The First World War (Part 3)

    The First World War (1914-1918)

3. Phases of the War  

The conflict developed on several fronts in Europe, Africa, and Asia. The two main scenarios were the Western front, where the Germans confronted Britain, France and, after 1917, the Americans. The second front was the Eastern front in which the Russians fought against Germans and Austro-Hungarians. 

After a brief summer German advance in 1914, the western front was stabilized and a long and brutal trench warfare started: it was a "war of attrition". Meanwhile on the Eastern Front the Germans advanced but not decisively.

In 1917, two events changed the course of the war: the United States joined the Allies and Russia, after the Soviet revolution, abandoned the conflict and sign a separate peace. 

Finally after the German offensive in the spring of 1918, the Allied counterattack managed to force a decisive retreat of the German army. The defeat of its Germany’s allies and the revolution in Germany that dethroned the Kaiser, brought about the signing of the armistice on November 11, 1918. The Great War was over.

 

1914: The war of movement

At the beginning of the conflict, no one expected a war that would stretch for more than four years. Naive soldiers even smiled on their way to the front lines and military headquarters made plans expecting a quick and easy defeat of the enemy.

 At the beginning, the Germans implemented the so-called Schlieffen Plan: they attacked France through neutral Belgium to get a quick defeat of the French army. This would allow German troops to turn against Russia before the Tsar could mobilize his massive army. 

The French, however, managed to stop the German attack in the Battle of the Marne, in the fall of 1914, and the Russians also halted the German advance in the east.

The Western Front was stabilized along thousands of kilometers and soldiers dug trenches preparing for a long war.

1915-1916: The war of attrition 

The confrontation between major industrial powers led to war at a level of violence and horror never before contemplated. The invention of new weapons (grenades, flamethrowers, tanks, toxic gas) and the use of machine gun led to systematic and great massacres, which, however, did not break the tactical tie on the Western Front. 

The war spread to several fronts. The Western Front (France-Germany) and the Eastern Front (Russia) accounted for the bulk of the operations. Apart from these two main fronts, the fighting took place on other minor fronts: the Alps (Italy), the Balkans and the Middle East. 

On the Western Front Germans fought against French and British in a long series of terrible battles that did little to break the front. The Battle of Verdun was the biggest example of what the German generals called the "war of attrition". Throughout 1916, heavy fighting took place around the French city of Verdun. More than 700,000 soldiers were killed but the front remained immovable. Something similar happened in the battles of Ypres and the Somme… 

Two great events came to turn the tide of the war in 1917: the U.S. entry into the war in April and Russia out of the conflict in December.

United States had remained neutral in the conflict but had supplied the Entente countries. The Germans decided to undertake submarine warfare, a risky tactic of attacking and sinking not only British or French ships but also attacking neutral shipping. The sinking of several American ships, with the consequent loss of lives eventually led President Wilson to declare war on the Central Powers. 

Popular discontent with the progress of the war in Russia culminated in a revolution that overthrew the Tsar in March and brought to power the Bolsheviks (Communists) in November. Lenin's new government signed the armistice with the Central Powers in December. Russia left the war. In March 1918, Russia signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk with the Central Powers, yielding large territories.