No, they don't. They lost in 1940 because they didn't grasp the concept of a strategic reserve (here's a hint- don't commit all your forces in the first couple of days) and in the armistice agreed to turn over ANYONE THE NAZIS WANTED TO TORTURE AND KILL to them.
Why did Germany do so well in WW1?
- Thread starter idontlikesand
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No, they don't. They lost in 1940 because they didn't grasp the concept of a strategic reserve (here's a hint- don't commit all your forces in the first couple of days) and in the armistice agreed to turn over ANYONE THE NAZIS WANTED TO TORTURE AND KILL to them.
So? They don't deserve the Cheese Eating Surrender Trope that is attributed to them is my point. But this is getting off topic I fear.
Riain
Banned
Firstly, I believe the Germans did do well in WW1, in the sense that they won great victories and took a hell of a lot of effort to defeat in the bitter end.
As for why, I believe that their sustained tactical superiority on the battlefield was perhaps the biggest reason. This was the reason why the war was fought deep in France rather than deep in Germany, why the repeated Allied offensives failed until late 1918, why they could invade Romania, prop up Austria and Turkey and defeat Russia. They were the first to triangularise their divisions, first to use the hurricane bombardment and infiltration tactics, first to issue mortars in large number, first and fastest to expand machinegun usage and make it the centrepiece of small unit tactics and first to use the defence-in-depth system of trenches.
Once the WAllies built up a level of tactical skill sufficient to deal with the Germans on the battlefield their vast strategic advantages quickly produced victory. But until that occurred every effort was thwarted at the lower tactical levels by the highly proficient Germans.
As for why, I believe that their sustained tactical superiority on the battlefield was perhaps the biggest reason. This was the reason why the war was fought deep in France rather than deep in Germany, why the repeated Allied offensives failed until late 1918, why they could invade Romania, prop up Austria and Turkey and defeat Russia. They were the first to triangularise their divisions, first to use the hurricane bombardment and infiltration tactics, first to issue mortars in large number, first and fastest to expand machinegun usage and make it the centrepiece of small unit tactics and first to use the defence-in-depth system of trenches.
Once the WAllies built up a level of tactical skill sufficient to deal with the Germans on the battlefield their vast strategic advantages quickly produced victory. But until that occurred every effort was thwarted at the lower tactical levels by the highly proficient Germans.
That's a rather odd definition of "doing well".
"Doing well" in your case would be synonymus with victory. In that case, I guess Napoleon never "did well", despite having a huge chunk of Europe under his control for a time. Also, by your definition, Hannibal Barca never "did well" in his war against Rome, despire his crushing victories against its Legions.
Germany absolutely did well in WWI. Germany, a relatively small country compared to the likes of Russia, China and the USA, with a colonial empire that was absolutely miniscule compared to the UK and France, was able to fight off most of the world for four years and come very close to outright winning against these crushing odds. That's about as clear definition of "doing well" as I can imagine.
Considering the number of opponents, and that they basically ended up propping the Austrians AND the Ottomans up, not to mention also helping hold off the Allies at Salonika, I think they did rather well.
That they lost is an irrelevance to the question of whether they did well or not.
Russia's collapse WAS to do with the Germans - it would never have come about if the Germans hadn't been able to advance OUT of Poland.
Mackensen was one of the outstanding commanders of the war, both in fighting on the East and in governing Romania
Cat!
That they lost is an irrelevance to the question of whether they did well or not.
Russia's collapse WAS to do with the Germans - it would never have come about if the Germans hadn't been able to advance OUT of Poland.
Mackensen was one of the outstanding commanders of the war, both in fighting on the East and in governing Romania
Cat!
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The first reason they did well on the Western Front was the insane amount of planning that went into the Schlieffen Plan. The german army seems to have been very, very well organized, and had trained battle scenarios for the western front many times prior to the war.
The second reason was the french basically reacted exactly according to plan, pushing into Germany over the Franco-German border and not keeping significant reserves behind to cover Belgium with enough force.
The third reason were the fruitless attacks on the reinforced German lines immediately following the 1st Marne.
