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Remembered Today:

March 1918 attacks and so on.


armourersergeant

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Firstly this question is not meant to reduce the cudos that the German army earnt in WW1 but i have started to question certain beliefs i have held for many years. I must add that i am not widly read on 1918 and these opinions are picked up along the way from this forum and limited reading done on the subject of these atttacks.

Given that i have been long of the opinion that the german army may well have lost the war rather than the 'British' and Allies won it. I find myself contemplating if the tatics and genius of the german high command were so great, how come they did not succeed?

Could this be because they were in fact not ever going to succeed and that the out running of their supply lines etc were factors that were obvious traits of the tatics used that this should have been accounted for in the planning? Or was it that the breakthroughs were far more far reaching than they had expected them too be?

Obviously you can use the opinion that the reason may well be because of the unified allied command structure and the dogged determination of the troops on the ground but i can not help wondering if there is something 'mythical' in all of this that because they broke the dead lock that they are genius. Yet the allied attacks later in the year whilst against a depleted enemy and with German moral lowered due to the failures, was still a good fighting machine, yet i appear to find less cudos showered on these victories?

The Allied attacks seemed to be better balanced and thought out, allowing a steady advance and keeping lines of communication and supply together. Perhaps they learnt from the German failures?

Just a few ramblings before i go off to work, any thoughts from the forum?

Arm.

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Hello,

If you want to read an excellent book on this subject, I suggest you search for a book called "Command or Control? Command, Training and Tactics in the British and German Armies, 1888-1918" written by Martin Samuels. In this book, the author looks at the differences between both armies.

Regards,

Jan Vancoillie

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The most recent work on this topic is by Martin Kitchen ' The German Offensives of 1918' published last year and there's an article in the last edition of Stand To! called 'The BEF and the Development of the Bite and Hold Operation on the Western Front 1915-1918' by some geezer, which considers briefly why the Germans lost.

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I assume we are talking about the Kaiserschlacht here? I do agree with you Arm, the German defeat was as much to do with Allied tenacity and tactics as it was with German error. The Germans did not, in my view, lose the battles of 1918, rather the Allies won. Although the Kaiserschlacht significantly depleted Gough's Fifth Army, the French managed to reinforce the line, and the resistance of Byng's Third Army to the north was nothing short of remarkable. Haig and Foch were thus able to plan for the blow that would finally break the German Army, resulting in the "Hundred Days" victory.

My two penneth on the matter.

Regards,

Matt

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Many people see the fighting of March 1918 as a defeat for the British, but I do not. The under strength British Fifth Army were bloody magnificent. General Gough had dicussed with his Corps Commanders the policy to be followed in view of the few reserves. Gough know that if the Fifth Army stood its ground, it would be wiped out by the far larger force facing it and there would be nothing then to prevent the Germans breaking right through and winning the war. He planned a gradual retirement until the reinforcements arrived but he had also ordered that every opportunity should be taken to counter-attack, and this is what the Fifth Army did until most of it was dead, wounded or POW'S. It slowed the German advance up enough, so the French and British units from the north could get to the Somme.

To the memory of the boys of the Fifth Army, March 1918, the best of the best.

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Ian Passingham, author of Pillars of Fire about Messines 1917 has been doing a lot of research in the German archives on exactly this subject. His view is that the creation of elite stormtroop units by the Germans was ultimately self destructive because they neglected to improve the fighting capability of the non-stormtroop units. These elites were ground down in the spring and early summer of 1918. The divisions that were left suffered because the loss of these elites was a loss of irreplaceable experienced, battle-hardened men. In short he maintains that the average capability of German divisions was in decline by mid 1918. In contrast the BEF, by not consciously trying to create elite divisions as such, did a much better job of bringing the capability of ALL divisions to a much higher average level of ability by mid 1918 than they had been at in mid 1916.

I think Passingham has a book on this subject coming out sometime next year. Well worth hearing him speak if you can catch him at your local WFA branch.

I read Samuels' first book (Doctrine & Dogma) a few years back and wasn't entirely convinced. I seem to recall that the main problem I had with it is that he compares the attacking ability of German Army in March 1918 with that of the BEF on 1 July 1916. A strange comparison to say the least.

My personal view is that the Germans may have won some tactical victories in the Spring of 1918 (i.e. they captured large areas of ground, including important features like the Chemin des Dames), but they suffered a strategic defeat. By July 1918 they had a much longer line to defend with an army that had lost many of its best elements a few months before.

I do wonder what might have happened had the Germans not left half a million or more men swanning around E Europe after the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk and used them on the Western Front. The longer term aspirations of creating a German sphere of dominance/empire in the East overruled the immediate need for men and materiel for the knockout blow in the West.

