World War I Western Front A New Style of Warfare

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World War I - Western FrontA New Style of Warfare

• American History
• Unit II- Foreign Affairs
• Chapter 21 Section 2
• The Western Front

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10th American HistoryUnit II- U.S. Foreign
AffairsReading Quiz for Chapter 21 Sect. 2

• 1. What was life like in trench?
• 2. Name three new types of weapons of WWI.
• 3. What was Shell Shock?
• 4. Who was losing early in WWI?
• 5.Before the war was over soldiers killed on both
  sides would number how many?
  
• 6. If Germany was winning in 1918, what changed
  everything?
  
• 7. What is the AEF and who was its leader?
• 8. What was the bad mistake that German generals
  and their emperor made?

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Total War and Slaughter
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Total War on the Western Front

• In the spring of 1915 the trenches along the
  western front were filled with millions of
  soldiers, at the average rate of one soldier per
  four inches of trench. The job behind the front
  lines was to keep the men fed, equipped and ready
  to continue the fighting until the end
  came.Since both sides targeted both civilians
  and military personnel, and mobilized men and
  resources at an unprecedented rate, the Great War
  was a "total war.
• This total war effected the lives of many
  different people
  
• in some communities unprecedented casualty rates
  especially among young officers stripped young
  women of all their male contemporaries
  
• West African soldiers were shipped in from the
  colonies to fight in the trenches
  
• brave Englishwomen traded other jobs for more
  dangerous jobs in weapons factories. Everyone was
  affected. T
  
• he first genocide of the 20th century -- the
  ultimate form of total war against civilians --
  was also part of this conflict. Over the next two
  years the Armenian population of Ottoman Turkey
  was uprooted and expelled to the desert regions
  of Mesopotamia. In the process between 500,000 to
  one million Armenians where killed or died of
  exposure or disease.

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Slaughter on the Western Front

• Impersonal killing- Hand to hand, sword, rifle,
  machine gun, bomb and airplane
  
• 1914- each side lost a 1/2 million men
• 1915- British and French advance was less than 3
  miles anywhere. France lost 1.5 million men
  
• In early 1916, the British had over 1 million men
  in Belgium and France, while the French and
  German armies had re-supplied their front line
  troops. The stage was set for both sides to try
  to make the breakthrough on the battlefield that
  would assure each victory. By 1916s end, both
  sides would lose nearly one million men with very
  little change in position of the front line
  trenches
• 1916 Battle of the Somme- 5 months. Germans lost
  over 600,000 men. 20,000 British soldiers died
  in one day.
  
• Before the end of the war over 10 million men
  would die on both sides. Another 10 million
  civilians from disease, starvation, and
  revolutions.
• 1918- German trenches were 50 miles from Paris,
  the German hope was to reach Paris and defeat the
  French before the Americans came into the war.

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American Expeditionary Force (AEF)

• May 1918
• Doughboys-The name may have come from the large
  brass buttons on the uniforms of Union soldiers
  in the Civil War they were said to resemble
  doughboys, a flour dumpling cooked in soup
• 2nd and 3rd Divisions fight at Belleau Wood and
  Chateau-Thierry. Argonne Forest.
  
• 85,000 American help save Paris
• General John J. (Black Jack) Pershing has an army
  of 1/2 million on the Southern Front.
  
• Oct. 1918- Battle of Sedan- American Victory.
  British and French Lines begin to advance.
  
• German mistake- Americans were late but made a
  difference.
  
• U.S. lost 50,280 men, and 25,000 to disease.
  42,000 Black troop fought in French units.
  
• Russia, England and France lost over 4 million
  total. 1 million other countries.
  
• Armistice- November 11, 1918- 11th hour, 11th day
  of the 11th month.

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Slaughter on the Western Front

• Battle of Verdun - 1916, became for the French
  what Gettysburg is for Americans.The goal of the
  German commander was not territory, but to bleed
  his enemy to death. The battle lasted nine months
  and in the end the front lines were nearly the
  same, while over 300,000 French and Germans were
  killed and over 750,000 were wounded.
• Battle of the Somme, where another million died.
  The battle also saw the introduction of the tank.
  42 British tanks. The British fired 1.5 million
  rounds of artillery shells at the Germans in the
  5 month battle. The opening barrage could be
  heard in England. For every yard of the 18 mile
  front there were two British casualties. 420,000
  British casualties and 1.3 million total in the
  battle.
• As the slaughter continued with no significant
  gains in territory by either side, the men in the
  trenches kept their sanity by using music,
  theater and trench newspapers to replicate the
  world they left behind.