The German success in the East seems to stem from both very good leadership on at least the tactical level and overconfidence on the side of the Russians. That said, the Eastern Front could have easly gone another way.
The reasons the Germans still didn't win in 1914 are manifold, but can be simplified to the Schlieffen plan simply being way to ambitious. It required troops that Germany didn't have, and then had these troops move with speeds that were simply not achievable by the infantry at the time. Lines of communication got to long, cohesion was lost and the troops were just generally very exhausted.
The second reason was the french basically reacted exactly according to plan, pushing into Germany over the Franco-German border and not keeping significant reserves behind to cover Belgium with enough force.
The third reason were the fruitless attacks on the reinforced German lines immediately following the 1st Marne.
The German success in the East seems to stem from both very good leadership on at least the tactical level and overconfidence on the side of the Russians. That said, the Eastern Front could have easly gone another way.
The reasons the Germans still didn't win in 1914 are manifold, but can be simplified to the Schlieffen plan simply being way to ambitious. It required troops that Germany didn't have, and then had these troops move with speeds that were simply not achievable by the infantry at the time. Lines of communication got to long, cohesion was lost and the troops were just generally very exhausted.
(1) It is not necessarily true that I make "doing well" synonymous with victory, since I am not sure that the German capture of Paris in spring 1918 would have been fatal to the Entente: https://groups.google.com/d/msg/soc.history.what-if/GoCu7BVwXz4/VOBJWLwl-CEJ
(2) In listing all the countries Germany (and Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire) had to fight, you are acting as if the Germans had to fight them *all at once*. But the US was not at war with Germany until 1917, and its troops did not directly make a difference until well into 1918. Russia was removed as an effective enemy by the Revolution (not just the October one but the February one, which dealt a fatal blow to military discipline). Hence saying that Germany was taking on "most of the world" is an exaggeration.
The presumption is that US participation can be butterflied away by adopting a defensive posture.
It was more to do with having a 'citizen army' of short term conscripts which then constitute a reserve once their term of service is up - rather than a proffessional one - which is due to the fallout of the fear of an army driven coup.
Germany in 1940 had a larger and partially battle experianced proffesional army
As for reserves - France did have a large mechinised reserve force as well as both Corps of the BEF but Belgiums reluctance to collaborate with Britain and France for her own defence meant that these very well equipped forces were obliged to rush into Belgium after the 11th hour - after Germany invaded the Low Countries and Belgium thinking that this attack was the 'dreaded' flanking manouver.
Had Belgium Collaborated earlier those mechinised forces could have been held back and normal infantry Divisions could have been sent into Belgium
I'm not suggesting that the French Mobile forces could have defeted the sickle cut - but they would have been a damn sight more effective than the forces that did eventually oppose them - and this might have been enough to blunt the sickle and stop the rot.
I don't think anyone can claim for sure that it wouldn't be fatal, seeing how it was the centre of French industry and both its communication and transportation network. However, that's not the point of this thread (neither is debating weather the Germans did well in WWI for that matter, but...).
Either way, I find it odd that you choose to judge how well the Germans did in the entirety of WWI based on the result of the Spring offensive in 1918.
Look at a map of the opposing sides before the US entry. The Germans were taking on most of the world all at once. Germany was the focus of basically all her main enemies, and Germany even had to prop up her allies during the course of the war. And I don't se why you are stressing the Revolution as if it had nothing to do with the fact that Russia was repeatedly defeated in the field by the Germans.
Redbeard
Banned
They understood the concept of a strategic reserve very well (I'd say they invented it during WWI) and they had a big one prior to May 1940, but their command, control and communication (CCC) system was repeatedly shortcut by swift German action. That was especially bad for an army like the French, which based on experience from WWI, was focused on grand schemes and plans executed like a clockwork and with all levels being tought to not think for themselves but just do what they were told.
If allowed time to unfold the French army could be a devastaing steamroller, but the German "Auftragstaktik" never allowed that and instead left frustrated French commanders and soliders waiting for new orders instead of those hopelessly behind the situation. Not even the best motivated, equipped and trained army can stand that for very long time.
