- Title: FEATURE: REMEMBERING THE FRONT - WORLD WAR I FEATURE
- Date: 18th November 1992
- Summary: WESTERN FRONT (1914-1918) (FILE - REUTERS) GV: TRENCH FIGHTING
- Embargoed: 6th July 2005 15:46
- Keywords:
- Location: VARIOUS LOCATIONS
- City:
- Country: Turkey Belgium United Kingdom Australia France
- Topics: Conflict
- Reuters ID: LVAC5VE3756JU0E93ONWY12P0O0H
- Aspect Ratio: 4:3
- Story Text: SUGGESTED NEWSREADER INTRODUCTION: Ceremonies will be held throughout the world on November the eleventh, to mark the 75th anniversary of the end of World War One.
Three quarters of a century after the Great War, debate continues over the political and military leadership, of all countries involved in the conflict.
Surviving combatants from the conflict are also asking similar questions....
---------------------------------------------------------------- In northern France, the First World War is still killing people.
75 years after the end of the conflict, thousands of unexploded shells still litter the countryside near Verdun - occasionally dug up near pretty farms, that were once the killing fields of Europe.
These overgrown trenches were the site of one of the more senseless battles, in a war known for its lack of sense. In 1916, millions of French and German soldiers fought over a pocket of land which had more psychological than strategic importance. Six hundred thousand died - no side achieved a decisive victory.
Munitions experts are still trying to neutralise the old weapons of war. The rusting shells are a chilling reminder of the carnage, but have to be treated with great respect. As well as the live explosives, many of the 900 tonnes of shells recovered each year still contain toxic gas.
More than six hundred bomb squad members have been killed by the unstable shells since the war, adding to the death toll of old battles, in some cases fought by their great grandfathers.
When the world exploded in conflict in 1914, Englishman Horace Ham was 19 years old. Two years later he was on the Western Front, going into battle on the Somme in 16th Middlesex battalion: (HORACE HAM, BRITISH ARMY) "WE WENT OVER ABOUT 800-STRONG AND I THINK THERE WAS ONLY ABOUT A HUNDRED CAME BACK. WE WERE TOLD YOU SEE THAT ALL THE GERMAN WIRE WOULD BE CUT, AND THERE WOULD BE VERY FEW GERMANS THERE AFTER THE BOMBARDMENT. BUT WHAT THEY DONE, THEY WENT DOWN IN THEIR DUGOUTS, AND AS SOON AS THE BOMBARDMENT FINISHED, THEY CAME UP, PUT UP THEIR MACHINEGUNS, AND SIMPLY MOWED OUR PEOPLE DOWN" Historians are still arguing over why the Great War was so long and bloody. But stories such as Horace's back the deep suspicions felt by many - that old tactics were being used against new technologies, that politicans failed to control the generals, whose sole strategy was to throw more and more men into the cauldron of war.
In the leadup to 1914, Europe was unstable and volatile. Germany had formed numerous, often conflicting alliances with its neighbours, for fear of another war with France. It's ally, the Turkish Ottoman empire was in decline, after having much of its territory taken by France, Italy, Britain and Russia. And the Austro-Hungarian empire was also crumbling, with rising independence movements in satellite states such as Serbia. Against the central powers - the Allies. Led by France, Great Britain and Russia, but also including many other smaller countries.
The assassination of Austria's Archduke Ferdinand in Sarajevo by a Serbian nationalist set the snowball rolling. While some German leaders were not enthusiastic for a widespread war, the country supported its ally, Austria. Austria feared reprisals from Russia, which was enraged by aggression against its fellow Slavs in the Balkans, and which itself feared Austrian control of the Black Sea.
Fear, ultimatum, bluff, and a general belief that any conflict would be short anyway, turned the snowball into avalanche. When Russia and France made it clear that they would not tolerate the attacks on Belgrade, Germany declared war on both countries. It launched a pre-emptive strike on Luxembourg and then Belgium, drawing Great Britain into the fight.
Both the Germans and the Allied forces were rushed into the War.
Old battleplans were used, and the generals, even the older ones, had no experience of a largescale European conflict.
The German army swept in a giant counterclockwise wheel through Belgium and northern France, coming within 50 kilometres of Paris.
A million and a half German soldiers were in action on the western front, forcing the allies into retreat. After fierce fighting, the German army eventually was checked, first at the Battle of the Marne, then at Ypres - the town's ancient Cloth Hall reduced to rubble in two stubborn defensive actions in nine months.
The retreating Germans decided to stand their ground by fighting from hastily-dug holes. Trench warfare had begun. The war of movement which had lasted for just a few months, descended into four years of stalemate, mud, disease and death .
(GEORGES LUCE, FRENCH ARMY) "WE PLAYED CARD GAMES IN THE TRENCHES, AND AS YOU PLAYED, YOUR PARTNER WOULD BE CAUGHT IN SOME SHELL FIRE, AND OFF HE WENT, HE WAS DEAD. YOU NO LONGER REGARDED THE LOSS OF SOMEONE AS SOMETHING EXTRAORDINARY. IT WAS AN IMPOSSIBLE LIFE. WE HAD LICE, WE DIDN'T WASH - IN WINTER THERE WAS MUD ALL OVER THE TRENCHES".