• The first Battle of the Marne took place between
  5th and 11th September, 1914. The French 6th
  Army came close to defeat and were only saved by
  the use of Paris taxis to rush 6,000 reserve
  troops to the front line. During the battle, the
  French had around 250,000 casualties. Although
  the Germans never published the figures, it is
  believed that Geman losses were similar to those
  of France. The BEF lost 12,733 men during the
  battle. The .
• The second major battle close to the River Marne
  took place during the summer of 1918. Over 85,000
  American soldiers took part in the battle. The
  German attack on the Marne was launched on 15th
  July. The Germans failed to break through. This
  included 24 divisions of the French Army, and
  soldiers from the United States, Britain and
  Italy. Allied casualties during the 2nd Battle of
  the Marne were heavy French (95,000), British
  (13,000) and United States (12,000). It is
  estimated that the German Army suffered an
  estimated 168,000 casualties and marked the last
  real attempt by the Central Power to win WWI.

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World War I Casualties

• Allies
• Belgium 45,550
• British Empire 942,135
• France 1,368,000
• Greece 23,098
• Italy 680,000
• Japan 1,344
• Montenegro 3,000
• Portugal 8,145
• Romania 300,000
• Russia 1,700,000
• Serbia 45,000
• United States 116,516

• Central Powers
• Austria-Hungary 1,200,000
• Bulgaria 87,495
• Germany 1,935,000
• Ottoman Empire 725,000
• Total Casualties
• 65 million mobilized both sides
• 8.5 million killed
• 21 million wounded
• 7.7 million POWs and missing
• 37million total casualties
• 57 of all men mobilized

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Weapons of World War I
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Rifles

• The main weapon used by British soldiers in the
  trenches was the bolt-action rifle. 15 rounds
  could be fired in a minute and a person 1,400
  meters away could be killed.
• The single-shot, bigger-bore rifle was the
  subject of extensive research and development in
  the latter portion of the nineteenth century,
  with the result that the major powers introduced
  new models that were small-bore, bolt-action
  weapons capable of firing multiple rounds from a
  spring-loaded clip inserted into a rifle
  magazine.

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Rifles, Bayonets and Hand guns

• Veterans of the Great War, when interviewed,
  tended to play down the impact of the bayonet
  during the war. Many remarked (partly in jest)
  that the bayonet was used primarily as a splendid
  means of toasting bread, and for opening cans, to
  scrape mud off uniforms, poking a trench brazier
  or even to assist in the preparation of communal
  latrines
• In essence a bayonet is simply a simply a blade
  that is attached to the barrel of a rifle for use
  in close combat.
  
• Most bayonets were of simple design, of the knife
  variety, although variations existed. For example
  the French devised a needle blade for use on
  Lebel rifles. Notoriously, the German army
  produced a 'saw-back' blade that, as its name
  suggests, gave the appearance of a saw with its
  double row of teeth on the back edge.
• One advantage of using a bayonet in close crowded
  combat, as opposed to a rifle or handgun, was its
  avoidance of risk in injuring one's fellow
  soldiers. A bullet fired at close range into an
  enemy could well pass through his body and enter
  a friend standing (or fighting) behind him.

There was undeniably psychological value to the
infantry in carrying a bayonet, even if in
practice it was seldom used. Bayonets continued
to be commonly issued in the Second World War.
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Hand guns

• The pistol, originally designed as a cavalry
  weapon, was the staple weapon for a variety of
  personnel during World War One (and beyond).
  Traditionally issued to officers of all armies
  the pistol was also issued to military police,
  airmen and tank operators.
• Reasons for Pistol Use
• For men involved in the latter professions the
  pistol was essentially the only weapon that would
  serve under their unique environments the
  cramped conditions of both the tank and aircraft
  dictated that the rifle - which was otherwise
  issued to virtually all regular soldiers - was
  impractical.
• Three Basic Types
• When war began there were three types of pistol
  in general use revolvers, clip-loaded automatics
  and the so-called 'blow-back' models (where
  expanding propellant gas caused the gun to reload
  by forcing the bolt back when fired).

French
German Luger
Colt 45
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Machine Gun

• Machine guns, usually positioned on a flat
  tripod, would require a gun crew of four to six
  operators. They had the fire-power of 100 guns.
  
• The 1914 machine gun, in theory, could fire
  400-600 small-caliber rounds per minute, a figure
  that was to more than double by the war's end,
  with rounds fed via a fabric belt or a metal
  strip.

