redpill me on WWI. What tactics were missing that made the Western Front devolve into such absurd bullshit?
>>779444
>redpill me
No tactics were missing. Infantry tactics through most of the war in the west were basically the same as in WW2. Light machine guns, mortars, rifle grenades pin the enemy, assault element moves up to close range.
Extensive mechanization and motorization to provide supply to your attacking forces, and even more importantly, to exploit and develop a breakthrough, was what was missing.
Remember that assaults, as in reaching the other side's trench, succeeded regularly. It was holding against the counterattack - with overextended, tired, forces low on supply, against an enemy not suffering from these factors - that was the problem.
Also don't forget that this applies for the relatively cramped frontline in the west. In the east, vast sweeping maneuvers and highly mobile warfare over the plains and fairly open ground was still very common.
>>779444
Defense hadn't caught up with attack yet. There was pretty much no way to counter a well placed machine gun until the tank came along
>>779516
>There was pretty much no way to counter a well placed machine gun until the tank came along
But there was. It's called machine guns, artillery, field guns, mortars, rifle grenades, grenades, small arms fire, flamethrowers, bayonets.
Just apply some common sense. By your 'logic' everyone would just stop and wait for a tank to roll up to blast a machine gun nest in the second war.
Also machine guns were not the big killer of WW1. Artillery was. Like in most big modern conflicts.
>>779511
>Infantry tactics through most of the war in the west were basically the same as in WW2
What? No, not at all.
Not at the start at least, late war tactics heavily resembled early war tactics in WW2. The Germans further improved on their techniques while the rest of the world lagged behind. Ironically the last country to enter the war, the US, was the first to adopt infantry tactics most similar to the Germans, while the British retained their more cautious, reserved and defense oriented tactics throughout the war, and the Russians sought to make up for tactical shortgaps with strategic planning.
Early WWI tactics were little better than Civil War tactics, which were little better than line infantry tactics. The first year of the war was a constant stream of men being sent to their deaths for no good reason, and with no attempts to lessen the casualties on the way over. They thought artillery could suppress the defenders, letting their men simply walk into the enemy trenches to claim it, and this was not the reality at all.
The Eastern Front was significantly more mobile, however. Still, Russian tactics were lacking or outright nonexistent. Most commanders would simply throw bodies at the problem in massed attacks. Not human waves by any means, but they would send large amounts of poorly trained, under equipped, barely led men to attack with little support or long term orders for what the men should do once they achieved their objective. They would often advance without much recon to determine where it would be easiest to attack, and few attempts were made to do more than simply bash against the German and Austrain lines.
For a time it worked, but as casualties mounted in excess of what they could find replacements for the better trained, led and equipped Germans soon pushed them back.
Similar problem Italy had. Not particularly motivated men receiving less than excellent training and officers who barely knew what they were doing.
>>779552
>No, not at all.
>... late war tactics heavily resembled early war tactics in WW2.
It is one or the other, anon.
>Ironically the last country to enter the war, the US, was the first to adopt infantry tactics most similar to the Germans
No, American tactics were by no means most similar to the Germans. Not in WW1, where they originally refused to heed the lessons learned by the other Allies, and definitely nor in WW2, where the American concept of a rifle squad without a dedicated light machine gun but with three fire teams was nothing like the MG-centric German squad tactics.
>Early WWI tactics were little better than Civil War tactics, which were little better than line infantry tactics.
This is getting perhaps a bit into semantics but European infantry tactics of the late 19th century were already ahead of Civil War tactics - which were much closer to linear warfare than what Europe had been seeing at that time. That would be companies or platoons in very loose, well spaced and thin lines of infantry "chains" making use of cover and fire and advance, not the massed regiments prevalent in the Civil War.
> le tommies mindlessly walking into machine gun fire maymay
>>779594
bbbbut muh blackadddder said sooooo
>>779601
People gave the British government a lot of shit a while ago about it, but "here's the final episode of Blackadder Goes Forth, with no context or explanation" was the entirety of my Secondary School education on the First World War.
>>779616
#triggered
Although to tell the truth I've had the chance to get a glimpse at what gets taught at the secondary level these days and I was pleasantly surprised, and by that I mean blown away in a good way.
I'd have expected the bullshit myths about the start of the war or Versailles or indeed the trenches to be alive and kicking but apparently, at least in some places, it's pretty much the cutting edge of WW1 historiography with basically no #trenchfoot or Blackadder or muh sleepwalkers memery.
