IGCSE History: World War I

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IGCSE History: World War I – Documentary

From the documentary '1914-1918':

Kaiser Wilhelm II promised to have lunch in Paris and dinner in St. Petersburg.
The Germans utilized the Big Bertha for the Battle of Verdun:

Huge howitzer.
Could fire 820kg shells.
As the Germans advanced through Belgium:

Citizens fought back.
Snipers attacked, inflicting large casualties.
This slowed the German advance.
The Germans were terrified of sniper attacks:

'Unless they shot first, no one knew where the enemy was,' reports a soldier.

There was no defense against this.
Nerve-racked German troopers would condone slaughter at the slightest provocation.
At the time:

10 Belgian civilians died for each German soldier they killed.
Propaganda:

British authorities started a propaganda war with Germany.
Germany was made to appear as a:
Beast; Germans were genetically bestial.
Bully crushing smaller nations fighting for survival, e.g., Belgium.
The British army was based on volunteers:

Even football matches became recruiting drives.
Towns and cities competed to see which could raise the most recruits.

'Join up with your friends' became the recruiting slogan.
Many signed up with their friends. These groups were kept together in the army:
Their members would be sent to the same outposts.
This had a huge impact on morale.
Men had to watch as their friends died in battle.
All recruits had to be of good health and aged between 19 and 30.
In 1914, Kitchener had a large army at his command:

It was an army built on the patriotism of the British people.
Some people joined because they wished to escape the boredom of agricultural life.

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Alsace and Lorraine:

French forces assaulted the German defenses here.
They advanced in a 19th-century formation.
They were in full view of the Germans throughout.
On 7th August 1914:

In the 4 days leading from this, 40,000 French soldiers were killed.
20,000 in one day.
The French were defeated.
The French had fallen for the German ploy to draw their troops away from Paris.
The British could not decide whether to fight the Germans or the French.
400,000 French soldiers had been lost just to reach a stalemate situation on the Western Front.
The Germans were faced with war on two fronts:

The Russian army mobilized much faster than expected.
They had thought that since Russia had been recently defeated by Japan, they would take at least 6 months to prepare for another war.
The Russian Army:

It was large.
Most soldiers were inexperienced and merely peasants.
Lack of artillery shells.
Officers and veterans were few.
The Russian commanders were not on speaking terms with each other.
Battle of Tannenburg (23-30 August 1914):

The Russians had split their forces in two.
These were intercepted by the Germans.
The First and Second Armies of Russia were almost completely destroyed.
100,000 Russians were taken prisoner at this battle.

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