1918 Catastrophe To Victory

Author : John Buchan
Publisher : Leonaur Limited
Page : 236 pages
File Size : 55,5 Mb
Release : 2018-06-07
Category : History
ISBN : 1782827064

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1918-Catastrophe to Victory by John Buchan Pdf

The final battles to Allied victory in the West The German Ludendorff Spring Offensive, launched at the Allied lines in Spring 1918, proved to be perilously close the right solution to achieve battlefield victory. Typically for German initiatives it was meticulously planned with coordinated operations working along an established critical timeline. While initially highly successful, the advance took longer than expected and Allied tenacity resulted in ill-conceived remedial actions which stalled the rapid progress upon which ultimate success depended. Allied commanders noted well the most effective components of the German modus operandi and were able to take advantage of its inherent weaknesses, which were exacerbated by Germany's comparatively limited and irreplaceable--in contrast to the Allied situation--resources in men and materiel. As it became clear the German attack had run out of impetus the Allies turned to the offensive and their own attack was launched in early August, 1918. Refined versions of the German grand-tactics were now turned upon them to great effect. This was at last a mobile campaign to be fought over terrain which favoured a rapid advance by all the resources the combined Allied armies could bring to bear. By mid-November the remaining forces of the Central Powers had been defeated, had recoiled towards the frontiers of their homelands and had agreed to an armistice which ended the First World War. How the Allied armies near defeat was so resolutely turned to total triumph in less than four months is the fascinating subject of this book by John Buchan which is supported by many maps, illustrations and photographs. A companion book, '1918--Catastrophe to Victory--the German 'Ludendorff' Spring Offensive' by Buchan, which describes the events which led to the Hundred Days Offensive, is also available from Leonaur. Leonaur editions are newly typeset and are not facsimiles; each title is available in softcover and hardback with dustjacket; our hardbacks are cloth bound and feature gold foil lettering on their spines and fabric head and tail bands.

Author : John Buchan
Publisher : Leonaur Limited
Page : 224 pages
File Size : 47,9 Mb
Release : 2018-06-07
Category : Electronic
ISBN : 1782827056

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1918-Catastrophe to Victory by John Buchan Pdf

The last German offensive that almost won the war in the west By the fourth year of the Great War on the Western Front the protagonists knew that established assault tactics could not be depended upon to deliver battlefield victories or, indeed, long endure. Time and attrition was on the side of the Allies, for the German homeland was hard pressed and suffering. The Allied cause was not challenged geographically, in materiel or logistically since the U-Boat menace was being defeated in the Atlantic and decisive military support from the United States America was at hand. The introduction of battle tanks meant an imminent end to the dominance of trenches. To prevail Germany needed to deliver an innovative, swift and encompassing attack solution which would decisively breach the enemy's lines and surge onwards to Paris, thus forcing a cessation of hostilities from a position of strength. In March of 1918 this German assault began and was initially so successful that Allied lines buckled and armies reeled back in disarray, falling back towards positions they had last held in 1914. The Ludendorff Offensive--named for its innovator--in the Spring of 1918, also called the Kaiser's Battle (Kaiserschlacht) was the final initiative for imperial Germany--and one that very nearly succeeded. How it was conceived, implemented, opposed and halted is detailed here, supported by many maps, illustrations and photographs, by John Buchan. A companion volume, '1918--Catastrophe to Victory--the Allied Hundred Days Offensive' by the same author, which describes the battles which concluded the First World War in the West, is also available from Leonaur. Leonaur editions are newly typeset and are not facsimiles; each title is available in softcover and hardback with dustjacket; our hardbacks are cloth bound and feature gold foil lettering on their spines and fabric head and tail bands.

