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Essay on military history new technology in world war ii
Essay on military history new technology in world war ii
Essay on military history new technology in world war ii
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What is life like in the trenches, well, muddy, and cramped, and filthy. Everything gets covered with mud; you can't wash, for water has to be fetched for a mile. There is no room, and if you walk upright in many of the trenches, you run grave risks; and you sleep, huddled together, unable to stretch. All day long shells and rifle bullets go banging and whistling, and from dark to midnight the Huns fire rifle-grenades and machine-guns at us. – Lieutenant Bernard Pitt in a letter to his parents (25th December, 1915)
The year is 1914, World War I had begun and new system of warfare has begun to show up on the front. This new type of warfare will forever be known as trench warfare and it will completely change how World War I will be fought.
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When some think of the trenches used in trench warfare, they probably think of a simple line dug out deep enough to hold soldiers. However, World War I saw the digging of 25,000 miles of trenches along the Western Front. The trench network stretched all the way from the English Channel to Switzerland. All of this was dug by hand by the soldiers and these trenches became their homes while they were stationed in battle. These trenches were horrendous as said by the Lieutenant earlier and over 200,000 men died in the trenches from either disease or from being killed by enemy fire after they exposed their heads above the trenches or ran out to attack. Another staggering statistic that came from trench warfare was that 80,000 British army soldiers suffered shellshock from their time in the trenches. Not only was there shellshock from being bombarded by artillery fire, but PTSD was also seen for the first time after World War I as a result of the horrors trench warfare caused for the soldiers. Warfare and wars in general have always been fascinating topics and especially the idea of trench warfare in World War I.
Trench warfare was not only a new, different type of warfare, but it completely changed how World War I was fought and how it would be remembered in the history books. These reasons lead to the writing of this paper and to answering a question that has been asked by many regarding trench warfare. The question that arises here and what this paper plans to answer is, why did trench warfare come to be the way of combat during World War I? Through analysis of sources, both primary and secondary, the answer will be clear that trench warfare came to be because it had to be the way to fight in order to survive the other advancing technological changes in warfare and that it was indeed an aberration from previous wars. Along with that point, it will be argued that trench warfare also impacted the way future wars would be fought because of what trench warfare did during World War …show more content…
I. Historical Background When someone mentions trench warfare, many people automatically think of World War I.
The first use of trench warfare date back way before it was used in World War I. The concept of trench warfare first started with the French military engineer Sébastien Le Prestre de Vauban. The first battlefield use of trench warfare can be dated as far back as Napoleon Bonaparte’s time. The concept of digging holes or trenches for battlefield protection is not a new idea in warfare however. Castle defenses during the Middle Ages regularly used moats, which were basically the same as trenches, just occupied with water. Roman legions would often entrench themselves at night in temporary trenches while on the move to stay protected from possible enemy soldiers. Not much is documented during these times in regards to the use of trenches in actual battles, much of the use of trenches in battle can be seen much later in the 19th
century. Trench and bunker systems were employed more regularly in the mid-19th century during the American Civil War, the Boer War, and others in response to the development of superior rifle and artillery technology. The Boers were especially known for their trenches and individual holes that allowed them to kill many more enemy soldiers than the trenches took of their own. In fact, much of trench warfare’s success and use in battle before World War I can be seen in the American Civil War. Trench warfare is evident in two major battles of the American Civil War in Vicksburg and Petersburg. Vicksburg and Petersburg were key battles in the American Civil War that showed the effectiveness of defensive entrenchments during sieges when protected by artillery and rifles. Similarly, in the last three years of the American Civil War, both offensive and defensive entrenchments revealed their worth in battle. Trench warfare of World War I continued the nineteenth and early twentieth‐century trend toward the increased power of the entrenched defense. Weapons were now even more powerful than before, and these advancements forced the troops underground into long lines of trenches, which lined the entire western front by late 1914. Before its use in World War I, trenches were used in wars mostly as hinderers to enemy advancements. As it was stated earlier, moats were used in Medieval time, which were essentially water filled trenches. These trenches were obviously not filled with soldiers waiting to ambush approaching enemy soldiers. These were used instead to keep their fortified castles and defenses safe