Initiative is not necessarily rewarded. General Sir Hubert Gough gets a poor press for his performance in command of Fifth Army in March 1918, notwithstanding controversies pertaining to his earlier decisions at the Somme and Third Ypres. With his removal from command, Gough was made a convenient scapegoat for the reverse suffered by his army, and for that suffered by the BEF as a whole. Yet given the unfavourable local force ratios he dealt with, typically 1:4, Gough had handled his army competently enough during the first week of the German offensive in one of the most taxing operations of war – the withdrawal. In particular, he had surely made the correct decision on 21 March 1918 in pulling back III Corps to the Crozat Canal. Indeed, on that fateful day Haig had recorded that ‘with my approval, Gough decided to withdraw from the sector between La Fère and the Somme to the St Quentin Canal’.32 By initiating a delaying battle rather than maintaining a futile forward defence, Gough probably saved III Corps, if not a larger part of his army, from destruction.
Général de Division Charles Emmanuel Marie Mangin, although limogéd (sacked) as the commander-in-chief of the French Sixth Army following the abortive Nivelle offensive of April–May 1917, was luckier than Gough. Unlike the British Fifth Army commander who remained on half pay for the rest of the war, Mangin was given a further chance that restored, if not made, his reputation in the summer of 1918.33 A highly controversial figure in the French Army, nicknamed the ‘Butcher’ for his alleged disregard for casualties, Mangin was appointed commander-in-chief of the French Tenth Army prior to the Second Battle of the Marne.34 His army defended the western side of the ‘Marne’ salient (also known as the Château-Thierry pocket) some 25 miles deep and 37 miles wide achieved by German forces during Operations Blücher and Gneisenau in May–June. Mangin is given much credit for his personal initiative and organizational agility during the planning and mounting of the French counter-attack of 18 July 1918, which can be regarded as a decisive turning point of World War I.35
On 15 July 1918, Ludendorff opened what turned out to be his last great offensive on the Western Front. Although its aim was to capture the city of Reims, it was in fact designed to draw in as many Allied reserves as possible, and so set the conditions for a subsequent attempt to defeat the BEF (Operation Hagen) in Flanders, much further to the north. Operation Marneschutz-Reims, having achieved only a limited penetration across the Marne River to the west of Reims, culminated after three days of hard fighting. Yet both Foch and Mangin had already started thinking about attacking the Germans’ weakly defended western flank well before the Germans mounted their own offensive.
On 14 June Foch had written to Pétain suggesting that ‘there would be advantages, as soon as circumstances permit, in mounting an offensive action aimed at giving us mastery of the plateau dominating Soissons to the west’. On receipt of this direction via his army group commander (Général de Divison Émile Fayolle), Mangin submitted proposals to seize a tract of open ground immediately to the east of the Forest of Villers-Cottérêts (part of the larger Forêt de Retz). Gaining approval, he launched a series of small-scale attacks between 15 June and 3 July to secure this area as a suitable line of departure for his counterstroke. Believing that the situation was now ripe for an even larger-scale operation, perhaps leading to the ‘elimination of the Marne salient’, Mangin advised on 5 July:
[Achieving] surprise is perfectly possible. On the one hand the forest provides the means of concealing the concentration of the infantry until the last moment; on the other, the constant redeployment of artillery along the front of 10th Army during the last three weeks will in all likelihood hinder the enemy in detecting the installation of fresh batteries in the area of Villers-Cottérêts.36
While Pétain favoured an immediate launch of the operation, Foch demurred, considering that it should be conducted in conjunction with one mounted by the French Fifth Army in the opposite direction from the south of Reims – but only when the timing was right. He sensed that the counter-blow should follow once the German offensive operations had culminated. After further planning, it was determined that both arms of the attack would be directed towards the high ground in the centre of the salient at Fère-en-Tardenois.
