Somme As A Victory: Flashcards
Explain how the Battle of the Somme made the army better.
A more professional and effective army emerged from the battle. And the tactics developed there, including the use of tanks and creeping barrages, laid some of the foundations of the Allies’ successes in 1918.
Explain how the alliance of Britain and France was important.
The Somme also succeeded in relieving the pressure on the French at Verdun. Abandoning them would have greatly tested the unity of the Entente.
Provide evidence that Germany lost to the Allies.
In the spring of 1917, the Germans retreated to the Hindenburg Line, a shortened defensive position. This move was a direct consequence of troop shortages resulting from the Somme fighting. The Germans feared another Somme. Therefore, the British did manage to inflict heavy losses on the German.
One German officer described the Battle of the Somme as ‘the muddy grave of the German Field Army: That army never fully recovered from the loss of so many experienced junior and noncommissioned officers.
Explain Haig’s view on the matter.
Douglas Haig, the commander of the British Expeditionary Force, on the other hand, offered a justification of the Somme campaign in a despatch dated December 23 1916 which was published in The Times a week later. He wrote:
“The objective of [the] offensive was threefold:
- To relieve the pressure on [the hard-pressed French at] Verdun.
- To assist our allies in other theatres by stopping any further transfer of German troops from the Western front [to the Eastern or Italian fronts].
- To wear down the strength of the forces opposed to us.”
He believed that achieving that justified the Somme, no matter what the cost was.
Explain the controversy about the first day.
People normally only focus on the negative aspects of the first day and look no further, but the French, for their part, managed to take all their objectives and suffered very few casualties.
What happened on July 14th?
Four British divisions made an attack at dawn, and caught the Germans by surprise. They were able to secure Longueval Ridge by mid-morning.
What happening during December?
On December 12 1916 Germany and Austria- Hungary proposed that peace negotiations be begun through the representatives of Switzerland, the United States, and Spain. On December 20 President Wilson of the United States called upon Germany and Austria-Hungary to make their proposals more specific but they declined to do so. Ten days later the Allies rejected the proposals as unworthy of serious consideration. The significance of this usually overlooked episode is surely that the Germans were no longer confident of winning the war.
