World War I Changed Combat Tactics

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In 1914, with the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife from Austro-Hungarian Empire caused an enormous war called World War I, that killed and injured about thirty million lives. It also destroyed the economy later on. World War I changed combat tactics in a whole new way, where people would die in a blink of an eye. Commanders and soldiers did not know about the capabilities of their new arsenals. The new industrialized developed weapons devastated the battlefield with blood, mountain of corpses, and small craters. Some of the weapons that were used were machine guns, poison gas, mortars, and tanks. Soldiers described the battlefield as a nightmare. This was the start of a new era arising through warfare. A very dangerous way to bring great change to the world but was not intended. World War I brought great changes to the world but, considering the countless deaths, it was the worst war ever, an inhumane war. The Generals and politicians thought the war was going to end very quickly where every I gets to go home on Christmas. Generals and Politicians said “A few quick campaigns and a few decisive victories would “bring the boys home by Christmas, “perhaps even by the fall” (Overfield, James H. Sources of Twentieth-century Global History. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2002. Print.) , p74. They were definitely wrong on that note. The war lasted 4 years in the hell the soldiers called the battlefield. One of the first major battles on the western front was called the Battle of Marne. The battle that halted the Germans from entering France into a long standing stalemate. The trench warfare started here, where soldiers dug deep into the ground and settled down to fight off the enemy soldiers. It was a stalemate for man... ... middle of paper ... ...rom the war unlike the countries who participated at the start. Many of the European countries lost a lot of power and started taking a passive attitude towards war, which weakened them to a great extent. A war so destructive costing millions of lives and billions of dollars. It brought forth many new technology of mass destruction and continued to contribute into new types of weapon development. New technology can be helpful and evil at the same time. Strategies and combat techniques were developed to maximize the potential of the weapons. These new ways of fighting only to come deadlier by the day. It deformed the land, tortured soldiers, and brought death along with it. A whole generation of young soldiers were lost and to never able to see the day of light ever again. The worst war ever to be told that left a historical moment and a permanent fear of future wars.

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