Explain the Nature and Purpose of the Battle of the Somme 1916

Authors Avatar
Ricky Dhaliwal Explain the Nature and Purpose of the Somme Offensive in July 1916 When Field Marshall sir Douglas Haig was put in charge of the western front it was already clear that the Great War had become a war of attrition. Haig knew that if it carried on, many more men would have died. So he believed that if a break through was made it would stop men loosing their lives in the long run. But for this to happen men would have to loose their lives in the big push, which he chose the battle of the Somme for. But no one thought that there would be 60,000 causalities in the first few hours. Haig clearly favoured a war of movement rather than a war of attrition. A war of attrition meant that the armies were bogged down and the winner would be who ever could fight for the longest. Whenever one side made a breakthrough it was nullified by the other side making a breakthrough, it was basically a stalemate. Haig knew that if it carried on it would mean that a lot of soldiers’ lives would be lost. He also didn’t like it, as he was originally a cavalry commander so naturally he favoured a war of movement rather than attrition. Also it was 1916 and the war had dragged on far past the expectations that the war would be over by Christmas 1914. The reason it had dragged on for so long and the reason it was a
Join now!
war of attrition was because there were drastic changes in warfare. Such as, instead of a war of movement the war was static due to the trenches. The trenches started as simple shelters but by 1915 they had developed into complex defensive systems. Another change was that artillery became more powerful and useful. Foe a lot of the war artillery would be used to do as much damage as possible to the enemy and their trenches, and they did as artillery caused more casualties than any other weapon. To begin with artillery was inaccurate, but as the war dragged on ...

This is a preview of the whole essay