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I have a problem with the idea that the fighting ability of British Divisions was higher than in mid 1916. There is really scant evidence for this, I believe Paddy Griffiths makes this case in ' Battle Tactics of the Western Front' but I feel rather unconvincingly- I think there is a lack of evidence to back this up, apart from the existence of training manuals by Maxse, but to what extent these were issued by divisions to battalions to companies etc is not made clear. Certainly the hurricane bombardments of the British Artillery were considerable by 1918, it made the artillery barrages of 1916 look like light rain in comparison. The entire Somme preliminary bomb. of a week could be carried out in a few hours in 1918, almost with pin point accuracy. (See Firepower, by Bidwell and Graham) It was a gunners war by 1918, the British Divisions following up didn't have to be efficient in carrying out complex manoeuvres, against a German Army that was worn out by mid July.

The British Army in mid 1918 was largely made up of men of 18 or 19 or older men late 30's. I cannot see how this was such an effective force better than that of 1916. But then again it didn't have to be after the failure of the German Spring Offensives, as the attrition rate of the German Elite formations was high- if we are to believe Passingham and Griffiths.

Samuels book can be criticised for its comparison with British Troops on the 1st July but there is much good research here, a very wide range of sources has been consulted. This perhaps needs to be read in conjunction with Bruce Gudmundson's 'StormTroop Tactics'

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It depends on what you mean by "fighting ability".

Was the individual soldier of 1918 any better informed, tactically aware, better able to deploy his weaponry, more mobile? I don't think so.

Was he any better commanded, to do things more effectively? Possibly: his commanders from NCOs up were certainly more experienced.

The biggest difference seems to me that the odds had been increasingly stacked in favour of the army to be able to fight - and stop the enemy from fighting. And as you say, this is principally about artillery. The firepower of the British Division of 1918 can surely be considered to be at least ten times that of its equivalent of the early days. The technical sophistication of being able to spot and destroy the enemy's artillery is a really striking difference from 1916.

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Ian Passingham, author of Pillars of Fire about Messines 1917 has been doing a lot of research in the German archives on exactly this subject. His view is that the creation of elite stormtroop units by the Germans was ultimately self destructive because they neglected to improve the fighting capability of the non-stormtroop units. These elites were ground down in the spring and early summer of 1918. The divisions that were left suffered because the loss of these elites was a loss of irreplaceable experienced, battle-hardened men. In short he maintains that the average capability of German divisions was in decline by mid 1918. In contrast the BEF, by not consciously trying to create elite divisions as such, did a much better job of bringing the capability of ALL divisions to a much higher average level of ability by mid 1918 than they had been at in mid 1916.

Hello,

I'm afraid the man doesn't understand the German tactics and ideas about Stormtroops. The elite units were used mainly as troops for support operations in specific attacks and to train other troops. The German idea was to make every unit into a stormtroop unit. Every basic German unit (division, regiment, battalion etc.) had its own stormtroop unit which could be used on any occasion.

Especially in the winter 1917-18 nearly all German divisions (except the Landwehr divisions perhaps who just held a quiet sector, although they also had been receiving training in the new tactics at some point in the war) were retrained behind the front in the stormtroop tactics in preparation of the new attacks.

The average capabilty after the attacks of course diminished because the Germans just didn't have the manpower any more to make up for the losses, combined with the political and economical problems in Germany.

However, it is very interesting to read the German regimental histories from September-November 1918. Regiments often only numbered 1 company in the frontline and this company managed, using these stormtroop tactics, to conduct counter attacks and regain parts of the lost territory in the final attacks and inflict heavy losses...

Regards,

Jan

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I agree with what you say about the German Storm Troops. I cam across a very interesting book in the last few months which explains how German Sorm Troops were employed:

'Sturmgrenadiere: Chronik des Sturmbataillon Nr 7' By Fritz Ristow.

This was one of the few German books I could access about the German Army in the Great War, because it was not written in gothic script (faktur?) and I could scan it and use a translation service to get the gist.

This book helped me understand the concept of German Storm Troops not as being special units in their own right but part of battalions which had their own trained troops, also if an objective was particularly difficult some of the Storm Troops from the Sturmbataillon would be used to train and act with the generic Storm Troops from the individual units. This seemed to be the case on the Aisne in May 1918 as far as the German 7th Army was concerned.

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This is a fascinating dsicussion which clearly involves many different issues.

One of those that I have not seen analysed is the British defensive schemes. The British plan for the Fifth Army was a series of outpost lines, the main battle line (redoubts and posts) and a final third ('Brown' line) that lay (theoretically at least) behind the battle zone. It all sounds very German in design.

A fundamental difference between British and German defensive theory/practice was that the British did not seem to have any defined/ingrained counter-attack plans. When forward German positions were captured they were usually counter attacked by local reserves, or troops brought up for that purpose. This must have had a significant and positive morale effect on the troops occupying the forward positions.

