Download World war I

World war I
General facts about the war
*All of the participants was expecting a short
war(”all over by Christmas”).
*Germany was keen on beating France
rapidly therefore the Schlieffen plan.
*But Paris doesn’t fall and a stalemate
develops on the western front(this is when
the trench warfare starts).This continues for
several years.
*By december 1917 the Germans has forced
the russians out of the war and the germans
are causing heavy losses to the british with
their submarine attacks
*The help from the U.S (april 1917) does
make a difference to this war. The germans
run out of means and are exhausted and an
ceasefire is signed in november 1918.
The western front 1914-(main events)
*The point with the Schlieffen-plan(august
1914) was to take over France and avoid a
twofront-war.The Germans got as far as
twenty miles of Paris but then it
stopped.Mainly it had to do with lack of food
and supplies. In september the german
forces were driven back to the river
Aisne(The battle of the Marne) were they
started to dig trenches.
*Battle of the Marne: 6-10 September 1914
The First Battle of the Marne marked the end of
the German sweep into France and the beginning
of the trench warfare that was to characterise
World War One.
Germany's grand Schlieffen Plan to conquer
France entailed a wheeling movement of the
northern wing of its armies through central
Belgium to enter France near Lille. It would turn
west near the English Channel and then south to
cut off the French retreat. If the plan succeeded,
Germany's armies would simultaneously encircle
the French Army from the north and capture
Paris.
A French offensive in Lorraine prompted German
counter-attacks that threw the French back onto a
fortified barrier. Their defence strengthened, they
could send troops to reinforce their left flank - a
redistribution of strength that would prove vital in
the Battle of the Marne. The German northern
wing was weakened further by the removal of 11
divisions to fight in Belgium and East Prussia.
The German 1st Army, under Kluck, then swung
north of Paris, rather than south west, as intended.
This required them to pass into the valley of the
River Marne across the Paris defences, exposing
them to a flank attack and a possible counterenvelopment.
On 3 September, Joffre ordered a halt to the
French retreat and three days later his reinforced
left flank began a general offensive. Kluck was
forced to halt his advance prematurely in order to
support his flank: he was still no further up the
Marne Valley than Meaux.
On 9 September Bülow learned that the British
Expeditionary Force (BEF) was advancing into
the gap between his 2nd Army and Kluck. He
ordered a retreat, obliging Kluck to do the same.
The counterattack of the French 5th and 6th
Armies and the BEF developed into the First
Battle of the Marne, a general counter-attack by
the French Army. By 11 September the Germans
were in full retreat.
This remarkable change in fortunes was caused
partially by the exhaustion of many of the
German forces: some had marched more than
240km (150 miles), fighting frequently. The
German advance was also hampered by
demolished bridges and railways, constricting
their supply lines, and they had underestimated
the resilience of the French.
In saving Paris from capture by pushing the
Germans back some 72km (45 miles), the First
Battle of the Marne was a great strategic victory,
as it enabled the French to continue the war.
However, the Germans succeeded in capturing a
large part of the industrial north east of France, a
serious blow. Furthermore, the rest of 1914 bred
the geographic and tactical deadlock that would
take another three years and countless lives to
break.(Taken partially from BBC:s world war one
web page)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwone/
*After this battle their is something called ”the
race to the sea”.This was when both sides tried to
outflank each other to the north.The most fierce
battles during this race was the first battle of
Ypres where the germans tried agressively to
break through to the channel ports.Through fierce
resistance the germans were hold back and the
stalemate continued.
*Why was there a stalemate?(”modern world
history”)
-Barbed wire in no-mans land which took away
the chanches of surprise attacks.
-Aircrafts could spot quite easily the trenches but
the accuracy of the aircrafts were not that good.
-Trenches were hard to take over since the
machine-guns were in use.
*This is according to Daily Mirror in april
1915(second battle of Ypres)
Germans gain ground near Ypres by using
asphyxiating gas
Berlin claims Yser Canal is forced and 1,600
prisoners taken
Allies advance in big counter-attack - 'French
troops had to retire overwhelmed by fumes,' says
Sir J French
Hun's Long Preparation of Forbidden Devices
By using asphyxiating gas fumes the Germans
north of Ypres have forced back French troops to
the Yser Canal near Boesinghe.
Though Berlin claims sweeping successes in the
fighting that ensued, Sir John French last night
reported that 'our front remains intact except on
the extreme left' and the French communiqué
states that the enemy's surprise attack 'has had no
grave consequences'.
