As well as the appalling physical conditions, the sheer stress led to severe mental problems. Firstly, the tedium of the routine every day of every week of every month – the soldiers had to stand most of the time in silence. Being among so many other people in their same position, they developed strong friendships, which were horrifically torn apart in battles. In battle, the constant bombardment led to shellshock – a mental condition in which the person is so traumatised by the bombing he is simply unable to express himself anymore.
The change throughout the battles in the trenches was immense. The quality of life got worse, the resources got more powerful, but the bloodshed remained terrible.
Question 2: Why did General Haig decide to fight the Battle of the Somme? (15 marks)
General Douglas Haig became the commander of the British Army in December 1915, after the failures at Loos and Neuve Chappelle. He replaced John French, who was “a source of great weakness to the army”. Haig was an experienced cavalry officer, but had never faced such a high position before. He had a massive responsibility placed on his shoulders; unfortunately his first role in this position was one of the hardest choices he’d ever have to make.
The decision to invade the Somme wasn’t made quickly – many plans were concocted to infiltrate the German line. It was decided that there should be a joint attack between the British and French, cooperating together in a combined assault to destroy the German army once and for all. There were many positive points for this plan – the two armies together would be one, doubling the impact. Also, this would increase morale for the French, proving the Allies could come together. However, the French were held up and outnumbered at the battle of Verdun. In five months, they had lost 700,000 men.
Haig was put under immense pressure now by French commander General Joffre, to take the British army to the Somme, to take the Germans away from Verdun. Haig knew that maintaining this Anglo-French relationship would increase morale, so he had to do what was right for both armies. Joffre insisted that the offensive date now had to be brought forward, to save the French soldiers from certain catastrophe. The Somme attack had to be moved forward to July 1st.
As well as pressure from the French, Haig had it from home too. New Prime Minister Lloyd George desperately needed some good news for a good start in office. The past battles in Loos and Neuve Chappelle had gone horribly wrong, with the British running out of shells and their gas being blown straight back to them. Also, with the stalemate, as well as the government being blamed for the lack of munitions being provided for the military, Haig now needed to boost morale back home.
So with Haig now facing pressure to launch an offensive from the British and the French, even his own commanders were now insistent that they went ahead with a “big push” very soon. Henry Rawlinson was an infantry officer of the 4th army, and he had to command the actions of the main attacks of his force. Like Haig, his belief was that the only way to get ahead was the big push. He came up with the plan to fire at the enemy trenches non-stop for seven days to wear down their morale. He felt sure that a “hurricane bombardment” would “bite and hold” the enemy, and would be more effective than a cavalry infiltration.
Haig’s optimism was in many ways his downfall. The intelligence officers reported that the German defence was weak, morale low, and there were few officers remaining. Haig also believed that the ammunition crisis had been solved. He said: “the nation must be taught to bear losses”, and followed his plan all the way through, despite his intelligence being inaccurate.
For seven days, over a thousand British guns fired in rapid succession against the German trenches. This was supposed to destroy the German defence and exhaust the German soldiers making it easy to go straight through. Haig now instructed the soldiers to simply walk forward, where almost all of them were instantly mown down by machine gun fire. The intelligence was wrong. The bombardment had done nothing. The German defence was stronger than ever.
Question 3: Explain why the Battle of the Somme failed to achieve British Objectives (20 marks)
The battle of the Somme was the bloodiest battle ever recorded, and the work of General Haig and his armies has often been criticized, with the battle being labelled as a pointless slaughter and a military failure. But with such a key battle being a massive blow to the German army as well as the British, there are the arguments that the battle did, in the end, help towards ensuring a British victory – but was such a sacrifice worth it?
The four main objectives for the British were simple. To help the French by relieving the German army at Verdun; to show the allied strength against the Germans by proving the two forces could combine and cooperate together; to increase morale back home, relieving the pressure from the PM and the government; and also to break the stalemate and move ahead in the war by striking a decisive military blow against the German Army.
The first two objectives were clearly achieved – the pressure on the French at Verdun was relieved substantially thanks to the Somme diversion. This enabled a successful counter attack of the French. Unfortunately, the need for diversion to help those at Verdun forced the date of the Somme attack forward, making it impossible for the allies to amass all the men and artillery they needed (only getting together half of what was planned). The Somme attack was now weaker than before, and couldn’t hope to be as effective. However – by taking this action, the Allies had shown that the British and the French were working together, cooperating, proving their strategic military advantage of having two armies.
As casualties mounted, the popularity of the war fell greatly at home – the political pressure on the home front had to be dealt with. Haig badly needed to prove he was right for this top job. Despite the many deaths at the Somme, Haig was considered, in Britain at the time, a war hero. Media footage of the battle reached home, and society did eventually consider it a success.
The war was in stalemate. Britain couldn’t hit the German line hard enough. Britain’s intelligence had failed in bringing them an accurate view of the German side, so the seven day bombardment proved useless. Instead of bringing down the morale, it simply warned them to prepare for a British attack. They prepared with machine guns. In his optimistic naivety, Haig had deemed the machine gun as “a much overrated weapon”, and with the British army having only one per 400 men, they didn’t stand a chance. Haig kept a reserve of cavalry at the Somme, proving that he hadn’t taken in lessons learned from earlier battles. The attack was nowhere near strong enough to break the enemy lines, and failed miserably. The inexperienced conscript army had no idea of how to use the “rushing” technique, so simply walked to their deaths. The technology of the Somme was obsolete, with the tank still in an early stage of development. Only 32 out of 49 tanks actually worked on the battleground. By using them when they weren’t ready, Haig had blown the cover of the British “surprise weapon”, even though this failure led to the tank being improved vastly for future use. The shells were also failing – one out of three didn’t go off at all.
One key success that could be taken from the battle was that the Germans lost a higher proportion of men than the British. Although the British lost more soldiers, the number the Germans lost was a much bigger percentage blow to their total armies. Combined with their loss in Verdun, this statistic starts to show how it could be considered a British victory. However, the other statistic that the British, after all this effort, had only advanced 8km is much less promising.
So was Haig really a “butcher” who sent innocent men to their deaths? The risky plan certainly was all his doing; and he failed to get the hang of the modern day trench warfare he was faced with. But he cannot be blamed for his decision – everything to influence the failure wasn’t his fault. The intelligence was false, the supplies were low, the ammunition and technology were nothing to do with him. My personal opinion is that Haig was not the “butcher of the Somme”, but was simply taking the best option that was there at the time. In the end, the British did win the war, even at a terrible loss from this one battle.
To conclude, the Somme failed because of military failures; poor supplies of resources and information. It was always going to have a major death toll – any major assault of this scale would have to. Not all objectives were achieved, but the battle was a major blow for the enemy, and in the end, probably secured an allied victory.