Although Mangin had already much of his preparation and planning for his counterstroke well in hand, at Foch’s urging, on 12 July Pétain issued new instructions concerning offensive operations. His Directive No. 5 emphasized the importance of ‘simple, audacious and rapid attacks’. It set out conditions for their success including: the ‘training of commanders, staffs and troops’; ‘secrecy of preparations’; an ‘initial surprise attack’; the ‘rapid execution and development in depth of the attack’ and its ‘immediate exploitation’. Notably, the Directive required simple and concise orders, stressing:
It will be left for the most part to the initiative and the temperament of each [commander] for the accomplishment of their mission; better a simple plan of manoeuvre, executed by those who understand it, than a better plan, which is less adapted to the temperament of those undertaking it.37
On 13 July, two days before the launch of Marneschutz-Reims, Pétain ordered that the twin French counter-strokes should begin on 18 July. Keys to the success of the operation, as Mangin had stressed, would be strictest operations security, concealment, deception, and the achievement of surprise. To ensure tactical overmatch, the French Army assembled very significant forces for the Tenth Army, which would be supported by the Sixth Army to its south.38 Fortunately for the Allied cause, in response to Marneschutz-Reims, Foch countermanded Pétain’s attempt to delay Mangin’s attack and to strip him of resources.39
The Tenth Army’s counter-stroke (also termed the battle of Soissons), spearheaded by XX Corps (the Moroccan Division with the 1st and 2nd US divisions), achieved the desired tactical surprise and penetrated about four miles on 18 July. However, this gain was about half that expected despite the heavy air and artillery support, and the impressive employment of tanks. Furthermore, at the end of the first day Pétain denied Mangin the additional forces required for immediate exploitation, thereby negating an important condition for success enunciated in Directive No. 5.
Under pressure on both their flanks, the Germans reorganized their defences in depth over the next few days and so prevented the link-up of French forces at Fère-en-Tardenois. In what then became a gruelling attritional battle of nearly three weeks’ duration, rather than one of grand manoeuvre, the Germans were forced to withdraw progressively from the Marne salient. Apart from the physical damage inflicted on the German Army (ten divisions had to be broken up), one result of the Allied counter-blow was the psychological effect on Ludendorff. Correlli Barnett highlights his ‘three days of virtual mental paralysis following the news of 18 July 1918’.40 Unsurprisingly, Ludendorff makes no mention of any such trauma in his memoirs, only glibly conceding that the ‘attempt to make the nations of the Entente inclined to peace before the arrival of the American reinforcements by means of German victories had failed’.41 And so it had.
The enduring value in this case study lies not in the tactical method employed by Mangin, but rather in how he recognized the opportunity for a decisive counter-blow and ‘sold’ his plan to his superiors, Général de Divisions Fayolle, Pétain, and Foch; and in how they expanded his proposals into a winning design for battle. Hence the counter-stroke of 18 July 1918 represents a good example of collective operational-level design and initiative, albeit one based on Foch’s and Mangin’s original ideas. Mangin excelled in preparing his multinational army for battle: his operation confirmed the age-old benefits of surprise, and associated deception measures. Furthermore, the resulting victory at the battle of the Second Marne was an Allied one: French-led, but with significant American, British, and Italian forces involved. Germany’s military locker was now laid bare. As a result, Ludendorff had to abandon his plans for Operation Hagen and the strategic initiative now passed irretrievably to the Allies. The Franco-British battle of Amiens-Montdidier, which opened on 8 August
(the ‘black day’ of the German Army), followed – initiating the ‘Hundred Days’ campaign of the ‘advance to victory’.42
Conclusion
In his memoir of the 1944–45 campaign in North-west Europe, Eisenhower famously observed that a ‘professional sequel’ to war is ‘the study and evaluation of its lessons’.43 Thus it behoves all militaries to thoroughly analyse past operations. Despite the passage of a hundred years, there is still much to learn from World War I generally, and from the Western Front in 1918 specifically. This chapter has described the various interdependencies that affected the German and Allied armies alike, whether across or within theatres of war. Many of these, such as the requirement for trust and mutual support between coalition partners, have an enduring quality. Likewise, the Western Front remains a rich source of useful examples of innovation and initiative, be they technical or tactical, or a combination thereof.
