Were there alternatives?
Haig failed to realise the importance of the machine-gun, he believed that two machine-guns per battalion (around 800 men) was enough. It was Lloyd George, Minister of munitions at the time, who insisted on increasing it to 16 per battalion.
One idea from a man called Paul Fussell was to stop the British barrage for two minutes before dawn witch was when most attacks took place. The Germans, thinking that an attack was about to start, would then being flocking back to their trenches to set up their machine-guns. Another heavy barrage would then have caught the Germans out in the open.
To rush or not to rush?
The order for the British men to attack at walking pace had been heavily criticised. The French had developed a technique of rushing in small groups across No Man’s Land, dodging in and out of shell holes for cover. This technique, known as ‘rushing’, limited casualties but needed troops well-trained. Haig did not believe his troops were trained at all because they were all new recruits.
The French did use ‘rushing’ tactics during the battle. They had bigger, and better trained army’s and captured the German trenches opposite them in the first hour of the attack.
However, the French success could also be explained by the fact that they had twice as many artillery guns in their sector of the front than the British. The French barrage was successful in destroying the German dug-outs. The British barrage, with few guns, was not. This was the key. Haig, and the man in charge of carrying out the attack, General Rawlinson, believed that the 1.5 million shells fired during the barrage would destroy the German positions. Therefore, ‘rushing’ tactics would not be needed. There wouldn’t be any opposition!
Why did the British attack on the Somme fail?
- The British had to cut and tape paths in their own wire before the attack. This tipped off the Germans.
- The Germans were able to fire at the gaps cut in the British wire. It was through these gaps that the British had to come.
- The British barrage inflicted little damage on the Germans or their trenches.
- The barrage did not destroy the German wire to let the British troops through.
- The troops were ordered to attack the Germans at waling pace rather than rushing. This was also because they had so much equipment on there backs that they couldn’t run, it was like carrying there own body weight.
The Plan
The battle was originally planned as an attack by the French army with British support. The British commander, General Haig, Actually favoured an attack further north and west in Flanders. The German attack at Verdun altered these plans. By the summer of 1916 it was agreed that Haig would lead a mainly British offensive in the area around the River Somme. The objectives were to gain territory and to draw German troops away from Verdun. Another aim was to kill as many German soldiers as possible as part of the ‘war of attrition’.
The Tactics
Haig and his deputy, General Rawlinson, worked out the details.
- There would be a huge artillery bombardment, and mines would devastate German positions.
- The enemy’s barbed wire would be cut and the German trenches and dug-outs smashed.
- The attacking British troops would be able to walk across no man’s land rather than run.
- They would carry heavy packs and trench repair equipment so that they could rebuild and defend the German trenches and so stop the Germans retaking their lost territory.
- British cavalry forces were also kept in readiness to charge into gaps in the German line.
Were these the right tactics?
Haig certainly knew about the German dug-outs and the masses of barbed wire in front of them. However, Haig overestimated the ability of the artillery to destroy the German defences.
- The defenders were on high ground with a good view of any attacking forces.
- The German defences had been in place since 1914 and the German soldiers had not been idle. Their dug-outs were deep under ground and fortified with concrete.
- The Germans had stretched wire like a band more that 30 meters wide all along the front. It was almost impossible to penetrate.
- Many of the shells supplied to the Allied gunners were poor quality. There was certainly a vast bombardment, but many shells were not powerful enough to destroy the defences or simply failed to go off.
1st July 1916
The infantry attack began at 7:30 a.m. on 1st July. Attacks usually began at dawn, but the commanders were confident that there would be little resistance. Two huge mines placed under the German lines by sappers were detonated. The noise could be heard from London.
The assault began. Twenty-seven divisions (about 750,000 men) went over the top against the Germans’ 16 divisions.
The French forces made some quick gains. They were more experienced than the British in such battles and they were moving quickly because they were not weighed down by sacks. However the French found themselves isolated and had to withdraw agai8n because most of the British were advancing to slowly.
The slow pace of the British advance gave the Germans enough time to emerge from their dug-outs and to set up machine guns. Some German gunners said that the sheer numbers of the British forces would have overwhelmed them, if they had charged more quickly. The wire was undamaged in many areas, so the British troops were funnelled into areas where there were gaps in the wire. They were sitting targets for the German gunners. There were around 57,000 casualties on the first day, about a third of them killed. Haig was bitterly criticised for this by his own soldiers, politicians and all over the newspapers.
The battle ended on the 13th of November 1916.