Author : Thilo von Bose
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 456 pages
File Size : 55,7 Mb
Release : 2019-08-26
Category : Amiens, Battle of, Amiens, France, 1918
ISBN : 1922265047

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The Catastrophe of 8 August 1918 by Thilo von Bose Pdf

Thilo von Bose's 1930 book The Catastrophe of 8 August 1918 was the 36th and last volume in a series of popular semi-official German histories of the First World War. It documents in great detail the 'black day of the German Army' at the Battle of Amiens in August 1918, a turning point that set the Allies on the road to victory just 100 days later. With considerable moral courage, Bose describes the causes and catastrophic nature of the defeat inflicted by a combined force of Australian, Canadian, French and British troops. Alongside his powerful critique of the failure of German command, Bose tells the human story of German soldiers as individuals rather than an anonymous field-grey mass. This new edition of his important book presents the original German text in parallel with the first ever English translation. The introduction, appendices, maps and photographs explain and illustrate the historical and military context, allowing the reader to navigate an easy path through Bose's account. This unique combination of content makes the book a key source in introducing a new audience to scholarship on the First World War and will also assist those keen to research the German side of the conflict in more depth.

Author : Alan Warwick Palmer
Publisher : Grove Press
Page : 402 pages
File Size : 41,7 Mb
Release : 2000-12-04
Category : History
ISBN : 0802137873

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Victory 1918 by Alan Warwick Palmer Pdf

Now in paperback, a distinguished historian recounts the myriad tragic blunders and the unprecedented, unfathomable bloodshed that was World War I in a fresh and revealing look at the war and its impact on the 20th century. Maps. of photos.

Author : Laurence V Keegan
Publisher : Pen and Sword
Page : 401 pages
File Size : 54,9 Mb
Release : 1995-05-01
Category : History
ISBN : 9780850524390

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Victory Must be Ours by Laurence V Keegan Pdf

Europe went to war in 1914 tot he sound of brass bands and cheering crowds; in every country, civilians and soldiers alike believed that the war would be won by Christmas time. By the time Christmas arrived, however, it became clear that this, indeed, would be a much longer war. In the months and years which followed, combatants perused the war with boundless intensity in order to emerge victorious. This was partially true of Germany where publicists pictured it as a life-and-death struggle for the survival of a nation surrounded by hostile enemies No nation involve din the conflict so completely mobilised its population, its resources, its energies into such a single-minded pursuit of the war. This unusual and incisive account chronicles Germany in World War 1 from the viewpoint of the solders who fought the battles and civilians who endured the ever increasing trauma of escalating casualties, widespread shortages, and declining conditions of living. It relates how Germany attempted to cope with a massive blockade, the scope of which had not been seen since the days of Napoleon, thus forcing German authorities to adopt a series of sometimes brutal measures, all of which rested on the underlying premise that victory, a clear-cut victory, could be the only acceptable option. Victory Must Be Ours explores the Germany which in 1914 took a prestigious leap into darkness. It explores the ingredients which make the Great War perhaps the single most fateful event in the Twentieth Century, setting in motion the most bloody conflict of all time, World War II.

Author : John Terraine
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 283 pages
File Size : 42,7 Mb
Release : 1978
Category : France
ISBN : 0333416864

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To Win a War by John Terraine Pdf

Author : David Stevenson
Publisher : Penguin UK
Page : 635 pages
File Size : 54,6 Mb
Release : 2011-05-26
Category : History
ISBN : 9780713998405

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With Our Backs to the Wall by David Stevenson Pdf

