SOME GERMAN THEORIES OF WAR.
Before I proceed with my story, let me call your attention to certain theories of war with which the German General Staff began the campaign. By a theory of war I mean some plan or scheme which, in the judgment of those making it, is likely to prove of great advantage, but which can only be proved to be so by actual practice. Some of the German theories turned out to be right, others wrong, as we shall see.
If you were to witness a field day of British troops you would notice that the infantry make their attacks in long, thin skirmishing lines. The men are widely spread out, and as they advance they offer a small target to the guns of the enemy. Their losses are thus reduced to a minimum. The Germans, on the other hand, believe in making their attacks with their men massed together in close formation.
Troops attacking in close order have certain advantages over those attacking in open order. First, they can begin their attack with the least possible delay. Suppose a hundred men are marching forward in fours, and are about to make an attack. If they are to spread out widely time will be needed for them to deploy. (See Fig. 2, p. [19].) But if they go forward packed close together as in Fig. 1, p. [18], they can attack much more quickly. You can easily understand that the quicker a blow is delivered, the more likely it is to be successful, for the defenders are given little time in which to make preparations for resisting it.
Then, again, an attack delivered in mass formation brings much more weight to bear on the part of the enemy's line against which it is directed than an attack in open order. If, for example, a hundred men are hurled against a front of a hundred yards, the force with which they can assail it is much greater than it would be if the same hundred yards of front were attacked by fifty men. Where, as often happens, troops have to advance on a narrow front, say against a bridge, a causeway, a street, or a defile, they must attack in close order if they are to succeed.
Of course, when a massed attack is made, a very good target is offered to the enemy, especially in these days of magazine rifles, machine guns, and quick-firing field guns, and large numbers of the attackers are sure to fall. In former wars it has been found that troops so punished break or are brought to a standstill, and that their attack therefore fails. The Germans, however, believe that men can be so disciplined that, though large numbers of them are shot down, the rest will push on and carry the position. They believe that this great waste of life is worth while, because the campaign will be over all the sooner, and the total losses will probably be no greater than they would be in a long-drawn-out war carried on by attacks in open order.
Fig. 1. Column advancing to the Attack in Close Order.
Now let us see how this theory bore the test of actual practice. You will remember that at the Battle of Mons and on other occasions the Germans made massed attacks on the Allied positions, and though their men were shot down in droves, they came on again and again, almost shoulder to shoulder. The theory that men can be so disciplined as to continue to advance in massed formation, even though they know that large numbers of them will certainly be killed or wounded, proved correct. Where the theory broke down was in supposing that the men who survived the slaughter would be able to carry the position. On some occasions they succeeded, but in the majority of cases a swarm of Germans advancing against inferior numbers were reduced by one-fourth, or even by one-third, in the first few minutes of the rush, and the remainder were too few to drive out the defenders. So, as far as actual results were concerned, attacks in close formation proved to be a failure. The Germans, however, persisted in them, and this led to an immense wastage of life. They flung away life like water, but, as we have seen, they did not win that speedy victory on which they had staked so much.
Fig. 2. Column deploying for Attack in Open Order.
Another theory of the German General Staff was that no existing fortress could withstand for more than a few days the effect of high explosive shells hurled from heavy howitzers. Up to about ten years ago it was thought that fortresses mounting heavy guns, and fully supplied with men, food, and ammunition, could hold out for months against a besieging force. The fixed guns of fortresses had then a far greater range than any movable guns that could be brought against them, and they were so powerful that they could, as a rule, put out of action the artillery of the besiegers.
A German Howitzer for Siege Work. Photo, Daily Mirror.
Notice the caterpillar wheels which enable it to traverse soft roads without sinking in.
On page 200 of Volume I. you were told how a howitzer differs from an ordinary field gun. Let me repeat what I then said. The great difference between the action of an ordinary gun and that of a howitzer is the difference between a boy throwing a stone at a mark which he can see, and the same boy lobbing a stone over a wall so that it will fall on something hidden from his view. The ordinary field gun has a long, flat sweep of fire, and is therefore unable to shoot over hills, trees, or houses, or to drop shells on men lying close behind a bank or in a deep, narrow trench.
