Jutland: the battle that won the First World War | History Extra Directory Jutland: the battle that won the First World War The British press declared it a disastrous defeat, and the public despaired. But, argues Nick Hewitt, the battle of Jutland, fought in the North Sea 100 years ago this month, ensured that Germany would never prevail in the First World War... This article was first published in the May 2013 issue of BBC History Magazine Tuesday 31st May 2016 BBC History Magazine - 5 issues for £5 The 1st German Armoured Cruiser Squadron on the morning of the battle of Jutland. “The spell of Trafalgar has been broken,” crowed Kaiser Wilhelm after the battle, but the Germans would never threaten British naval hegemony again. (Topfoto) Between the hazy late afternoon of 31 May 1916 and the grey dawn of 1 June, more than 100,000 British and German seamen aboard 250 warships fought a brutal naval engagement. They were battling for control of the North Sea, global oceanic trade and, ultimately, victory in the First World War.

For the British it became known as the battle of Jutland. For the Germans it was the Skagerrak. By the end, 25 ships had been sunk, almost one in 10 of those sailors was dead, and Europe’s fate had been decided. For both sides, this battle was a new experience. The British had been the undisputed masters of the seas since the end of the Napoleonic Wars, more than 100 years earlier. However, the last time the Royal Navy had fought a sea battle against an enemy fleet, it had entered the fray with wooden sailing ships armed with muzzle-loading cannon. The service now went to war in armoured, steel ships, powered by steam engines and armed with breech-loading rifled guns in revolving turrets. Uninterrupted peace in western Europe had arguably led to complacency, failure of imagination and tactical stagnation. Nevertheless, the Royal Navy was still the most powerful navy in the world. The Kaiserliche Marine, or Imperial German Navy, had existed only since Germany unified from a multitude of kingdoms and principalities into a single, Prussian-dominated state in 1871.

The German kaiser, Wilhelm II, was determined to make Germany a world power, and in 1897 he had appointed Rear (later Grand) Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz as secretary of state of the Reichsmarineamt, or Imperial Navy Office. Tirpitz was a compelling advocate of the need for a larger navy, and within a year he had persuaded the German parliament to pass the first of a series of naval bills calling for the construction of 19 battleships and 50 cruisers. The British responded in kind, and an expensive arms race between the two powers followed, vociferously supported on both sides of the North Sea by popular nationalist lobbying. In 1906, the British reset the arms race. Under the dynamic leadership of the visionary First Sea Lord, Admiral Sir John ‘Jackie’ Fisher, they emphatically replied to the German challenge by launching the revolutionary battleship HMS Dreadnought – faster, and with better armour and more heavy guns than anything else afloat.

At the same time Fisher developed a new type of ship, the battlecruiser, with heavy guns but light armour to allow exceptional speed, intended to outgun enemy cruisers but able to use its speed to escape enemy battleships. At a stroke, the existing British and German battle fleets were rendered out of date. It was a gamble, but it stemmed from absolute confidence that Britain could outbuild Germany, which was trying to maintain the largest army in Europe at the same time. A postcard showing HMS Dreadnought. When she was launched in 1906, Dreadnought was faster and better armed than any other ship on the world’s oceans, and she instantly rendered the German – and British – battle fleets out of date. (Topfoto) British firepower A new and even costlier arms race followed, with both sides building ‘dreadnoughts’, as the new battleships became known. But the British had judged correctly. Between 1905 and 1914 Germany’s defence budget increased by a staggering 142 per cent, but when Britain declared war on 4 August 1914, the British had 28 dreadnoughts and nine battlecruisers.

The Germans had only 16 dreadnoughts and five battlecruisers. The battle of Jutland was essentially decided two years before the first shots had been fired. The British war plan was to concentrate the Royal Navy’s most modern warships into a Grand Fleet at Scapa Flow, in the Orkney Islands, from where it could maintain a close watch on the North Sea and blockade German trade. The blockade stopped vital imports of food and raw materials, including nitrates from South America, essential for producing both fertilisers and explosives. The German Hochseeflotte (High Seas Fleet) was essentially under house arrest, able to patrol the North Sea but unable to make a meaningful impact on the war. The status quo favoured Britain, which really did not have to take any action at all to be assured of gradually starving its enemy, leaving the French, its continental ally, to fight the land campaign against a progressively more demoralised and weaker foe. The onus was on the Germans to defeat the far bigger Grand Fleet, unlock the door to global trade, and change the outcome of the war.

The first two years of the war at sea were characterised by confrontations that were little more than skirmishes, in the North Sea and further afield, with the Royal Navy rounding up and destroying Germany’s small overseas naval forces. The German fleet was constrained by the kaiser’s unwillingness to risk his expensive battleships. But in January 1916, a new, more energetic officer took command of the High Seas Fleet: Vice Admiral Reinhard Scheer, who persuaded the kaiser to approve a more aggressive strategy. Scheer proposed a plan to give the Germans their holy grail: Kräfteausgleich – equalisation of forces, the numerical parity that was an essential prerequisite for victory. Vice Admiral Franz von Hipper’s battlecruisers were to threaten British trade convoys to neutral Norway, hoping to provoke a response. Scheer assumed that the British would respond in force, but he also assumed that the British battlecruiser force, under Vice Admiral Sir David Beatty, would reach his chosen battlefield before the Grand Fleet because the former was based in Rosyth on the Firth of Forth – closer than the Orkney Islands.

