Essay On Advantages And Disadvantages Of Trench Warfare

734 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Write an essay explaining exactly how trench warfare was used during World War

The first world war was defined by the heavy use of trench warfare, as the decorated soldier and writer Segfried Sassoon observed, “the war was mainly a matter of holes and ditches” (the great war, modern memory). Trench warfare was primarily utilized due for protection from opponent small arms fire and shelter from artillery, they kept soldiers on both sides safer and reduced casualties. Despite these benefits and many more, various primary and secondary sources can be used to question their efficacy. This essay will delve into the advantages and disadvantages of trench warfare, how these shaped the experience of a soldier fighting in the trenches, and how these experiences differed for soldiers in the Central Powers and the Triple Entente. …show more content…

Trench warfare is a style of battle in which opposing forces dig trenches across from each other and fight in close quarters. Trenches were dug in zig-zag patterns and crenellations to increase the protection against the opponent. Fighting in such conditions proved to be extremely brutal. Though a savage form of warfare, trenches were advantageous in comparison to traditional battlefield style war during this time. First, it offered many strategic benefits. With the advent of modern weaponry such as heavy artillery and machine guns, trench warfare became prominent on the western front out of necessity. Traditional tactics armies have used for centuries prior were now outdated and would prove to be a strategic disaster if implemented in WW1. Armies had such strong confidence for trenches that they were willing to stand guard every dawn and wait for opponent attacks which included heavy bombardments (46 the great way, modern memory). This brings into mind the second key advantage of trench warfare during WW1: safety. The acknowledges the fact that trenches reduced soldier causalities, and protected them against opponents’ modern arms, such as machine guns and heavy artillery. For example, a sentry could keep watch out on opponents during heavy bombardments and report their finding to better prepare for future, and possibly worse attacks. Trenches protected soldiers against these new warfare

Show More
Related

  • Camaraderie in All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque

    1133 Words  | 3 Pages

    Between the years of 1914 to 1918, the whole of Europe was locked in arms, not only for pride but mostly for survival. The years of war brought devastation upon all societies. Men were massacred in droves, food stuff dwindled, and at times an end seemed non-existent. The foundation of the first Great War, one can muse, began as a nationalistic race between rival nations. By the onset of 1914, once the Archduke Frendinad had been assassinated in Saravejo, the march for war became not just a nationalistic opinion, but now a frenzy to fight. In battle, unlike previous wars, new weaponry caused drastic alterations in strategy. No longer will armies stand to face their rivals on the plains. Now the war will be fought in trenches, hidden underground from the new, highly accurate artillery. In many respects, World War I was a war of artillery, gas, and mechanization. Except as new weapons were becoming essential for battle, the leaders, on all sides, appeared too inept to fight this new style of warfare. Generals, or any leader for that matter higher in the chain of command, sent their troops in massive assaults. Regardless of their losses there were no deviations from the main ideology of sending massive waves of men and shells to take a position. On an individual level, the scene of repeated assaults and mayhem of the front line did little to foster hope for their superiors or even for the naiveté of their fellow countrymen who were not fighting. I submit that in times of sheer madness and destitution, as during World War I, men banded together to form make-shift families for support and companionship when all seemed lost; as exemplified in the novel All Quiet on the Western Front.

    Read More

  • Life and Suffering in The Trenches

    1694 Words  | 4 Pages

    "Feature Articles - Life in the Trenches." Firstworldwar.com. First World War, n.d. Web. 05 Apr.

