Victories on the western front

[Dikke Bertha]

Mmmmmmm I'll have to think about Le Cateau before I could agree with your logic there.

However you have answered my question in that you consider Le Cateau and the Somme to be British victories.

My understanding is that the Somme offensive was intended to break through the enemy lines. It did not manage this. Haig's assertions that it was designed as an attritional battle did not come until later. According to Laffin, Haig regarded the Somme as a victory.

Third Ypres was planned in order to clear the Belgian coast not to liberate the ruins of Paschendale.

I emphasise again that I am not trying to start an debate as to who won. I am interested to see if these battles are regarded as victories.

[Dikke Bertha]

NMG

I responded just before your post appeared on the forum.

As stated above I am not trying to start a debate as to who won these battles but rather asking if battles such as these are still regarded nowadays, after the distance of time and the amount of study done, as British victories.

From the responses received so far it seems that some people do regard them as victories even though the objectives were not even nearly achieved. German miltary action stopped the results from being achieved.

While the war was still in progress the public had to be fed with positive reports of all actions and measuring ground conquered was one easy method. Personally I would not use the distance from the start line as the deciding factor unless measured against the stated objective of the offensive. After the war the losses were so great that all offensives had to be represented as victorious to justify such losses.

But now after 90 years do we feel the same or is the subject still too sensitive?

[Nathan Greenfield]

Dikke:

Ninety years is, surely, enough time for feathers (nationalist and otherwise) to be unruffelable (if that be a word).

You are right about Haig's view of the Somme and Passch. Before the battles he envisioned them one way, during another and after a third. I remember reading somewhere that Haig said after the war that entire Western Front must be considered as one gigantic battle -- a rather useful way of looking at it after the fact, especially since the Allies won it and he commanded the BEF.

It is easier to judge the success of the Canadians in the Hundred Days, when they were given an objective and met it each time, for example, than it is the earlier battles. Perhaps it would be easier to say that battles like the Somme and Passch. were failures rather than defeats, for this second word conjures up images of disorderly retreats.

In a way the problem is similar to Jutland. The Germans sank more ships. The British took more losses. And the German High Seas Fleet never went to sea again. Hard to figure out the score on that one except that the purpose of the battle was to sweep the Kaiser's ships from the seas -- and it did. Was it a victory? Nelsonian surely not. Not even the sinking of the Bismarck, but it did rid the seas of Wilhelm's surface ships.

NMG

[Justin Moretti]

. Hard to figure out the score on that one except that the purpose of the battle was to sweep the Kaiser's ships from the seas -- and it did. Was it a victory? Nelsonian surely not. Not even the sinking of the Bismarck, but it did rid the seas of Wilhelm's surface ships.

NMG

Interesting way of looking at it!

I repeat my claim that Le Cateau was a British victory - Smith-Dorrien achieved all the aims he set for the battle. Expecting him to destroy or rout all the forces opposing him (the unequivocal definition of victory) is unrealistic.

[Dikke Bertha]

NMG

I think that your comparison with Jutland is very relevant. This is certainly regarded as a British naval victory.

I also agree with your definition of the Somme and Third Ypres as failures rather than defeats with the connotations you mention.

Justin Moretti has answered my original question as he regards Le Cateau as a victory and stands by that.

I had not really considered these matters until recently. I can understand the wartime propoganda continuing through to the years after the peace but I just wondered if, after the passage of time and the intense study devoted to the war, people still regarded battles such as Mons, Le Cateau, the Aisne, First Ypres etc as victories.

I hope my query is clear. I am not trying to define what constitutes a victory or whether they were in fact victories but rather whether they are still unquestioningly regarded as such.