How world war one led to stale mate

There were several reasons why world war one lead to stalemate but the main reason was the failure of the schlieffen plan. The Chief of General Staff, Count von Schlieffen, created the schlieffen plan.

The plan was to march through Belgium, as Belgium would not put up much resistance, avoiding the French defenses and storm Paris, which would cause the French to surrender. Which in turn would prevent the British joining the war. Meanwhile Russia would declare war on Germany, Von Schlieffen calculated that it would take Russia at least six weeks to organize its large Army for an attack on Germany. The plan involved using 90% of Germany's armed forces to attack France and leaving the rest to defend the eastern front from Russian attacks. After the army had taken Paris and the French had surrendered it would rush back to the Eastern front and attack the Russian army.

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But this is what really happened. The Germans did go through Belgium like in their plan however the Belgians put up a lot more resistance than expected and this slowed down the Germans considerably. Also the British came to the Belgium’s aid. The German army fought there may through Belgium and made a dash for Paris they almost made it but the French rushed out reserve troops in any transport vehicle they could get their hands on and the Germans were stopped at the Battle of Marne. Meanwhile Russia was gathering their forces and a lot faster than the Germans thought. They attacked Germanys eastern front but as the Russians had inadequate weapons they were getting slaughtered by machine guns as they charged into Germany. At the Battle of Marne both sides had fought to a standstill by Christmas 1914.

Both sides dug trenches to protect themselves from machine gun fire and heavy artillery shells. Neither side was able to advance. Neither side was prepared to give up. There was STALEMATE on the western front.

In the trenches. Life in the trenches was a peculiar mixture of boredom and uncertainty, of discomfort and danger. Most of the time shells were falling. Soldiers lived the fear of being killed by an exploding shell, a snipers bullet or a poison gas attack.

The front line trenches were most active at night, because an attack was most likely after dark. Sentries had to keep watch and scouting parties were sent out to capture prisoners, spy on the enemy and repair any damaged barbed wire barricades.

Not all parts of the front line were dangerous. There was little fighting in some areas and the enemy was rarely seen.

Soldiers had to cope with terrible conditions. In the winter, the ground was frozen and hard, in autumn rainfall turned the battlefields and low-lying trenches into mud baths. In some parts the water reached waist height. This could cause 'trench foot' where the feet would swell and in some cases turn gangrenous and need amputating.

All of this started because the Schlieffen plan failed.

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Corpses could not be buried quickly enough, and were often dislodged by shelling.