(WILLI NOTDURFT, GERMAN ARMY) "YOU DIDN'T THINK ABOUT IT..YOU WERE A SOLDIER ON THE GERMAN SIDE AND HAD TO FOLLOW THESE ORDERS." Willi Notdurft had no reason to hate the French. As war broke out, he was learning to be a cheesemaker in the French region of Normandy. After a polite parting of the ways with his employer, he returned to Germany to join his country's army. Shortly afterwards he was back in France, fighting the French at Verdun.
(NOTDURFT) "WELL WE DIDN'T SEE THEM..THEY ONLY SAW US THROUGH BINOCULARS ..
AND THE WHOLE AREA WAS JUST FILLED WITH ARTILLERY FIRE AND WHOEVER HAPPENED TO BE LYING IN THE PLACE WHERE GRENADES WERE LANDING, THAT WAS BAD LUCK FOR THEM. AND TODAY THE FRENCH ARE MY BEST FRIENDS..THEY DO NOTHING WITHOUT ME..WHENEVER ANYTHING'S HAPPENING IN VERDUN THEY CALL ME, WILLI YOU MUST COME OVER (IN FRENCH OF COURSE), WE'RE HAVING A BIG PARTY AND YOU MUST BE THERE".
Willi frequently returns to Verdun as head of his local Franco-German friendship society. Each time he goes back, he places flowers on the graves of his fallen friends.
(NOTDURFT) "THESE WERE GIVEN TO ME BY THE MAYOR OF VERDUN. YOU CAN HAVE THEM." Decades later, and across the other side of the world, Australian survivors of the war mark an event that's etched into their country's national consciousness - Anzac Day. Colonial soldiers from countries such as Australia, New Zealand, Canada, South Africa and India fought in their tens of thousands for the British and Allied cause. For the Anzacs - Australians and New Zealanders - Gallipoli is a name that evokes mixed feelings of national pride and anger.
The Anzacs were the spearhead of a campaign to open a new front against the Turks at the Dardanelles, and to open the Black Sea to Russia. After a failed naval bombardment, the troops were sent ashore, outgunned and facing an almost hopeless strategic position.
The well-entrenched Turks had the Allies pinned on the beaches, with heat and disease adding to the toll.
(TURKISH VETERAN , BRIGADIER GENERAL ABDULLAH ONHON) "BOTH FORCES CAME FACE TO FACE AT ARIBURNU. AT THE TIME WHEN THE LANDING STARTED, ATATURK WAS GIVING THE FOLLOWING ORDERS TO HIS SOLDIERS - I WANT YOU TO FIGHT AGAINST THE ENEMY, I WANT YOU TO KILL THEM, I WANT YOU TO DIE. THAT IS HOW WE MADE THE ENEMY BELIEVE THAT THE DARDANELLES CANNOT BE CROSSED EITHER BY LAND NOR BY SEA.
AFTER THAT, THE ENEMY RETREATED WITH THEIR SHIPS AND LEFT THE DARDANELLES, DEFEATED AND CONVINCED THAT THE DARDANELLES COULD NOT BE CROSSED." After suffering more than 200 thousand casualties, the Allies retreated. While the Turks would ultimately lose their empire in Mesopotamia, Palestine and Syria, Gallipoli ensured the Ottoman Empire's survival - at least for another three years. The Allies' failure at Gallipoli probably extended the war, and heightened feelings among the colonials that they were poorly led - being used as little more than cannon-fodder by their British military masters.
On land, sea and in the air, 1914 to 18 was a war of new and experimental technology - technology that would increase casualty figures beyond the worst nightmares of previous conflicts.
Overhead, the first dogfights took place over France, Belgium and Britain - romantic and spectacular, but of little long-term significance to the outcome of the war. However, in a portent of what was to happen in the next great conflagration, homes in Britain were bombed by German Zeppelins, and on the continent by the fledgling Royal Flying Corps, later to become the RAF.
At sea, the latest deadly technology was invisible - submarines and mines. The most fierce sea battle of the war was the battle of Jutland, where British and German craft fought for control of the sealanes. While there were successes on both sides, such as the allies sinking the German Cruiser the Blucher, the battle was indecisive.
(WILLIAM FIGG, ROYAL NAVY) "YOU SEE, ALL THE GERMAN BOATS WERE FASTER THAN US. WE COULD NEVER BEAT SPEED, AND THAT'S WHY WE COULD NEVER CATCH THE BUGGERS. AS SOON AS WE GOT A SIGHT OF THEM, THEY JUST SIMPLY PUT THEIR FOOT DOWN AND THEY'RE GONE" What the allies had no initial defence for, were the German submarines and mines. German U-boats were used sparingly at the start of the war for fear of angering the United States. But with the Western Front campaign bogged down, the submarines started ravaging commercial shipping. At one point, 25 percent of all merchant ships leaving British ports were sunk by mines and U-boats. Amongst them were neutral American ships, and the United States finally joined the war.