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Machine Gun

• The reality however was that these early machine
  guns would rapidly overheat and become
  inoperative without the aid of cooling
  mechanisms they were consequently fired in short
  rather than sustained bursts. Cooling generally
  took one of two forms water cooled and,
  increasingly as the war developed, air cooled.
  Water jackets would be provided for the former
  (which held around one gallon of liquid) and air
  vents would be built into the machine gun for the
  latter
• Water cooled machine guns would still overheat
  relatively quickly (sometimes within two
  minutes), with the consequence that large
  supplies of water would need to be on hand in the
  heat of a battle - and, when these ran out, it
  was not unknown for a machine gun crew to solve
  the problem by urinating into the jacket.
• Whether air or water cooled, machine guns still
  jammed frequently, especially in hot conditions
  or when used by inexperienced operators.
  Consequently machine guns would often be grouped
  together to maintain a constant defensive
  position.

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Poison Gas

• Considered uncivilized prior to World War One,
  the development and use of poison gas was
  necessitated by the requirement of wartime armies
  to find new ways of overcoming the stalemate of
  unexpected trench warfare.
• First Use by the French
• Although it is popularly believed that the German
  army was the first to use gas it was in fact
  initially deployed by the French. In the first
  month of the war, August 1914, they fired
  tear-gas grenades (xylyl bromide) against the
  Germans. Nevertheless the German army was the
  first to give serious study to the development of
  chemical weapons and the first to use it on a
  large scale

• Country Casualties Deaths
• Austria-Hungary 100,000 3,000
• British Empire 188,706 8,109
• France 190,000 8,000
• Germany 200,000 9,000
• Italy 60,000 4,627
• Russia 419,340 56,000
• USA 72,807 1,462
• Others 10,000 1,000

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Poison Gas

• The German army were the first to use chlorine
  gas at the battle of Ypres in 1915. Chlorine gas
  causes a burning sensation in the throat and
  chest pains. Death is painful you suffocate!
  The problem with chlorine gas is that the weather
  must be right. If the wind is in the wrong
  direction it could end up killing your own troops
  rather than the enemy.
• In consequence experiments were undertaken to
  deliver the gas payload in artillery shells. This
  provided the additional benefits of increasing
  the target range as well as the variety of gases
  released.
• Phosgene
• Following on the heels of chlorine gas came the
  use of phosgene. Phosgene as a weapon was more
  potent than chlorine in that while the latter was
  potentially deadly it caused the victim to
  violently cough and choke.

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Poison Gas

• Mustard Gas
• Mustard gas was the most deadly weapon used. It
  was fired into the trenches in shells. It is
  colorless and takes 12 hours to take effect.
  Effects include blistering skin, vomiting, sore
  eyes, internal and external bleeding. Death can
  take up to 5 weeks.
• Remaining consistently ahead in terms of gas
  warfare development, Germany unveiled an enhanced
  form of gas weaponry against the Russians at Riga
  in September 1917 mustard gas (or Yperite)
  contained in artillery shells.
• Mustard gas, an almost odorless chemical, was
  distinguished by the serious blisters it caused
  both internally and externally, brought on
  several hours after exposure. Protection against
  mustard gas proved more difficult than against
  either chlorine or phosgene gas.
• The use of mustard gas - sometimes referred to as
  Yperite - also proved to have mixed benefits.
  While inflicting serious injury upon the enemy
  the chemical remained potent in soil for weeks
  after release making capture of infected
  trenches a dangerous undertaking.

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Poison Gas- Mustard Gas effects
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Tanks

• Tanks were used for the first time in the First
  World War at the Battle of the Somme. They were
  developed to cope with the conditions on the
  Western Front. The first tank was called Little
  Willie and needed a crew of 3. Its maximum speed
  was 3mph and it could not cross trenches
• The more modern tank was not developed until just
  before the end of the war. It could carry 10 men,
  had a revolving turret and could reach 4 mph
  

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Tanks

• By the time the war drew to a close the British,
  the first to use them, had produced some 2,636
  tanks. The French produced rather more, 3,870.
  The Germans, never convinced of its merits, and
  despite their record for technological
  innovation, produced just 20.

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Flame-throwers

• The basic idea of a flame-thrower is to spread
  fire by launching burning fuel. The earliest
  flame-throwers date as far back as the 5th
  century B.C. These took the form of lengthy tubes
  filled with burning solids (such as coal or
  sulfur), and which were used in the same way as
  blow-guns by blowing into one end of the tube
  the solid material inside would be propelled
  towards the operator's enemies.
• Quite aside from the worries of handling the
  device - it was entirely feasible that the
  cylinder carrying the fuel might unexpectedly
  explode - they were marked men the British and
  French poured rifle-fire into the area of attack
  where Flammenwerfers were used, and their
  operators could expect no mercy should they be
  taken prisoner. Their life expectancy was
  therefore short.

