John Mosier's new book on Verdun

[phil andrade]

This makes my head spin.

The biggest concentration of artillery ever assembled and an attempt to inflict commensurate damage on the French, even if this meant using metal instead of manpower.....and this was neither intended to be - nor regarded as - a major operation ?

I'm not being adversarial here ; I'm just bewildered !

Phil (PJA)

[David Filsell]

I echo compliments for Cristina's analysis. Having had another go at a couple of chapters I am bemused by Jankowski's thinking and his convoluted writing style, both are frequently confusing. I really am asking if the book is worth the effort or a review.

[phil andrade]

David,

A thread was opened in this section of the forum regarding Jankowski's book by trenchtrotter on 27th April.

I can sympathise with anybody being confused in his thinking about Verdun.

At least Jankowski, despite his style of prose, has the virtue of humility.

Phil (PJA)

[Martin Bennitt]

David,

A thread was opened in this section of the forum regarding Jankowski's book by trenchtrotter on 27th April.

I can sympathise with anybody being confused in his thinking about Verdun.

At least Jankowski, despite his style of prose, has the virtue of humility.

Phil (PJA)

Twas I, actually, with some fulsome praise for a book that left a deep and essentially favourable impression on me. Okay, so his style is a bit convoluted, but I didn't have to read many of his sentences more than twice. I thought his descriptions of what it was like to fight at Verdun very evocative, and I liked his chapters on attrition, prestige and the offensive trap. I guess for Falkenhayn it seemed a good idea at the time, but beyond that I wouldn't go. Mosier I will probably not bother with. I was reading the Amazon reviews of both books, and I liked one comment comparing these two to Mosier's discredit, e.g.: "Both Mosier and Jankowski include a long detail bibliography, but it is clear that only the latter actually read all those books and documents." The same review refers to another book, "Battle Story: Verdun 1916" by one Chris McNab, described as a good factual account, though I know nothing of it.

Cheers Martin B

[Fattyowls]

Thanks Martin; I was hoping that you would share your impressions which sound pretty good to me.

Pete.

[trenchtrotter]

I have not yet read my copy (still reading BMACs excellent Z Day). I hope my buying Jankowskis book was not a mistake. Will avoid the book subject of this thread and keep my mind open. Let you know my thoughts.

This thread is also confusing as you never know if it's Ms book or Js that being referred too at times.

TT

[phil andrade]

There is something conspicuously absent in most of the accounts that I have read about Verdun : the number of French prisoners that the Germans captured.

This is significant in my reckoning. The number itself is, perhaps, indicative of the fragility of morale in the French army and nation that Falkenhayn had seized upon as a rationale for the kind of operation that he had in mind.

Only in that dated but super, super book the Price of Glory have I seen the pertinent citation :

Between 21 February and 15 July, the French had lost over 275,000 men ( according to their official war history ) and 6,563 officers. Of these, somewhere between 65,000 and 70,000 had been killed ; 64,000 men and 1,400 officers had been captured ( according to the Crown Prince) .

That's from page 298.

This is a portentious count. It implies that, in approximate terms, French soldiers were surrendering at the same rate as they were being killed. Moreover, the ratio of prisoners to overall casualties is rather higher for the French at Verdun than it was for the war as a whole.

Roughly one in ten of all French soldiers who were killed on the Western Front were victims of the 1916 battle ; but the number of prisoners cited above exceeds that proportion.

This is, of course,to be considered with circumspection.....what the Crown Prince claimed and what the actual figure was might not match ; it might be that the figure applies to a wider sector of the front than that of the battle proper etc. etc.

But the figure looks plausible to me.

It also helps to explain the preponderance of those posted " missing" in the official French casualty list, and explains the disparity between the French and German casualty totals in respect of the proportion of killed/missing.

I hope to find out more about this. I would like to think that I might actually write some kind of essay about it. It's been neglected as a subject worthy of study. Perhaps the French were - and maybe still are - a bit touchy about it.

If memory serves me, in the summer fightng the French politicians did raise some concern about the tendency of their soldiers to surrender at Verdun. There were a couple of exemplary executions of French officers, weren't there ? I wonder if this reflected that anxiety.