Berlin's claim is that the Germans forced a
passage across the Yser Canal, that Langemarck
and three other places were captured, and that
1,600 French and British prisoners with 30 guns
fell into German hands.
Even in the short time at their disposal the Allies
have retaliated and a vigorous counter-attack has
developed successfully.
An official telegram from Berlin says: 'The
Admiralty Staff states that recently the German
High Sea Fleet has repeatedly been cruising in the
North Sea, and has advanced into English waters,
without meeting any British naval force.'
The bombardment of the Dardanelles forts has
been resumed, and the transports of the
Expeditionary Force have arrived in the Gulf of
Saros.
Gas Fumes that Drove Back Our Ally
Sir J French Reports that British Had to Readjust Line to New Front
Sir John French last night communicated the
following, dated yesterday: Yesterday (Thursday)
evening the enemy developed an attack on the
French troops on our left in the neighbourhood of
Bixschoote and Langemarck, on the north east of
Ypres salient. This attack was preceded by a
heavy bombardment, the enemy at the same time
making use of a large number of appliances for
the production of asphyxiating gases. The
quantity produced indicates long and deliberate
preparation for the employment of devices
contrary to the terms of the Hague Convention, to
which the enemy subscribed.
The false statement made by the Germans a week
ago to the effect that we were using such gases is
now explained. It was obviously an effort to
neutralise criticism in advance.
During the night the French had to retire from the
gas zone, overwhelmed by the fumes. They have
fallen back to the canal in the neighbourhood of
Boesinghe.
Our front remains intact except on the extreme
left where the troops have had to readjust their
line in order to conform with the new French line.
Two attacks were delivered during the night on
our trenches east of Ypres and were repulsed.
Fighting still continues in the region north of
Ypres.
This (Friday) morning one of our aviators, during
the course of a reconnaissance which he
completed successfully, damaged a German
aeroplane and forced it to descend. Our Flying
Corps also brought down another German
machine about Messines.
*To summarize this battle(the second battle of
Ypres) one could say that the germans tried to
capture Ypres by using massive firearms. Also
chlorinegas was used in order to suprise their
enemy.This was also what happened. All in all no
great advances were made only big losses. The
german losses were close to 40% when the
brittish were a bit over 60%.
*The battle of Verdun takes place in february in
1916. This was the the bigggest offensive made
by the germans so far.This can be seen as the
longest and bloodiest battle of the war. The battle
ends in autumn and has the same outcome as so
many other battles.No practical advance made but
instead many injured and dead.Germans
approx.350.000, french approx 400.000 dead.
July 1 - November 28, 1916
The Battle of the Somme was the largest all out
offensive planned by the British against the
German Army up to this point in First World War.
The mastermind of the offensive was Lt.. Gen sir
Douglas Haig, who had previously been in
command of the B.E.F. 1st Corps and had
recently been promoted to commader of all
British forces on the western front. The main
responsibility of the offensive fell to the the 4th
Army under Gen. Sir Henry Rawlinson.
Lt. Gen. Sir Douglas Haig, Mastermind of the Somme Offensive
Haig's plan called for a massive artillery barrage
that was to knock out all German resistance along
an 18 mile long section of the front. He employed
the use of 1,500 British guns backed by almost
the same amount of French artillery. As the
barrage commenced, British infantry would flood
into the front line trenches in preparation to
advance on the broken German front. The barrage
was set to begin on the June 24, 1916. Following
the taking of the German lines, the British would
then sweep through to Cambrai and Douai,
breaking the German line in two.
The massive barrage began on schedual at
pounded the German lines for seven days non
stop. However, the British lacked high explosive
shells in their arsenal at the time and the
concussion shells used did little damage to the
German trenches and barbed wire tangles which
went unnoticed by the British high command.
The Germans remained in their dug outs for the
duration of the barrage, quite safe from the
artillery.
British Troops on the way to the Somme Front, 1916
At 7:00 AM on July 1st, zero hour, the barrage
lifted and the infantry were ordered over the top.
The British were confident that the barrage had
all but wiped out the German defenders and that
they would find only empty trenches across no
man's land. The British units, advanced in close
order, bayonets fixed, towards the German lines.
As the first units of the B.E.F. got into the middle
of no man's land, German machine gun nests
sprung up to meet them.