But it started with the French commander Gamelin planning for the Germans to follow the French plans - ie. main German trust through Belgium. Most of his strategic reserve was so committed in a plan that was outdated from the start as the German main trust was in the Ardennes and thus cut of the best part of the allied forces. The problem wasn't their concept of strategic reserves but extremely bad intelligence work.
After that the battle was lost but the French acutally fought very well where they had the chance and German losses rose dramatically. In a few weeks they thus went from old fashioned cohesive frontlines to company or platoon positions in chequerboard formation that could survive being overrun by panzers but keep the follow up infanty back. That tactic proved the way to stop blitzkrieg but took years for the allies to learn and by June 1940 too little of the French Army was left to stop the Germans.
But back to WWI the Germans certainly did well in the sense that they kept a much stronger enemy at bay for four years and still had a plausible chance of winning. The very agile doctrines (auftragstaktik) that in WWII was so succesful at the tactical and operational levels had not emerged out of blue air in the interwar years but went back to the Prussian army of the 19th century. We often today imagine WWI Germans as goose walking militarists with shiny boots and Pickelhauben - they were that too - but also a much more flexible and egalitarian system than the French or British.
In 1870-71 that had worked well and I guess they hoped it would do so in 1914 too. The problem was that the French had learned a lot and implemented it in their 1911 army reforms. The German problem was a very critical strategic situation with a Russian Empire accelerating in strength on one side and a hot headed revanchist France on the other - in that context alienating the British Empire by taking on the cost of building a high seas fleet does not appear very wise. Especially as tyhey never really got close to defending their (anyway worthless) colonies. Imagine the resources spent on the High Seas Fleet put into the German and Austrian armies instead and the seapowers (UK and USA) neutral!
Regards
Redbeard
elkarlo
Banned
I've always thought that the western fronts Entente's stats were iffy. The British too seemed to be dishonest and many sources still use wartime documents. Only the Germans with their OCD seemed to have reliable stats
Deleted member 1487
Yeah the official French stats for war dead don't include all the categories Germany added after the war, including the men that died after the conflict for years because of it. That's where the 1930's stat of ~2 million comes from; if we go by French standards for Germany, then Germany lost ~1.77 million men during the war, France ~1.4 million. We don't know what the French losses were going by German standards laid out in their post-war Sanitätsbericht:
http://wiki-de.genealogy.net/Sanitätsbericht_über_das_Deutsche_Heer_1914-18/Band_3/012
http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/publication/12097
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trajen777
Banned
I think the war can be summarized kind of like this :
1. German Population was 69 mm people – France 40 mm – despite this the French army was larger at the wars beginning. Germany could have fielded 6 additional corps and still had the same % as the French army vs population. Those 6 corps placed closer to help Austria could have made a massive difference.
2. German Army did very well vs the French British army, Its use of heavy artillery and grabbing key points and allowing the Fr/ Brit army to bleed itself to death in 15 – 17.5 was war winning.
3. IN the east the Germans badly outclassed the Russian army and won all significant campaigns.
4. The FR / Brit really fought a very poor war until late 1917 when the French started to learn the trench war / German tactics and had finally gotten the HA needed vs their 75’s for this type of war. The British never learned and their losses were awful.
5. The Brit fought a brilliant propaganda war in the USA
6. The Brit / Fr lost over 2-1 vs Germans on the western front
7. Brit was bankrupt by 1917 and unless the US came in would have had to stop fighting
8. Germans lost the war by turning loose their U boats. After the starvation and loss of so much they had no hope vs millions of fresh troops and unlimited supplies.
9. After the USA – the Germans had to win quick so at this time they threw the dice
1. German Population was 69 mm people – France 40 mm – despite this the French army was larger at the wars beginning. Germany could have fielded 6 additional corps and still had the same % as the French army vs population. Those 6 corps placed closer to help Austria could have made a massive difference.
2. German Army did very well vs the French British army, Its use of heavy artillery and grabbing key points and allowing the Fr/ Brit army to bleed itself to death in 15 – 17.5 was war winning.