During the war the Germans launched in excess of
650 flame-thrower attacks no numbers exist for
British or French attacks.
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Grenades

• The British bombing team usually consisted of
  nine men at a time an NCO, two throwers, two
  carriers, two bayonet-men to defend the team and
  two 'spare' men for use when casualties were
  incurred.
• As an attack or raid reached an enemy trench the
  grenadiers would be responsible for racing down
  the trench and throwing grenades into each dugout
  they passed this invariably succeeded in purging
  dugouts of their human occupants in an attempt at
  surrender (often not accepted as they were
  promptly shot or stabbed).
• Grenades - either hand or rifle driven - were
  detonated in one of two ways. They were either
  detonated on impact (percussion) or via a timed
  fuse.
• Generally speaking, infantrymen preferred timed
  fuses (of whatever amount of time) to percussion
  devices, since there remained the constant risk
  of accidentally jolting a grenade while in a
  trench and setting off an explosion.

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Mortars and Artillery

• Large field guns had a long range and could
  deliver devastating blows to the enemy but needed
  up to 12 men to work them. They fired shells
  which exploded on impact.
• mortar is essentially a short, stumpy tube
  designed to fire a projectile at a steep angle
  (by definition higher than 45 degrees) so that it
  falls straight down on the enemy.
• The chief advantage of the mortar was that it
  could be fired from the (relative) safety of the
  trench, avoiding exposure of the mortar crews to
  the enemy. Furthermore, it was notably lighter
  and more mobile than other, larger artillery
  pieces. And, of course, the very fact that the
  mortar bomb fell almost straight down meant that
  it would (with luck) land smack in the enemy
  trench.
• Mortars were variously used to take out enemy
  machine gun posts, suspected sniper posts or
  other designated features. Larger mortars were
  occasionally used to cut enemy barbed wire,
  generally in situations were field artillery
  could not be used.

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Trenches

• The Allies used four "types" of trenches. The
  first, the front-line trench (or
  firing-and-attack trench), was located from 50
  yards to 1 mile from the German's front trench.
  Several hundred yards behind the front-line
  trench was the support trench, with men and
  supplies that could immediately assist those on
  the front line. The reserve trench was dug
  several hundred yards further back and contained
  men and supplies that were available in
  emergencies should the first trenches be
  overrun.
• Connecting these trenches were communication
  trenches, which allowed movement of messages,
  supplies, and men among the trenches. Some
  underground networks connected gun emplacements
  and bunkers with the communication trenches.

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Trench Facts

• Each battalion had its own supply of rum that it
  distributed to its soldiers. Each division of
  20,000 men received 300 gallon.
  
• Every soldier carried iron rations -- emergency
  food that consisted of a can of bully bee,
  biscuits and a tin of tea and sugar.
  
• A single pair of rats could produced up to 880
  offspring in a year.
  
• A total of 3,894 men in the British Army were
  convicted of self-inflicted wounds. A
  firing-squad offense -- none were executed, but
  all served prison terms.

• The British Army treated 20,000 soldiers for
  trench foot during the winter of 1914-15.
  
• One-third of all casualties on the Western Front
  may have been killed or wounded in a trench.
  
• A lit candle was fairly effective in removing
  lice, but the skill of burning the lice without
  setting yourself on fire was difficult to
  learn. Soldiers in the trenches often depended
  on impure water collected from shell-holes or
  other cavities, causing dysentery

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Trenches

• Trenches were not built in straight lines. This
  was so that if the enemy managed to get into the
  front line trench they would not have a straight
  firing line along the trench. Trenches were
  therefore built with alternating straight and
  angled lines. The traverse was the name given to
  the angled parts of the trench.
• The typical front-line trench was about 6 to 8
  feet deep and wide enough for two men to pass.
  Dugouts in the sides of the trenches protected
  men during enemy fire. Barbed wire helped protect
  the firing trench from surprise attacks.
• Between the enemy lines lay a stretch of ground
  called "no man's land." Soldiers generally served
  at the front line from a few days to a week and
  then rotated to the rear for a rest
• Every soldier carried iron rations -- emergency
  food that consisted of a can of bully beef,
  biscuits and a tin of tea and sugar.
  