Heavy indirect artillery was the biggest stifling factor. Indirect artillery was known and studied, but the true effects of it weren't well understood. So when both sides began levying extremely large bore high explosive guns against eachother, well, it was a learning experience. Heavy & reliable machine gun emplacements were the cherry on top, but not the primary reason -- machine guns were used all over the eastern front, after all.
Concept of deep warfare didn't exist, this was in the days of The Grand Flanking Manoeuvre, which didn't much work when the lines extended right to the sea.
>>779552
>The Germans further improved on their techniques while the rest of the world lagged behind.
No, each of them improved on their own techniques. The French 10th Army pioneered infiltration techniques in May-June 1915 at the second battle of Artois, with an advance guard preceded by a rolling barrage, supported by light machine guns such as the Chauchat or Lewis Gun, while squads of Nettoyeurs and engineers cleared the isolated German troops in their wake. The Germans, under Hutier developed virtually the same tactics independently, while the British further elaborated on the Marching fire concept. The Canadian usage of similar tactics at Vimy Ridge in 1917 demonstrated that the Germans were not alone or even standout in their grasp of infiltration, and the AEF was not the "First" to grasp any of these tactics.
Indeed, it was the Germans who lagged behind in 1917, having barely grasped the combined arms value of the tank in pushing the breakthrough and having lost the skies; the use of proto-mechanized infantr, communicating with the tanks as the British did at Cambrai and the French did at Malmaison in close conjunction with a rolling barrage was something the Germans had neither the men, initiative, resources or tanks to grasp by 1917.
>The first year of the war was a constant stream of men being sent to their deaths for no good reason,
The fact that the Germans happened to be encamped on French and Belgian lands is pretty fucking good reason as far as the French, Belgians and their British allies were concerned.
>They thought artillery could suppress the defenders, letting their men simply walk into the enemy trenches to claim it
They thought correctly, it was the implementation that was refined over the years. The rolling barrage was vital in supporting the combined arms attacks of the late war.
>and this was not the reality at all.
But it was. Hell, the lesson taken by the French (correctly) was that "The artillery conquers, the infantry occupies."
>>779762
Sources in advance:
Army Capstone Concept & the Genesis of German World War One Assault Squad & Infiltration Tactics
>https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwiU5KzGoKTLAhWosYMKHZJwDBsQFggdMAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fsmallwarsjournal.com%2Fblog%2Fjournal%2Fdocs-temp%2F487-shunk.pdf&usg=AFQjCNHlqMgC7-Qs7iUWcxN2u-WI_TBq0A&sig2=71skWuTyYm95IX67NKNpJQ
First World War Occasional Paper No. 1 (2015) The Battle of Malmaison - 23-26 October 1917 ‘A Masterpiece of Tactics’
http://www.bcmh.wildapricot.org/Resources/Documents/FWW%20Occasional%20Papers/BCMH_First_World_War_Occasional_Paper_No_1.pdf
Early Trench Tactics in the French Army: The Second Battle of Artois, May-June 1915
>https://www.academia.edu/11829077/Early_Trench_Tactics_in_the_French_Army_The_Second_Battle_of_Artois_May-June_1915
Cambrai 1917: The Birth of Armoured Warfare
>>779762
This makes me wonder, how different WW2 would have been if the Germans didn't have a chance to use the Spanish Civil War as a testing ground for their new doctrines.
>>779854
quite significantly different i suspect
after all it was not some inherent technological, material superiority that was the reason for german quick conquests of early war, "just throw our super tanks at them", but rather tactical and operational, doctrinal brilliance (which funnily enough papered over the cracks of sometimes not the best equipment, i.e. the mass use of the already obsolete pz1/2 in early war)
>>779444
Tactics that would let people make frontal assaults against machinegun emplacements.
>>779877
infantry assaults automatic weapon emplacements to this dan, anon
>>779864
It was French incompetence and luck. Even the German high command was surprised the battle for France was won, let alone won so quickly.
>>779444
Combat was dominated by artillery.
The first years of the war are opposing sides trying to find the right balance and the best techniques. The battles fought in 1915, especially by the British show how a complete lack of artillery support, a lack of communication with soldiers once they went over the top and too high expectations.
It is in 1916, that levels of necessary artillery are first seen. At the Somme, the volume of artillery is there, but the quality isn't.