Scheer was gambling that he could destroy Beatty’s squadrons, which had been reinforced by the Royal Navy’s four newest and most powerful dreadnoughts, giving him Kräfteausgleich by the time the Grand Fleet, under Admiral Sir John Jellicoe, arrived. SMS Seydlitz sits in dock at Wilhelmshaven after sustaining heavy damage at Jutland. The Germans lost 11 ships during the battle. (NMRM) Famous outburst Scheer’s plan failed. Beatty and Hipper met at the Jutland Bank off the Danish coast late in the afternoon of 31 May, and Hipper dutifully turned to lead his adversary south on to Scheer’s guns. Early signs were good for the Germans: errors in signalling and gunnery by the British gave their foe a tactical advantage. Two British battlecruisers, HMS Queen Mary and HMS Indefatigable, blew up and sank, thanks in part to poor ammunition-handling procedures.

Queen Mary’s dramatic loss provoked Beatty’s famous outburst: “There seems to be something wrong with our bloody ships today!” But as soon as Beatty sighted the main German fleet he reversed course, pulling the Germans back to Jellicoe’s far more powerful Grand Fleet. When Scheer saw his enemy at sea at full strength, he realised that his only chance for victory had passed. Though half an hour of bitter fighting saw his ships sink another British battlecruiser, Invincible, and three large but obsolete armoured cruisers, he was forced to withdraw into the mist and head for home. The British were poorly prepared for night fighting and, though the battle continued with a series of vicious skirmishes in the dark, the High Seas Fleet returned safely. The Germans got home first, and newspapers announced a German victory. On 5 June, Kaiser Wilhelm travelled to Wilhelmshaven to proclaim that: “The English were beaten. The spell of Trafalgar has been broken. You have started a new chapter in world history.” The Grand Fleet made for home, burying its dead on the way.

The British public had been conditioned for a century to expect another Trafalgar, ending with their enemy’s fleet scattered, sunk or captured, and they were bewildered and bitterly disappointed when that didn’t happen. The Admiralty exacerbated the situation, issuing a communiqué that was achingly honest about British losses and suspiciously vague about German ones. It came out on 3 June, after rumours had already begun to spread like wildfire from the dockyards, and after publication of the German account had – unbelievably – been permitted. The communiqué began: “On the afternoon of Wednesday, May 31, a naval engagement took place off the coast of Jutland. The British ships on which the brunt of the fighting fell were the Battle Cruiser Fleet and some cruisers and light cruisers, supported by four fast battleships. Among these the losses were heavy.” British newspapers were quick to declare the battle a disaster, and the Grand Fleet’s men met a very different welcome to that received by their German counterparts.

Midshipman Henry Fancourt of the battlecruiser Princess Royal remembered going ashore in Rosyth and meeting people who asked: “What’s the navy been doing?” It’s undoubtedly true that the British lost more ships, and many more men: 6,094 dead, compared with 2,551 Germans. But to declare the battle a defeat based on a simple comparison of losses was to oversimplify what was a complicated, subtle strategic situation. Jutland was a clumsily fought and costly battle, followed by a public-relations disaster, but it was a clear win for Britain. Jellicoe was not Nelson, and Jutland was certainly not Trafalgar. But in 1916 Britain did not need Trafalgar. Jellicoe, described by Churchill as “the only man on either side who could lose the war in an afternoon”, knew exactly what was required – and delivered it. Nelson may well have won a more dramatic and convincing victory, but Jellicoe still delivered a victory.

More perceptive observers, such as the London newspaper The Globe, agreed: “Will the shouting flag-waving [German] people get any more of the copper, rubber and cotton their government so sorely needs? Not by a pound. Will meat and butter be cheaper in Berlin? Not by a pfennig. There is one test, and only one, of victory. Who held the field of battle at the end of the fight?” Winston Churchill described Admiral Jellicoe, pictured aboard the dreadnought HMS Iron Duke, “as the only man on either side who could lose the war in an afternoon”. Luckily for Britain, he didn’t. (Topfoto) Flight from the field Across the North Sea, informed Germans were in no doubt about the implications of the flight of the High Seas Fleet from the ‘field’.

Georg von Hase fought at Jutland aboard the battlecruiser Derfflinger and wrote afterwards that: “The English fleet… by its mere continued existence had so far… fulfilled its allotted task.” Admiral Scheer agreed, writing in a confidential report submitted on 4 July that: “The disadvantages of our military-geographical position, and the enemy’s great material superiority, cannot be compensated [for] by our fleet to the extent where we shall be able to overcome the blockade.” The Grand Fleet was a knife permanently held to Germany’s throat, pushing steadily against the national jugular, and nothing that happened at Jutland changed this situation. The Grand Fleet was ready for action again the next day, as strong as before, and it soon increased in size thanks to a steady flow of new and refitted ships joining the fleet. The Imperial German Navy needed to take the initiative again, but many German ships took months to repair and, even when the High Sea Fleet was again battle-ready, the Germans were so badly shaken by the weight of the British response that they never staged another serious challenge. German naval building, unable to compete before the war, could not hope to do so now.

The British blockade continued unabated, eventually leading to a 50 per cent reduction in German food supplies and terrible privations for German civilians. Some areas came close to famine thanks to an unfair and inefficient rationing system: a British intelligence report on the Strasbourg region in July 1917 grimly noted that “their children are dying like flies and coal production is 30 per cent down”. After February 1917, the Germans tried to use submarines (U-boats) to starve the British into submission. At the peak of their attacks in April 1917, U-boats sank an average of 13 ships per day; at one point in early 1918, Britain was reduced to reserves equivalent to just two weeks’ food. But in the end submarine attacks on neutral ships helped bring the US into the war on the side of the Allies, hastening Germany’s defeat. The blockade continued its remorseless erosion of the German will to fight. Many Germans became hungry, war-weary and open to communist anti-war propaganda, sparking a revolution that began on 29–30 October 1918.

