100 years ago today - 1st poison gas attack at Ypres

If its not on youtube, it didn't happen.

Chlorine gas- Germans

Gas warfare was just terrible. When gas first started being seen on the battlefield, one of the early attempts at a gas mask was to give soldiers very rudimentary contraptions like this...


or this



... When a gas attack was coming in, which was almost daily at some points, the soldier was supposed to piss on the mask and then put it on their face covering their mouth and nose. The urine was supposed to protect them.

Add that on top of the smell of living in a trench for days or even weeks on end surrounded by thousands of other soldiers who, just like you, had no means to bathe or change their heavy wool uniform. Then there's the matter of no toilet facilities. And finally, the stench of thousands of rotting corpses. WWII may have killed more people, but nothing matches the brutality and suffering of the Western Front of WWI.

Very true. WWI has always been fascinating to me in in that it is arguably the most transformative event in world history since the discovery of the New World. It literally birthed the modern world in which we live. Even today, 100 years later we are still dealing with its aftermath.

quote:

---

Just finishing Harcore History pod cast about WWI, some of them have been eye opening about how terrible and stupid WWI was.

---

I love that podcast. The last one I downloaded was episode V. Wish he'd hurry up and release the next one. I think it will be the last in the series though.

quote:

---

Very true. WWI has always been fascinating to me in in that it is arguably the most transformative event in world history since the discovery of the New World. It literally birthed the modern world in which we live. Even today, 100 years later we are still dealing with its aftermath

---

I'm not a huge history buff, but WWI and WWII always fascinated me. I have always heard that WWI was tactically the worst war ever fought (i.e. basically using the same tactics used in prior wars but now armies are lined up facing each other taking machine gun fire as opposed to musket balls)

quote:

---

I'm not a huge history buff, but WWI and WWII always fascinated me. I have always heard that WWI was tactically the worst war ever fought (i.e. basically using the same tactics used in prior wars but now armies are lined up facing each other taking machine gun fire as opposed to musket balls)

---

This is pretty much true, especially in the first half of the war. Before WWI, historically wars were won by bringing an enemy force into one huge battle where the war was decided. And usually the army with the most aggressive offense was the winner. What the leaders in WWI did not realize though was that the rise of the machine gun and barbed wire along with improvements in artillery meant that where in the past offense usually won the day, now it was defense that held the balance of power. The result was stalemate where neither side could overcome the defenses of the other and men were slaughtered by the millions.

The fact that this stalemate lasted for all intents and purposes for almost four bloody years has been a major source of criticism of the leaders of both sides over the years. However, this criticism should be tempered by the fact, in their defense, the leaders of WWI were faced with a totally new form of war. No one had ever faced what they were facing so there were no ready answers on how to solve the stalemate problem. And while many accuse them of just trying again and again with the same old frontal assaults, that's not entirely accurate.

Almost as soon as the stalemate set in on the Western Front at the conclusion of The Race to the Sea in the autumn of 1914, leaders on both sides started to look for ways to break it. The subject of this thread, poison gas, was one of the first attempts at breaking the stalemate. Later on there would be new ideas put into effect like the creeping barrage by the British, the Germans basically invented modern infantry tactics with the formation of the Sturmtruppen battallions, and of most importance (and what finally did break the stalemate) the Allies invented the concept of modern day combined arms warfare incorporating armor, infantry, artillery, and air power all together.

Add in the fact that WWI also saw the rise of things like submarine warfare, air-to-air combat, tactical air support, and strategic bombing, just to name a few, and you can see that the leaders of WWI not only were quite innovative, they actually were the inventors of modern warfare.

quote:

---

WWI was just pointless, pointless death. Biggest exercise in stubbornness and futility humans have ever conducted.

---

I can see what you're saying. Still, for better or worse, it gave rise to the world of today.


(On a subject for another thread, I've always wondered how things would be today if either the war never happened or if the British had stayed on the sidelines and Germany & Austria-Hungary had won the war in 1914.)

quote:

---

quote:
, but nothing matches the brutality and suffering of the Western Front of WWI.


how about the brutality and suffering of the Armenians, Jews, Gypsies, Chinese, Tsarists, gays, mentally handicapped, etc that were all killed in genocides during both wars?

---

I was speaking towards a standpoint of warfare, not murder.

quote:

---

Socialist revolution breaks out in France first instead of Russia, still resulting in a second major European conflict sometime around the middle decades of the 20th century.

---

I could see that happening. France had a strong socialist movement prior to WWI and had already had a communist uprising with the "communards" in Paris at the end of the Franco-Prussian War.