British Machine Gun Crew in Phosgene Helmets
The British idea of a quick victory faded quickly
as regiment after regiment fell before the German
machine guns. Soon the German artillery joined
in the attack. Many British regiments were killed
still at their starting points, never making it out of
their trenches. The 1st Lancashire Fusiliers and
several other regiments from the 29th Division,
were pinned down in a sunken road halfway to
the German lines and were subsequently shot to
pieces by the German machine guns. Only a
handful of British soldiers managed to actually
make it to the barbed wire tangles and even fewer
to the German front line itself. By the end of the
first day, the British had lost 60,000 men on the
assault. Among the units decimated during the
first day of the battle was the 36th Ulster Division, the 1st
Newfoundland Regiment, which had actually
made it to the German wire tangles, the 10th
Battalion West Yorkshires, which got into the
German trenchline and was surrouned and
oblitereated, and the 1st Essex Regt.
British Troops Going Over the Top, First Day of the Somme, 1916
Gen. Haig was still confident that the battle
would succeed as long as the British infantry kept
pressure on the Germans despite the mounting
losses.The battle rage on for weeks. The French
gained small amounts of land on the southern
section of the line but the gains overall were
minimal. On September 25, the British again tried
a large scale assault on the German lines with the
same consequences. However, the British had
managed to move somewhat in the north allowing
them to take Beaumont-Hamel in mid November.
Tending to the Wounded on the Somme Front, 1916
By the end of November, the Somme Front had
stabilized. The battle was considered over by
November 28 and by this point had claimed
420,000 casualites for the British, 195,000 for the
French, and 650,000 for the Germans trying to
stop them. Gen. Haig finally gave into pressure
from his subordinates and acknowleged the
offensive's failure. There would be no significant
actions on this front again until late 1917.
The Battle of Jutland, 31st May 1916. (Sea battle)
This was the greatest naval
battle of all time up to then, with 250 ships and 5
sea-planes involved. (The Second World War
battle of Leyte Gulf in October 1944 was even
greater.)
As the Germans were
outnumbered by the British, Scheer planned a
strategy which he hoped would end British naval
superiority. Admiral Hipper, with part of the
German fleet, would sail ahead of Scheer and
draw the impetuous British Admiral David
Beatty, in charge of the Battle Cruiser Squadron
now stationed at Rosyth. Once Beatty had sighted
the Germans, Hipper was to turn and lead Beatty
onto the main German fleet, which would destroy
Beatty's force, Beatty being unable to receive
help from Jellicoe who would be too far way.
Unluckily for the Germans,
Room 40 learned, from radio intercepts which
were deciphered, of the departure from its base at
Bremerhaven of the entire German High Seas
Fleet, although there was no hint of what the
German intention was. However, incompetence at
the British Admiralty meant that Jellicoe was
informed, wrongly, that Scheer had not left
Bremerhaven, that is, that the entire German fleet
was not at sea; this misinformation unfortunately,
but not surprisingly, made him distrust
intelligence information that came later from
Room 40. Thus when Jellicoe took the Grand
Fleet out of Scapa Flow he did not hurry, for there
seemed to be no great danger and high speed
meant increased fuel consumption and a reduced
range of action.
When Beatty and Hipper
sighted each other's fleet, it was largely by chance
as the two fleets would probably have passed
each other had they not gone to investigate a
neutral merchant vessel sailing between them!
Beatty, as anticipated, chased after Hipper, who
turned and led Beatty towards Scheer. When
Beatty saw Scheer's ships and realised that he had
fallen into a trap, he quickly turned, chased by the
German fleet; in the ensuing battle, the superior
German ships did considerable damage to the
British. Meanwhile, Jellicoe, informed of the
battle, was racing to Beatty's assistance, all of
which was of course unknown to the Germans,
who were in fact themselves now being drawn
into a trap. However, Beatty failed to inform
Jellicoe exactly where he was, but Jellicoe
calculated the right place and managed to cross
Scheer's T, so that all the British guns could fire
while the Germans were masked by their own
fleet. Scheer decided against battle and under the
cover of dusk turned about and raced for home,
first firing torpedoes which caused Jellicoe to be
cautious in pursuit.
Jellicoe followed Scheer south,
hoping for another "1st of June" the next day
(the "Glorious 1st of June" of 1794 was when
Admiral Lord Howe beat the French Brest Fleet
off Ushant.) During the night, there were clashes
between parts of the fleet when they sighted each
other in the dark but the situation was very
confused. But in the night, Jellicoe lost the
German fleet, which arrived safely back in port.
