Re: WW1 Generals and lessons learned by Roman Army
From: Bob Keeter (rkeeter_at_earthlink.net)
Date: 12/29/04
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To: sci-military-moderated@moderators.isc.org Date: Wed, 29 Dec 2004 04:58:31 GMT
"Abrigon Gusiq" <abrigon@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:41CFFEC2.323AC562@yahoo.com...
> "Scipio's Reforms of the Army
Snippage. . . . . . . .
> Above a lesson that Rome learned, that from reports, The Generals of
> WW1, should have known and lived, and not wasted?
Well, it would seem that the generals are due for a chastizing for not
learning
the history of war , or for fighting the current war just like the last war!
Damned
if they do, damned if they dont!! 8-)
> Did the Generals of WW1, really be as wasteful as we have been lead to
> believe? I just can not see how the people of nations like Britain and
> France, could have stood by and watched 10,000 soldiers did in a single
> day, like at the Somne, or Verdun and like?
>
> Mike
>
Ten thousand casualties in a single day of combat during a major WWI
offensive
was definitely cheating the Grim Reaper. On the first day of the Battle of
the
Somme (1 July, 1916) the British army ALONE suffered almost 20,000 KIA
with another 37,000 WIAs!
The European generals did not have the benefit of the US Civil War as a
serious
learning opportunity. While certainly the mid-to-late 1800s were not idylic
peace in Europe, there really wasnt a lot of new tactics being churned out
for
big-unit army battles. The Brits had a taste of modern war in S. Africa
but had a "re-inforcing" experience in which old fashioned tactics worked
just fine against sword wielding Dervishes in the Sudan. France and Germany
had some brew ups, but IIRC they were generally so mis-matched as to
be totally non-instructive.
As I see it, Europe was still fighting almost a Napoleonic war (with the
addition
of trenches) in which masses of men advancing with "cold steel" were the
cure-all
of whatever ailed an advance. This in spite of rapid fire, breach loading
field guns
and most particularly machine guns. In the US Civil War, those same tactics
could not really carry the day even when the "opposition" was nothing more
than
muzzle loading rifled muskets. When it was breech-loading, magazine fed
rifles
and machine guns, it turned into a meat grinder; the last vestiges of
Napoleonic
warfare charged into the machine guns until someone figured out it really
just
plain did not work!
Sometimes its very hard to throw away 20 or 30 years of military experience
and indoctrination overnight. Im not sure that the Brits and French ever
did
in WWI. I know the Germans did by WWII!
Just my $0.02 worth.
Regards
bk
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