Except during an attack, life fell into a dull
routine. Some soldiers stood guard. Others
repaired the trenches, kept telephone lines in
order, brought food from behind the battle lines,
or did other jobs. At night, patrols fixed the
barbed wire and tried to get information about
the enemy.
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Trenches- Trench Foot

• Much of the land where the trenches were dug was
  either clay or sand. The water could not pass
  through the clay and because the sand was on top,
  the trenches became waterlogged when it rained.
  The trenches were hard to dig and kept on
  collapsing in the waterlogged sand. As well as
  trenches the shells from the guns and bombs made
  big craters in the ground. The rain filled up the
  craters and then poured into the trenches
• Soldiers who spent prolonged periods of time
  standing in waterlogged trenches were liable to
  suffer from frostbite and/or trench foot. To
  prevent trench foot, soldiers were instructed to
  change their socks frequently, wear waterproof
  footwear and to cover their feet with whale oil.

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Trenches- Rats, Lice and Trench Fever

• Many men killed in the trenches were buried
  almost where they fell. If a trench subsided, or
  new trenches or dugouts were needed, large
  numbers of decomposing bodies would be found just
  below the surface. These corpses, as well as the
  food scraps that littered the trenches, attracted
  rats. One pair of rats can produce 880 offspring
  in a year and so the trenches were soon swarming
  with them.
• Men in the trenches suffered from lice. Various
  methods were used to remove the lice. A lighted
  candle was fairly effective but the skill of
  burning the lice without burning your clothes was
  only learnt with practice. Where possible the
  army arranged for the men to have baths in huge
  vats of hot water while their clothes were being
  put through delousing machines. Unfortunately,
  this rarely worked. A fair proportion of the eggs
  remained in the clothes and within two or three
  hours of the clothes being put on again a man's
  body heat had hatched them out.
• As well as causing frenzied scratching, lice also
  carried disease. This was known as pyrexia or
  trench fever. The first symptoms were shooting
  pains in the shins and was followed by a very
  high fever. Although the disease did not kill, it
  did stop soldiers from fighting and accounted for
  about 15 of all cases of sickness in the British
  Army.
• Soldiers in the trenches often depended on impure
  water collected from shell-holes or other
  cavities, causing dysentery.

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Trenches- Self Inflicted wounds Shell Shock

• Faced with the prospect of being killed or
  permanently disabled, soldiers sometimes hoped
  that they would receive what was known as a
  blighty wound, and be sent back home. There were
  some cases where soldiers shot themselves in an
  attempt to end their time on the frontline.
  Self-inflicted wounds (SIW) was a capital offence
  and if discovered, a man found guilty of this
  faced execution by firing-squad. A total of 3,894
  men in the British Army were convicted of SIW.
  None of these men were executed but they all
  served periods in prison.
• By 1914 British doctors working in military
  hospitals noticed patients suffering from "shell
  shock". Early symptoms included tiredness,
  irritability, giddiness, lack of concentration
  and headaches. Eventually the men suffered mental
  breakdowns making it impossible for them to
  remain in the front-line. Some came to the
  conclusion that the soldiers condition was caused
  by the enemy's heavy artillery. These doctors
  argued that a bursting shell creates a vacuum,
  and when the air rushes into this vacuum it
  disturbs the cerebra-spinal fluid and this can
  upset the working of the brain.

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Blimps

• The Zeppelin, also known as blimp was an airship
  that was used during the early part of the war in
  bombing raids by the Germans. They carried
  machine guns and bombs. However, they were
  abandoned because they were easy to shoot out of
  the sky.

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Airplanes

• Planes were also used for the first time. At
  first they were used to deliver bombs and for
  spying work but became fighter aircraft armed
  with machine guns, bombs and some times cannons.
  Fights between two planes in the sky became known
  as dogfights
• Light machine guns were adopted too for
  incorporation into aircraft from 1915 onwards,
  for example the Vickers, particularly with the
  German adoption of interrupter equipment, which
  enabled the pilot to fire the gun through the
  aircraft's propeller blades.

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Submarines - U-Boats

• Torpedoes were used by submarines. The Germans
  used torpedoes to blow up ships carrying supplies
  from America to Britain.
  
• In February 1915 the German government announced
  its solution to the problem -- unrestricted
  submarine warfare. The Germans realized they
  didn't have to capture a merchant ship, just sink
  it - crew and all. They declared a war zone
  around the British Isles within which they would
  sink any allied merchant vessel on sight.
• The Germans torpedoed the passenger liner
  Lusitania on May 1st 1915 which sank with a loss
  of 1,195 lives. Americans were outraged and
  joined the war in 1917 on the side of the
  allies.

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World War I Disabilities

• Over 1.65 million men in the British Army were
  wounded during the First World War. Of these,
  around 240,000 British soldiers suffered total or
  partial leg or arm amputations as a result of war
  wounds. Most of these men were fitted with
  artificial limbs.