It is the battles of summer/autumn 1917 by the British which show the success of smaller scale objectives, increased artillery firepower concentrated on s smaller front which worked closely with the infantry. The Offensives at Menin Road, Poelcappelle and Broodseinde were all relatively successful.
This debate cannot just be all about the infantry though. In order to launch successful attacks, you have the better training of nco's, conferences which gave nco's better tactical insight. Units were allowed freedom to develop their own solutions to the problems of modern warfare. Then you had the logistic side. As the attack moves forward, all the railways, roads, ammo dumps, artillery all needs to be moved forward as well unless you want your infantry to be gunned down. In the case of the British, you are taking a Volunteer Army in 1914 and trying to turn it into a Professional one. This takes time. The war industry also took time to get up to scale. Much of the war industry had to be nationalised in order to keep up with demand. The British knew they would not have the required war industry until 1917.
It is no coincidence that by 1917, you see British gains (albeit small). The finally had the industry to support the war, the artillery support to force entry into the German trenches and infantry experienced enough to be able to occupy the ground.
You also had over 800 Stationary Service pamphlets which gave reports/advice on how to conduct operations.
Below are some fantastic books which cover this subject.
Paddy Griffith - Battle Tactics of the Western Front: The British Army's Art of Attack, 1916-18
Sanders Marble - The Infantry Cannot Do with a Gun Less: The Place of the Artillery in the BEF, 1914-1918
Simpson, A. ‘British Corps Command on the Western Front, 1914-1918 in G.Sheffied and D.Todman (eds), Command and Control on the Western Front, The British Army’s Experience 1914-1918
>>779762
If I may ask, what was the impact of the Tromblon VB?
It was an important component of the French platoon with severals launchers and everybody but the Chauchat teams carrying spare VB grenades but I've yet to find precise accounts of their effects, especially from the German side (as the French usually resumed it to "It was efficient").
>>779889
>frontal attacks against machine gun emplacements
read before posting your shit
>>780161
Not him & not the answer you are looking for but speaking of rifle grenades, I always found it funny how the rifle grenade is referred to as the "howitzer" of a platoon in British training manuals:
http://www.forgottenbooks.com/readbook_text/Notes_on_Recent_Operations_Army_War_College_August_1917_1000133767/13
Heres the story for you.
>>779619
I concur. Ultimately it depends on the quality of the teacher.
The problem I find is that nowadays children just aren't interested, no matter how hard I try.
>>779444
Transitioning from Napoleonic armies to Modern Amries by developing conventional tactics.
>>779444
It wasn't tactics that were missing. It was technology. Defensive technology greatly outclassed offensive technology.
No radio made creeping barrages extremely hard to coordinate. No aircraft meant that the fog of war was still a very real thing to keep in mind. No tanks meant that advancing infantry were ripped up by machine guns after being slowed down by barbed wire. Bolt-action rifles prevented them from having suppressive fire that was truly effective (muh mad minute) Some armies made due by improving small unit tactics such as the German stormtroopers but the defense had such great power over the offense that it became a slugging match between two sides that grabbed each other by the throat.
The thing that allowed WWII to have a moving front was radio for coordination, tanks for mobility and aircraft for scouting. If you look at the end of WWI, light tanks were being used as APCs and destroyed barbed wire and machine gun nests.
>>780596
>No aircraft meant that the fog of war was still a very real thing to keep in mind.
The main role of Aircraft was scouting and artillery spotting in the first world war. Hell, it was the only thing aircraft could do effectively, since they had very low bomb capacities, could only pull off level bombing due, and were both too horribly fragile and lacked the air brakes to accurately dive bomb anyway.
>>779444
>>779444
I think the biggest issue was that tanks in WW2 were absolute bollocks so there was nothing to really break through the enemy line. Slowly grinding the enemy down through attrition was the ONLY way to win.
Tanks were utter shit. They constantly broke down, they were slow, they were under-gunned, and you could stop them with a simple anti-tank rifle. An anti-tank rifle is just a regular rifle scaled up to fire a larger cartridge out of a larger barrel. Heavy machine guns like the Browning M2 were also capable of ripping WW1-tier tanks apart.
During the second world war, tanks become a force to be reckoned with.
>>780504
just by using the word Napoleonic anywhere near WW1 except to say "WW1 was in no way Napoleonic" shows how little you know
