Why did the Allied victory occur in 1918 and not before Essay Example

Why did the Allied victory occur in 1918 and not before? Essay The First World War, at the time known as the War to end all wars, owes much of its horror and length to the slow and laborious aspect of the offensive during it, which makes it difficult to understand the precise reason for it finishing in an allied victory in 1918 and not in any of the previous years. Any number of events could have brought about the end of the war or the capitulation of one of the main protagonists, such as the Battle of the Somme, Verdun or even as early as the Battle of the Marne, but none did and in the end it was a very specific conjunction of events that set the cene for the final outcome, which we will study in this essay, focusing on the USAs late involvement in the war, the Central powers loss of momentum after they had thrown their last reserves into the fray, the culmination of the new technologies used and the disgust of war from many of the populations involved, which are all linked to each other. We will write a custom essay sample on Why did the Allied victory occur in 1918 and not before? specifically for you for only $16.38 $13.9/page Order now We will write a custom essay sample on Why did the Allied victory occur in 1918 and not before? specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer We will write a custom essay sample on Why did the Allied victory occur in 1918 and not before? specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer One of the major factors of Germanys demise and more importantly of when it happened was instigated by Germany itself, which is the USAs involvement in the war. Indeed, when they decided in February 1917 to give the go-ahead for nrestricted submarine warfare, the tactic of destroying all ships, military or otherwise, going towards the British Isles, it was in full knowledge that it would in all likelihood bring the US into the war, as they had used this as their main term to not get involved earlier after the sinking of the Lusitania, but the German decided it was worth the risk to knock the British out of the war before any decisive action could be taken on the ground. This did not happen and the US did get involved with the additional incentive of the Zimmerman telegram trying to push Mexico into the war. The announcement of the USAs decision to enter the war on the allied side was made on the 6th April 1917 and it would eventually mean the downfall of the Central Powers. What the American intervention did in Europe was to set the clock ticking for Hindenburg and Ludendorff, as the Central Powers would have to come up with a way to win in the next 12-15 months . The allies knew that once the American troops arrived they would be able to use the numerical advantage the freshness of these new soldier to their advantage and the Germans, after several years of fghting ithout any reinforcements of this scale would struggle to contain them, and in the end that is exactly what happened. The fact that the arrival of the US into the war in 1917 does explain in that way the hurriedness that came into the war and why it finished at such a late date in, but it is curious in that the intervention could have heralded a much earlier victory, as it took almost two years for the end to come, but that can also be explained, as the soldiers did not arrive straight away. As the US did not have a large standing army, only 175. 000 at any time, they had to draft and train ecruits before they could be set over and this caused a delay. Add to that the delays caused by the news that Mexico was being courted by Germany to keep US out of Europe and the sinking of ships by the unrestricted submarine warfare, albeit a reduced number of them after the putting in place of the convoy system to protect ships, and it took a long time to arrive on the front and the bulk of the force only and be able to make a strong impact which would cause General Ludendorff to internally acknowledge the defeat in September and the peace agreement to be signed in November. Another country which contributed to the war ending at that precise moment was Russias withdrawal from it in 1917 after they had changed government through a socialist revolution and were on the brink of a crushing defeat from Germany, as it gave Germany the opportunity to move over one million troops to the western front from the east and accelerated events further. The troops gained from this move were some of the main protagonists in the ill-fated spring offensive of 1918 and meant that during the subsequent Allied counter attack, there were close to no troops available to be transferred to the defence, as all the German troops nvolved in the war had been used to attack France, with the few remaining being necessary in the South to protect Austro-Hungary from the Italian forces, who were still in the war even if they had suffered some serious defeats. The Russian defeat also meant that the idealists and socialist thinkers in the opposing armies finally had something to look to when they pushed for peace and an end to the war. These thoughts and wishes for peace were progressively gaining more and more followers in the conflict and it was the Germans which suffered from it most, especially at ome, as we will see later on in the essay. The German army itself and the balance of power between the two sides was also obviously a massive factor in the war lasting until the end of 1918 and not be over by Christmas as the British recruitment and the newspapers were convinced of at the start of the conflict. Throughout the war the two belligerent sides had traded the supremacy and advantage and, although they had not always been dominant, Germany had rarely been on the retreating side or been unable to trade blow with the allies and this lasted until early to mid-1918 with he Western powers taking a dramatic dominant position in the last 100 days of the conflict. Germany had always been able to use spare troops and their strategic positional advantage at certain locations to keep a certain strength in any battle, especially if they had used kept some of their forces in the reserve, but this changed when they put in place Operation Michael, the Spring offensive of the final year of the war as, aware that the arrival of American forces to the continent would give the allies an insurmountable advantage over them, they everything they had into a final offensive on the western front. Although it was extremely effective, especially due to the development of the new units known as Sturmtruppen, Storm troopers in English, used alongside creeping artillery barrage tactics, it slowed and faltered after the front line troops failed to be rotated in and out and became exhausted, the stretching of the supply line which could no longer reach the front lines, and the intensifying of Allied defences against a weakening enemy. Recovering from their defeats, the British and French troops, now combined to American reinforcements which were by now arriving at a rhythm of around 10. 