The development of a Stalemate

Stalemate is a term borrowed from chess. It means that, how ever hard they try neither player can make a winning move. It is a very good term to describe the situation on the Western Front from December 1914 right through to 1918. However hard they tried, neither side could make a break through. The reasons were simple.

The techniques and the weapons were better suited to defence than to attack. It was much easier to defend a position than to attack one. And for these reasons a stalemate developed on the Western Front. The failure of the war plans was one of many reasons why a stalemate developed on the Western Front.

Once each countries war plans had failed no one knew what to do. Long before 1914 all the major European powers had prepared complicated military plans to ensure victory. These plans were based on the nineteenth century idea of war that to be successful an army had to strike quickly and decisively with huge numbers of soldiers. It was widely believed that the first strike might easily be the last and that an army should attack first in order to defend itself. Each country had a war plan based on these ideas. Germany's Schlieffen Plan was to defeat France in six weeks by invading at high speed through Belgium.

Then the German armies could turn to fight the Russians, 1000 kilometres away to the east. France had Plan Seventeen an all-out attack on the provinces of Alsace and Lorraine by soldiers trained to fight hard and fast, whatever the odds against them might be. Great Britain had a small but well trained Expeditionary Force ready to cross the English Channel to defend Belgium and France against the Germans. Austria's Plan R was to send huge forces across the border into Russia. Russia planned to do the same in reverse. Each of these plans had been worked out to the last detail, which was their problem.

The key to their success was speed. Every army was to be taken to battle in thousands of railway trains and would overwhelm the enemy by sheer force. It took only three weeks for each of the war plans to fail, which meant that after only three weeks the military leaders had to rethink what to do next. The first of which being The Schlieffen Plan, when the German armies marched into Belgium the Belgium army put up more resistance than Germany had expected. The Belgium army fought bravely for ten days in a battle at liege.Then the British Expeditionary Force showed up which the Germans called a "A Contemptible little army," and slowed down the first German army at Mons.

The failure of the Schlieffen Plan was the biggest contribution to stalemate as it was attacking so many countries that its failure would either lead to Germany's defeat or a stalemate. While the Germans were being slowed down in Belgium, the French were being torn to pieces in Lorraine their orders were to attack with speed and guts. But even with that attitude they still found themselves charging at walls of well defended machine gun posts.Speed and guts were ineffective against these and three hundred thousand French soldiers were mown down in just two weeks.

France's Plan seventeen had failed completely. When the plans eventually failed or didn't pay off it lead to a lot of disbelief, confusion and worry in each army as everything they were relying on to win them the war had failed. This caused stalemate as the armies had done everything they were told to do and they had still failed. So when they had run out of ideas the armies had no choice but to stay where they were and build trenches so they could defend the land that they had gained.Also because the military leaders didn't know what to do next this led to them making stupid mistakes for example Molke deciding to cut inside and attack Paris.

The military leaders' tactics on the western front were out dated and ineffective for the type of warfare they had encountered in the Great War, especially trench warfare. Because of this the war took longer and more people's lives were lost. The reason that the leader's tactics were out of date was due to the fact that they had all learnt their tactics in an age were attack was the best kind of defence and Cavalry charges were one of the most effective ways to win battles.They weren't used to the use of machine gun fire, because they didn't know that a few machine guns had the power to mow down a whole Calvary charge. The Military Leaders each had their separate faults. The German commander Helmurth van Moltke was over-cautious.

By altering the balance of his forces, he made it less likely that the Schlieffen plan would succeed. Which lead to stalemate on the western front. The French commander, Joseph Jofffe made the mistake of sending the main French army to attack Alsace-Lorraine.The Germans were blatantly expecting this and, the French army suffered heavy losses. This also left France's northern flank exposed to German attack further, although Joffre restored his reputation by winning the Battle of the Marne, the historian A. J.

P. Taylor argues that Joffre missed several opportunities to win a more decisive victory over the Germans. The British commander, Sir John French, was a veteran cavalry officer. He found it difficult to work with Joffre.

The historian J. M. Winter claims: 'Like other cavalry men, he was puzzled by the' nature of the war in 1914-15. All three commanders were men in their 60s. They made decisions at headquarters far from where the fighting was taking place, (which effected their judgement) often on old or inaccurate information.

Because of the military leader's tactics it meant that the war would go on longer. So in theory if the military leaders had been slightly more efficient on their tactics accounting for the modern weapons maybe they could of avoided a stalemate because they could of took the opportunities for attack when they arise and not attack when the chances are against them.The nature of the war and weapons on the Western Front helped to cause stalemate as all of the weapons used were a lot better at defending than attacking. At first the Military leaders weren't use to this new breed of weapons, but after losing thousands of men they soon realised that the weapons were a lot more efficient and devastating if used in a defensive way, even though the damage had been done. This caused stalemate as each sides defence got so good that it meant that you would have to sacrifice so many lives to gain a few yards.A reason for this was the development of new small arms.