There are caveats : maybe many of the prisoners claimed by the Germans were wounded....I know that the future President De Gaulle was bayoneted in the thigh and captured.

Neither Mosier nor Janowski allude much to this haul of prisoners. There is a gap in the literature here.

Please help me address it.

Phil (PJA)

[Fattyowls]

I could go on and on but I’ll stop there...

Christina

Christina,

I've been trying to get my head around your post as I find the arguments compelling, but like Phil I find the reference to Verdun as not being a major operation intriguing. I can't think of another senior commander whose words are as ambiguous as Erich Von Falkenhayn's. I'm wondering if he felt an insecurity in his position as if memory serves he was promoted over more senior candidates on the General Staff having been the Kaiser's military tutor. I think you are spot on that the arguments in the infamous memo would have been aired at the time and Falkenhayn subsequently tidied them up to justify his strategy. He would hardly be alone amongst Great War leaders in doing that.

I would be very interested in the context of the quote about Verdun not being a major operation. I can't help wondering if this refers to the limited number of troops in the plan. Maybe the audience Falkenhayn intended the remarks for were Hindenberg, Ludendorff and the Easteners in the German leadership. They presumably would be pressing Falkenhayn for troops to realise the tantalaising prospect of a German empire stretching all the way to the Don basin.

As for the plan for a quick victory culminating in the Supreme War Lord's triumphal entry into Verdun I think this makes huge sense. The Germans had the precedent of the quick victory of 1870 which led to Frenchmen killing Frenchmen on the streets of Paris. It seems likely that Falkenhayn's intelligence overestimated the damage that 1914-15 had caused the French army; they wouldn't be alone in that either. He could hardly have said that in the event of not taking Verdun quickly he would allow the battle to drag on for ten months, just as Haig could hardly have said that the plan for the Somme was to take a few miles of chalk downland at the cost of over 400,000 casualties. When I was last in the visitor centre at Thiepval there was a map of the corps boundaries for the start of the battle with the right wing wheeling to face east and the lines extending to Bapaume and beyond. I found it very poignant.

I'll leave it there; I'm finding it hard to know where to stop too. I'm going to ignore the Mosier book but I think I will give the Jankowski book a try based on Martin's recommendation. It sounds like it has something to say about how the battle got out of control and I'm interested if it has any insights into the role of Schmidt von Knobelsdorf who has always interested me.

Pete.

[Christina Holstein]

Something reaches out and grabs the attention in Falkenhayn's memoirs...he frequently alludes to the astonishing resistance put up by outnumbered and outgunned German troops in Champagne and Artois in autumn 1915.

He seems to imply that, if his men could hold things together under that sort of pressure, with all that material and manpower preponderance arrayed against them, then what might they accomplish if they were afforded a massive artillery superiority on a carefully chosen sector ?

Yes, that sounds about right.

Let’s take prisoners first: I have no overall figure for how many prisoners the Germans took at Verdun and I doubt if there is one. However, when you read the German regimental histories and even the Official History (Der Weltkrieg) it’s clear that time and time again they took substantial numbers. To take a couple of examples, the popular French account of the fate of Driant’s men mentions a figure in the 50s for those who ‘survived’. However, the Germans took over 600 prisoners. So those who ‘survived’ must have been those who got back to French lines and over the years that has been understood to mean that everyone else was killed. Over on the Left Bank – a much neglected area where I’m spending a lot of time at the moment, there’s a memorial to the 6 companies of the 69^th Infantry who disappeared at Haucourt on 6 April 1916. The French records speak of losing over 1400 officers and men at Haucourt and only 4 men got back to French lines at the end of that day. So you read that and think they all died but the Germans record taking over 500 unwounded prisoners. Unwounded – how on earth did they escape being wounded in all that shelling? That raises questions about the shelling too and that’s another can of worms which it is difficult to open without sounding casual about what it must have been like to be there. In Malancourt Wood on 20 March 1916 there was a very shocking example of the complete collapse of an entire French brigade and a supporting territorial company – over 5000 officers and men going into captivity. Discussing the surprising success of the day, one of the German regimental histories wonders whether, at least on their part of the front, the French had previously decided not to fight. This is all very difficult stuff to discuss, even today, especially when German records regularly speak of prisoners being unwounded.

