Essay about World War I

Men were living outside for days or weeks on end, with limited shelter from cold, wind, rain and snow in the winter or from the heat and sun in summer. Artillery destroyed the familiar landscape, reducing trees and buildings to desolate rubble and churning up endless mud in some areas. The incredible noise of artillery and machine gun fire, both enemy and friendly, was often incessant. Yet soldiers spent a great deal of time waiting around, and in some quiet sectors there was little real fighting and a kind of informal truce could develop between the two sides. Even in more active parts of the front, battle was rarely continuous and boredom was common among troops, with little of the heroism and excitement many had imagined before the war. The Italian infantry officer Emilio Lussu wrote that life in the trenches was ‘grim and monotonous’ and that ‘if there were no attacks, there was no war, only hard work’.[1] The order to attack – or news of an enemy assault – changed

The opposing armies were in a deadlock and trenches had become a dominate feature of the war (Page 63, 2nd paragraph). Some trenches were from 5 feet deep to 30 feet deep; they caused a stalemate that was almost impossible to break. If you break into their lines there is another one waiting for you. The trenches were hundreds of miles long, constantly fighting. Also they were filled with rats and frogs. Trenches were always in repair, they were reinforced with sandbags, with sheets of corrugated

Trench warfare is a war strategy used in the American Civil War in 1861 – 1865 and the Russian – Japanese War of 1904 – 1905, but it wasn’t until World War One that trench warfare became the standard form of fighting. World War one is best known for being the war fought in trenches, and the ditches dug into the ground to give troops protection from gunfire and enemy artillery. When men volunteered to fight in World War One on the Western Front, little did they know about the living and fighting conditions that was seen in the trenches. World War one saw massive development in technology which allowed enemies to fight in different ways. Trench warfare was the most important and significant operation undertaken by troops.

By mid September 1914 the introduction of trench warfare had begun and on the western front for the Germans it had become a war of attrition. By November 1914, with the exception of the United States of America, most major nations were at war due to allegiances or direct involvement.

There is rubble all around them, somewhat signifying their lives as they miss their homes and families and watch their closest friends die or suffer from deadly battle wounds beside them. In this picture the men's poses look famished and weak, as you can imagine there was no fine dining in line for them, only minimal food and beverage they often time shared with nuisance rodents unwillingly. They seem to sit in waiting for the next attack to befall them in their soiled uniforms and delusional faces.

The Western Front was the main location of war during World War 1. The outcome of the battles resulted in the formation of a battle front, which saw three years of warfare in 1915, 1916 and 1917, with only a few months of mobile warfare at the start and at the end of four years of fighting.

Since the majority of the Great War accounts for a vast network of resources on what the trenches ultimately provided this research will explore within and above trench lines. The failed plans of leaders halted what is known to be the most strategic play in physical versus intellectual attributes of warfare altogether. If it weren’t for the salient of trench warfare throughout the years of 1914-1918, indulged the importance of communication and its

The troops had little food, lick grass for water, had to bear the sight of other’s deaths, as well as live under the thought that they could

Trenches were long, narrow ditches dug into the ground where soldiers lived day and night. There were many lines of German trenches on one side and many lines of the trenches on the allied side. In the middle there was no-man’s land, so called because it didn’t belong to either army. Soldiers crossed no- man’s land when they wanted to attack. Soldiers in the trenches did not get much sleep, but when they did it was in the afternoon during daylight and at night for only 1 hour at a time. They were woken up at different times, either to complete one of the daily chores or the go to fight. The system of trenches was employed because a German commander, General Erich von Falkenhayn, decided that his troops must at all costs hold onto those parts of France and Belgium that Germany still occupied. Falkenhayn ordered his men to dig trenches that would provide them with protection from the advancing French and British troops. The Allies soon realised that they could not break through this line and they also began to dig trenches.

Trench warfare was implemented to provide cover for soldiers during battle in WW1 seeing that most battlefields were open field & farms, so soldiers had little or no cover from rifle fire. After suffering thousands of casualties, soldiers began to dig into the ground creating cover. Over the months the trenches grew & evolved to hold barracks & equipment. Within a few months trenches were equipped with all essentials to ensure there was no need to leave them unnecessarily. Trenches were first dug by hand but soon soldiers would be equipped with shovels to increase productivity. Trenches were also mainly built at night to avoid detection by enemy troops.

Soon the machine gun became a defensive weapon rather than an offensive weapon, as it was used to stop offensive enemy troops across this no man’s land. Gas was used infinitely by both sides in an effort to triumph over the trenches. If any trench was taken by an opposing force, a succeeding trench was dug just meters behind the one taken, making advancements longstanding and difficult. In this process many troops lost their lives, more so than any other war.

World war I is considered one of the bloodiest wars ever fought in the history of the world. A major contributor to the death toll of this war was the new tactic of trench warfare. Trench warfare is a battle strategy using man made trenches and weapons to attack and take the enemy’s trench. This battle strategy combined with the use of new war technology, and the living conditions in the trenches resulted in one of the deadliest wars ever fought by mankind.

It is in the middle of winter in 1915, and the Germans seem to be not giving up any ground, my team is the tip of the spear, we are to destroy the enemy trench through a network of tunnels and underground passages and cause a distraction as our mates go over our heads and run through no man’s land, most likely to their deaths…

We all sleep and rest and eat in the trenches, but it’s not paradise. One night, the sound of loud booms woke us up. We were being attacked by some very dangerous artillery. We could feel every boom and every crack in the dirt above us. Many soldiers were not prepared for this and got sick. The attack come out of nowhere and frightened all of us.

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.