The uprising began, appropriately enough, among the demoralised sailors of the High Seas Fleet, who mutinied when ordered to carry out one final operation. On 21 November 1918 they steamed their ships to surrender and internment at Scapa Flow, and on 21 June 1919 the ships were scuttled in an act of defiance against their British jailers. It was the end of the kaiser’s dream of global power. The crew of the German battleship SMS König Albert, pictured following Jutland. (Getty) The long-term, strategic consequences of Jutland were complex and hard to explain to a British public steeped in Trafalgar lore. The debate, focused on the respective roles played by Jellicoe and Beatty, raged well into the interwar period, and still raises the hackles of historians today. It hinged on the question of whether overwhelming victory had eluded the British as a result of Jellicoe’s alleged caution, inflexibility and lack of initiative, or Beatty’s alleged impetuosity, vanity and glory-seeking.

Both admirals, to their credit, stayed largely aloof (at least publicly) from this poisonous internecine conflict, which was fought mainly through the sometimes vitriolic outpourings of their friends and supporters. Beatty’s wife was more outspoken, writing to a family friend on 10 July 1916 that: “There seems to be very little to say except to curse Jellicoe for not going at them as the B.Cs [battle cruisers] did… I hear he was frightened to death in case he might lose a B. ship. I think the real truth he was in a deadly funk.” There is no question that, for the Royal Navy in general and the Grand Fleet in particular, what became known as ‘The Jutland Controversy’ soon overwhelmed objective consideration of the battle, with both sides broadly accepting the myth of defeat to reinforce the case against their rivals. Perhaps inevitably, defeat slowly became the popular perception and, as decades passed, the battle was largely discarded as one of the First World War’s key symbols, engulfed by a torrent of literature, poetry and art, drawing almost exclusively from the tragedy, sacrifice and ultimate triumph of the trench war on the western front.

Rejection of the battle in Britain was perhaps encouraged by its public celebration in Germany, where the ‘victory’ of the Skagerrak was used to offset the ‘shame’ of the 1918 naval mutiny and as the foundation of a new naval tradition. Skagerraktag (Skagerrak Day) was observed in Germany until the end of the Second World War and, when German re-armament gathered pace in the 1930s, the ‘pocket battleship’ Admiral Scheer, cruiser Admiral Hipper and a number of destroyers were named after their Jutland heroes. In Britain, Jutland gradually began to be dismissed as a mere appendage to the arms race story: an inconsequential stalemate that failed to justify Britain’s huge investment in dreadnoughts before 1914. In this centenary year of the battle, a reappraisal of Jutland is long overdue. It is surely high time that this extraordinary encounter, arguably the greatest naval battle in history and simultaneously a triumph and a tragedy on an epic scale, was placed back at the heart of the lexicon of the First World War.

It is, quite simply, the forgotten battle – the clash by which the Royal Navy won the war. Nick Hewitt is head of heritage development at the National Museum of the Royal Navy. His books include The Kaiser’s Pirates (Pen and Sword, 2014). World War I – WWI Military Records – Ancestry June 1914 Assassination of Franz Ferdinand Serbian Gavrilo Princip assassinates Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the throne of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, in Sarajevo after Bosnia-Herzegovina is annexed into Austria. July 1914 Austria-Hungary Declares War on Serbia A month after the assassination of the archduke, Austria-Hungary declares war on Serbia, beginning the First World War. A series of alliances quickly brings Germany, Russia, and France into the conflict. August 1914 Germany Declares War on Russia and France After Germany declares war on Russia and France in the first days of August, the Germany military quickly mobilizes its troops and invades Belgium, who had remained neutral.

August 1914 August 1914 Battle of Tannenberg Germans decimate Russian forces in a maneuver aided by intercepted radio communications and discord among Russian generals. Some 92,000 Russian fighters are taken as prisoners of war. September 1914 First Battle of the Marne Germany invades France, sparking a week-long Franco-British counterattack, including a rush of soldiers to the frontlines in taxis and buses. Strategic offensives by Allies result in a German retreat. October 1914 First Battle of Ypres In October of 1914, the First Battle of Ypres finds countries battling to control ports in Northern France. The muddy struggle of trench warfare is many soldiers’ first taste of the Great War. Dec 1914 First Zeppelin Raids on England In the middle of the night, the Norfolk Coast explodes with terrifying noise as enormous German airships drop bombs on Great Britain for the first time. December 1914 Christmas Truce Around Christmas Day in December 1914, the bloody struggle of the Great War is paused as both the Allies and the Central Powers celebrate a temporary—and unofficial—ceasefire.

January 1915 Bombing Raids on Britain Starting in January 1915, Germany attacks Britain from above, carrying out 50 zeppelin raids in three years. Though the death toll never passes 1,500, the bombings cause panic and hurt morale. March 1915 Churchill Resigns In the fallout of the failed Battle of Gallipoli, Winston Churchill resigns from his governmental post and joins the army, commanding a battalion in the trenches of France. April 1915 Dardanelles and Gallipoli Campaigns In hopes of capturing the Ottoman capital of Constantinople, Russian, British, and French troops land on the Gallipoli Peninsula in April of 1915. Eight months later, defeated Allied troops withdraw to Egypt. April 1915 Second Battle of Ypres Germans unleash poison gas on the Allied forces, the first use of a chemical weapons in a major military offensive. Flooding the trenches, the toxic fumes result in high casualties. May 1915 Zeppelins Attack London Zeppelins began hitting strategic sites in London.