3. IN the east the Germans badly outclassed the Russian army and won all significant campaigns.
4. The FR / Brit really fought a very poor war until late 1917 when the French started to learn the trench war / German tactics and had finally gotten the HA needed vs their 75’s for this type of war. The British never learned and their losses were awful.
5. The Brit fought a brilliant propaganda war in the USA
6. The Brit / Fr lost over 2-1 vs Germans on the western front
7. Brit was bankrupt by 1917 and unless the US came in would have had to stop fighting
8. Germans lost the war by turning loose their U boats. After the starvation and loss of so much they had no hope vs millions of fresh troops and unlimited supplies.
9. After the USA – the Germans had to win quick so at this time they threw the dice
tenthring
Banned
While German diplomacy was certainly retarded, I'm convinced the USA would get involved whether Germany used U-Boats or not. Lots of loans had been made to the Entente, especially through private sources like JP Morgan. In the beginning they were secured but this was no longer true by 1917. In addition lots of wealthy Americans owned assets in France and the UK that were set to go to shit if the Entente lost.
Once Wilson was elected he no longer needed to placate the peace faction. Money drive war, the rest is propaganda.
Once Wilson was elected he no longer needed to placate the peace faction. Money drive war, the rest is propaganda.
elkarlo
Banned
Thanks for the links. I think it is pretty amazing that Germany lost only a bit more than the French did, despite fighting several more enemies, plus the French.
I wonder what the real British losses were at the Somme? As the claims I have seen, give them parity with the Germans there. I read Mosier's book http://www.amazon.com/The-Myth-Great-War-Military/dp/0060084332 and I think he is a whack job, and def goes to far the other way. But I do agree that the Entente were using estimates for Germany's losses, which are still sourced today. While the Germans used pretty detailed documentation.
I for one, would love to see the losses declassified. As there has been so much face saving going on for so long, it has been accepted as fact.
Deleted member 1487
I think official Entente stats about total losses are accurate, but the smoke thrown up by the British official history post-war trying to justify their mistakes by inflating German losses has obscured factual history. The British lost about 420k, the from something over 200k and the Germans about ~480k at the Somme IIRC from their 10 day reports accumulated in the SB.
Germany's political leadership and grand strategy were disastrous. It brought America into the war and neglected basic economic needs like feeding your population. Germany's tactics and operations succeeded brilliantly - the German's consistently outfought their opponents, achieving a good ratio of casualties against the Allies on all fronts.
German success at these lower levels can be accountable to several factors:
1) German industrial, scientific, and economic strength meant the German soldier was well armed (plentiful artillery, lots of machine guns) with good supplies and consistently innovated new weapons (poison gas, flamethrowers, light machine guns). The only area they really lagged was tanks.
2) German soldier was extremely well trained because of their reserve system and military tradition. It had a large group of junior officers and NCOs that survived battles so that core of veterans could be used to form new units (in contrast, Britain lost most of the future core of their mass army at Mons).
3) German doctrine was superior, having developed "mission type tactics" that rewarded initiative. German NCOs and junior officers were generally a class above their Allied counterparts regardless whether they were Russian, Italian, French, British, or American. They remained innovative and adopted well to trench warfare and later stormtrooper assaults.
German success at these lower levels can be accountable to several factors:
1) German industrial, scientific, and economic strength meant the German soldier was well armed (plentiful artillery, lots of machine guns) with good supplies and consistently innovated new weapons (poison gas, flamethrowers, light machine guns). The only area they really lagged was tanks.
2) German soldier was extremely well trained because of their reserve system and military tradition. It had a large group of junior officers and NCOs that survived battles so that core of veterans could be used to form new units (in contrast, Britain lost most of the future core of their mass army at Mons).
3) German doctrine was superior, having developed "mission type tactics" that rewarded initiative. German NCOs and junior officers were generally a class above their Allied counterparts regardless whether they were Russian, Italian, French, British, or American. They remained innovative and adopted well to trench warfare and later stormtrooper assaults.