Belleau Wood - another perspective

[South]

http://time.com/5406235/everything-you- ... -is-wrong/


Good morning all,

Another perspective is presented in re Chateau Thierry / Belleau Wood.

Note how France maintained its 110 divisions in 1918 in re number of regiments per division.


~ Bob
eastern Virginia, USA

[Plain Old Dave]

This writer gets it. Pull:

It must be baldly stated: Germany would have won World War I had the U.S. Army not intervened in France in 1918.

And another:

The Doughboys won the war by trapping the German army in France and Belgium and severing its lifeline. Looking at 1918 in this new way, restoring the enormous impact of the U.S. military to its proper scale and significance, achieves two important things. First, it fundamentally revises the history of the First World War. Second, it brings out the thrilling suspense of 1918, when the fate of the world hung in the balance, and the revivifying power of the Americans saved the Allies, defeated Germany, and established the United States as the greatest of the great powers.

This is exactly what I have said here for 15 years, and what my old man said his entire life that I was aware of. I have a new book to get.

[Terry Duncan]

Just because confirmation bias is comforting does not make it factual, you should probably be able to spot the many glaring errors in the text that indicate the book is pretty much worthless as anything else. Maybe you could post a list of any errors you can spot easily, as there are quite a lot for a short piece. After all, if you are unable to spot the errors, how will you have any idea if what you are reading is factual or fiction? If you want a good account of the last year of the war that comes from a US writer who would have no reason to play down the US role, why not try 'No Man's Land: 1918, The Last Year of the Great War' by John Toland? He was a Pulitzer Prize winner after all.

[Plain Old Dave]

A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep." Saul Bellow, 1976.

This goes a long way towards explaining "the majority of academic research" this forum is so proud of. This article is one of the most succinct summaries of the precarious Allied status that has been written since the Jazz Age.

Question. Have you actually read either Mosier or this book?

A review.

https://www.nyjournalofbooks.com/book-r ... ns-freedom

[Terry Duncan]

I have not read the book, only the article linked to, which is grossly inaccurate and if taken directly from the book indicates the book is at best not to be taken too seriously. Given the many inaccuracies I would really rather hold back on buying such a book, or ever trusting the writer of the article to get anything right. Have a read through and see how many glaring errors or 'misstatements' you can see in it!?

I have read Mosier, why do you ask? I have read fairly widely on WWI and a friend who is a librarian recommended I read it as it was getting such atrocious reviews from academia, and had been voted the worst book ever on WWI - which given the competition from people like John Laffin is quite some claim. Lets just say facts and objectivity are not the books strong points.

[Plain Old Dave]

What's so inaccurate about the article?

[Richard Anderson]

What's so inaccurate about the article?

Well, the first paragraph for a start. The French and British were not "stalled in their sectors". The British and French had reached the Hindenburg Line between 14 and 18 September and paused to prepare for the next phase. For the British, it began on 29 September with the assault crossing of the St Quentin Canal and for the French it was a direct assault on St Quentin. By 5 October the line had been breached in that sector and on 8 October it was breached again at Cambrai, forcing the German retreat, which continued through the Armistice.

[Plain Old Dave]

A matter of opinion.

[Richard Anderson]

A matter of opinion.

No, a "matter of opinion" would be saying I believe the French and British were "stalled in their sectors" on 26 September 1918. However, the fact would be that the British and French defeated the final German offensive, they counterattacked and drove the Germans past their original front and onto the Hindenburg Line, which they prepared to assault beginning 26 September. Wawro opines that the Germans would have simply continued to fall back to successive river lines, but that ignores the state of the German armed forces at that point.

The American entry into the war and the massive numbers they placed on the Continent as quickly as they did, combined with its expanding military industry, could be characterized as the straw that broke the camel's back. That is slightly different from the tone Wawro took for his advertisement in Time (the book was just released Tuesday), but that is to be expected.

[Plain Old Dave]

the state of the German armed forces at that point.

An interesting phrase. They were six weeks from driving England out of the war in Spring 1917, and had defeated Russia. They drove to 40 miles from Paris about six weeks before the Argonne. While incapable of offensive operations, the German Army could have sustained a stalemate with England and France for several years. If there was a frail army on the Western Front, it wasn't German and certainly wasn't the AEF.

[Terry Duncan]

What's so inaccurate about the article?

OK, lets make a brief list other than what Richard has already mentioned;

It must be baldly stated: Germany would have won World War I had the U.S. Army not intervened in France in 1918.

Given you have dismissed easily verfied facts posted by Richard as 'A matter of opinion' and offered nothing to counter his points, I can quite happily state this is only the opinion of Wawro and something that not only is impossible to prove beyond doubt, but also counter to what the Germans themselves believed, as they thought even if they could defeat France they would be forced to come to terms with Britain as they had no means at all to defeat her, thereby only ever being able to negotiate a peace with Britain that maintained France as a great power as Britain would accept nothing less, as well as the restoration of Belgium.