Though Kaiser Wilhelm forbade attacks on royal palaces and residential areas, many civilians lost their lives in the bombings. May 1915 Sinking of the Lusitania On 7 May 1915, a German U-boat torpedoes the British ocean liner Lusitania, killing 1,198—including 128 Americans. The tragedy rouses anti-German sentiment and helps bring the U.S. into the war. September 1915 Battle of Loos The Battle of Loos in September 1915 is one of the largest Allied offensives in the war. Despite the strength of 75,000 British soldiers, “The Big Push” brings minor gains and high casualties. February 1916 Battle of Verdun In February of 1916, the Germans attack the French at Verdun. It turns into the longest battle of the war; fighting continues for nine months and resulted in approximately one million causalities.

May 1916 Battle of Jutland In the war’s only full-scale conflict at sea, German battleships near Jutland, Denmark, face the powerful British fleet on 31 May 1916. After a day of fighting, both sides claim victory. July 1916 Battle of the Somme In July 1916, French and British troops challenge Germany in the Battle of the Somme—a five-month confrontation that includes the bloodiest day in British history when almost 60,000 soldiers fall. January 1917 German U-boat Campaign Desperate for victory, in early 1917 the German Kaiser signs an order resuming unrestricted submarine warfare targeting British and Allied vessels in hopes of disrupting shipments of food and munitions. April 1917 U.S. Declares War on Germany After years of neutrality, the United States officially enters the war on 6 April 1917, providing much needed manpower and financial aid to the Allied cause. July 1917 Battle of Passchendaele The Allies launch an offensive attack against Germany on 31 July 1917 in the Battle of Passchendaele.

Once again, Ypres, Belgium, is turned into a battlefield of mud, mustard gas, and mass casualties. November 1917 Battle of Cambrai In November and December of 1917, tanks became a staple of war during the Battle of Cambrai, when the British deploy almost 500 equipped with machine guns and artillery. December 1917 Treaty of Brest-Litovsk After suffering more than 1.7 million casualties, Russians sign a treaty with leaders of the Central Powers on 3 March 1918, in Belarus, officially withdrawing from the war. March 1918 German Spring Offensive On the first day of spring, 21 March 1918, Germany begins their last offensive against a British-held section of the Western Front. Almost a million Germans are lost in their quest for victory. April 1918 Forming the RAF In response to frequent bombing raids by the Germans, Great Britain forms the Royal Air Force in April 1918. By war’s end it is the largest air force in the world.

April 1918 Battle of the Lys During the three-week battle in April of 1918, British, Portuguese, Belgian, French, and American troops attack German lines in Flanders, Belgium. In the end, casualties ran high on both sides of no man’s land. July 1918 Second Battle of the Marne In the summer of 1918, British troops ally themselves with the French (pictured), Americans, and Italians to defeat Germany along the Western Front. This decisive battle marks the Allied advance to victory. August 1918 100-Days Offensive Starting in August 1918, and lasting through the fall, the Allies launch a series of attacks, hoping to force the Germans out of France, eventually bringing the war to a close. November 1918 Armistice Ends the War In 1918, at 11 a.m. on the 11th day of the 11th month, the Great War officially comes to an end when German and Allied forces sign a ceasefire in Compiègne, France.

First World War.com - Feature Articles - Germany During World War One Feature Articles - Germany During World War One Introduction The Great War, World War One, consisted of two stages: conventional warfare that lasted from 1914 to 1916, and a war of desperate expedients, when both sides struggled for their own existences, lasting until the end. The two sides of the war consisted of the Allied Powers (France, Great Britain, Russia, the United States, and other smaller counties) and the Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Turkey/Ottoman Empire, along with other smaller country support). Though Germany turned out to be the Central Power most involved in the war, there is little or no evidence that the Germans had planned for war. There are several fundamental causes that had brought the world to the brink of war: nationalism, imperialist competition, militarism, and the build up of pre-war alliances. These growing appearance of these factors perhaps inevitably led to what was called the Great War, World War One. June 22nd - Conflict Begins The war began as a chain of events that revolved around several alliances made between countries.

These pre-war alliances called for the defence of various countries under attack, and all of the major players in the war had made these alliances. These alliances combined with tensions between militarily active countries set the world up for a major war. The chain of events that led up to the war began on June 22nd 1914, when a Serbian student named Gavrilo Princip, who was part of the militant group called the "Black Hand", assassinated Austrian archduke Frances Ferdinand and his wife. The assassination was a result of the nationalism caused by the moulding of the Yugoslavian provinces into a single state. The Serbian government was implicated as being involved in the plot and naturally the Austrians grew angry with them. Austria declared that they would go to war against Yugoslavia, but they were hesitant to do so because Yugoslavia held a defensive treaty with Russia. Germany had made a defensive treaty with Austria, so they promised that if Austria went ahead and made a move against Yugoslavia, Germany would defend them from Russia. Germany then told Austria to begin the war, and if it evolved into a larger conflict, Germany would support them. Germany had a variety of reasons for being willing to be involved in this war.

