Warfare History

The World on Edge: 7 Major Battles That Changed The Outcome of World War I

Kurt Christopher - July 2, 2017

The Brusilov Offensive

While the Germans and the French held each other by the throat at Verdun in the west, in the east Russia was foundering following a series of defeat. Turned back at Tannenberg, denied relief with the failure of the Gallipoli Campaign, and harassed by a joint German-Austrian offensive in 1915, it seemed the Russians had little prospect of turning the tides. Nonetheless, in June 1916 Russians commander Aleksei Brusilov would shock the Central Powers by orchestrating one of the most effective offensives of the entire war.

Brusilov had observed the repulsion of one offensive after the next on all fronts during the war, and he concluded that previous campaigns had failed because massing forces for a breakthrough in a small space allowed to enemy to concentrate defensive artillery and reserves to stop any breach in the lines. To overcome these defensive advantages, he planned for an offensive against the Austrians on a broad front, which he hoped would disperse Austrian artillery and reserves. He also called for the digging of saps as close to the enemy lines as possible so as to reduce the time that his troops would be exposed in no man’s land after going over the top.

On June 4, 1916 Brusilov unleashed his 650,000 men upon the slightly smaller Austrian force at the southern end of the front. The attack began, as most did, with an artillery barrage designed to destroy defensive obstacles and make way for the advance of Brusilov’s storm troopers. The Russians captured a tenth of the Austrian defenders on the first day, and when the Austrians committed their reserves Brusilov opened the offensive along the rest of the front, enveloping them. The next day the Russians began a similar push in the north.

The Austrians were soon in full retreat, entreating Germany to send troops to assist them. The Germans, engaged in Verdun, at first refused aid, prompting the Austrians to cannibalize forces from their Italian front. This infusion of new blood slowed but did not stop the Russians, and eventually the Germans would relent and pull some of their soldiers out of Verdun to prevent an Austrian collapse. The delay provided the Russians with a remarkable opportunity, but they were not prepared to follow up their success as no one but Brusilov had ever really expected that a breakthrough was possible.

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The Battle of Passchendale

Despite the Russian successes in 1916, by early 1917 Russian would find itself in the throws of a full-blown revolution that would sweep the Tsar from power and replace him with a new Soviet regime by the end of the year. German unrestricted submarine warfare was threatening to choke off supplies to the British home islands, and in France mutinous murmurs within the army were only silenced by promises that they would not have to conduct an attack for six months.

Faced with the prospect of a million new German troops freed up from the eastern front, and the danger of internal collapse in the west, in July 1917 the British would launch the last great set-piece battle of the war at Passchendale in Belgium in the hopes of ending the war immediately. Though the British did gain some ground early in the battle, the offensive ground to a halt when weather conditions turned.

The month of August saw the worst rains in thirty years. Situated as it is in the Low Countries, the water table at Passchendale was in places only a few feet below the surface, and it became saturated by the rains. The earth, churned by artillery, turned to a literal quagmire in which soldiers who stepped off duck boards laid over the ground could simply be swallowed up by the mud. The British commander, Douglas Haig, persisted all the same.

As the battle dragged on into the fall, the British gained support from Canadian forces, who renewed the offensive in October. The Canadians would manage to do in ten days what the British had failed to accomplish in three months, taking the ridges overlooking Passchendale. German general Ludendorf would later write that the defeat of Germany began at Passchendale, but they had not yet given up and a year of bloody fighting still remained.

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The Kaiserschlacht

By 1918 all of the Great Powers of Europe were exhausted by four years of war. However, a fresh power outside of Europe had recently committed itself to join the fight as well: the United States. Provoked by German unrestricted submarine warfare and the discovery of a German plot to induce a Mexican attack on the United States, President Woodrow Wilson asked congress to declare war on Germany in April 1917. It would take some time, though, for the United States to mobilize and deploy significant forces to Europe.

In March of 1918 the Germans, drawing upon troops freed up from the eastern front following the Russian revolution, would attempt to break the French and British before the Americans could arrive. This attack, the Kaiserschlacht or Emperor’s Battle, was made up of four separate offensive. Three were to serve as diversions, while the fourth offensive, code-named Michael, was to drive through the British at the Somme and make for the sea to cut them off.

Early on Michael saw stunning success, advancing at a rate not seen since the beginning of the war. The Germans came to within seventy-five miles of Paris, close enough to begin shelling the city with their sixteen inch guns. The advance had been too rapid, though, as the Germans outran their supply lines. As Michael was running out of steam American troops began to arrive on the battlefield, tipping the balance and halting the Kaiserschlacht for good.

By August, with nearly two million fresh American troops had arrived on the continent, the Allies would counterattack against the Germans. This so-called Hundred Days Offensive hurled the Germans back, undoing all of their gains from the spring and pressing towards Germany. Recognizing that Germany could no longer win the war, Hindenburg and Ludendorf told the Kaiser to maneuver for a favorable peace. When the Kaiser called for the German Navy to take to sea to strike a blow to the British that might improve their bargaining position the sailor mutinied. The mutiny expanded, and turned to a revolution that would sweep the German Kaiser from power and replace him with a new government that sued for peace. The war was over.

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