The French army would push the weaker southern army down and chase after it, and then the southern army would come through Belgium and into Paris. For this plan to work the Russians would have to take 12 weeks to mobilise and the northern army must be quick.
Once the French army had gone down enough the southern army would take stand and all in all the Germans would, as General Von Schlieffen said, ‘crush it like a nut between a hammer and an anvil, with Paris encircled France would surrender. On paper this was a good plan but in motion the plan had to many holes.
There are many reasons the Schlieffen Plan failed.
The first reason is that, General Von Schlieffen died in 1913 and Von Moultke took over, Von Moultke lacked General Von Schlieffen s nerve and feared that the southern army would be driven back into Germany. He decided to change the ratio from 10:1 to 10:4 by reducing the size of the northern army. The stronger southern army now drove the French army back. This meant fewer troops were away from Paris. This wasn’t the only problem, there was trouble in the north.
Another reason was the weaker northern army was held up by an unexpected strong resilience from the Belgium and British armies. (BBE). The Germans were stopped by BBE and French at the battle of Marne in mid September. The now weaker army was forced to back to the river Aisne.
A final reason was Von Moultke now again weakened the northern army and sent troops to the eastern front where the Russian had mobilised in only six weeks.
In the end Von Moultke sent a telegraph to the German king, William, ‘ Your Majesty Germany have lost the war’ This was true but it took another four years for the king to believe him. Both sides then built trenches and then battled it out whilst stationary.
I conclude that the Schlieffen plan failed mainly because the Belgians put up a fight taking crucial time needed by the germens, the Russians mobilised quicker than expected, and the plan was changed, because of this Germany 's army simply wasn’t strong enough. It look like a great plan in motion, however in practice it wasn’t so great.