    Read More

  • TRENCH WARFARE

    1362 Words  | 3 Pages

    The First World War saw a new form of warfare known as Trench warfare which involved trenches which were deep long dugouts made by the soldiers that lived in these trenches. The trenches proved useful as they protected the soldiers from artillery and bomb fire and were most likely situated in the eastern and western fronts of Europe. However the conditions of the trenches were far from exuberant but were in fact severely terrible. There was bad hygiene throughout the trenches, for example soldiers bathed probably only once a month and as such were prone to diseases such as trenches fever (which were due to the lice attracted by the bad hygiene). The weather was no exception as well, in the summer it would be too hot and in the winter it would be too cold and due to the nature of the trenches, when it rained the trenches would be filled with water, and due to such conditions welcomed the disease known as trench foot which was due to prolonged exposure to water and claimed the foots of many soldiers. There was also the constant danger of bomb fire and snipers would always be on the lookout for any movement. Latrines, which were toilets used in the trenches also sprouted fear as the enemy could see them in this area of the trenches and therefore were in constant danger of death. Soldiers also had to follow a strict code of conduct which was known as trench etiquette which ordered them to respect higher officers and they would have to be punished if the trench etiquette was ignored.

    Read More

  • World War One Battlefield Tactics

    1099 Words  | 3 Pages

    The First World War witnessed an appalling number of casualties. Due partly to this fact, some historians, developed the perception that commanders on both sides depended on only one disastrous approach to breaking the stalemate. These historians attributed the loss of life to the reliance on soldiers charging across no-man’s land only to be mowed down by enemy machineguns. The accuracy of this, however, is fallacious because both the German’s and Allies developed and used a variety of tactics during the war. The main reason for battlefield success and eventual victory by the Allies came from the transformation of battlefield tactics; nevertheless, moral played a major role by greatly affecting the development of new tactics and the final outcome of the war.

    Read More

  • Life on the Western Front During World War One

    2401 Words  | 5 Pages

    Life on the Western Front During World War One A dispassionate look at the numbers of the horrendous casualties sustained by the armies of the Allies and the Central Powers on the Western Front in WW1, clearly indicate that these casualties figures are far inferior to what might be anticipated if, indeed, total war had reigned in every location, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, and along all the 475 miles of trenches that extended from the North Sea to Switzerland. A couple of simple examples will readily make the case. Imagine two front-line trenches separated by only 20 to 30 yards of ‘No Man’s Land’ (in some extraordinary situations, distances were even less). A determined and prolonged effort by a few hand-grenade bombers on either side could make any hope of a sustained tenancy quite impossible. Again, given the accuracy and rapidity which trench mortars could be deployed against routinely manned trenches (one battalion per 1,000 yards) and their associated dug-outs, a quite short, but determined, and mutually hostile, barrage could readily reduce both trench systems to total ruin.

    Read More

  • Battle Of The Bulge Essay

    1055 Words  | 3 Pages

    “The Battle of the Bulge, fought over the winter months of 1944 – 1945, was the last major Nazi offensive against the Allies in World War Two. The battle was a last ditch attempt by Hitler to split the Allies in two in their drive towards Germany and destroy their ability to supply themselves” (Trueman).

    Read More

  • The Stalemate in World War I

    563 Words  | 2 Pages

    By December 1914 the First World War had reached a dilemma on the western front that neither the triple entente nor the triple alliance had expected. The war had reached a stalemate, a state where both sides are so evenly balanced that neither can breakthrough against the enemy. The advances in Technology played a big role in creating the stalemate through strong defensive weaponry such as Machine Guns and Artillery, this caused ‘trench warfare’ (BOOK 48). Trench war is when troops from both sides are protected from the enemy’s firepower through trenches. Many advances in technology also attempted to break the stalemate throughout the war with tanks, gas and aircraft, these however failed. Eventually the stalemate was broken through a combination of improved technology, new strategies and the blockading of the German ports.

    Read More

  • Effects of War Exposed in All Quite on the Western Front, Bury the Dead, and Paths of Glory

    2030 Words  | 5 Pages

    Effects of War Exposed in All Quite on the Western Front, Bury the Dead, and Paths of Glory

    Read More

  • Canada's Involvement in World War One

    1424 Words  | 3 Pages

    "First World War.com - Feature Articles - Life in the Trenches." First World War.com - A Multimedia History of World War One. N.p., n.d. Web. 3 Mar. 2011. .