The French army actually mutinied in 1917, half of its demoralized combat divisions refusing to attack the Germans.

The 'French Army' did not mutiny, elements of it did. A more correct statement would be that 'various units in half of the French combat divisions mutinied and refused to attack the Germans'. This could range from an entire battalion refusing to attack or even just a company within a division. It was not 'half of the army' that mutinied but elements in half of the army, leaving the other half unaffected.

the notorious three-month assault on the muddy heights of Passchendaele, where 300,000 British infantry fell to gain just two miles of ground.

Fine as far as it goes but fails to note the context. The heights of Passchendaele Ridge were the entire point of the offensive in the first place as they overlooked the Ypres Salient from three sides, making holding Ypres costly and difficult due to the lower land becoming waterlogged. If they didnt take the ridge they would just as well return to their starting positions as the ground in between was even less suitable that what was held at the outset. It was not the 'two miles of ground' but taking the high ground that was important, and it was achieved. You can argue if it was worth the cost but that applies to the entire war too.

The British, barely maintaining 62 divisions on the Western Front, planned, in the course of 1918

This was not an inability to maintain the formations but Lloyd-George refusing to send reinforcements whilst maintaining something like 250,000 troops in SE England, not to forget the large forces in the Middle East that could have been redeployed if it was a case of losing the war or not doing so. The British also changed from four regiments to three in a division, partly for lack of troops and partly due to the belief the three unit formation was better suited to the roles required and that the four unit formation was somewhat unweildy.

The French army limped into the year, effectively out of men and in revolt against its officers

The French army had recovered by 1918, and whilst many thought morale was still fragile it stood the test in the German Spring Offensives.

Lloyd George feared social revolution in Britain if casualties continued to mount, and lamented that Haig “had smothered the army in mud and blood.”

Lloyd-George was in a position to either negotiate a peace or force the military to adopt any strategy he believed better suited to winning the war. He may have not liked the cost, but he had no other idea of how to win the war and was unwilling to seek a negotiated settlement. His protests about what the generals did with the army should be seen in the light of their following orders that came from him in the first place when he told them he expected them to win the war.

the Germans had crushed the Russians and Italians and begun deploying 100 fresh divisions to the Western Front for a war-winning offensive in 1918:3.5 million Germans with absolute artillery superiority against 2.5 million demoralized British and French.

This is the 'war winning offensive' that broke the German army when it was repulsed mostly by the British and French armies with minimal involvement from the US troops until it was already too late. The supposedly low on manpower and low on morale British and French armies defeated the 'war winning' German army with its extra 100 divisions.

In June 1918, the Germans brushed aside fifty French divisions and plunged as far as the Marne River, just fifty miles from Paris.

Maybe you would like to remind me what date the German offensives began in 1918? They were all halted just like this one the author mentions, no matter what distance they were from an unobtainable geographic location. They were closer than fifty miles to the important rail junction at Aras and didnt take that either.

Doughboys and Marines went into action at Château-Thierry and Belleau Wood and stopped the German onslaught on the Marne. With Haig facing defeat in Flanders, actually warning London in April 1918 that the British had their “backs to the wall,” American troops— the manpower equivalent of over 100 French or British divisions—permitted Foch to shift otherwise irreplaceable French troops to the British sector

Lets get this clear, Haig was facing defeat in April 1918 and only saved because the US troops stopped the German offensive at battles on 1st - 26th June and 18th July 1918 and and allowed the French to redeploy troops? How did they deploy them back in time?

The Americans saved Britain and France in the spring and summer and destroyed the German army in the fall.

We have a very good record of what armies were involved in offensives 'in the fall' of 1918 and most were not American.

Marshal Ferdinand Foch’s famous Hundred Days Offensive – a coordinated Anglo-French-American envelopment of the German army on the Western Front

An envelopment? Seriously? The Germans were pushed back certainly, but not enveloped.

They spent their dwindling strength breaching the Hindenburg Line and had little left for the Meuse, Moselle, or Rhine lines

After the Hindenburg Line there were no viable defensive lines until the Rhine, even that was doubtful, and the Germans did not have the ability to maintain their armies with munitions for more than a few weeks at the time of the armistice. With strikes at home the troops were not getting the ammo they would need to hold off any attacks. The allies had outrun their supply lines and ability to project the offensives any further at that precise moment, but that applied to all the allied armies including the US.

Lloyd George’s war cabinet warned Haig that the shrinking army he was conducting slowly eastward was “Britain’s last army,” and it was going fast.

The last army? Which one of the several British armies on the Western Front was the last, there were several there, as well as elsewhere in the world?

