Why was there a stalemate at the western front?
The conventional explanation offered by historians for the stalemate on the western front (an area stretching from Belgium all the way down to the Alps) is that by 1914 technology and industrialism had overtaken military strategy and tactics, making them obsolete. Supposedly machine guns and rapid-fire artillery had made the traditional tactics worthless; linear tactics and cavalry charges were things of the past by 1914. This explanation is accurate to a degree; as far as it goes, it explains the situation. I contend, however, that this explanation ignores the crucial factor: leadership.
It makes one wonder had the British commanders really been clued up to the art of modern warfare or maybe even taken a lesson in sanity maybe the war might not have been so disastrous in terms of casualties. Even theorists from ancient warfare had far more reason on their side , for example Sun Tzu ( to pretend he was just a single person ) writes:
The conventional explanation offered by historians for the stalemate on the western front (an area stretching from Belgium all the way down to the Alps) is that by 1914 technology and industrialism had overtaken military strategy and tactics, making them obsolete. Supposedly machine guns and rapid-fire artillery had made the traditional tactics worthless; linear tactics and cavalry charges were things of the past by 1914. This explanation is accurate to a degree; as far as it goes, it explains the situation. I contend, however, that this explanation ignores the crucial factor: leadership.
It makes one wonder had the British commanders really been clued up to the art of modern warfare or maybe even taken a lesson in sanity maybe the war might not have been so disastrous in terms of casualties. Even theorists from ancient warfare had far more reason on their side , for example Sun Tzu ( to pretend he was just a single person ) writes: