By September 1914, both sides on the Western Front had descended into trench warfare. To the east, the Ottoman Empire had joined the war on the side of Germany and Austria-Hungary — which lead to the Allied defeat at Gallipoli. Let's turn our attention to the Eastern Front, and the naval activity of the two sides.
This is Part Five of a series of posts leading up to the centenary of the end of The Great War on November 11, 2018. For details of the Ottoman Empire entering the war and the Gallipoli Campaign, please see The Great War Centenary: Part Four, Ottomans and Gallipoli.
General Paul von Hindenburg and staff, Battle of Tannenberg, 29 August 1914
The Eastern Front
As we have seen in an earlier post, Germany entered World War 1 largely following the Schlieffen Plan. One of its major aims was to avoid fighting a war on two fronts. This required the rapid invasion and defeat of France before inevitably facing the Russians in the East. This was based on the assumption that Russia would take about six weeks to mobilise.
What Schlieffen and his successor von Moltke had noticed was how rapidly Russia had been modernising its infrastructure and transport systems. A force of 150,000 troops was mobilised within a week of war being declared. This was more than double the number of troops in East Prussia, the most vulnerable border with Russia. Germany's worst fear was being realised: war on two fronts against vastly superior numbers.
Von Moltke was forced to divert troops away from the Belgian front to Prussia. Incidentally, von Moltke had ordered that troops guarding the Franco-German border be sent to the East, but the Bavarian commanding officer refused to send his Bavarian troops to their old enemy, Prussia.
The Russians poured across the Russo-Prussian border in overwhelming numbers. The commanding officer, General von Prittwitz, lost his nerve and ordered a retreat. Von Moltke was furious and called up retired General Paul von Hindenburg to replace von Prittwitz.
Hindenburg realised that the Russians had a problem: Russian railway tracks were a different gauge to the Bavarians'. This had slowed down their progress and the rapid deployments had stretched their supply lines. Effectively they were stuck in a forested and marshy area near the village of Tannenberg. In addition, a note was found on a dead Russian soldier that laid out the entire Russian attack plan, knowledge that convinced Hindenburg to end the retreat and go back on the attack.
Movements of 27–30 August 1914
Hindenburg and his deputy Erich Ludendorff devised a plan that took advantage of the German rail system to rapidly deploy his forces to strategic areas. In a massive pincer movement, completely unnoticed by the Russians, the Germans surrounded the Russian Second army at Tannenberg. The ensuing Battle of Tannenberg, fought between 26 and 30 August 1914, was a heavy defeat for the Russians with 300,000 thousand casualties and 125,000 taken prisoner. The Germans lost 13,000 men.
It was the most complete victory in military history. Hindenburg had proved that a smaller but much more mobile force could imitate a much larger force. Hindenburg had released the pressure from the Eastern Front, freeing up troops to bolster those further south and on the Western Front.
Paul Ludwig Hans Anton von Beneckendorff und von Hindenburg
Von Hindenburg became a national hero. He was idolised by the people. He was promoted to Field Marshal and later became commander of the entire German army. After the war, he was elected president of the Weimar Republic in 1925, and on his death in 1934, was succeeded by Adolf Hitler.
The war at sea
By Christmas, all hopes that the war would be over had gone and the holiday saw men on both sides digging themselves into trenches on the Western Front. The German successes in the East allowed the Germans to expand their efforts, particularly at sea.
In 1914 Britain had the most powerful navy in the world. The Germans were wary of taking it on directly and relied on its fleet of submarines, called U-boats, to disrupt merchant supply ships to Britain and even to sink the capital ships of the British Grand Fleet.
The U-boat Campaign from 1914 to 1918 was fought by these German U-boats against the trade routes of the Allies. Both countries were dependent on imports of food and raw materials. Both countries were determined to blockade each other.