Room 40 had in fact informed Jellicoe of Scheer's
route but Jellicoe, having before been given
wrong information by Room 40, took no notice
and so lost a chance to destroy the German fleet.
Opinions vary as to who won
the battle. Technically, the Germans won because
they inflicted heavier casualties on the British
than they themselves suffered. 6,097 British
sailors out of 60,000 died and 14 British ships,
with a total tonnage of 112,000, were sunk. As for
the Germans, 2,551 sailors out of 36,000 died and
11 ships, a total of 62,000 tons, were sunk.
However, the Germans had run away and the
German navy never again ventured out in full
force, despite the fact that the relative German
success had shattered the myth of the invincibility
of the Royal Navy.
Jellicoe was much criticized
afterwards, especially for letting the Germans
escape. The main British failing had been poor
communications, for which Jellicoe was
ultimately responsible and his disregarding
information from Room 40 meant that he lost the
Germans during the night. However, he had
found the German fleet despite Beatty's failure to
signal, crossed the T, and generally showed
himself "very able if cautious" (Liddell Hart).
A German victory at Jutland
would have been disastrous for Britain for,
without control of the sea, it would have been
deprived of essential supplies from the Empire
and the United States. As Churchill put it, Jellicoe
was the only man who "could lose the war in an
afternoon".
*The eastern front
Battle of Tannenberg: 26-30 August 1914(BBC
web-site)
Allied with France and Britain, Grand Duke
Nicholas, the Russian commander, agreed to help
relieve the French, under attack from Germany,
with an offensive in East Prussia. This required
mobility and nimbleness(clever and quick
thinking); unfortunately the Russians had neither.
Two Russian armies invaded German East
Prussia in August 1914. Rennenkampf's First
Army was to converge with the Samsonov's
Second Army to give a two-to-one numerical
superiority over the German 8th Army, which
they would attack from the east and south
respectively, some 80km (50 miles) apart.
The plan began well at Gumbinnen on 20 August,
when Rennenkampf's First Army defeated eight
divisions of the German 8th Army on its eastern
front. By this time Samsonov's forces had crossed
the southern frontier of East Prussia to threaten
the German rear, defended by only three
divisions.
Faced with imminent attack, Prittwitz,
commander of the 8th Army, approved Lieutenant
Colonel Hoffman's idea to attack Samsonov's left
flank, aided by another three divisions moved by
rail from the Gumbinnen front. However, on 23
August Prittwitz was replaced by General von
Hindenburg whose chief of staff, Ludendorff,
immediately confirmed Hoffmann's plan to strike
at Samsonov's left flank.
The Germans then got lucky when they
intercepted an uncoded Russian message
indicating that Rennenkampf was in no hurry to
advance. Developing Hoffman's original plan,
Ludendorff concentrated six divisions against
Samsonov's left flank and took a calculated risk
to withdraw the rest of the German troops from
Gumbinnen and move them to face Samsonov's
right flank, leaving only a cavalry screen against
Rennenkampf. This move was helped by the lack
of communication between the two Russian
commanders, who disliked each other.
Samsonov's forces were spread out along a 60
mile front and advancing gradually against the
Germans when, on 26 August, Ludendorff
ordered an attack on Samsonov's left wing near
Usdau. There, German artillery forced a Russian
retreat, whereupon they were pursued toward
Neidenburg, in the rear of the Russian centre.
A Russian counter-attack from Soldau enabled
two Russian army corps to escape south east
before the German pursuit continued. By nightfall
on 29 August the Russian centre, amounting to
three army corps, was surrounded by Germans
and stuck in a forest with no means of escape.
The Russians disintegrated and were taken
prisoner by the thousands. Faced with total
defeat, Samsonov shot himself. By the end of the
month, the Germans had taken 92,000 prisoners
and annihilated half of the Russian 2nd Army.
Rennenkampf's army had not moved at all during
this battle, vindicating Ludendorff's calculated
risk.
After being reinforced, the Germans turned on
Rennenkampf's slowly advancing Army,
attacking it in the first half of September and
driving it from East Prussia. It was a crushing
defeat for the Russians. In total, they lost around
250,000 men - an entire army - as well as vast
amounts of military equipment. The wafer-thin
silver lining was that the Russian action had
diverted the Germans from their attack on France
and allowed the French to counter-attack at the
Marne.
