War Planning 1914

[Crunchy]

War Planning, 1914 Ed by Richard F. Hamilton and Holger. H. Herwig. Cambridge University Press. AU$38.95

When war erupted in 1914, armies all across Europe swung into action within days. Reservists hurried to re-join the colours, and the railways burst into life carrying troops to pre-arranged concentration points in a race to gain an advantage of days over their foes. For example, the German Great General Staff planned the movement of 11,000 trains to mobilise its army, and between 2 and 18 August no less than 2,150 trains, or roughly 126 trains per day, crossed the Hohenzollern Bridge over the Rhine alone. This massive movement of men and material from Russia in the east, to France in the west was the culmination of years of planning by respective military staffs. Germany’s Schlieffen Plan, as modified by Moltke the Younger, is well known, but few would know those of the other major European belligerents. War Planning, 1914 fills this gap.

The great virtue of this book is that the plans of six of the major European nations that became embroiled in the war, are succinctly covered in one volume. However, this is more than simply a discussion of war plans. Its focus, as the editors and authors are at pains to emphasize, is on the planning. More particularly they address the influences, internal and external, that affected the outcome of the plans the armies went to war with, followed, in most chapters, by an examination of their execution when the dice was finally rolled.

Presented by experienced historians, each covering one of the combatant nations, they provide an evaluation of what drove the military planners of Austria-Hungary, Germany, Russia, France, and Great Britain to unleash their armies in the way they did, and for Italy to address the conundrum of planning to fight on the side of an ally they distrusted, and eventually went to war against. Most are covered in roughly 30 pages, except for the very comprehensive discussion of Russia’s dilemma and machinations, resulting in an unsatisfactory compromise, which is twice the length of its companions. Richard Hamilton’s Introduction, which provides a telling comparison between theory and reality, and Holger Herwig’s Conclusion, which draws out the key themes emerging from the discussions, top and tail this valuable little book. It provides an keen insight into the peculiarities of each bureaucracy, and the pressures they faced in planning for war, together with the plans with which the major European players embarked on the the great catastrophe.

The plans differed in scope. While those of Germany, Austria-Hungary and Russia entailed mobilisation and planned offensives, the much maligned French Plan XVII only took the troops to specified concentration areas, providing flexibility for operations depending on German operations. That the French suffered applying casualties during the Battle of the Frontiers, had more to do with Joffre and the his firm belief in the offensive a outrance, than the plan itself. Had Italy gone to war alongside the Central Powers in August 1914, and complied with their contribution on the Rhine, one wonders whether the Germans would have been victorious in 1914, and the catastrophe of the Western Front could have been averted.

Perhaps the greatest insight is the differing internal influences, and positions within the bureaucracy of the respective war planners, together the almost complete lack of coordination within governments across all six nations. A telling by-product that emerges, is that we learn something of the character of Europe a century ago. The one thing that seems to have driven the continental participants to plan so assiduously for war, and to embark on it without consideration of its consequences, was a fear of each other - that it was the other nation which would attack them, which in the end became a self fulfilling prophecy. Driven by this fear was the urgency of time, to get in first; an urgency that drove the mobilization of the armies and the desire to snatch a march on their opponents, and precluded calm and considered consideration of a crisis that got out of hand. While Germany has generally shouldered the blame for starting a war that should never have erupted, after reading this book one can only conclude she was not alone.

A great addition to our knowledge of what drove the major European nations to go to war with each other, without any clear war aims - or need to.

[Old Tom]

I must see if I can lay hands on this volume. I like your last line.

Old Tom