One of these reasons was that the assassination was an example of the Hapsburg's loss of control and if Austria were to decline to Germany's offer, Germany would be completely surrounded by enemies.1 The German government also knew that Russia would lose a major base in Europe if they were to lose Yugoslavia. An annexation of Yugoslavia would also leave Greece and Bulgaria open to attack. Germany believed that Russia would back down like they had in 1908, when Austria had annexed parts of Serbia. The only difference from the earlier conflict was that in 1908 Russia was also suffering from a revolution, but by 1914 Russia had not only stopped the revolution, but they also had recovered enough to fight against Germany or Austria. Aside from that though, Germany had recently made an alliance with Turkey, and that made them confident that they could defeat any European country. Another benefit that Germany had was that England would not enter the war if Russia were the aggressor. Little did Germany know that the general consensus around Europe was that even if Serbia had been involved in the assassination it was not grounds to conquer it. The Schlieffen Plan Germany had been developing plans for invasions into every European country since the time of Bismarck.

One of these plans was called the Schlieffen Plan. The plan basically called for quick, encircling movements that would surround and destroy the enemy. This plan was used for the invasion of France and also for individual conflicts like the Battle of Tannenberg. One of the key points of this plan was that it was absolutely necessary to put all possible force behind the invasion of France and not to hold any soldiers back in reserve. It was Germany's hope to end this war quickly by attacking France immediately and overrunning it before Russia had a chance to mobilize. The violation of this plan was what many consider to have caused the Germans to lose the war. This could easily be compared to Pericles and the Peloponnesan war. He warned the Athenians that the only way they could win the war was if they did not try to expand and colonize. In this example too, they broke the condition and therefore lost the war. Anyway, the plan involved attacking Belgium and then proceeding south into France. Unfortunately for Germany, the Belgians didn't simply step aside for the Germans; they fought back, making it much harder for Germany to carry out the Schlieffen Plan.

Aside from these war plans, Germany also tried to stop countries from getting involved in the war by starting revolutions in them. As we shall see, it worked in Russia but all attempts to start a revolt in Ireland failed. A State Of Imminent War Danger The Germans, in order to prevent England from entering the war, tried to make it appear as if Russia had really started the war. They announced that any conflict between Austria and Serbia was a local conflict in which outside powers should not interfere. Of course, the other European states saw right through this ruse and prepared themselves for a war that would involve all of the great powers. On July 13th, 1914, the Austrians made an ultimatum saying that they would require all Serbs to leave Albania. The Serbians were not willing to agree to any demand that would hurt their government, and they immediately mobilized for war. On July 28th, three days after Yugoslavia refused to yield to their demands, the Austrians officially declared war. The conflict was begun with the intentions of capturing a small part of Serbian territory and then bargaining that land for compliance with their demands.

On July 29th and 30th, Russia began its mobilization with the intent to protect Yugoslavia from Austria. Germany's only stop from entering the war was England. Their main energies were put into trying to keep England out of the war. England, as a result of the outbreak of war, tried to begin peace talks but none of the involved parties complied. Soon after this attempt at peace, the German government decided that England was not going to remain neutral, but they decided to engage in the war anyway. This was another reason the Schlieffen Plan would fail; Britain's entry into the war was not expected, at least not so quickly. On July 30th, Moltke, Germany's military leader, announced a "state of imminent war danger."2 The next day Russia completed its mobilization, but they still maintained that they would not attack if peace talks were to begin. Germany then replied that Russia must demobilize within the next twelve hours. This short deadline shows that Germany was really itching for a war and did not expect Russia to comply in any way. Russia naturally declined to demobilize and Germany used this as an excuse to declare war.

On July 31st William II ordered Germany to fully mobilize its armies. Moltke decided that a war would have to be fought and won on the western front before they could defeat Russia. If the Schlieffen Plan worked, he could concentrate all of his army on the Eastern Front. He went on to demand that Belgium allow him to cross through their country and on into France unopposed. As we shall see later, this refusal to comply was a key factor in the defeat of Germany. August 3rd, 1914 - World War One Begins The war began on August 3rd when Germany declared war on France, saying that they had infringed upon Germany's territory. The German army that took the field August 1914 has been described as the most brilliant the world had ever seen. The day after the declaration of war against France, Germany moved soldiers into Belgium, and the Belgians resisted. Three days later the Germans captured the stronghold of Liege, and Belgium fell. As the opening invasion into Belgium began, England sent an ultimatum to Germany saying that they had to withdraw from Belgium or England would enter the war. England effectively lost any element of surprise by announcing their attack beforehand.

By August 18th Germany had overrun all of Belgium and the German army was gathering on the French border to begin the offensive. Two days later the attack began, and the French were immediately driven out of Lorraine. The Germans continued to advance until they hit France's frontier fortifications. This offensive took the French completely by surprise even though a German defector had already warned them. On August 22-25 the French tried to begin their own offensive but were soundly defeated at the battles of Neuchateau and Longwy. Soon after this failed offensive, the Germans advanced into France from the north and quickly defeated the French at the battle of Namur and the British at the battle of Mans. The Battle At Marne By the end of the initial offensive, August 25th, Germany's front was uncontested by any of the other powers. The Schlieffen plan had stated that the German army should have been in France in 40 days and by the 32nd day the Germans were still 25 miles from the city. This was Moltke's largest mistake- the mistake that would eventually lose the war for the Germans.

He saw that the Germans were doing well in France and therefore decided to send divisions to stabilize the eastern front, which had been compromised by a quick Russian mobilization. By August 27th, the German army had already been greatly lessened by the loss of the forces sent to the eastern front and the loss of the forces sent to survey the land around Antwerp. To add to this, the army was weakened by the siege of Maubeuge and at other forts along the way. The Germans had, on the western front, only 40 of the 52 divisions that had begun the war. This was enough to continue winning, but it became obvious that it was not enough to take Paris as the Schlieffen Plan dictated. On August 30th the Germans began their pursuit of the French army that was retreating towards Paris. The armies were directed to advance to two points near Paris. The emergence of another French army caused Moltke to have to rethink his plan. He ordered the southern armies to advance to the northwest and the northern armies to advance to the southeast. This action was intended to surround the French army.

