Over by xmas?

[armourersergeant]

It is an excepted fact that most thought the war would be over by Xmas, but what troubles me about this is not that we with hindsight can see this to be rubbish but that how they believed it would be.

Given that the military did many studies at Staff college etc and that they would have studied the American civil war , Beor war , Franco-German war, crimean war, Napoleonic war, and so on. I am confused as to where they got this impression?

I am wondering if it is a bit of a myth that the military thought this and that it was just the public and some politicians? I know that Kitchener certainly thought it would last many years, thus the volunteer regiments.

Did the change and accuracy of the modern weapons lead them to believe a decisive victory could be won?

Or did thye believe it because the major plans of the Germans and French were grande sweeping events, or expected to be?

Did the French and Germans etc also believe it would be over by Xmas?

Sorry so many questions.

Arm.

[MartinWills]

I know that the French view was not that it would be over by Christmas; with typical Gallic outlook they believed that it would all be over by the grape harvest.

I believe the Germans had a similar viewpoint but I can't remember the exact phrase.

Martin

[michaeldr]

You can always rely on Arm to raise an interesting subject

Army/Politicians' over-confidence goes back some way before 1914

This extracted from Prince Philip's Gallipoli lecture, 7 May 1987 [published as part of 'The Straits of War - Gallipoli Remembered,' ed. Sir Martin Gilbert]

Committee for Imperial Defence, 1909. Fisher was First Sea Lord, Asquith was PM

During the Marocco crisis the French came within an ace of declaring war on Germany and they insisted on 120,000 British troops being sent to the French frontier. The Cabinet agreed and plans were put forward by Gen Nicholson. Fisher was silent and only spoke when asked a direct question by Asquith, "Whether the Navy could guarantee transport?" Fisher answered "Yes."

Asquith then asked Fisher if he had anything more to say, to which he replied yes, but nothing that anyone present would care to hear. Asquith pressed him and a scene took place.

Fisher told the committee that if 120,000 English were sent to France then the Germans would put everything else aside and make any sacrifice to surround and destroy the British. He said that to despatch British troops to the front in a continental war would be an act of suicidal lunacy.

Fisher went on at some length and HRH described his remarks as "an impassioned diatribe against the War Office and all its ways, including conceit, waste of money and ignorance of war."

Strong stuff, But was he right?

Regards

Michael D.R.

[AOK4]

The Germans believed first that the war would be over by Christmas, then Easter 1915 and again by Christmas 1917 (they really believed the peace appeal of the Kaiser and the American proposal had a chance). In 1918 they believed again the war would be over by Easter (the offensive) and then they didn't believe anything any more. They just knew the war was lost from the Summer 1918 on and they just hoped to survive and hoped the 14 points of the Americans would be respected.

Jan

[AOK4]

Everyone believed the war in the West would be over by Christmas 1914 when the war broke out, the Germans because they believed they could sweep through Belgium & France with their Schlieffen-Moltke Plan, later they believed they could outflank the allies and in October they believed they could drive the British and Belgians in the sea and so make them surrender.

The French had their Plan XVII. They believed they could reach the Rhine, encircle the attacking German troops and thus ending teh war.

The British believed in October 1914 they could attack from Ypres towards Gent and so to the Rhineland, ending the war.

Jan

[Annette Burgoyne]

I do not think many British Generals thought it would be over by Christmas, only the lads joining up, who were worried it mite be over by Christmas and miss out on doing their bit.

Annette

[Kate Wills]

The Kaiser (apparently) promised that it would "be over before the leaves fell from the trees", which (if true) was a fair prediction, and even allowed for unexpected delays. Schlieffen's Plan was designed to knock France out of the war quickly, around 7 weeks, thus releasing troops to concentrate efforts against Russia. That reckoning would take until to mid-September at the latest, when the leaves would indeed still be gracing the trees.

I think it fair to say that no-one expected to be slogging it out until the leaves fell in 1918. The South African experience had already given the British an idea of how protracted warfare can be, but looking across to the huge European armies about to sweep across the Continent in classical style, it is easy to see why the politicians could spin the line of a short war. The Franco-Prussian campign was a very brief affair, so why should this Great European War, with a few extra players, be any different? Again, the media played its part in promoting a hurried conflict, which was fair enough with those athletic advances and retreats in the war of movement; but the military top brass knew different, as did anyone who had taken time to read Clausewitz. Why else would K. want to raise those new armies. Not simply to match Continental forces man for man, for new men had to be trained, and trained well. That is a long process, and he and others knew this new war was not the short sharp shock that press and politicians would have the nation believe.

