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| The Myth of the Great War: A New Military History of World War I by John Mosier paperback |
Miracle at Belleau Wood: The Birth of the Modern U.S. Marine Corps by Alan Axelrod additional titles |
Posted on 02/21/2016 7:38:14 PM PST by abishai
The American Civil War was our first encounter with industrialized warfare on a massive scale; for much of Europe, that came in WWI. The earlier wars (Franco-Prussian, Austro-Prussian) were settled too quickly for them to understand how warfare had changed.
The trench mutinies of 1917, which were hidden from the Western public at the time, came about when French troops realized their lives were being thrown away needlessly by elderly generals with no concept of how warfare had changed. Two decades later, the offspring of those French troops refused to be conned again; Germany took France in weeks because a new set of aging French generals were prepared to go to war “1914-style”.
Even after the first grim, horrific months of trench warfare and thousands of deaths from soldiers marching into machine gun fire, they still had generals, like British commander Haig, who thought cavalry could work against fortified machine gun positions. In that war the generals were generally dumber than the pols.
One of the people who did see the futility of fighting a modern war with obsolete methods was Churchill. He was maybe the first person to advocate the use of tanks to defeat the trench warfare system and the machine guns. Naturally, it wasn't until much later in the war that tanks were used extensively.
But, of course, Churchill is maligned for his supposedly bad plan with the Gallipoli campaign. If Churchill had been given full charge, the plan most likely would have worked. Churchill never planned for an army landing and trench warfare.
He devised a naval assault on Istanbul that would probably have worked and knocked Turkey out of the war. With Turkey out of the war Germany would have had one less ally and other countries in the area might have been encouraged to support the Allies against Germany.
An initial naval assault up the weakly defended straits had wreaked havoc on the Turks and almost caused them to abandon Istanbul.
But the Allied generals in charge delayed action and refused Churchill's request for a large naval assault on Istanbul. Instead, they delayed and settled on an army invasion of the lower peninsula. By that time, with the help of the Germans, the Turks had fortified the area. Another naval assault would probably have worked again, but again Churchill was turned down.
So he gets all the blame for a campaign that was basically screwed up by the army chiefs who didn't like Churchill. All this is from William Manchester's "The Last Lion" a three volume bio of Churchill.
I sometimes wonder how much different and better Europe would be without the World Wars...
#18 & 20 At least the war planners got a medal for their plan.
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| The Myth of the Great War: A New Military History of World War I by John Mosier paperback |
Miracle at Belleau Wood: The Birth of the Modern U.S. Marine Corps by Alan Axelrod additional titles |
The Germans were forced back on the defensive that summer, under pressure elsewhere from the British-led attack on the Somme and Russia's Brusilov Offensive.The Germans and Austrians were much more concerned about the eastern front, because of the terrain. In the west the German forces and their allies would maintain their front with surprisingly few personnel, and when those large British/French offensives would begin, the Germans would give up the easy ground, typically with minimal losses, retreating to easily defended terrain and existing fortifications, dig in, and wait for the British/French assault. When the attack came, it was up slopes, against fortifications, across kill zones.
It was right around this time 100 years ago this year that my grandfather was listed dead for the second time in the NYTimes while fighting in WWI
PLEASE!!!
I went there about 10 years ago with a college classmate. He was a history major and we toured the French battlefields of World War I. Before we got there he tried to describe the Verdun Ossuary to me and finally said it was just something you had to see to understand. He was right.
I have always wondered if he kept the style as part of his shtick that he was standing up for the WWI vets who were sold down the river by the Prussian aristocrats who agreed to the Versailles peace, but I have never found any discussion of it.
I’d love to see the pictures.
Thanks in advance.
L
Churchill did bring some knowledge, having been in combat himself in Africa. As for dealing with Turkey, nobody expected their tenacity or willingness to take high losses; I don’t know how those plans would have worked out.
Sad but true. Australia’s independence push started when they watched their youth p!ssed away at Gallipoli, and when Britain wouldn’t release their troops in the desert in WWII (when Japan started their rampage in Pacific) the relationship was forever broken. Fortunately for us; while Britain sat out Vietnam, Australian troops were right there with us.
Again, I'd have you read Manchester's account of the debacle. Manchester deemed Churchill's original plan a brilliant idea went afoul due to the stupidity of the people over Churchill.
I'll repeat.... Churchill really wasn't in total charge of the whole operation. His main plan was supposed to be a huge naval assault on Istanbul. He never wanted trench warfare which began too late to be of any good. His plans were always shot down by various army or navy people who didn't want any glory going to Churchill.
So instead of a timely naval expedition on Istanbul followed by an army invasion of a depleted city, you had army chiefs twiddling their thumbs for many weeks before discarding Churchill's naval expedition and beginning the failed army invasion on the lower peninsula while the Turks had built up their defenses.
My son and I are visiting Verdun and the Somme next month on our way to Berlin.
Evil, criminal losers.
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