An angry British Prime Minister, Lloyd George, ordered his reluctant military leaders to start protected convoys. This tactic alone reduced losses to about one percent, and reduced the importance of the naval campaign. Lloyd George's intervention was sadly one of the few occasions where politicians exerted their authority over the military.
-------------------------------------------------------------- But the campaigns at sea, in the Middle East, and in Africa and the Pacific, remained dwarfed by those in Europe. Back on the Western Front, the slaughter continued.
Between 1914 and 1918, four hundred million artillery rounds were fired in the narrow battlefield straddling France and Belgium.
Casualties from individual battles were measured in the hundreds of thousands, The Somme, Verdun, Passchandaele - with gains of only a few hundred metres, often lost again later.
The Germans were mainly defensive. The British and French - operating independently - were committed to the traditional strategy of repeated offensives, often at the strongest point of enemy concentration. The German armies simply mowed down the attacking forces with machineguns - a new weapon the allied generals repeatedly dismissed as a purely "defensive" instrument.
Allied cavalry charges were rare. But when they did occur, such as in the Somme in 1916, they were simply obliterated by German machineguns. Again, the impact of technology was to blame.
Any gains were bound to be slow - the ground was so churned up by the bombardments, that men and the newly invented tank, simply became swallowed by mud. With such conditions, the advantage was usually on the defensive side. It was easier to reinforce, than it was to supply an army moving forward.
But despite private reservations, politicians dared not question their generals, who often kept them in the dark anyway. The politicans feared that any public doubts would spark outrage by a populace which mainly supported the war, at least until 1917.
Statesmen on all sides concentrated on the logistical side of the war effort - recruitment of soldiers, censorship of the media, and mobilising factories for military production.
While the Western Front was bogged down, the East was more fluid.
Germany, propping up a weakening Austria, was staging crushing victories against Russia. While Russia had almost unlimited manpower, her soldiers were badly supplied and were rolled back through Poland and the Ukraine. The collapse of the Russian monarchy and the Bolshevik revolution led to Russia pulling out of the war, to the anger of the allied powers.
No longer forced to fight on two fronts, Germany turned all its attention to the Western Front. Despite knowing that an outright victory was unlikely, German forces launched a huge offensive in 1918. They hoped that a decisive push might force a negotiated peace from the allies before American forces arrived in great number.
It was not to be. After intial success, the German army faced exactly the same problems as the Allies had earlier in the war and overstepped their abilities. The central powers quickly collapsed - the Ottoman Empire crumbled in the Middle East, and the Austro-Hungarian empire disintegrated into separate states after Italian victories in 1918.
On the Western Front, an allied counter-attack, including the Americans, prompted the Germans to ask American President Wilson for an Armistice. The German government itself disintegrated and an armistice was signed.
As wild celebrations broke out in London and Paris on November the eleventh, Germany stood defeated, even though its forces still occupied much of Europe. After the treaty of Versailles, Germany remained a sovereign nation, but with her navy impounded, much of her weaponry handed over, the Rhineland seized, and facing an enormous reparations bill.
The seeds of the Second World War had partly been sown.
Long after the guns fell silent, tourist buses take old soldiers and their descendents, to the sites where so many friends were lost in battle.
(AUSTRALIAN VETERAN) "WHEN YOU LOOK AT THE REMINDERS OF THE HORRIBLE LOSS OF LIFE - THE THOUSANDS OF NAMES, IT'S TERRIBLE TO THINK OF IT, IT'S RATHER EMOTIONAL, AND A REMINDER OF THE HORRORS OF WAR. I THINK THAT IF THERE'D HAVE BEEN TELEVISION IN THE 14-18 WAR IT WOULDN'T HAVE LASTED A MONTH BECAUSE THE PUBLIC WOULD HAVE REVOLTED" (ENGLISH) The few soldiers left from the Great War have seen numerous conflicts since the war that was supposed to end all wars.
The youngest are in their nineties. They remember their war as a time when life was expendable, when experimental technology was used to increase the casualties - machineguns, poison gas, submarines, mines, aerial warfare.
Many say nothing much has changed since then. They doubt from what they've seen since, that world leaders have learned very much in the past three quarters of a century.
(WILLIAM FIGG) "CANDIDLY SPEAKING, AND I HAVEN'T GOT ANY BRAINS AT ALL, CANDIDLY SPEAKING, I DON'T THINK THEY HAVE, AND I DON'T THINK THEY EVER WILL, AND TO ME, FROM WHAT I LISTEN TO, ALTHOUGH I'M NOT EDUCATED, TO ME IT SEEMS TO BE GETTING WORSE NOW THAN EVER. NO, I'M SORRY TO SAY, NO, "WE'RE ABSOLUTELY A LOAD OF BLOODY NINNIES" (ENGLISH) While the dwindling number of Great War veterans bear their psychological scars, further along the Western Front, the cleanup of the region's physical damage carries on.
Almost a million hectares of northern France remains sealed off to the public, while explosives experts continue their patient task.
They're likely to be at work long after the last veterans are gone, perhaps even when those descendents mark the 100th anniversary of battles like Verdun, Ypres, Arras, and the Somme.
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