The lessons of war reflected both continuities and changes, reflecting national perspectives and traditions – as in the exercise of command. In the British case, the Kirke Report of 1932 rested its observations on previously published official histories. Although the Reichswehr under von Seeckt was quicker off the mark with its detailed studies of the early 1920s, both the British and German armies addressed to varying degrees the requirements of mobile war – rather than institutionalizing the lessons of trench warfare. For the British, that was perhaps the greatest doctrinal legacy of the fighting of 1918. While the Germans always anticipated recreating a mass army from the cadre of the Reichswehr, in practice the British Army reverted to its pre-1914 type – one of colonial policing. As a result, very quickly it lost both its feel and taste for large-scale operations, let alone manoeuvre at echelons above division, as seen in the ‘Hundred Days’ campaign. Never again would a British general officer command as large a force as Haig did.44
Meanwhile, during the inter-war period the French derived their concept of a methodical battle (la bataille conduit) under the tutelage of Debeney and other like-minded officers. With their preference for firepower over manoeuvre, centralized command, and a step-by-step, strictly phased approach to battle, the French drew more inspiration from the First Army’s action at Montdidier of 8–11 August 1918 than they did from the Tenth Army’s counter-stroke at the Marne during the previous month. Close tactical control of the battlefield, designed to minimize casualties and to guarantee limited success, was preferred over embracing larger risk for bigger potential operational gains. Had Mangin rather than Debeney been the father of French doctrine following World War I, then perhaps a different conceptual path might have emerged. It could have included, for instance, an emphasis on generating a fluid, mobile battle, which required decentralized command. It remains an intriguing thought.
So how far should one attempt to learn lessons from past wars if the conditions of the next may prove startlingly different to those presently predicted? While no army can hope to anticipate these precisely, it may nonetheless take an informed view as to the character of future conflict. Again, history may guide us. Bearing in mind that World War II would break out within seven years of its publication, the Kirke Report concluded presciently:
In looking back at the war and all its lessons we must not overlook the most important lesson of all, viz, all wars produce new methods and fresh problems. The last war was full of surprises – the next one is likely to be no less prolific in unexpected developments. Hence we must study the past in the light of the probabilities of the future, which is what really matters. No matter how prophetically we may be, the next war will take a shape far different to our peace-time conceptions.
With specific regard to training, the Report added, ‘In order to cope with this upset to our preconceived ideas our leaders must be versatile, mentally robust and full of common sense and self-reliance. To produce this sort of mentality must be the object of our training.’45
Engendering this sort of adaptability and initiative institutionally, perhaps, represents the greatest teaching lesson of all from World War I. But such an approach must also rest on sound, forward-looking, doctrine and training, and not one derived from a particular perspective of previous warfare, potentially based on faulty historical analysis. The differences between French and German doctrinal development in the inter-war period, and not least the outcome of the battle of France in 1940, surely highlight this point. As Doughty has sagely noted,
By over-reliance on the historical example as the correct model of operations, the French doctrine for the methodical battle was moulded more by past experiences than by technological or conceptual advances, or by careful analysis of more recent wars.46
In this light, the broader lessons of interdependence, innovation, and initiative from the Western Front in 1918 surely remain worthy of study, as is its doctrinal legacy.
* * *
*The author wishes to acknowledge the kind advice and assistance he has received from Dr Tim Gale, Dr Matthias Strohn, and Major General (Ret.) David T. Zabecki PhD in researching and writing this chapter; and from Mr Bob Evans of the British Army Historical Branch in providing access to a number of important British Army publications of World War I and the inter-war period.
ENDNOTES
Foreword
1A staff ride is an instructional military exercise involving the study of a military problem on a particular piece of ground (often an historical battle studied at its site) as a means to teach doctrine or rehearse operational plans. It was a method developed by Generalfeldmarschall Helmuth von Moltke the Elder as Chief of the Prussian Großer Generalstab from 1855–88 and remains an effective, efficient, and frequent mechanism for military instruction today.
