Why Was There Stalemate On The Western Front Between Germany And Franc

The German Command, in planning for a short and swift war, found themselves in a bind when the war started to prolong itself. From the very beginning, their plan started to fall apart, as Belgium, who they assumed would just let them march through to France, took up arms in resisting their approaches (Hull, 2005). The war would get longer and longer and seemed farther away from its conclusion as the months grew colder. As a result of this as well as their Prussian roots, they resorted to dangerously risky and destructive tactics, trying to bring the war to a quicker end while putting more of their resources in jeopardy, a move that eventually did not pay off and ended up leading to the German Empire’s demise (Hull, 2005).

The Schlieffen Plan was a German battle plan to fight a two front war devised in 1905 by Alfred von Schlieffen as the Chief of the General Staff for Germany. The plan called for the German army to apply overwhelming force in France to capture the capital of Paris within six weeks before changing focus to Russia. The plan intended to achieve a quick and decisive victory by sweeping a line of armies through neutral Belgium and into France. In actuality, Helmuth von Moltke made significant changes to Schlieffen’s original plan before and during World War I. Ultimately, the plan ended in failure when the German advance halted at the First Battle of the Marne (Limbach, 2014).

     The object of the German offensive was to push through the Belgian Ardennes, cross the Mousse, retake Antwerp and its harbor facilities, thrust to the north and reach the sea which they almost succeed in doing. This would cut off the Allied troops in Holland and Belgium, making it impossible for them to withdraw. The success of the operation depended on three important

The Schlieffen plan had failed by November 1914. It didn’t entirely go to plan.. What the Germans presumed wasn’t right. Firstly they presumed that it would only take 6 weeks to get through Belgium and that it wouldn’t take long at all, but in the end it took than expected. The Belgians resisted a lot and put up a strong fight. German troops got held up in Belgium and never got round to invading Paris. In addition to this, Russia mobilised quicker than presumed! So

The main theatre of fighting in World War One was on the Western Front. The

Reality quickly set in for the Germans that they were in a stalemate on the Western Front, so they decided to shift many of their fighting forces to the Eastern Front to try and finish off the Russians. This left them with an army along the Western Front that could hold the line, but would have a hard time gaining any ground.

A Stalemate on the Western Front A stalemate formed on the Western Front due to four main reasons, one

Germany sought to conduct a massive counter-offense to seize control of the Allied Forces’ main hub of Antwerp. The German Army intended to split

In the early 1915 both sides had built endless trench lines stretching from the coast of Belgium to the Swiss border. This made it impossible for either side to defeat the enemy, so all attacks had to be head on front. Armies were much bigger in WW1 than ever before. The Prussian army that had invaded France during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871 was less than 300,000 men. The German army involved in the Schlieffen Plan in 1914 was 4 million. Other European armies grew to a similar size during WW1, so the entire trench line could be occupied completely. This also meant that there were more men on the reverse trenches. The senior commanders on both sides were narrow-minded. They couldn 't think up any other form of attack than a mass front attack continued by a heavy artillery bombardment. A combination of the above factors meant that a stalemate developed on the Western Front from the beginning of 1915,as it was too difficult to break through the enemy trench lines.

In the spring of 1918 the German army began an offensive to break through allied lines and ultimately end the war. The spring offensive was meant “to push the [British Expeditionary Force] off the continent and then deal with France separately before significant numbers of Americans could arrive in Europe and tip the manpower balance decisively in the Allies favor.” (Zebecki 43) In order to successfully accomplish this task Germany decided that it needed a diversion in the south in order to draw French reserves out of Flanders and weaken the Allies in the north. The original plan of the Germans was that of a limited attack of only 13 miles. The Germans “[were] certain that the French would panic and pull their reserves out of Flanders.” (Zebecki 43) When the Germans advanced 13 miles on May 27th, Pétain ordered 16 division to block

On August 7 allied forces begonia moving from their positions, Canadian and British from Canen, moving south and the Americans from Avranches, moving north. German leadership realized that their army was being encircled and that the only route of egress was through the towns of Chambois and Argentan. The German forces fought hard to keep this gap open and evade encirclement, if they could not maintain a possible escape route the only choice would be to fight and die. General Bradley, after studying the map and movements of ground troops noticed a gap that would allow German forces to elude the allied advance. In order to close the gap General Bradley need to act swiftly to prevent the German army form escaping the pocket, he issued orders to General Patton; “strong elements of Patton’s Third Army turned north at Le Mans and moved aggressively toward the city of Alençon, they could link up with the Canadians and British, who were attacking south toward Falaise. This would block all the roads out of Normandy and trap Army Group B”. If General Bradley’s plan would work he saw it as “ a once-in-a-century opportunity

The Battle of the Bulge is remembered as Adolf Hitler’s final effort to escape total defeat during World War II (WWII). His initial efforts were successful, however the Allied force commanders proved superior through there demonstrated adaptive and decisive decision making. These actions helped to overcome the military force and military intelligence failures during the battle. If these failures had been avoided, the Germans would have been defeated much quicker, effectively preventing the casualty numbers and damage inflicted on the Allied forces during the Western Front of WWII.

The French Army realized that the Germans were preparing for an offense operation when they villages surrounding Verdun began to be evacuated. General Herr, the commander of Verdun, requested additional Soldiers and equipment from General Joffre, the French Commander and Chief. General Joffre did not believe the Germans would attack Verdun, but sent on of his aides to investigate the situation at Verdun. When it became apparent that Verdun was the target, two divisions were sent to General Herr which would not arrive until 12 February 1916.

The right wing of the attack had to be extremely strong. This was something he had said in his last words “Remember, keep the right wing strong”. That’s why Schlieffen had ordered 90% of the troops to go there. Also, the the Germans needed to retreat the troops at the Franco-German border, so that the French army would walk into the trap, not be able to save Paris or realize what was going on.


The second aspect to the Schlieffen Plan was to invade neutral Belgium as a means to get to France, because the German-Franco border was heavily fortified and would mean almost certain defeat for