from enemy sabotage. Enemies would sometimes use trenches to dig tunnels to get to the castle walls if there was no moat, in an attempt to penetrate or break the wall and allow them to advance into the stronghold. Most warfare in Medieval time was up close and personal because there was a lack of long range weapons besides bow and arrows. Since the warfare was mostly up close and personal during this time in history, trenches were not used as defensive tools, but were instead used as a tool of slowing down enemies and possible concealment at night. The use of trenches for tactical and protective uses did not come along until the late 1800s during the Napoleonic Wars. Vauban first used his idea of trench warfare in the Siege of Maastricht. His idea of trenches were very similar to the ones used in World War I with zig zag pattern to avoid artillery fire. Trenches during this time were used and considered a part of how to perform siege warfare. The idea behind using these trenches in siege warfare, was to surround
Imagine four years of justing trying to capture the other teams trench, how dreadfully boring. World war one a great war of powers, invoked first by serbia’s overwhelming feeling to be their own people separate from Austria-hungary which thus lead to the assassination of the archduke Ferdinand of the Austrian-hungarian empire, which then lead to all the countries allied with Austria-hungary to support Austria in it’s attack on serbia, then all the countries allied with serbia to bring up arms on Austria, and Austria’s allies. This in terms of alliances had come upon through imperialism that lead to germany already against Austria in terms of expansion.
The outbreak of World War One was accompanied by new strategies, innovations, and inventions that developed modern warfare. World War One saw the widespread use of everything from artillery to machine guns and airplanes to submarines. World War One also saw the world’s most powerful navy, Great Britain’s Royal Navy, pitted against the up and coming German Imperial Navy. From Britain’s effective use of the naval blockade to Germany’s terrifying unrestricted submarine warfare, both sides were constantly looking for new strategies to implement.
"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. .
World War I, also known as the Great War, lasted from the summer of 1914 until the late fall of 1918. The war was fought between the Allies, which consisted mainly of the United Kingdom, France, and the Russian Empire, and the Central Powers, which consisted mainly of the German Empire, the Ottoman Empire, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and the Kingdom of Bulgaria (Alliances - Entente and Central Powers). In total, it is estimated that twelve million civilians and nine million combatants died during this horrific and devastating war (DeGroot 1). When the war first began in 1914, many people thought that it would be a war of movement that would quickly be over. However, that changed when the Germans, who were trying to reach and capture the city of Paris in France, were forced to retreat during the Battle of the Marne in September 1914 (Ellis 10). German General von Falkenhayn, who felt that his troops must at all cost hold onto the parts of France and Belgium that they had overtaken, ordered his men to dig in and form defensive trench lines (Ellis 10). The Allies could not break through the enemies lines and were forced to create trenches of their own (Ellis 10). This was only the beginning of trench warfare. A war of movement had quickly come to a standstill on the Western Front. A massive trench line, 475 miles long, quickly spread and extended from the North Sea to the Swiss Frontier (Ellis 10). With neither side budging, soldiers were forced to live in the most miserable of conditions. Simply put, life in the trenches was a living hell. A lieutenant of the 2nd Scottish rifles wrote, “No one who was not there can fully appreciate the excruciating agonies and misery through which the men had to go [through] in those da...
was useful for firing over the top as you could rest your gun on it.
World War I is marked by its extraordinary brutality and violence due to the technological advancement in the late 18th century and early 19th century that made killing easier, more methodical and inhumane. It was a war that saw a transition from traditional warfare to a “modern” warfare. Calvary charges were replaced with tanks; swords were replaced with machine guns; strategic and decisive battles were r...
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.
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.
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.
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.
In document thirteen, we encounter a letter written by a young English soldier fighting the Germans from the woods. He starts his letter by explaining how once again he was forced to be out in the trenches for forty-eight consecutive hours. The letter, addressed to his parents, illustrates how devastating it can be for a young man out at war. When he asked for time alone they told him to take a group of men with him and after a bit of difficulty they finally let him go off on his own. While he is out on a stroll he comes across a German trench and kills an officer, he does the same thing the next day. By the end of the letter he simply defines the experience as awful.
a realistic picture of life in the trenches as he had known it and a
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
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.
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...