People did not expect the war to develop in the way it did. In 1914 people expected that Britain would win the war and be home by Christmas. In reality the new trench warfare and complicated tactics meant that both alliances held out and battles resulted in stalemate many times.
New techniques and equipment were developed after 1914 to tackle these new challenges. There were new artillery and tanks and new tactics to get past trenches and get around barbed wire.
At the beginning of the war the artillery was not accurate and often meant that they hit their own trenches before they got the range right. By the end of the war the technology had advanced much more as most factories across Europe had been given over to making guns and shells.
These changes meant Calvary were not used as much in fighting and more in transporting materials and supplies.
Of course, some things changed less than others. For example, infantry tactics like ‘Going over the top’ were used throughout the war. This involved attacking the enemy’s front lines with heavy artillery none stop (called a Barrage). As soon as this Barrage stopped troops would be given the signal to ‘go over the top’, this was when the soldiers climbed over the top of the trench and raced to get over the barbed wire and obstacles of Norman’s land before the defenders managed to get their machine gun’s firing. The defender’s normally managed to wipe out hundreds of infantry, those that did succeed in getting to the enemy’s trenches had to try and hold that position which normally proved impossible.
Other areas that saw little change were the tactics like charging enemy’s front lines and using infantry to get through to the opposition’s trenches.
Although the importance of the infantry’s role grew, the actual tactics did not change that much.
CONCLUSION
After studying all the sources provided to me, I have come to the conclusion that the overall fighting on the western front changed in three main ways:
- Trenches became a main part of warfare.
- Artillery became more powerful and accurate.
- Infantry became more important although tactics remained the same.
These three factors contributed towards stalemates that caused the war to go on for so much longer than anyone anticipated.