast Town of Germany Defeats Attempts of Enemy to Capture It
Over 17,000,000 Fighting Men of Eight Nations Now Engaged in the Colossal European War
German Fleet Sinks a British Mine Layer: Scoutship Pathfinder Is Chased by the Kaiser’s Warships But Makes Its Escape
England Calls All Unmarried Men From 18 to 30 to Serve King and Country in This Hour of Need
In 1890, the United States naval historian Alfred Mahan published The Influence of Sea Power upon History, the single most important work in naval strategy. Mahan argued that sea power was the deciding factor that allowed strong nations to thrive and impose their will on weaker nations, and that the proper way to achieve naval supremacy was large-scale battle between fleets. At the time, the Imperial German Navy subscribed to the commerce raiding theory of navy strategy, but Mahan’s arguments had enormous influence over subsequent German and British thinking. Translated into German, a copy of the book was placed in every German naval vessel. Kaiser Wilhelm II immediately subscribed to Mahan’s ideas after reading his book in 1894 and sought Reichstag funding to implement them.
While America was at peace, the domestic economy ran on a laissez-faire basis, with American banks making huge loans to Britain and France — funds that were in large part used to buy munitions, raw materials, and food from across the Atlantic. Until 1917, Wilson made minimal preparations for a land war and kept the United States Army on a small peacetime footing, despite increasing demands for enhanced preparedness. He did however expand the United States Navy.
Battle of Amiens (Aug 8, 1918 – Aug 11, 1918)
The Battle of Amiens in France, also known as the Third Battle of Picardy, was the opening phase of the Allied offensive which began on 8 August 1918, later known as the Hundred Days Offensive, that ultimately led to the end of the First World War. The objective of Hundred Days Offensive—kicked off on August 8, 1918, with a decisive victory at Amiens, France—was to breach the Hindenburg Line in late September.
Allied forces break through the Hindenburg Line Sept 29, 1918
Built in late 1916, the Hindenburg Line—named by the British for the German commander in chief, Paul von Hindenburg; it was known to the Germans as the Siegfried Line—was a heavily fortified zone running several miles behind the active front between the north coast of France and Verdun, near the border of France and Belgium.
With the fall of the Hindenburg Line, Generals inform the Kaizer that the situation is hopeless and Germany must seek an immediate armistice. Germany then s, on 4th October, 1918, ends a request to Pres Wilson to negotiate an armistice.
Germany had formally surrendered on November 11, 1918, and all nations had agreed to stop fighting while the terms of peace were negotiated. On June 28, 1919, Germany and the Allied Nations (including Britain, France, Italy and Russia) signed the Treaty of Versailles, formally ending the war.
Postwar Germany was governed under the “Weimar Republic.” The Weimar government signed the Versailles Treaty, which made it immediately unpopular with the German people. Crippled by the conditions imposed by the treaty, the ineffectual government could due little to improve the German economy.
Far-right politicians promising to return Germany to its former glory began to accumulate power. In 1933, Hitler and his Nazi Party soon took control of the government, dissolving the Weimar Republic and establishing the Third Reich. Many historians argue that the Treaty of Versailles played a large role in Hitler’s emergence.
Next
subratachak 
_13_September_(black_line).jpg){kind=link}
#/media/File:German_Submarine_Zone_February_1915_SGW_Vol_V.png){kind=link}
#/media/File:8th_August_1918_(Will_Longstaff).jpg){kind=link}