The exemplary executions of two officers mentioned by Phil occurred on 10 June 1916 (I think), three days after the fall of Fort Vaux. However, they weren’t shot because anyone surrendered but because they pulled their men out of line and back to the barracks. You wonder what they were thinking of.

To stop Phil’s head spinning, let me say that instead of ‘major’ operation, I should perhaps have said that it wasn’t intended to be a long-running operation or to suck in as many men as it did. It certainly became major when it went on for months and when Falkenhayn wanted to shut it down – as he did by the middle of March 1916 – he was told by Schmidt von Knobelsdorf that to do so would be bad for morale. It was the Crown Prince’s army, after all. Maybe that’s what he meant. It’s interesting to see who had the Kaiser's ear there.

Pete – I’ll have to check again what Falkenhayn said about his view on Verdun as a major operation. I would certainly think it refers to the limited number of troops made available.

Pete – Falkenhayn seems to have been a man who played his cards very close to his chest, perhaps by temperament and also perhaps because he was unpopular with some of his peers, having been promoted over the heads of many of them. It seems to be true that when he put forward his bleeding white idea, it wasn’t understood by 5^th Army who took it as an opportunity to go for Verdun. But then 5^th Army had a beef with Verdun, which they had almost pinched out in September 1914. In 5^th Army’s view, they were unfairly ordered back at the end of the Battle of the Marne when they could have got the city. They then came up with a plan to capture Verdun in October 1914 which was put off when a sufficient ammunition supply couldn’t be guaranteed. They then drew up another plan for 1915, which also came to nothing and then, boy oh boy, here’s another chance to get the darned place in 1916. That was what mattered to them. Whether they understood what Falkenhayn was aiming to achieve or they disregarded it, I don’t know. In any case it didn’t matter as long as it brought the French to the negotiating table quickly.

Hobby horse mode again …

Christina

[David Filsell]

That any one has to read a sentence twice - I have read some three or four times - strikes me as a major author failure. I think the best thing about the Jankowski book is probably the debate and responses it has triggered here. They are clear, sensible and apposite, unlike jankowski's pretentious striving for effect at the cost of clarity. We have leased with some goodnew worksthiscenrenary year and some dross.

[Christina Holstein]

The main problem I have with Jankowski is that if you come to the book wanting to know what actually happened at Verdun, you won't know by the time you get to the end. It wanders around, back and forth in time and space without making clear what the chronology is or in what order things happened or why they happened. And there are lots of incorrect facts in it too, which is unforgivable in my view as the one thing you can't do is give the reader incorrect facts.

Jankowski seems to have followed the style of writing of Gerard Canini in his book Combattre à Verdun. In fact, he mentions Canini's book in his bibliography and he's the only English-language author I know (apart from me) who does so. Canini's book is about what it was like to fight at Verdun and it too wanders about because he's dealing with the battle under topic headings like Moving Up, At the Front, Wounded, etc, rather than dealing with it chronologically. It's a very good read but if you don't know what was happening in the battle,you won't get it from Canini. You'll get the flavour of the battle and that seems to be what Jankowski was trying to give too. That's all very well if you already know the facts and want something else. For me, there's no one better than Horne to give the facts and describe the battle as it was.

Christina

[Christina Holstein]

Pete -

On the question of how quick the Verdun offensive was intended to be, bear in mind that when Falkenhayn was planning it – around Christmas 1915 - he wanted to bring the war to an end before the British Army was at full strength. He thought that would happen by about mid-summer 1916, which meant he hadn’t much time. That’s why the Verdun operation was launched in February – the worst possible time of the year in a part of France with an awful climate.