2In several instances this diversity reveals aspects of historical controversy; as ever there is no universal version of historical truth.
3The British Army’s Leadership Code requires our leaders to: lead by example; encourage thinking; apply reward and discipline; demand high performance; encourage confidence; recognize strengths and weaknesses; and strive for team goals.
4Although of course the global war did not end neatly in November 1918 and the British Army had to fight on in Russia, Turkey, and Iraq.
Chapter 1
1The other defeated nations had to sign similar treaties: Austria at St Germain on 10 September 1919, Bulgaria at Neuilly on 27 November 1919, Hungary at Trianon on 4 June 1920, and the Ottoman Empire at Sèvres on 10 August 1920. On the treaties and the immediate criticism of them, see Carole Fink, ‘The Peace Settlement, 1919–1939’, in John Horne (ed.), A Companion to World War I (Oxford: Blackwell, 2012), pp. 543–557, here p. 546. For an in-depth description of the Treaty of Versailles negotiations, see H. W. V. Temperley (ed.), A History of the Peace Conference of Paris, published under the auspices of the British Institute of International Affairs, 6 vols, (London: Frowde and Hodder and Stoughton, 1920–1924).
2Quoted in Georg Alexander von Müller, The Kaiser and his Court (London: Macdonald, 1961), p. 344.
3Sönke Neitzel, Weltkrieg und Revolution 1914–1918/19 (Berlin: be.bra verlag, 2008), p. 75. On the battle, see John and Eileen Wilks, Rommel and Caporetto (Barnsley: Pen & Sword, 2001)
4See Alan Palmer, The Gardeners of Salonika. The Macedonian Campaign 1915–1918 (London: Faber and Faber, 2009).
5For the war in the Levant see Rob Johnson, The Great War & the Middle East (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016).
6Named after Alexander Kerensky, first Minister of War and then Prime Minister of the new regime until he was toppled by the Bolsheviks in the October Revolution.
7Peter Lieb, ‘The German Occupation of the Ukraine, 1918: Blitzkrieg and Insurgencies’, in Matthias Strohn (ed.), World War I Companion (Oxford: Osprey, 2013), pp. 210–225.
8Stéphane Audoin-Rouzeau and Annette Becker, 14–18. Understanding the Great War (New York, Hill and Wang, 2002), pp. 22. For a general discussion of these figures, see Jennifer D. Keene, ‘The United States’ in: Horne, A Companion to World War I, pp. 508–
523, here p. 517.
9Stephen Broadberry and Mark Harrison, The Economics of World War I (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), pp. 7 and 10. For a discussion of the US economic figures, also see David Stevenson, With our Backs to the Wall: Victory and Defeat in 1918 (London: Penguin, 2012), pp. 350–370.
10Paul Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers: Economic Change and Military Conflict from 1500–2000 (London: Random House, 1987), p. 557.
11Charles Gilbert, American Financing of World War I (Westport: Praeger, 1970), p. 221.
12For a discussion of this, see Dieter Storz, ‘ “Aber was hätte anders geschehen sollen?” Die deutschen Offensiven an der Westfront 1918’, in: Jörg Duppler and Gerhard P. Groß (eds), Kriegsende 1918: Ereignis, Wirkung, Nachwirkung (Munich: Oldenbourg, 1999), pp. 51–96.
13Martin Kitchen, The German Offensives of 1918 (Stroud: Tempus, 2001), p. 16. This book offers a good introduction to all of the German offensives in the West in 1918. Short overviews of the individual battles (not only the German offensives) on the Western Front are also provided in Mungo Melvin (ed.), The First World War Battlefield Guide, vol. I, The Western Front (Andover: [British] Army Headquarters, second edition 2015). The German official history provides an in-depth narrative of the offensives: Reichsarchiv, Der Weltkrieg 1914–18, vol. XIV, Die Kriegführung an der Westfront im Jahre 1918 (Berlin: Mittler und Sohn, 1944).
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