0 troops a day, regrouped and launched their hundred day offensive on the depleted and disorganised army which faced them. Indeed, this was the first time since 1914 and the Battle of the Marne that the allies were able to achieve a decisive victory which pushed the Germans back over a long distance. Differently to the start of the war however, it did not turn back into a static war but became a war of movement, as well as profiting ever more until they could no longer sustain the defensive stance, meaning this was the first time they were in a position where they had no alternative but to surrender. Linked to this last push is the advancement in terms of technologies and tactics that occurred throughout the war and which contributed to the end of the war. As it drew on and the deadlock got steadily longer, both sides searched more and more for ways to break through enemy lines, with varying degrees of success, but in the end it became unsustainable to have trenches with the amount of new effective ways of getting round them as a problem. The changes started with weapons that would eliminate the enemy without taking the position outright, such as gas which the Germans tested first in 191 5 or improved artillery which both sides obtained through the war, but it got gradually more offensive and mobile, as with the use of tanks which was pioneered by the British and used in 1916 to debatable effect, or the use of assault troops like the German storm troopers which made trenches almost useless by the end of the war, given that both sides had come up with way of bypassing the problem. This translated itself into a need to return to more conventional tactics of previous wars which lasted much less time, causing the war to end at that time and not before when the deadlock could not be broken as easily and ertainly not over such distances as the ones covered by Allied troops during their devastating hundred day campaign offensive. It wasnt only on the battlefield that the victory was decided however, as there was also the home front in the countries involved, driving the government and the High Command to take certain decisions. As the war drew longer, there was a permanent need for more and more sacrifices on the part of the populations of the fghting countries as the industry suffered from the constant need of more ammunition and resources from the army, a need that was hown in October 1916 when the German government ordered for 20. 000 men a week to be deported from Belgium (Hardach, 1977, The First World War, 1914-1918, p. 8) as there was a shortage of skills labour to work in the armament factories, a sign that the local populations were having to work night and day to build weapons that would b then sent to the front and would not benefit the workers. These grievances came to a head late on in the war when the German people started demanding an end to the war and for better living conditions, which could not be given in the current circumstances. Even though there had been these conditions for a long time because of the conflict, the reason it happen at this particular moment and not earlier can be put down to two major reason: Firstly, the German industrial machine was struggling to keep up with the demands of the war, as its output had gone down to less than half of what it was before the war while the needs had, if anything, increased, meaning that the people were getting even less of what they produced and secondly, the winter of 1917 to 1918 was one of the worst on record, causing many people to die of frostbite or at the very least live in the constant cold, ringing them to a tipping point as the war went on. Added to that the spreading ideas of socialist revolution coming from the newly Communist Russia thanks to Germany and the people were close to breaking point. The ordinary people were not the only ones unhappy on the Home front for Germany, as it was also the case among the sailors stationed in the countrys Northern ports who had been stuck there and the battle of Jutland in 1916 behind a British blockade. Towards the end of the conflict, as the German forces were retreating from the Allied surge, there was a idden plan to attempt a final sea offensive, but when word somehow got the sailors, they rejected the idea and mutinied, almost rioting against their superiors. Although of course there had always been some discontent in the country from Pacifists and Communists, this was wave a protests came from such a wide range of sources that the government could do nothing and it coincided with an imminent German defeat whereas they had previously played off opposition by promising victory over the Allies. Naturally, the British and French were not immune to internal disorder, but hey were able to quell the unhappiness in their population more efficiently than their enemies and in their armies relatively so, even though the French were on the brink of a full uprising in their army directly after the Russian revolution and the peace treaty of Brest-Litovsk. The other main protagonist in the war, Austro-Hungary, was having similar problems to those of their ally, Germany, with the added complication of their country being a collection of different cultures and ethnic minorities who each wanted their own aims achieved and were therefore close to mpossible to appease. Many of these minorities which would go on to create their own nations after the defeat of the Central Powers and the collapse of the Austro- Hungarian Empire swathe war and the difficulties their country was facing to put forwards their own claims and ambitions and the government was unable to answer those and the exterior war as well. The calls for a change in regime from these interior agents echoed those in Germany and when the two rose in 1918 and the army was the struggling to maintain the war effort, they contributed to the Allied victory. To conclude, the end of the First World War has a great many factors, as do the causes for it ending at the specific time, the most important being the USAs involvement in the conflict at a crucial point to tip the advantage in favour of the Allies and Germany exhausting its strength in the months leading up to the peace agreement, but other factors also played a big part, such as the home front in Germany and Austro-Hungary collapsing while the ones in Britain and France were still functioning better, or Russia leaving the conflict which accelerated the unfolding of all the other factors.