The German armies were assembled for the new offensive by September 4th but this manoeuvre had made the left flank of the northern army vulnerable. The French noticed this vulnerability and attacked the German front with 52 divisions while they sent a smaller detachment to attack the exposed side. The ensuing battle took place at Marne. The German army turned and defeated the small detachment in three days of fighting, establishing their military superiority over the French. The complete turn to the west that the northern army made caused a gap to form in the northern front. The English army advanced into this opening, thereby placing the Germans in a weak position. Moltke saw this and ordered his army to retreat, and as they were doing so the French army advanced and began to attack the retreating soldiers. The eastern armies tried to resist the attack but Moltke ordered the withdrawal of the northern army due to its precarious position. The result of this battle, the Battle of Marne, was a major swing in the German army's momentum as they were now moving backward for the first time.

"Its [Marne's] loss by Germany meant the failure of the entire Schlieffen plan; the end of any prospect of a short war."3 A short war was basically what the entire German military was counting on as the only way to win the war. When this possibility was taken away, the prospect of winning began to fade. Moltke's lack of judgment in this matter can be attributed to the distance he was away from the actual line of battle. He could not make decisions because he could not see what was going on. The condition of the soldiers was also a factor as reported by a German officer: "Their faces coated with dust, their uniforms in rags, looking like living scarecrows. They march with their eyes closed, singing in chorus so that they shall not fall asleep…It is only the delirium of victory that sustains our men."4 A War Of Attrition - The Trench Forms On September 14th General Erich Falkenhayn replaced Moltke, and by the 15th the western line had been stabilized. By this time the German army was so hurt that even if they could have reached Paris, they could never have taken it.

After the battle, the two lines entrenched themselves as close as 800 yards away from each other. Here was where the trench warfare that caused so many losses began. The giant trench formed the western front, and the battle in the west from then on became a war of attrition. Falkenhayn decided that there was no way to win a war against England, France and Russia put together. He adopted the policy of attrition in order to tire out the western powers. He planned to be merely defensive on the western front while attacking the eastern front. On the days of October 17-30 the battle of Yser was fought, in a last effort to assault the French. The Germans committed all of their last resources to launch this attack on the French front but the battle proved costly and ineffective. The attacks lasted until November 3rd, when Falkenhayn was finally convinced that the west was hopeless and the only place a victory could be won was in the east. "Falkenhayn had to send into the holocaust thousands of half trained volunteers straight from school or the university, commanded by elderly officers.

Enthusiastically singing "Deutschland Deutschland Uber Alles", the youngsters were mowed down in swathes by the expert marksmen of the B.E.F." The Eastern Front While the conflict in the west was developing, Russia was having success with driving the Austrians back and also infringing on German territory. Their basic strategy was to concentrate all of their forces on Austria, but due to the success of Germany in France at the time they sent 28 divisions into East Prussia as a relief force. The Russians had mobilized more speedily than the Germans expected and were therefore able to overrun most of East Prussia before the Germans could react. The eastern general for the German force, Von Prittwtiz-Gaffron, hesitated before making any move. He was immediately deposed of, and on April 23rd General Von Hindenburg and Ludendorff, two of the most influential generals of their time, replaced him. Hindenburg was a veteran of the wars in 1866 and 1870. He was a very careful and calculating general. Ludendorff was one of the nationalistic zealots created by the outbreak of war. Hindenburg decided to attack at once.

He left a small force in Germany and lead 166,000 men against Russia's 200,000. These forces came against each other on August 26-31 at the battle of Tannenberg. The German army performed a perfect Schlieffen plan manoeuvre and encircled the Russian army. They captured 92,000 Russian soldiers while overall 3/5ths of the Russian army was destroyed (at least those in Prussia). The offensive ended at the battle of the Masurian Lakes (September 9-10) wherein the Russians withdrew from the rest of Germany without putting up a fight. The Austrians, on the other hand, were soundly defeated by the Russians due to the lack of coordination between the Austrian and German armies. At the beginning of the war the Germans had not even told the Austrians about the Schlieffen plan and their intentions to invade France. This shows that the Germans did not really care about the Austrians and what had initially caused the war. They acted like they were fighting their own war despite the fact that the Austrians supposedly started it.

By September 13th the Austrians had lost 300,000 soldiers and the entire army had retreated into the mountains. By February the army had lost 1.5 million soldiers. The Austrian army was also defeated at two attempts to invade Serbia. At this point, Austria was effectively out of the war leaving Germany and Turkey alone against the Russians. During October, while the battle of Yser was going on in the west, the German forces launched an offensive and advanced all the way to Warsaw and Iangorad, but by the end of October, a build-up of Russian forces along the border caused the Germans to retreat from Poland completely. Hindenburg moved most of his forces into North Prussia where they could strike against the unprotected northern front of the Russian army. He even got a promise from Falkenhayn of six divisions to join in on the offensive. Unfortunately for Germany, Falkenhayn decided that a withdrawal of western forces would be perceived as a retreat, so the divisions were never sent. Falkenhayn then decided to continue the attack at Ypres and again was defeated. On November 18th, the western army began to break off and slowly go to join the eastern soldiers.