The German campaign had a dual aim: to remove the threat of British warships against supply ships to Germany, and to sink ships supplying Britain and strangle their trade. It took place largely in the seas around the British Isles and in the Mediterranean. It was highly effective. German U-boats sank almost 5,000 ships with nearly 13 million gross register ton, losing 178 boats and about 5,000 men in combat.
Sinking of the RMS Lusitania, 1915
Lusitania sunk
On 7 May 1915, one of the most infamous and consequential U-boat encounters occurred: the Cunard ocean liner RMS Lusitania was sunk. The ship was identified and torpedoed by the German U-boat U-20 and sank in 18 minutes. 1,198 people were killed leaving 761 survivors. It is important to note that 128 of those killed were US citizens. When Germany began its U-boat campaign against Britain, US President Woodrow Wilson had warned that the US would hold the German government strictly accountable for any violations of American rights.
The German government attempted to justify it with a range of arguments, which are still debated today. There was massive outrage in Britain and America, and the British felt that the Americans had to declare war on Germany. Wilson refused to overreact, but there is no doubt that it was this act that put America on the path to joining the war.
Jutland
The British — with their overwhelming sea power — established a naval blockade of Germany immediately on the outbreak of war in August 1914. All manner of “contraband” was prevented from crossing, including foodstuffs. It all but prohibited American trade with the Central Powers. In early November 1914, Britain declared the North Sea to be a War Zone, with any ships entering the North Sea doing so at their own risk. The Germans regarded this as an illegal attempt to starve the German people into submission and wanted to retaliate in kind.
The blockade extended to the German Imperial Navy, and its ships were confined to port. Their activities were limited to a divide-and-conquer strategy of staging raids into the North Sea and bombarding the English coast, with the aim of luring out small British squadrons and pickets, which could then be destroyed by superior forces or U-boats.
When Vice-Admiral Reinhard Scheer was appointed to command the German Imperial Navy, he changed the strategy to a much more aggressive one. The plan was to lure out, trap and destroy a portion of the Grand Fleet. The German fleet wanted to split the British fleet and destroy it ship by ship.
On 31 May 1916 the Battle of Jutland began. It was the only truly large-scale naval battle of the war. It began in the afternoon when both fleets went to check out a merchant ship sailing in the North Sea. Firing between the ships resulted in major damage to the British fleet. Although superior in numbers to the German fleet, they had inferior armour. The Germans also had superior guns, and many British ships were badly damaged or destroyed. In a series of intricate moves, the two fleets attacked and retreated from each other, inflicting heavy damage. Finally, as night fell, the badly damaged German fleet managed to limp back to port.
Fourteen British and eleven German ships sank, with a total of 9,823 deaths.
Both sides claimed victory. The British lost more ships and twice as many sailors but succeeded in containing the German fleet. Scheer's plan of destroying a substantial portion of the British fleet also failed. The British had succeeded in their long-term goal of denying Germany access to both the United Kingdom and the Atlantic. The German surface fleet was consigned to harbour for the rest of the war.
Aftermath
The German Navy turned its efforts and resources to unrestricted submarine warfare and the destruction of Allied and neutral shipping, which by April 1917 triggered the United States of America's declaration of war on Germany.
The blockade, which lasted until 1919, caused widespread starvation among its home population. Malnourishment and illness claimed thousands of lives, mainly those of civilians, and wounded soldiers who had returned to the home front. The famine and hardship of the winter of 1916-1917, the Turnip Winter (when the population was reduced to eating turnips), severely affected the morale within Germany.
This series on World War One will be continued in Part Six, tomorrow
Previous post in this series:
The Great War Centenary: Introduction
The Great War Centenary: Part One, The Tinderbox
The Great War Centenary: Part Two, The Spark
The Great War Centenary: Part Three, Invasion
The Great War Centenary: Part Four, Ottomans and Gallipoli
References:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Tannenberg
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_von_Hindenburg
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U-boat_Campaign_(World_War_I)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinking_of_the_RMS_Lusitania
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blockade_of_Germany
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Jutland
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turnip_Winter