Campaigns and crises on the eastern front :
1914-1916
Russian prisoners after defeat in East Prussia,
1915
In 1914, Russia was hardly prepared for war. Just
nine years earlier she had been defeated in a war
with tiny Japan. The Revolution of 1905, when
revolts and uprisings had forced the Tsar to
concede civil rights and a parliament to the
Russian people, had also shaken the empire.
The subsequent reforms and rebuilding were far
from complete, but as workers and land-hungry
peasants rallied to the Russian flag and marched
off to fight against the Central Powers, the initial
auguries for both war and national unity were not
bad.
'This failed Russian advance...signalled the
beginning of an unrelenting Russian retreat'
National unity, however, could only be built on
victory and, in that regard, Russia's hopes were
dashed early in the Great War. At Tannenberg and
the First Battle of the Masurian Lakes, in 1914,
Russia lost two entire armies (over 250,000 men).
This failed Russian advance into East Prussia did
disrupt Germany's Schlieffen Plan and thus
probably prevented the fall of Paris, but it also
signalled the beginning of an unrelenting Russian
retreat on the northern sector of the Eastern Front.
By the middle of 1915 all of Russian Poland and
Lithuania, and most of Latvia, were overrun by
the German army.
'Many factors - including the militarisation of
industry and crises in food supply - threatened
disaster on the home front'
Fortunately for the Russians, they did better in
1916. The supply of rifles and artillery shells to
the Eastern Front was vastly improved, and in the
Brusilov Offensive of June 1916, Russia achieved
significant victories over the Austrians - capturing
Galicia and the Bukovina - and she was also more
than holding her own in Transcaucasia, against
Turkey.
However, the country's political and economic
problems were greatly exacerbated by the war.
Many factors - including the militarisation of
industry and crises in food supply - threatened
disaster on the home front.
Added to this cocktail were rumours that the
tsarina, Alexandra, and her favourite, the
infamous Rasputin, were German spies. The
rumours were unfounded, but by November 1916
influential critics of the regime were asking
whether Russia's misfortunes - including
1,700,000 military dead and 5,000,000 wounded were a consequence of 'stupidity or treason'.
This was a rabble-rousing exaggeration, but
certainly the outdated strategies of Russia's
General Staff had cost hundreds of thousands of
lives, while the regime seemed careless of such
appalling losses.
Brest-Litovsk and its consequences
Delegates at negotiations for the Brest-Litovsk
treaty, March 1918
After taking power, the Bolsheviks promised to
deliver 'Peace, Bread and Land' to the
beleaguered people of Russia. With regard to the
first of these, a 'Decree on Peace' (26 October
1917) was dashed off by Lenin, calling upon all
belligerents to end the slaughter of World War
One.
Not that Lenin was a pacifist: rather, his hope was
to transform the world war into an international
civil war, when the 'imperialist' powers refused to
cease fighting and thereby revealed their
rapacious ambitions.
'the anti-Bolshevik Russians who had remained
loyal to the Allies now took up arms'
However, the Central Powers responded to the
Bolsheviks' appeal by agreeing to an armistice on
the Eastern Front, and Lenin's lieutenant, Trotsky,
found himself in the uncomfortable position,
during the winter of 1917-18, of negotiating a
separate peace treaty with Imperial Germany and
her allies at the Polish town of Brest-Litovsk.
Trotsky tried to delay matters and to inculcate
revolution in central Europe by refusing the harsh
terms presented to him. When Germany, however,
merely resumed its invasion of Russia on the
Eastern Front, pushing further east in five days of
February 1918 than it had in the previous three
years (the German soldiers, to Trotsky's
consternation, continued to obey their officers),
the Bolsheviks were forced to sign the Treaty of
Brest-Litovsk on 3 March 1918.
This punitive treaty effectively handed over
Finland, Poland, the Baltic provinces, Ukraine
and Transcaucasia to the Central Powers, together
with one-third of the old empire's population,
one-third of its agricultural land and threequarters of its industries.
Outraged by this, the anti-Bolshevik Russians
who had remained loyal to the Allies now took up
arms in earnest against the Bolsheviks. They were
actively assisted by Allied forces in Russia, who
hoped to rebuild the Eastern Front. Notable in
this regard was the Czechoslovak Legion, a
40,000-strong army made up of former POWs,
who in 1918 seized the entire Trans-Siberian
Railway, from the Volga to Vladivostok.