End of the War

Why did Ludendorff gamble all in March 1918?,
The Spring Offensive,    The Hundred Days ,    End of the War

In March 1918, the German Army launched its Spring Offensive, the Kaiserschlacht (Kaiser’s Battle), a massive ‘make-or-break’ spring offensive designed to storm and defeat the allies on the Western Front.  The aim was to destroy the British Army in Northern France, and push the French back to Paris. 

In the end, it was ’break’ and Germany lost the war.  Why did the German General Ludendorff risk such a gamble? 

Going Deeper

The following links will help you widen your knowledge:

Basic account from Revision World

Voices of WWI: The German Spring Offensive (plus transcript) - IWM

Voices of WWI: August 1918 (plus transcript) - IWM

Voices of WWI: Advance to Victory (plus transcript) - IWM

YouTube

Solid narrative video from Epic History

5-minute summary of The Hundred Days

Why did Ludendorff gamble all in March 1918?   [ARABS]

1. America: America’s entry into the war would overwhelm Germany’s limited resources; by Spring 1918 10,000 American troops a week were arriving in France; there was an urgency to mount the attack before the Allies became too strong to defeat.

2. Russia: The Russian Tsar Nicholas II had abdicated in March 1917, but the Provisional Government which took over had tried to continue fighting.  In October 1917, therefore, Germany had helped smuggle Lenin into Russia, who led the Bolshevik revolution in November 1917.  Lenin had no interest in helping the capitalist/imperialist nations of France and Britain, and the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (3 March 1918) took Russia out of the war … and made available for the Western Front a million battle-hardened German troops from the Eastern Front.

3. Allies: Germany’s allies had reached the point where they could fight no longer.  In 1918, Austro-Hungary was starving and on the point of collapse.  There were mass-desertions from the Ottoman armies.  Bulgaria was threatened by Greece, which had declared for the Entente in June 1917.

4. Blockade: By Spring 1918 the U-Boat campaign had failed to damage Britain -- whilst the British blockade and a harvest failure was reducing Germany to starvation.  The communism that Germany had promoted in Russia was beginning rear its head in Germany.

5. Stormtroopers: The German Army had developed new tactics for a war of movement.  The best soldiers were creamed off to form ‘stormtrooper’ units; they attacked quickly, supported by a ‘rolling barrage’, but pushed on past strong-points, which were mopped up by following units.  The German generals believed that Britain’s setbacks at Passchendaele and Cambria had reduced the morale of her army

The Spring Offensive

Events

• Operation Michael (Somme Offensive) launched on 21 March, over-running the forward positions of the British Fifth Army towards Amiens.

• When Operation Michael ground to a halt, Operation Georgette (Lys Offensive) took over on 9 April, attacking Portuguese troops in the Hazebrouk area and heading towards the coast.  Georgette was similarly followed by Blücher–Yorck (Aisne Offensive, 27 May towards the Marne), then Gneisenau (9 June: towards Paris – failed) and finally and fizzling-out Friedensturm (15 July)..

• In June, the Germans were only 50 miles from Paris, and there was panic.

• In July, however, the Offensive ground to a halt.

• On 8 August the Allies counter-attacked.  In just over 3 hours, the German front line was overrun.  In total, the Allied forces captured 29,144 prisoners, 338 guns, and liberated 116 towns and villages.  It was the ‘Black Day’ of the German Army.

Why did the Spring Offensive fail?  [LEADS]

1. Leadership: The campaign was hastily-and poorly-planned.  Although the changes in target bewildered the Allies, they seemed to have no coherence or clear end objective.

2. Exhaustion: as in 1914, the attackers were required to advance on foot as well as fight.

3. Allies: The Allied Forces did not break and flee, they retreated in good order, had massive supports available to them, and unlimited ammunition.

4. Depletion: putting your best soldiers in the attacking units meant a powerful initial attack, but that meant they suffered the most casualties, and the troops replacing them were of increasingly inferior quality.

5. Supplies: as in 1914, the attack ran ahead of its supports and supplies.  Ravenous German soldiers broke off their attacks to loot food depots.

The Hundred Days

Events

• The Battle of Amiens – The British Fourth Army broke through the German lines, and tanks pushed on through German rear positions.  When the attack faltered, Haig disobeyed an order from Foch to continue attacking, and instead launched a fresh offensive by the Third Army on Albert (21 August), and then another by the First Army on Arras (26 August).

• The Meuse-Argonne offensive (beginning 26 September) and the Battle of St Quentin Canal (29 September) broke through the Hindenburg Line.  General Ludendorff reported that “the situation of the [German] Army demands an immediate armistice in order to save a catastrophe”.

• Canadian troops reached Mons (where the BEF fought their first battle of the war) at 4am on 11 November 1918.  They were surrounded by jubilant civilians.

• Armistice: fighting on the Western Front continued right up to the last minute until finally, at 11am on 11 November 1918, the Armistice came into effect and hostilities ceased.  The last soldier to die was American soldier Henry Gunther, one minute before the armistice.

• Cost: the Allies suffered perhaps 700,000 casualties, and the Germans three-quarters of a million, with many becoming prisoners of war.  The Meuse-Argonne is the bloodiest battle the United States military has ever fought, with over 26,000 killed and 95,000 wounded.

Why did the Hundred Days Campaign Succeed?  [OCATAG]

1. Overall strategy: French General Ferdinand Foch was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the Allied Forces on the Western Front in March 1918.  He imposed a coordinated strategy.

2. Combined arms approach : infiltration tactics with artillery support, and especially:

3. Aircraft: Allied aircraft outnumbered the German five to one.  Control of the skies enabled the Allies to know the German positions whilst concealing their own.

4. Tanks: in the battle of Amiens on 8 August, the Australian Corps and Canadian Corps spearheaded the attack and advanced quickly behind the 534 tanks.

5. Americans : more than a million and fresh!! The attack on the St Mihiel salient (12-15 September) was the first and only American led attack during the First World War.

6. German troops : were demoralised and starving.  Around 30,000 German soldiers surrendered during the Battle of Amiens.

End of the War 

1. 6 October: Austria-Hungary collapsed; Yugoslavia, Poland and Czechoslovakia proclaimed their independence..

2. 30 October: Turkey signed an armistice with the Allies.

3. 3 November: Kiel Mutiny: Germany’s sailors refused to go to sea when ordered, and set up Russian-style ‘soviets’.  There were Bolshevist-style uprisings in Munich, Stuttgart and Berlin.  (This frightened the Allies as much as it did the Germans, and made an Armistice urgent.)

4. 7 November: Armistice negotiations began; the German government had asked the US for an armistice (on the basis of Wilson’s ‘Fourteen Points’) in September, and again on 4 October.

5. 9 November: Kaiser Wilhelm abdicated and fled to Holland.  A German republic was proclaimed with Friedrich Ebert heading a new provisional government.

6. 11 November: At 11am on 11 November 1918, in a train carriage at Compiègne, the Armistice was signed and hostilities ceased.