The first machine gun named the Gatling gun, had been invented in the eighteen sixty's but it was large and heavy. Smaller, lighter machine guns had been invented by nineteen fourteen which were more effective. Even if they did not have machine guns, soldiers in nineteen fourteen had guns which could fire repeated shots quickly which were nearly as good when used in mass. This changed the nature of warfare as a simple cavalry charge could now be mown down in a matter of minutes.Attacking armies tended to race at the enemy on foot.

This made it easy for defenders to shoot down the massed ranks of attackers. This led to a stalemate as military leaders knew that if they attacked they would have heavy casualties. Also armies in nineteen fourteen made use of railways. Even if attackers were able to break through, the defending army could transport reinforcements to a new position by rail. Since the attacking army was moving on foot, the reinforcements could find a good defensive position for themselves before the attackers arrived.As well armies in nineteen fourteen had better artillery than they had before in previous wars.

A combination of all of these knew weapons led to a stalemate it made defending and holding your position the easier option which made it the more popular option. But the main factor was before the first world war the main way of advancing and defeating your enemy was the cavalry charge and the new weapons made this tactic useless and neither side discovered another tactic to replace the cavalry charge. The new weapons changed the face of warfare but failed to create a breakthrough on the western front.Despite this they still had a massive impact on the war as artillery like howitzers had a range of thirteen kilometres which meant that you could shell your enemy from miles away. Poison gas which was used at Ypres caused horrific injuries on a massive scale and enabled a few people to release gas that could wipe out an army if they didn't have gas masks.

Finally machine guns the most effective of the weapons fired around six hundred rounds a minute and were able to cut down lines of attackers; this caused thousands of casualties and reduced the chances of success of a direct attack on enemy trenches.The use of machine guns caused stalemate on their own as it was impossible for an army to attack without suffering heavy casualties at the hand of machine guns. The Battle of the Marne was one of the deciding battles of the war. Even thought the French at that moment in time were on the defensive it wasn't going that well for the Germans either. The Germans had to pull out around one hundred thousand troops to fight the Russians as they had mobilised earlier than predicted and had already invaded Germany.This was the chance that the French and British had been waiting for.

Also the Germans had run out of food and supplies as they had advanced to quickly, so the soldiers were underfed and exhausted. The German Commander decided to make a modification to the Schlieffen plan and to head straight to Paris instead of swinging around it. This gave the French a chance to intercept the Germans by rail. The German army was weary and overstretched, but they were fighting to save their country.The combined British and French forces were able to stop the German advance along the line of the river Marne.

They then counter attacked and pushed the Germans sixty kilometres back to the river Aisne, but they couldn't push them out of France completely this massive loss made the Germans more incline to defend what land they still had left, this would help to develop a stalemate.. Neither side could make any progress so they dug trenches and set up machine gun posts and barbed wire to defend themselves. These were the first signs that stalemate was to come.

The key battle in this race to the sea was the Battle of Ypres from the twelfth October to eleventh November nineteen fourteen. The British Expeditionary Force lost around fifty thousand men and the Germans lost probably one hundred thousand, but the British led by Lt-General Haig held this important ground. They kept control of the English Channel ports, which meant they could be supplied with equipment and reinforcements. By November nineteen fourteen it was a dead lock. The British Expeditionary Force had been decimated.

The French had already suffered around one million dead or wounded in just ten weeks. Despite this, the French army tried to break through the German lines in Artois and Champagne in December, but they were beaten back with heavy losses. This made each side reluctant to risk any other big attack as the casualties were horrific and the rewards were dismal. As nineteen fourteen ended, the fighting had reached a stalemate which was to last until nineteen eighteen. Millions of troops were dug into a line of trenches that stretched from the sea in the west to the Alps in the east.It became known as the 'Western Front'.

The Battle of the Marne was a turning point. The French had been saved for the time being and the generals now wondered what to do. The Schlieffen plan had failed. Germany was caught up in a two war front.

Worse still, the German generals had discovered that they could not break through the enemy lines. Moltke was replaced by a new commander, Falkenhayn, who decided to try and outflank his enemy's lines. The charge began on twelfth of October. The Race to the sea had begun.The French the British Expeditionary Force and the Germans all set off north, hoping to outflank each other before thy reached the English Channel. During the race to the sea terrible battles were fought.

The most awful of these battles was the battle of Ypres, although this victory came at an outstanding cost. Even thought the British Expeditionary Force had stopped the Germans from outflanking them they lost so many men. One British division lost three hundred and sixty five of its four hundred officers and ten thousand seven hundred and seventy four of its twelve thousand soldiers.Nobody won the race to the sea so they started to dig trenches to stop the other from advancing. Gradually the lines of trenches lengthened so far that by the end of nineteen fourteen they went from Flanders in Belgium down to Switzerland.

It was impossible for either army to move. The sea was the best chance that either side had of breaking past the enemy so when both sides failed it was a big demoralizer for both sides as it meant that the only way they could advance was to storm through the centre of the enemy.It was now a stalemate In conclusion I believe that stalemate developed on the western front mainly because the military leaders weren't prepared for the scale of the battle and the magnitude and destruction of the weapons, but it doesn't come as surprise as no-one at that time could of imagined what the war would be like. This led to them making stupid judgements and too many people getting killed which led to stalemate on the Western Front.