    Read More

  • Battle of the Somme

    1174 Words  | 3 Pages

    Trench warfare became a common practice in World War One, leading to a war of attrition. Both the Allies as well as the Germans enacted similar basic defense strategies and dealt with many of the same debilitating trench conditions. Trenches were built in an elaborate networking system, with three major sections, the front lines, the support, and the reserves. There was a rotation schedule for soldiers in the trenches, so that each regiment served time at the front lines. Trench conditions were horrendous including rodent infestation as well as unsanitary living spaces; many were infected with diseases such as trench foot with most trenches were filled with dead corpses for weeks after they were first killed. Defense mechanisms included creating dense fields of barbed wire in No Man’s Land, between the enemy trenches, in order to prevent an attack on the trench. Trench sanitation and defense were not the only reasons for the stalemate connected with World War One. The weather played

    Read More

  • Trench Warfare In The Trenches Essay

    507 Words  | 2 Pages

    Trench warfare was introduced in order to bring a barrier between forces. They were dug by soldiers and were very lengthy, but very cramped. Soldiers crouched down for extended periods of time to keep their heads blocked from being a target for the other side. They sat their watching their friends die from disease and from being shot, bombed, or poison gassed while they waited to fire their weapons at the enemy.

    Read More

  • The Development of the Trenches in Spring 1915

    785 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Development of the Trenches in Spring 1915 The spring of 1915 saw a new frontier develop: the trenches. Trench

    Read More

  • Analysis Of The Film War Horse

    1373 Words  | 3 Pages

    The First World War introduced a new type of warfare. New weapons were combined with old strategies and tactics. Needless to say, the results were horrific. However, a new type of warfare was introduced: trench warfare. In the movie War Horse, the character that owned the horse originally while he worked on his farm, Albert Narracott, finally was old enough to join the army. His first sight of battle was the Battle of Somme which took place in France near the Somme River. During this battle, the British troops start out in trenches, which were pretty much tunnels dug strategically to avoid gunfire. The soldiers would wait until they were told to advance, and they would run from one trench to the next. Trenches and the area between trenches were muddy and the trenches themselves were poorly conditioned (http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/chapters/ch1_trench.html). Many of the soldiers who fought in trenches succumbed to a foot disease called trench foot and if not treated immediately, gangrene could infect the foot and an amputation would be necessary for survival. Commanding officers ordered one or t...

    Read More

  • The Great War And Modern Memory By Paul Fussell

    1658 Words  | 4 Pages

    In Paul Fussell’s book, The Great War and Modern Memory, he discusses some of the ways in which World War I affected the men who fought in it, specifically those in the trenches. One of Fussell’s main points in his book as he tries to characterize World War I was the widespread irony that spread in its wake. Even though the focus of his book is based upon the British perspective of World War I, Fussell also briefly mentions the effects of the war upon other countries involved in the war.

    Read More

  • Irregular Warfare And Terrorism Essay

    814 Words  | 2 Pages

    “The trouble is that a praise worthy quest for precision can descend into a flattering of tidy minds at the cost of a realistic grasp of the complexity and interconnectedness that is the story of strategic history.” Colin Gray warns in the opening sentences of the chapter “Irregular Warfare and Terrorism” in his book Another Bloody Century of the dangers of oversimplifying the categories of warfare. To look at warfare as either regular or irregular without being absolutely clear on the definitions of each and the context in which the terms are used is fruitless. Regular forces have been known to use irregular type tactics just as irregular forces have used conventional warfare to reach their political goals. It is imperative then, that the U.S. military forces are trained to fight wars falling on a spectrum of warfare and educated to distinguish the type of war they face. In order to protect national security interests as outlined in the 2014 Quadrennial Defense Review, the U.S. armed forces must rebalance and be capable of conducting operations across the spectrum of conflict in order to win against both a regular and irregular adversary, combating a wide scope of tactics and strategies ranging from terror tactics to full scale, multi-phased conflict against a peer or near peer by maximizing the capability of the force and nation.

    Read More

More about Essay On Advantages And Disadvantages Of Trench Warfare

Open Document