Change in Weaponry during First World War

Martin Klima Year 10C History Ms.Carlevaro

4/6/08

Weapons have been used since humanity existed. Humanity has always found a way to, hunt or kill its prey or enemy, more effectively. One of the biggest developments for weaponry was during the First World War. I have choose to research and write about this topic because I find it very interesting how war can develop technology and I wanted to know by how much further it developed Weapons that were later on used or developed during the Second World War. I will be searching for sources that will prove my statements. I have researched types of weapons used during WW1, their strengths and weaknesses, and how they changed before/during/after WW1.

Before the War begun many weapons that were used in WW1 have been designed and created but later on developed into more powerful masses of destruction. Only few weapons were actually designed and created in the First World War.

Despite the advancements in s, s and technologies, all remained relatively unwieldy and cumbersome in comparison to the rifle, which remained the most crucial, ever-present infantry weapon throughout World War One.

The Rifle:

The infantry was the solid bone of the army but o be effective he had to have the right equipment. Troops had steel helmets that would protect them against shrapnel from enemy shelling; this only became standard equipment in 1916. Soldiers also improvised their own weapons for the conditions of trench warfare. Many new types of rifles were designed but all had the same one goal, to kill. During the nineteenth century the rifle had developed from the slow, ineffectual musket to an accurate, long-ranged instrument of death. In WW1 a well-entrenched defender could kill many soldiers with using just his rifle. The Lee Enfield rifle was the most common weapon used by the British Trench soldiers. The advantage was that the rifles were pretty accurate, they weren’tvery good in close range combat though due to them being large in size, that is why a bayonet was usually attached at the end of the rifle for close combat (This idea of a bayonet being attached to the rifle was already used in pervious wars). The soldiers were told that “the bayonet should be used more to kill an enemy and that firing should be more avoided in the mix-up because a bullet, passing through an opponents body may kill a friend who happens to be in the line of fire.” Rifles kept developing into more accurate and better rifles and by the end of World War 2, newly Lee Enfield Scope rifle was developed (Sniper rifle) which were more accurate, stronger and could kill from a 10 times greater distance than the Original Lee Enfield in WW1.

The Machine Gun:

This is a preview of the whole essay

The Machine Gun:

The ultimate killer in the battlefield during the trench wars was the machine gun. The machine gun has been used in the second Boer war so it wasn’t an invention that occurred during world war one. The very first stage of a machine gun was the Gatling gun which was already invented in the 1862 by . The machine gun might have not been invented during WW1 but they were certainly one of the most effective weapons at that time. The big advantage of the machine gun was that it could fire 8 bullets a second or more, this was never before achieved with the earlier Gatling and Machine guns. They fired shells that exploded on impact. The machine gun was most effective against infantry. The weakness of this weapon was heat, due to its fast speed, the gun most of the time overheated that’s why most of the time generals thought of the idea that if they attack with enough men, they might overwhelm the machine gun eventually and capture the trench, this would off course cost many casualties (However, the idea that generals just threw away lives is not supported by any evidence). The machine gun changed many strategies in WW1. Machine guns kept developing even after the World war 1 and are still used today. Modern Machine guns are more powerful and can even pierce the armor of a heavy vehicle.

Submarines:

Submarines were a new technology, although submarines were invented before WW1 in 1896 by , they were used in WW1 first time for combat. U-boat was a German submarine that was first used in the 1914. A U-boat could go under water and could surprise its enemy by sending a torpedo at its opponent’s ship which exploded on impact with the ship and eventually sank it. The conditions in the U-boats were horrible; “our own mates are dying while their diseases remain behind them, with no fresh air, the diseases spread rapidly”. Submarines turned the oceans upside down and created a new type of warfare in the seas. Throughout WW1 scientist tried improving the submarines by adding in more powerful and faster torpedo’s. Submarines were used in the Second World War and made a huge impact on sea warfare. WW1 was one major step for the development of more powerful submarines that possibly changed the outcome of the second world war.

Poison Gas:

The first Gas attack was made on April 1915 using chlorine. It was released in to the no-mans land and slowly drifted towards the British trenches. It caused chaos and Panic among the soldiers that were struggling to breathe. Poison gas was one of the deadliest inventions of World War 1. It was never seen before and never used as a weapon in a battlefield. In the first attack, the British thought it was just normal smoke to make a camouflage for the Germans, even the officers and the staff stood gazing into at the scene struck and dumbfounded.

“It was horrible, a knife pain in the lungs and the coughing up of a greenish froth of the stomach and the lungs finally resulting in death.”

Scientists on both sides developed many types of poison gasses that evolved into more deadly ones or more painful ones that were used later on such as the mustard gas. A poison gas could make you blind, burn your skin, burn your lungs and most of all, result in a very painful death. However Scientists developed very effective gas masks. Gas masks became part of the equipment that soldiers had to carry around at all times. The main significance of the gas was its psychological impact. Many soldiers that could bear heavy bombardments often lived in fear of the gas because even the gasmasks wasn’t 100 percent reliable; a small hole in a gas mask could be fatal to you. Poison gas isn’t used in modern combat today due to its disadvantage of it being a gas and can be easily blown back on you than on the enemies. Although deadly gases aren’t used in today’s combat they developed and now modern soldiers use smoke gas grenades to create a camouflage.

Conclusion:

Off course there were many other great technologies that had were invented in the WW1 (such as the Tank) and many other weapons such as the artillery was developed into bigger, better and more powerful artillery. During World War 1 Air war was hugely advanced as planes were designed to drop bombs and shoot down other aircrafts. The plane wasn’t invented in the First World War but it was turned into a death machine. In World War 2 it then changed the whole air warfare. WW1 was a huge step in development of today’s modern aircrafts. So to conclude this, WW1 has pushed the boundaries of weaponology further. Those weapons that have been discovered before the war were greatly developed during WW1. World War 1 was one big step in the evolution of weapons.

Bibliography:

Books:

GCSE modern world history

Author: Ben Walsh

First published: 1996

Web:

Michael Duffy. "Weapons of War: Rifles." First World War. 28 Aug. 2002. 4 June 2008 <http://www.firstworldwar.com/weaponry/rifles.htm>.

"Wiorld War 1 GCSE." School History. 23 Jan. 2003. 5 June 2008 <http://www.schoolhistory.co.uk/gcselinks/wars/wwi.html>.

"Navy Diaries." Military History. 8 Apr. 2001. 5 June 2008 <http://www.history.navy.mil/download/ww1-06.pdf>.

Axelrod, Alan. "fighter aircraft." Encyclopedia of World War II, Volume I. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2007. Modern World History Online. Facts On File, <>

Images:

Fig 1 (accessed 5 june 2008)

Word count incl. bibliography: 1112

http://www.firstworldwar.com/weaponry/rifles.htm

Lee Enfield Rifle 1915 Fig. 1 (Bayonet shown) http://www.kmike.com/KWjpg/LEmark4.jpg

From a government pamphlet on military training, published BEFORE the war.

GCSE modern world history

Diary of a Marine (source 9) 1916 “http://www.history.navy.mil/download/ww1-06.pdf“

Lance Sergeant Elmer Cotton, 1915 http://www.schoolhistory.co.uk/gcselinks/wars/wwi.html

GCSE modern world history

Encyclopedia