World War One Sources Question

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World War One Sources Question

a)

The main aim of the Schlieffen Plan was to win a war over France so that Germany could become the most powerful country in Europe. However if, as the Germans thought, France's ally Russia would come to help the French then the Germans would have to split up their army as Russia bordered Germany on one side and France the other therefore Germany would have to fight a war on two fronts. The Germans therefore thought up a plan that would enable them to fight only one country at a time.

The plan was that Russia would take six to ten weeks to mobilise their army, after they had heard about the war, as Russia's railways and roads were quite backward and it would take time to assemble all their men from all over the country. This would give the Germans enough time to defeat France.

The problem was how to defeat France in just six weeks when the French already had troops along the French/German border and behind the troops were heavily fortified towns. The Germans needed to launch a surprise attack on France if they were going to achieve their objective of winning a war over France. However, the French had not put up any defences on the French/Belgian border as Belgium was a neutral country and the French would not expect an attack from there.

Part of the Schlieffen Plan, therefore, was to attack through Belgium and the Germans hoped that the Belgians would just let them through. However, even if the Belgians did put up a fight it would not matter as they only had a small army that would swiftly be defeated by the German army.

In the plan the German army was now in France but what was the best of taking France? Count Von Schlieffen, who wrote the Schlieffen Plan, thought that it would be best to tae the capital, Paris. They would achieve this by sweeping six parallel armies through northern France, taking the Channel ports to stop any overseas help i.e. British help, getting through and surround Paris (see diagram). The Germans would then take Paris and cause the French to surrender. Once this was accomplished the German army could then concentrate all its forces on fighting Russia.

b)

Stalemate developed on the Western Front for many different reasons. The Schlieffen Plan failing was one reason as to why stalemate developed. This was because if the Schlieffen Plan had accomplished its objectives the Germans would have won the war and stalemate would not have developed. Also the when the Schlieffen Plan did fail the German army decided that they needed to surround the French and the British by sweeping round to the north if they were going to have a chance of winning the war. However both the French and British did this as well. Neither side could outflank the enemy in the 'Race to the sea'. As neither army won the 'Race to the sea' both decided to 'dig in'. The Germans did this because they could not advance any further and so that they could keep the land they had already gained. The British and French did this to prevent the Germans advancing. This ended the 'War of Movement' making it difficult for either side to accomplish a victory, which made stalemate develop further.
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To drive the Germans out of France the British and French had to attack. Unfortunately for them trench warfare favoured the defenders not the attackers. The only way in which the attacking armies could achieve a victory in trench warfare was to achieve a breakthrough. This entailed first crossing No-man's Land to attack enemy positions and break-in to the enemy trenches. Then breaking through the trenches to capture and occupy them, creating a gap behind enemy lines and then breaking out behind enemy lines by sending a large number of troops through the gap to encircle and defeat ...

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**/*** The essay has some valid points, and knowledge and understanding of the relevant content is good. The answer would benefit from better organisation (factor-led) and an avoidance of the tendency to write short, brief paragraphs with narrative. It is important to demonstrate a level of thinking and the answer would benefit from more explicit links to the question.