The British did not appear to have had the mobility and flexibility of a counter attacking force, and in all of the documents that I have seen showing the 'defensive scheme' none is ever mentioned. (The nearest reserve for the Fifth Army was the 20th Division - 9 miles behind the front line which had orders to occupy the Brown line defences). The lack of immediate reserves and a counter attack philosophy must have had a significant effect on the morale of soldiers in the front line positions, especially when they had been bypassed/outflanked. Does it explain why so many men surrendered?

There is no doubt that following the break through, that it was the small groups of soldiers, grouping together and improvising local defences, that slowed the German advance and bought time for reserves (especially artillery support) to be brought up. (eg Carey's force on a large scale - and there were many smaller less organised groups of men too, scattered across the front.)

I know that this does not address the German tactics directly, but I do not believe that you can uncouple German offensive and British defensive tactics.

Brendon Moorhouse.

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Hi Brendon

The lack of reserves was the Fifth Army's biggest problem. It only had three Cavalry Division in reserve behind the front line, the 20th and 39th were G.H.Q. Divisions and like you say some 9 miles behind the front line and the 50th Div. were in Army reserve and still furth back near Cayeux, and that was it. That is why Gough had planned a gradual retirement until more reinforcements arrived from other parts of the line, and he knew it would take many days before any would arrive. In all seventeen Divisions of the British Fifth Army faced forthy three German Divisions (I believe the German Division was smaller then a British one but many British Divisions of the Fifth Army were under strengh).

Thence the British Fifth Army were magnificent in the fighting of March 1918.

Annette

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Thence the British Fifth Army were magnificent in the fighting of March 1918.

Annette

Too right, nice to see someone giving the men of the 5th Army some praise for a change. The talk is too often of poor old Goughie (who incidently I do have a bit of sympathy for.) who never the less still finished the War in a lot better state than the majority of his men.

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I think the Germans left closer to a million on Eastern Front after " peace " with the Russians. A huge number of those transfered to the west deserted and Ludendorf wanted no more of them. None. He considered them unreliable. Such transfers did make up about 13% of their manpower when spring offensives began which did lead to Germany's defeat. But, it was coming in any event, would have taken longer and US would have played a very large role which it did not in 1918. Try convincing Americans of that though!

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Gough probably deserved to go for his generalship before 1918 or more importantly should never have made army command but 5th army did not deserve the disgrace that was associated with the unfair dismisal of Gough for the 'failings' of march 1918.

5th Army should be proud of what they did in stemming the tide.

post-4-1065453387.jpg

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Hello,

If you want to read an excellent book on this subject, I suggest you search for a book called "Command or Control? Command, Training and Tactics in the British and German Armies, 1888-1918" written by Martin Samuels. In this book, the author looks at the differences between both armies.

Regards,

Jan Vancoillie

Unfortunately his two examples illustrating his theories are 1 July 1916 and 21 March 1918 - there appears to be a correlation between these two dates (anyone spot it?)

For some reason, I missed several posts that said much the same as the following, however I think it still holds true. As for Jan's point about the stormtroops tactics being misunderstood by Ian Passingham, it doesn't get away from the fact that it was a fundamentally flawed approach given the losses to the later waves:-

Samuels addresses an interesting issue in this book the difference between Directive Command and Restrictive Command - unfortunately he doesn't address the whole war - particularly the extent to which the British Army worked on a principle of directive command in 1918 and the extent to which his exemplar of directive command applied to the whole of the German Spring Offensive. In the latter case, there were quite clearly occasions when the German units came on en masse in waves in a manner abandoned by the BEF in 1916-17.

To be read with extreme caution. See p. 221 for example and the basis for conclusions that the French Army produced 'better soldiers' than the British...

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Could you provide any examples or sources which state that the Germans came on in masses in 1918. I think Paddy Griffiths makes this point in his book on battle tactics but I am not sure if he actually backs this up effectively.

Having checked Griffiths book there are two footnotes which claim that the Germans came on in 'shambling cricket match crowds' (Conclusion of Battle Tactics)but where this claim from is not mentioned other than to refer back to chapter three where a footnote states '...Stormtroop divisions ...often degenrated into a shambling mass of closely packed targets that suffered very heavy casualties.'

I remain unconvinced of the sources Griffiths has used, partly because he hasn't stated them. Or are they somewhere else in his book that I have overlooked?

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Here's an example. British Official History, 1918 volume 2, p53. 28 March 1918. North of the Somme, Third Army area: "Except on the right, there was no progress whatever; some ground, indeed, was lost to the Australian Division. The Germans came on time after time with the greatest bravery, sometimes almost shoulder to shoulder, assured that it required but one more effort to break the British front, only to be held and repulsed by the combined fire of guns, machine guns and rifles".

