Describe the nature of the fighting in the First World War, including trench warfare on the Western Front and the reasons the war became one of attrition

What this dot point is asking

SEAB wants you to describe how the First World War was actually fought, especially the trench warfare and stalemate on the Western Front, and to explain why it became a long "war of attrition" rather than the short, glorious war that most people expected in 1914. The task combines description (what the fighting was like) with explanation (why it lasted so long). A strong answer links the power of defensive weapons to the failure to break through and to the grinding strategy of wearing the enemy down.

The answer

The short war that everyone expected

When war broke out in 1914, soldiers marched off believing they would be "home by Christmas". Both sides expected a quick war of movement, won by bold attacks, like the wars of the previous century. This belief came partly from militarism and from plans such as Germany's Schlieffen Plan, which aimed to defeat France in weeks. The reality turned out to be completely different, because modern weapons had changed the balance between attack and defence.

Stalemate and the trench system

Germany's plan to knock out France quickly was halted at the Battle of the Marne in September 1914. Unable to advance, both sides dug trenches to protect their soldiers from enemy fire. Soon a continuous line of trenches stretched from the English Channel to the Swiss border. This was the Western Front, and it barely moved for the next four years. The opposing trenches were separated by "no man's land", a churned strip of mud, shell holes and barbed wire. Life in the trenches was wet, cold and dangerous, with constant shelling, disease such as trench foot, and the threat of sudden attack.

Why defence beat attack

The central reason for the stalemate was that defensive weapons were far stronger than the means of attack. Machine guns could fire hundreds of rounds a minute, cutting down soldiers who advanced across open ground. Barbed wire slowed attackers and trapped them in the killing zone. Heavy artillery could pound enemy lines from miles away. When soldiers "went over the top" to attack, they were usually mown down before they reached the enemy trench. As a result, even huge attacks gained only a few hundred metres of ground at a terrible cost in lives.

A war of attrition

Because no side could break through, the war became one of attrition. Attrition means wearing the enemy down by inflicting more casualties and damage than you suffer, until the enemy can no longer fight. Generals launched massive battles hoping to bleed the enemy white and exhaust their reserves of men and supplies. The Battle of the Somme in 1916 and the Battle of Verdun the same year are the classic examples: months of fighting, over a million casualties between them, and almost no change in the front line. The war became a contest of which side could endure the longest and out-produce the other.

New weapons and the search for a breakthrough

Both sides searched for a way to break the deadlock. Poison gas was first used on a large scale in 1915, causing terror but rarely a decisive advantage. Tanks were introduced by Britain in 1916; early ones were slow and unreliable but pointed toward the future. Aircraft were used for scouting and later for bombing and fighting. None of these on its own broke the stalemate during most of the war, which is why the Western Front remained locked until 1918. The war was also fought at sea (where Britain blockaded Germany) and on other fronts, but the trench deadlock in the west defined the conflict.

Examples in context

Example 1. The Battle of the Somme, 1916. On the first day of the Somme, 1 July 1916, the British army suffered around 57,000 casualties, the worst single day in its history. The battle continued for months and cost over a million casualties on all sides, yet the front line moved only a few kilometres. The Somme is the clearest example of how attrition warfare produced enormous human cost for very little ground.

Example 2. The first use of poison gas, 1915. When chlorine gas was released on a large scale in 1915, it caused panic and a temporary gap in the enemy line, but the attackers could not exploit it before the defenders recovered. Both sides soon issued gas masks. This shows how each new weapon was quickly countered, so none could break the deadlock on its own.

Try this

Q1. What is meant by "no man's land"? [3 marks]

• Cue. The dangerous strip of ground between the opposing trenches, full of shell holes and barbed wire, swept by machine-gun and artillery fire.

Q2. Explain why the war on the Western Front reached a stalemate by the end of 1914. [5 marks]

• Cue. Germany's quick-victory plan failed at the Marne; both sides dug trenches; machine guns, wire and artillery made attack almost impossible, so the front froze.

Q3. "New weapons, not attrition, decided the course of the First World War." How far do you agree? [8 marks]

• Cue. Argue that for most of the war new weapons were countered and the war was decided by attrition and endurance; weigh the role of tanks and other advances, especially by 1918, before judging.