The opportunity for Hindenburg's flanking manoeuvre however, was lost. Though Russia managed to destroy the Austrian army, The Battle of Tannenberg was the event that effectively knocked Russia out of the war. Later on, after the Bolshevik Revolution, the Russians would completely surrender to Germany. 1915 - Germany Slows Down The situation at the beginning of 1915 was definitely not in Germany's favour. The western front showed 90 German divisions against 108.5 Allied. On the eastern front, there were 78.5 German divisions against 93.5 Russian. Falkenhayn decided to leave only enough soldiers to hold the west and to bring the rest over to the east, to fight the Russians. These soldiers took part in the second battle at Masurian Lakes where the Russian army was again completely destroyed. By the last week of January, the Germans had also freed the trapped Austrian forces. The German army joined up with the Austrians and proceeded to break the Russian line in Austria at the beginning of May. The eastern forces continued their success through the summer of 1915, overrunning Poland, Lithuania, Galicia and Latvia.

The Russian casualties were estimated at 200,000. While this was going on in the east, an Allied offensive had begun to liberate France on September 25. Despite a 5:3 soldier ratio, the German army was unable to do anything about it. As a result of this failure, Falkenhayn decided to test his luck with yet another offensive against the French line. He decided to attack the French army's cornerstone at Verdun. The offensive began on February 21, 1916, and met with initial success but was soon stopped. The battle was reduced to a "grim endurance test on a narrow battlefield transformed by rain into a grenade pocked quagmire." Falkenhayn was attempting to "bleed the French white" by exhausting their resources, but the battle proved to be just as exhausting for the Germans as it was for the French. No one ever made any headway but both sides suffered severe casualties. Falkenhayn did not finally call off the attack until July 1916. Soon after the Battle of Verdun, the Allies launched their own offensive with 52 divisions at Somme.

After two months of fighting, Germany's line had only backed up six miles. With the offensives of Verdun and Somme, the casualties for both sides were over 600,000, with both sides losing almost the same number of people. The offensive was renewed in September of 1916. The Germans began to worry about the increasing number of Allied soldiers as well as the invention of the first tanks, a technology which the Germans had not pursued up until then. On the eastern front, the Germans were still making much headway. On August 27th, Rumania, one of the Balkan countries which was sitting on the fence over which side it would join, declared war on Austria and therefore Germany. Rumania did this because Russia promised them Transylvania. The fact that the Russians were also launching an offensive in the area was also a small part of their decision. On August 29, 1916, Hindenburg and Ludendorff were given complete command of the entire eastern front. The first act of these generals was to invade Rumania, and by December 6th, Bucharest was occupied.

The Effect of War Back Home During the fighting in the west and the east the people of Germany were mostly in support of the war. The belief was widespread that even though the war was forced upon the German people, it was for the "Greater Germany" that it could become. When the war started turning against Germany, there was still the general belief that at least they should gain something from their effort. The German people were mostly willing to have peace as long they did not have to give up any land. The government did not want peace because they thought it would be seen as a loss and the liberal party would lose popularity, and perhaps there would be a revolution. This situation can be compared to the conflict between Israel and the PLO, where Israel wants peace but does not want to lose land. Germany, in general, wanted peace, but not at the expense of the land they had taken. When the war was beginning, it had the support from a coalition of the SPD, the Progressives, and the Kaiser's conservative government. As the war continued and was becoming more and more a war of attrition, the SPD, who were already opposed to an offensive war, split into three groups: the Independent Socialists, the SPD and the International Socialists.

The international socialists (Spartacists) were opposed to any war of any kind while the other two groups were still in support of a defensive war. The leaders of the Spartacists, Liebknecht and Luxenburg, held a demonstration against the war on May 1, 1916. They were arrested, and in response to this the workers rose up for their first strike of the war. From this, there can be seen the first seeds of discontent among the people. The German economy was also going through more and more strain as the war went on. In 1914 the German economy was almost completely reliant on outside trade and therefore not ready for a protracted war. They had absolutely no large stocks of guns or ammunition and were forced to employ chemists to find replacements for substances that were made scarce by the war. They discovered things like a replacement for gunpowder ingredients, synthetic rubber, and the use of oil instead of coal in machinery.5 There was such a shortage that riots had already begun in 1916. The armed forces took all the hired labour out of the economy.

The immediate consequences of the war on the economy were more government control of goods and production, army control of what determined economic policy, and an increase in scientific pursuit. Entered World War One The German navy was not very active during World War One. In fact, the only major battle, the Battle of Jutland, was fought on May 31, 1916. Germany was the victor but was still behind in terms of naval superiority. An Allied fleet in the North Sea blockaded Germany, and as a result, Germany declared that they would sink any Allied ship that they find. The Germans initially did not try to get out any further than the Baltic Sea due to an U.S. ultimatum, but in 1917 they began to advance and sink various American ships carrying munitions and reinforcements, thereby drawing the U.S. into the war. 1918 - Germany Makes a Treaty With The Bolsheviks By 1917 and 1918 the German people had begun to lose faith in the war. The government was torn between what the people wanted, a "status quo" peace, and what Hindenburg wanted, a "fruits of victory" peace.

On November 7-8, 1917, a German encouraged revolution, the Bolshevik Revolution, began in Russia. After much conflict, the Communist leader Lenin was appointed their new leader. He wanted peace with Germany because of the instability of his position in the Russian government. On December 20, 1917 the central leaders and Russia met to make a peace treaty. The talks lead to nothing and Germany began its attacks on the Balkan states. Peace talks again resumed with Russia and by 1918 Germany had concluded a peace treaty with the Ukraine. By March 3rd, a treaty was made with Russia. Germany quickly ignored previous treaties and marched straight into the Ukraine, taking Kiev on March 1. From there they proceeded directly into Russia, despite recent treaties. The attack was so effective that the Germans had reached the Caspian Sea by September 1918. On August 27, 1918, the German government decided that they had enough land, and they signed another peace treaty with Russia. At this point, Russia had pretty much surrendered to the Germans.

