Stalemate:
World War I is credited by many to have begun with the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, by Gavrillo Princip, member of the Serbian group the Black Hand. While to what degree this can be attributed to be the cause of The Great War, the course which the war would take following the assassination is clear. Not long into the war a Stalemate began.
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Deadlock
By the end of 1914, the two sides settled into trenches and faced each other across no man’s land, the area between the trenches on the western and eastern fronts. A war of attrition was underway, with each side trying to wear down the other. This harsh reality had a devastating effect on the morale of the soldiers on both sides. At the beginning, most people expected that the war would be over by Christmas 1914. This expectation prompted an outburst of patriotic enthusiasm on the part of the soldiers headed to the front as well as on the part of the civilians left behind. Young men eagerly signed up to achieve the type of glory that was associated with fighting for one's country.
However, when the early offensives failed and the casualties mounted, a widespread sense of despair developed in the trenches. The public did not know the extent of the despair because governments concealed it from them by imposing rigid censorship. Governments prevented news reporting of the slaughter at the front and intercepted mail from soldiers that contained messages of gloom and doom.
Causes of the Deadlock
For three years of continuous warfare, neither side succeeded in gaining a decisive success on either of the main European fronts, in spite of the millions of lives sacrificed. By the end of 1914, the western front had solidified into two deeply entrenched systems of fortifications running west to east from the English Channel to the border of Switzerland. The fortifications consisted of numerous parallel lines of interconnected trenches protected by lines of barbed wire. The leaders on both sides thought that the way to achieve a breakthrough was to penetrate enemy lines and gain access to open country. In the open country, they believed that they could regain the ability to maneuver. They also thought that the only way to penetrate enemy lines was to start a massive artillery bombardment of a chosen sector and to follow it up with a massive infantry assault.
However, both sides had equal forces, so they could repel enemy attempts to overwhelm entrenched defensive positions. The tragic equilibrium, as it has been called, caused continued assaults. With each assault, both sides attempted to improve upon the preceding one, chiefly by adding more artillery shells to the bombardment and more men to the attack. As more soldiers were killed in futile efforts to overrun enemy positions, leaders continued the same pattern because they felt that they had to prove that it would succeed, thus justifying the slaughter of their troops.
The reason that the leaders continued using this suicidal strategy for the remainder of the war was that no alternative appeared to exist. Maintaining fixed positions in the trenches was no solution, since it produced only boredom and eventually despair. In addition, as each army appointed new leaders, they resumed the deadly offensives to try to earn a place in history by masterminding a breakthrough that would end the war.
Source: Encarta http://encarta.msn.com/text_761569981___31/World_War_I.html
Why would the leaders continue to pursue this strategy?
Next: Using the Documents attached in the Links Below
1. In your groups (Allied and Central Powers) Use the information that you discover in the sources to the right to understand the Various causes that helped to create stalemate conditions. 2. Create a plan for your group (Allied or Central Powers) to solve what you have found to be the major problems contributing to the Stalemate conditions. CENTRAL POWERS DOC ALLIED POWERS DOC |
Further Research Sources
Hint: Split up the readings amongst your group members The Great War: Stalemate The Great War: More on Stalemate The Great War: French Bravery and German Firepower The Great War: The Outbreak of War |
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