German attackers were slaughtered wholesale on Third Army front on 28 March 1918. The OH covers it in great detail, and the massing of enemy infantry is implied in much of what is said but the above is the nearest I could find to talking about "coming on in masses".

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I take your point, but my defence-admittedly flimsy- as testified by Crown Prince Rupprecht that this mass assault was carried out in exceptional circumstances, because the German High Command felt that they 'stand (stood) immediately before the success of the final breakthrough'. (OH 1918 ** page 53)

Presumably the troops carrying out this last attempt at breaking the deadlock of trench warfare were soldiers from the 'Trench Divisions,' the Sormtroopers after nearly 8 days of combat would have been worn out.

I will have to do some research to see how effective the British Division at Amiens in August were. I suspect that if the British troops were committed to a breakthrough battle, as opposed to a 'Bite and Hold' operation, that the old style linear formations would have been adopted, but I guess I had better see if I can come up with some concrete examples first.

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Hello,

If you want to read an excellent book on this subject, I suggest you search for a book called "Command or Control? Command, Training and Tactics in the British and German Armies, 1888-1918" written by Martin Samuels. In this book, the author looks at the differences between both armies.

Regards,

Jan Vancoillie

Unfortunately his two examples illustrating his theories are 1 July 1916 and 21 March 1918 - there appears to be a correlation between these two dates (anyone spot it?)

For some reason, I missed several posts that said much the same as the following, however I think it still holds true. As for Jan's point about the stormtroops tactics being misunderstood by Ian Passingham, it doesn't get away from the fact that it was a fundamentally flawed approach given the losses to the later waves:-

Samuels addresses an interesting issue in this book the difference between Directive Command and Restrictive Command - unfortunately he doesn't address the whole war - particularly the extent to which the British Army worked on a principle of directive command in 1918 and the extent to which his exemplar of directive command applied to the whole of the German Spring Offensive. In the latter case, there were quite clearly occasions when the German units came on en masse in waves in a manner abandoned by the BEF in 1916-17.

To be read with extreme caution. See p. 221 for example and the basis for conclusions that the French Army produced 'better soldiers' than the British...

[in the latter case, there were quite clearly occasions when the German units came on en masse in waves in a manner abandoned by the BEF in 1916-17]

In Paddy Griffiths ' Battle Tactics' page 96;

(with regard to Infantry attack formations)

'This however, was the fault of application rather than principle, and lines continued to be widely used throughout 1918'

( the footnote to this adds that the 9th Division reverted to skirmish lines, 'History of the 9th Division' page 330)

In 'Amiens to the Armistice' by Harris and Barr, page 37 the following is stated:

'In the Hundred Days the most forward troops would generally arrange themselves in lines or waves while those to the rear would employ artillery formation of sections and platoons in single file'

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I don't think Barr and Harris were making that subtle distinction of 'skirmish lines'. In their book prior to the quotation I used from their book, 'Amiens to the Armistice' on page 37 we find;

'Over the course of the war there were debates about whether to attack in a series of extened lines or'waves' on the one hand or in small flexible colums, sometimes called 'worms on the other.'

If this is the case the British Army never attacked in 'waves en masse', not even on the Somme.

The casualties sustained in the Hundred Days were even higher than at 3rd Ypres, amongst the infantry. If the attacking formations were so sophisticated, bearing in mind the tremendous advances in artillery which provided support, how come the rate of attrition was so high? Surely it wasn't just because the the Hindenburg line was so strong and the Germans- battle weary by July 1918- so effective in defence.

Or could it be that British infantry tactics didn't have to be so sophisticated (After all many of the men were very young) because the British Army was so numerically superior at that stage of the war. Whilst not forgetting the French and Americans as well ( the latter certainly not experts in fieldcraft).

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2RWF fought through the war and played a significant role in Somme, Passchendaele and Advance to Victory battles. Their historian, Dr Dunn, was convinced that the unit peaked earlier than 1918 in fighting ability. And yet it, like so many others, soldiered on.

Perhaps the BEF was better AS AN ENTITY despite many components being worn out. In which case, where would the credit for ultimate victory lie?

This is an interesting facet in the 'Haig, villain or hero' debate.

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The fact of the casualties is a good point to consider in evaluating the performance of the army in the hundred days but it would need to be balanced in comparision to the German casualties, does anyone have those?

Arm.

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I think that the reason why the BEF became effective wasn't so much to do with better infantry tactics- certainly better gunnery techniques- but their strategy changed from fighting a set piece battle in one area to simultaneous attacks up and down the line. Strangely enough this, according to William Philpott in an article in 'Leadership in Conflict' edited by Matthew Hughes and Matthew Seligmann (Leo Cooper 2000) was initiated by Marshal Foch.

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