At that point, Germany also made an alliance with Finland and deposited 150,000 soldiers in their country- soldiers that could have been used in the actual war. The German Army Is Defeated By the summer of 1918 the Germans had concluded most of their business in the east, so half of the eastern army was sent to aid the west. By March there were 190 German divisions in the west opposed to 170 Allied. Ludendorff decided to attack the point where the English and French lines met, hoping to separate the two armies and force the English to withdraw across the sea. On March 21, 71 German divisions prepared to attack the 26 British divisions. The British were overwhelmed and the French were pressed back. In the ensuing battle from March 21-April 5 Germany advanced 35 miles into the line, causing the British to lose 163,000 soldiers and the French to lose 77,000. The Germans tried to follow up on this success by launching an attack on April 9. This attack met with minimal success was basically considered a failure.

Ludendorff then decided to launch a new offensive, this time concentrated on the French lines, in the hopes that the Germans could cut off reinforcements to the British. When the British were in a position where they were unable to secure reinforcements, the Germans would attack the them. The offensive began on May 27th and the Germans were able to force back the French line. By June 3rd the Germans had reached a point five miles from Paris, but the Allies rallied and managed to stop the German advance. Ludendorff began to plan yet another offensive. In June of 1918 the first American soldiers fought the Germans. The Germans began their new offensive on July 15th with 51 divisions, this time against the combined forces of the British, the French, and the Americans. The German army was met with strong resistance and many losses. Three days later, the French began a counter-offensive lead by 600 tanks. The move by the French took the Germans by surprise and the Allies began to slowly push the Germans out of Marne. The German army suffered 30,000 casualties and lost 800 artillery pieces.

The Allies pressed their advantage, and on August 8, 1918, they began a huge offensive that completely broke the German's strength. This was the major turning point in the war, as the Germans not only lost their momentum but also began to lose more and more ground. The offensive was renewed against the German lines and the whole German army began to be pushed back. By September, the Germans had lost 1,000,000 soldiers, reducing their army from 3.5 million to 2.5 million. The previously superior German army was now down 191 divisions to the 400-500 of the Allies. The American involvement in the war rose from 200,000 in March to 2,086,000 at the end of the war. During the days of September 14-30, Allied troops caused the entire Bulgarian front to collapse. At the same time, the Austrians were also negotiating their own peace treaty with the Allies. Meanwhile, a combined French, British, Greek and Serbian army liberated the Balkans, and by November 10 they had moved into Rumania.

Ludendorff accurately summarized the outlook of the war when he said: "The condition of the army demands an immediate armistice"6 An Immediate Armistice Bulgaria (Germany's ally) collapsed in late September, and Austria-Hungary was soon to collapse. With no other choice left, the Germans proposed the armistice on October 3rd. The Allies declared that they would grant it only if Germany made no move to improve its military strength. On October 26th Ludendorff resigned because he was unwilling to sign the armistice. After his departure, the Germans amended the constitution to prevent people like Ludendorff from becoming virtual dictators. Instead, the general was made to require the support of the Reichstag. This shows that the Germans were not completely supportive of the war. The armistice was given to Germany. It basically required that the Germans retreat into their own borders and leave all of their weapons behind. William fled the country and Prince Max was put on the throne just long enough to sign the armistice. The German soldiers began to retreat into their own country and on November 11 the armistice was signed, officially ending the war.

Conclusion During World War One we were still seeing the nationalistic tide that was begun by Otto von Bismarck and would ultimately end after the Second World War. Germany was a country that had just unified forty years earlier, after decisively beating almost every European country. When Kaiser William came into power, he had very expansionist views. Furthermore, he did not have any of the political savvy that was displayed by Bismarck. The downfall of the German people was that they had a leader who was trying to repeat the conquests of the past while lacking the skills to do so. William "cleverly" tried to gain power by finesse and treating the Balkan conflict like the unification wars: localized and defensive. When the other powers saw through this fumbling ruse, he dropped all pretence of political manoeuvring and just started attacking everybody, a policy that would inevitably end with his destruction as he also, at the start of the war, lacked a military mind that could make up for his political bluntness. Moltke and Falkenhayn took a war that should not have been started in the first place and made it even worse by horribly bumbling it.

The people during this time period were only kept going by the leftover nationalism caused by the unification. The war was probably looked at from the point of view of a country that had never lost a major conflict. The German people went to war expecting to win because they knew of nothing else. They had been raised on the tales of the unification wars and to them, this was just another step. Bibliography 1. Holborn, Hajo. A History of Modern Germany 1840-1945. New York: Knopf, 1969, p.415 2. Holborn, Hajo. A History of Modern Germany 1840-1945. New York: Knopf, 1969, p.422 3. Ryder, A. J. Twentieth Century Germany From Bismarck to Brandt. New York: Columbia University Press, 1973, p. 115 4. Holborn, Hajo. A History of Modern Germany 1840-1945.

New York: Knopf, 1969, p.434 5. Ryder, A. J. Twentieth Century Germany From Bismarck to Brandt. New York: Columbia University Press, 1973, p. 154 4. Holborn, Hajo. A History of Modern Germany 1840-1945. New York: Knopf, 1969, p.506

Question: By what name do the British know First World War battle that became known as the "Victory of the Skaggerrak"?
Answer: BATTLE OF JUTLAND