As winter approached and the Allies sagged, everything hinged on the pending American thrust northward from Saint-Mihiel and Verdun toward Sedan

Given Germany had collapsed long before the US had come close to achieving a brakethrough, little depended on a single offensive.

The Doughboys won the war by trapping the German army in France and Belgium and severing its lifeline.

Utter rubbish. The German army was not trapped in France, it was retiring into Germany when the war ended, the US armies had certainly not trapped it or severed its lifeline.

Looking at 1918 in this new way, restoring the enormous impact of the U.S. military to its proper scale and significance, achieves two important things. First, it fundamentally revises the history of the First World War.

Nationalist flatulance intended to sell books to a certain market. It may sell books but it will not change facts nor the preponderance of evidence as to what happened in 1918.

[Terry Duncan]

They were six weeks from driving England out of the war in Spring 1917

This is incorect as has been pointed out to you previously.

While incapable of offensive operations, the German Army could have sustained a stalemate with England and France for several years.

The German home front had fallen apart. There was no way to keep the armies in the field let alone sustain the stalemate. How many more 'Turnip Winters' do you imagine the Germans would have accepted, and the blockade was still in place. Keep in mind that only limited rationing was finally introduced in April 1918 in Britain, most things were still not rationed even then!

If there was a frail army on the Western Front, it wasn't German

History tends to suggest otherwise as it was the German army that broke, the others performed admirably.

and certainly wasn't the AEF.

You seem to have a massive insecurity complex on this subject, nobody has said the AEF was fragile. It had very high morale, but took time and higher losses than were needed by using already discredited tactics. You are over-compensating and it shows.

[Plain Old Dave]

Discredited tactics.

Another interesting turn of phrase. The US Army's most recent institutional experience in large scale combat was the Civil War, specifically the advances through Central Virginia and Georgia. While the Army of Tennessee in Georgia was ineptly led, Lee and the ANV were determined to make Grant pay for every inch of advance through Virginia. But Grant still prevailed.

So, the Argonne wasn't discredited tactics at all. It was the same tactics in similar terrain with a similarly dedicated enemy that had succeeded 50 odd years before. The enemy is in a thick forest. All the fancy tactics in the world won't smoke him out. Only brutal and up close battle will.

We got it done in the Wilderness, and got it done down in the Argonne

[Richard Anderson]

Discredited tactics.

Another interesting turn of phrase. The US Army's most recent institutional experience in large scale combat was the Civil War, specifically the advances through Central Virginia and Georgia. While the Army of Tennessee in Georgia was ineptly led, Lee and the ANV were determined to make Grant pay for every inch of advance through Virginia. But Grant still prevailed.

So, the Argonne wasn't discredited tactics at all. It was the same tactics in similar terrain with a similarly dedicated enemy that had succeeded 50 odd years before. The enemy is in a thick forest. All the fancy tactics in the world won't smoke him out. Only brutal and up close battle will.

We got it done in the Wilderness, and got it done down in the Argonne

I must confess I am truly astonished at this line of reasoning. Perhaps it is a misunderstanding of what tactics are? "Tactic” comes from the Greek “taktikos”, which translates as “the art of ordering or arranging” and is generally accepted as referring to the art or science of disposing military or naval forces for battle and maneuvering them in battle. However, tactics in warfare tend to be somewhat age specific and change according to changes in weapons, organization, and communications. Thus, the linear infantry tactics, controlled by written messages and semaphore, using mostly single-shot muzzle-loading black powder rifles, and supported by direct-fire artillery placed close to the line of battle, as practiced by the armies of the American Civil War, were quite different from the tactics initially used by the American Army in the Great War, which were very different from those developed by the British and French and later utilized by American forces in the Great War.

That you imagine the tactics of Grant and Lee were the same as those of Pershing explains a lot of your apparent confusion.

[Terry Duncan]

Discredited tactics.

Another interesting turn of phrase. The US Army's most recent institutional experience in large scale combat was the Civil War, specifically the advances through Central Virginia and Georgia. While the Army of Tennessee in Georgia was ineptly led, Lee and the ANV were determined to make Grant pay for every inch of advance through Virginia. But Grant still prevailed.

So, the Argonne wasn't discredited tactics at all. It was the same tactics in similar terrain with a similarly dedicated enemy that had succeeded 50 odd years before. The enemy is in a thick forest. All the fancy tactics in the world won't smoke him out. Only brutal and up close battle will.

We got it done in the Wilderness, and got it done down in the Argonne

I am glad Richard answered this before I saw it as I am really rather lost for words over just how mistaken your perception of these events is. I notice you did not bother to engage further over your own question as to if I had read Mosier, is this the only book on land warfare in WWI you have read? Quite what do you mean by 'brutal up close and personal battle'? Assault and combat with the bayonet?