Falkenhayn’s aim, as explained before the battle and discussed at length in Der Weltkrieg (the official history) was to attack at Verdun on a limited front using limited resources in order to inflict such casualties on the French in a short time that the government would feel unable to continue with the war. He was intending to keep the bulk of his forces back in order to respond to the Allied offensives which he expected would follow the attack at Verdun. He expected those to be weak and once he’d dealt with them, he’d launch his own major mopping-up counter offensive that would bring matters to an end. He was recorded by Hermann von Kuhl on 11 January 1916 as saying that he planned to launch his counter offensive 'around the middle of February'. Von Kuhl was Chief of Staff to Army Group Crown Prince Rupprecht. On 3 February in a conversation with Conrad von Hotzendorf, Falkenhayn expressed the belief that a decision would be reached shortly after the start of the Verdun offensive. An Austrian staff officer present at the meeting recorded Falkenhayn as saying that the operation against France could bring a decision in 14 days. And then there’s the Kaiser, who fully expected to attend a victory parade at Verdun at the end of February.

If ‘attrition’ means ‘wearing down’, that doesn’t sound like attrition to me. It’s more like a quick collapse. In fact, I think the term bleeding white gives it away. After all, one bleeds white in about five minutes; it isn’t a long-drawn out process.

Christina

[Fattyowls]

Chistina

An absolutely superb summary, thank you. It also puts the choice of the word Gehricht for the operation into a new light for me. I have to admit I've never been to Verdun in winter but I could imagine it being unpleasant, the length of day for operations must only have been around 8 to 10 hours. I'm also very intrigued by your take on the apparent mass surrenders; it would appear that they might have been more widespread than I'd thought from reading Horne. But trying to put myself in the place of those men under that kind of bombardment doesen't make me think any less of them

Pete.

[Marilyne]

Dear all,

THANK YOU for this topic, because you just spared me a lot of trouble... I was trying to figure out what I was going to read about Verdun for the 100th anniversary... I'm keeping up with the history of the war in chronological order right now.

I've got some books I've already read and took notes on, like Horne's of course, Malcolm Brown's and of course Christina's "Walking Verdun" but I wanted something new to start in 2016... So I'll definitely take a very wide berth around Mosier and Jankowski; and instead will start with Ian Ousby's "The Road to Verdun", Bernède's "Le point de vue Français", Canini's book (all available at the libraries) and finally the new one by Prost and Krumeich.

And probably re-read Horne's book and the one and only good reference.

M.

[Marilyne]

oh .. and I forgot the copy of German Werth's book I still have somewhere...

M.

[trenchtrotter]

Jankowskis wasn't that bad IMHO!

TT

[phil andrade]

Jankowskis wasn't that bad IMHO!

TT

Good, cogent analysis completely ruined by bad prose.

Details of Prost and Krumeich, please ...I'd like to investigate.

Phil ( PJA )

[Marilyne]

on popular request... my view on the books I have mentioned in this thread earlier:

BERNEDE's "Verdun - le point de vue français" is good, if you're willing to go through the dry description of battles and the staff "work" ... or rather the comments exchanged between the commanders who seemed to have nothing better to do than insult one another all day long. Verdun is as much about the myth as about the battle itself, but Bernède, as tactics teacher (never was friends with those) takes on ONLY the terrain part, which makes his book horribly dry and hard to read.

OUSBY, in his "The road to Verdun" is the complete opposite: he describes the battles, yes, because it's inevitable, but manages at the same time to offer a glimpse of the war around the battle and what it was all about. The links with the rest of the front and the underlying factors of the battle and the men who fought it. it's absolutely brilliant!!

I started the first chapter of Prost and Krumeich, but because that one is mine and the other on "give back" deadlines from the library... choices, choices...

to be continued...

M.

[Marilyne]

With my sincerest apology for the delay... start of the marching season and the need to write on my own came in between my reading intentions...

but I finished "Verdun 2016" by Prost and Krumeich and can only recommend it.

It's not about the battle itself... the authors figure that with the amount of literature existing, there is no need to put us through all of it again. As a friend of mine said when seeing me with the book in hand : "I know how it ends!"

There are three parts: first of all the preparation: why did the Germans chose Verdun and how did the French spend the months before the battle, in other words: what was the real importance of Verdun for both sides?

Then there is the battle: how was it experienced on both sides? How did the soldiers live the battle?

And last part is about the commemoration: how did Verdun turn into a myth, also on both sides.

now of course one has the idea that there is much more info about the French than the Germans... well if they hadn't have their archives burnt in WWII ... then maybe we'd know more about the Germans... but all things considered, both authors did a really good job on this project!

Greetz,

Marilyne