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Main ideas of the main events - Coggle Diagram
Main ideas of the main events
Germany needed to avoid a long war on two fronts, given its lack of natural
frontier defences :
The Schlieffen Plan
the main German attack on France would take place in the north, on the
assumption that France would attack Germany in Alsace-Lorraine
German forces would hold the French attacks until the right wing had taken
Paris and moved to attack the French from the rear
the railways that had been used to concentrate forces against France would
then carry German troops to the East, where they would defeat Russia
The war of movement
French attacks further south resulted
in heavy casualties and prevented a German breakthrough
Russia invaded eastern Germany but was unable to exploit its
advantage by a drive on Berlin.
In the West, each side tried to outflank the other
Each side struggled to
gain the most advantageous positions, especially high ground
Turkey, the far east and africa
The new goberment of turkey leaned towards germany
This caused that germany helped turkey resist the russians
Defence and attack
defence turned to be easier than attack
this was because the evolution of technology and weapons for masive killing
the railways strated to carry more men and supplys of weapons adn this made advance the industrial capacity of the modern states
Characteristics of the war on the Western Front
Why was it so hard to break through?
Commanders were faced with large concentrations of enemy forces in developed trench lines, supported by heavy artillery, machine guns, mortars, barbed wire and accurate long-range automatic rifles
, the lines were established in open country or in
small villages (apart from the large French forts at Verdun)
Italy’s entry into the war opened up new, heavily defended, lines, while Romania’s entry brought it a crushing defeat by Germany, An attack
by Britain on Constantinople to knock Turkey out of the war ended in more, trench warfare on the Gallipoli Peninsula and eventual British withdrawal
The Battle of the Somme, July 1916
In 1916, one of the most infamous battles in the history of warfare took place
. British and some French forces faced well-established German
positions on the River Somme in France
The Allies were anxious to break through to
relieve the pressure on France, which was being attacked by the Germans at Verdun
millions of shells, were fired on to the German line in, what was probably the greatest, artillery bombardment in history