Look at this little diagram. A howitzer, A, is firing at a fort, B, from the other side of a hill. The howitzer is invisible from the fort, and the men firing the howitzer cannot see the mark at which they are aiming. But a man on or above the hill can see the fort easily, and can so direct the fire of the howitzer that it can lob its shells over the hill and drop them directly on the fort. The guns of the fort are incapable of hitting the howitzer. The shells which they throw pass right over the hill, and fall a long way behind it.
Until recently the fortress gun was master of the howitzer, for several reasons. The howitzers then in use were small, and their range was much less than that of heavy guns mounted in forts. No matter how carefully the howitzers were concealed or how frequently they were shifted about, they were sure sooner or later to be "spotted" from the fortress, and put out of action. The explosives which were then used in the howitzer shells were not sufficiently powerful to destroy the steel and concrete of the forts, and there was much difficulty in discovering, whether the aim of these high-angle guns was true.
The Austrian and the German General Staff had studied all this very carefully, and they had come to the conclusion that howitzers could be constructed of such a size that they would be more than a match for fortress guns. Former howitzers were 6 inches across at the mouth; but before the war the Austrians built howitzers of from 11 to 12-inch calibre. This doubling of the calibre meant that the new weapon was eight times as powerful as the old one. Such howitzers could throw their shells from an immense distance, and could take advantage of steep cover so far off that the fortress guns could not reach them. Though the new howitzers were so heavy, they were capable of being moved from place to place as soon as they were "spotted".
Not only was the howitzer made much bigger than formerly, but new and very powerful explosives were discovered, and huge shells were filled with them. Experiments led the German Staff to believe that these explosives would utterly destroy the forts, no matter how solidly they might be constructed. How to aim these howitzers correctly was the only remaining difficulty. Aeroplanes and balloons solved the problem. Observers could fly high enough to see the forts, note where the shots fell, and signal to the gunners so that they could find the exact range.
The Germans believed that no fortress along the line of their advance could long resist their big howitzers and high explosive shells. The French, on the other hand, thought that such ring fortresses as those at Liége, Namur, and Verdun could hold out for a considerable time. During the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-5, Port Arthur, though attacked by howitzers, held out for eleven months. The French saw no reason why their forts should not resist for several weeks at least.
From what you have read in the former volumes you know that the German theory was right, and that the French theory was wrong. Liége, Namur, Maubeuge, and Antwerp all fell before the high explosive shells of the huge howitzers in an astonishingly brief time. Verdun did not fall, it is true, but this was because the French turned it into a new type of fortress altogether. They made field works at a considerable distance from the old forts, and moved out the heavy guns to advanced trenches. Rails were laid down so that as soon as the guns were "spotted" they could be moved to new positions at short notice. Thus, as I told you on page 280 of Volume II., instead of fixed forts, each, say, mounted with ten heavy guns, these same ten guns were "dotted here and there in trenches rapidly established in one place and another, along perhaps half a mile of wooded vale, and free to operate, when they moved, over perhaps double that front." This is the German theory of fortification, and Verdun was saved because the French adopted it.
Another theory of the German Staff was that high explosive shells could be used with great effect not only against fortresses but against troops in the field. In former wars shrapnel[4] was largely used, but in the present war the Germans believed that high explosive shells would be more effective.[5] Modern armies, as you know, "dig themselves in" whenever they can, and fight from trenches. Against troops in deep trenches with good head-cover shrapnel is not very deadly. When trenches have been occupied for some time they become little fortresses, with strong parapets and entanglements of barbed wire in front of them. Before sending infantry to attack such trenches, the Germans determined to fire high explosive shells at them, so that the barbed wire would be torn away, the parapets of the trenches would be blown in, and the defensive works destroyed. In this respect, too, the German theory proved correct, and when the trench warfare began in real earnest the Allies had to follow the German example. Months passed, however, before their supply of howitzers and high explosive shells was sufficient to enable them to cope with the Germans on equal terms.