[Terry_Reeves]

I agree with what much of what Kate has said. After the Napoleonic wars, conflict on the European mainland was localised and and relatively brief. Britain's experience of war in the same period, worldwide, with the exception of the Crimea and South Africa, was much the same, localised conflicts, mainly colonial actions, of short duration.

In 1911, English author Norman Angell published The Great Illusion, in which he argued that the economic consequences of war benefitted no one. The international banking community took a similar line, arguing that the leading industrial nations would not dare risk their economies in a major war, or if they did engage in conflict, it would be short because of that risk. I was also believed that the old system of diplomacy would assert itself before matters got too far out of hand. These ideas, along with the belief that politically unstable regimes would avoid conflict, and that any war would some how be limited, proved to be illusory.

This was of course, the first war between fully developed industrialised nations out of which came the concept of total war, where the belligerents used, and risked, all their human, economic and industrial resources in pursuit of victory. From a distance, it is not difficult to see how these illusions were shattered.

Terry Reeves

[Tom Morgan]

Remember that the ones who said that the war would be over by Christmas were national leaders or their supporters, people who wanted to drum up enthusiasm, possibly doing a bit of flag-waving, sword-brandishing stuff, as they do. It's possible that none of them actually believed it. The phrases "weapons of mass destruction, " "45 minutes" and "therefore vital" come to mind.

[Guest Ian Bowbrick]

Tom,

Just goes to show that nothing changes.

Ian

[AOK4]

I think a lot of generals (there were exceptions) actually believed the war would be over quickly. It is easy for us to say afterwards that they were idiots, but it was rather accepted on both sides that there would be a swift victory somehow... Both sides believed in their own possibilities.

Jan

[armourersergeant]

I can understand after some consideration that the German or French generals believing that the war would be over quickly because after all they had planned for it to be so. You of course do not make a plan not expecting it to work(the next four years excepted.)

But i think i am right in that apart from a supporting role, Britian did not actually have a war plan of attack , did they? So i would conclude from that there belief would be in that they felt the french would beat the germans!

Perhaps Blackadder summed it up best when he said to para phrase " they had a plan, .....there was only one problem it was Bo****ks"

I still go back to my first post though. the last major war in Europe was the Napoleonic and yes it had moved on technology wise greatly since then but both the Crimea ( distance may have lenghtened this) and US civil were lengthy events and the Beor war perhaps only a 'skirmish' dragged on for two years. The only one i am not sure about whilst typing here is the Russo-japan war was that a short one? and yes i realise that the Franco-Prussian was a short war but this perhaps the exception to the rule.

I can also buy into a 'propoganda ' theory by the powers that be to increase support etc for the war. this i would say would be highly essential and given that a raising of a large army would be costly something the politicians had been reluctant to spend on the army previously it seems strage that they would then splash out on recruits if they truely believed it would end soon. Even given that they would feel it prudent to cover themselves in case.

I wonder if any Pals out there have any references to this over by xmas being quoted by the politicains or high rqanking Generals. Or wether its just the poor old bloke in the street that believed it.

Perhaps at the end of the day they felt that the 'Pace' of war had moved on and this would make the difference. I suppose that it could be argued that some wars last a long time due to distance and the like. this was in there back garden so to speak.

Jury still out on this one for me.

Arm.

[Neil Burns]

Hi Arm,

If I recall correctly the British plan was to cooperate with the French or at least that was the impression I remember from "Death of An Army" though I read it quite some time ago. So I don't recall a specific British plan.

Both the Austro-Prussian War and the Spanish American War were also realtively brief events as well and the Russo-Japanese War lasted longer only due to the geographic distances involved.

I think most Officers and politicians are smart enough to keep quiet regarding lengthof a conflict early on. William Tecumseh Sherman in the American Civil War made the mistake of saying early on that it would take years and an army of (I'm paraphrasing from memory) 3 Million men for the Union to prevail and people thought he was literally insane. One American Congressman offered to mop up all the blood shed in the Rebellion with his hankerchief.

I think you're on to something regarding the pace of the war. All nations had mobilistaion plans and understood that the faster one could mobilise the more likely victory could be won. Prussia trounced Austria and France by using rail systems and accelerated mobilisation to concentrate troops before their opponents were prepared.

I think Commanding officers figured a faster mobilisation would prevent the drawn out conflicts of the Napoleonic Wars (although Napoleon himself ended quiet a few campaigns by simply being faster than his adversaries)

when all is said and done though I feel people are just natural optimists and look for reasons to believe conflicts will be brief.

Great topic.

Take care,

Neil