At the end of 1917 Britain and France faced a strategic nightmare. Their great offensives against Germany had been calamitous, leaving hundreds of thousands of young men dead and wounded for negligible territorial gains. Despite America's entry into the war the US army remained tiny, the Italian army had been routed, and Russia had dropped out of the conflict. The Central Powers now dominated Central and Eastern Europe, and Germany could move over forty divisions to the Western Front. Yet only one year later, on 11 November 1918, the fighting ended in a decisive Allied victory. In his new book David Stevenson retells the story of the final year of the First World War and, in a remarkable and fascinating piece of original research,goes to the roots of this dramatic reversal of fortune, analysing the reasons for Allied success and the collapse of Germany and its partners. Everything from food supply to finance, from strategy to technology, logistics, and morale, is explored in an assessment that lays bare the nerve-racking decisions taken on both sides and the sheer uncertainty faced by the leaders. Ironically Stevenson traces Germany's 1918 disaster to 'Operation Michael', the great spring offensive that tested the British army to the uttermost and led on to Field Marshal Haig's famous 'With our backs to the wall' order to his troops to fight to the last man. This is a rich and compelling study of a turning point in modern history. The consequences of the events of 1918 shaped the whole of the twentieth century - and still touch us today.

Author : Ashley Ekins
Publisher : ReadHowYouWant.com
Page : 570 pages
File Size : 41,9 Mb
Release : 2010
Category : History
ISBN : 9781458752307

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1918 Year of Victory by Ashley Ekins Pdf

1918: Year of Victory, convened by the Australian War Memorial in Canberra in November 2008 to mark the ninetieth anniversary of the end of the Great War. Ashley Ekins (volume editor) is Head of the Military History Section at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra.

Author : Stephen C. McGeorge and Mason W. Watson
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 80 pages
File Size : 48,9 Mb
Release : 2024-06-30
Category : Electronic
ISBN : 8210379456XXX

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The Marne 15 July - 6 August 1918 by Stephen C. McGeorge and Mason W. Watson Pdf

Author : Christoph Cornelissen,Arndt Weinrich
Publisher : Berghahn Books
Page : 516 pages
File Size : 45,9 Mb
Release : 2022-11-11
Category : History
ISBN : 9781800737273

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The Historiography of World War I from 1918 to the Present by Christoph Cornelissen,Arndt Weinrich Pdf

From the Treaty of Versailles to the 2018 centenary and beyond, the history of the First World War has been continually written and rewritten, studied and contested, producing a rich historiography shaped by the social and cultural circumstances of its creation. Writing the Great War provides a groundbreaking survey of this vast body of work, assembling contributions on a variety of national and regional historiographies from some of the most prominent scholars in the field. By analyzing perceptions of the war in contexts ranging from Nazi Germany to India’s struggle for independence, this is an illuminating collective study of the complex interplay of memory and history.

Author : Kathleen Burk
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 299 pages
File Size : 52,6 Mb
Release : 2014-04-24
Category : History
ISBN : 9781317700517

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Britain, America and the Sinews of War 1914-1918 (RLE The First World War) by Kathleen Burk Pdf

Anglo-American relations were transformed during the First World War. Britain was already in long-term economic decline relative to the United States, but this decline was accelerated by the war, which was militarily a victory for Britain, but economically a catastrophe. This book sets out the economic, and in particular, the financial relations between the two powers during the war, setting it in the context of the more familiar political and diplomatic relationship. Particular attention is paid to the British war missions sent out to the USA, which were the agents for much of the financial and economic negotiation, and which are rescued here from underserved historical obscurity.

Author : G. J. Meyer
Publisher : Bantam
Page : 818 pages
File Size : 42,6 Mb
Release : 2007-05-29
Category : History
ISBN : 9780553382402

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A World Undone by G. J. Meyer Pdf

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Drawing on exhaustive research, this intimate account details how World War I reduced Europe’s mightiest empires to rubble, killed twenty million people, and cracked the foundations of our modern world “Thundering, magnificent . . . [A World Undone] is a book of true greatness that prompts moments of sheer joy and pleasure. . . . It will earn generations of admirers.”—The Washington Times On a summer day in 1914, a nineteen-year-old Serbian nationalist gunned down Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo. While the world slumbered, monumental forces were shaken. In less than a month, a combination of ambition, deceit, fear, jealousy, missed opportunities, and miscalculation sent Austro-Hungarian troops marching into Serbia, German troops streaming toward Paris, and a vast Russian army into war, with England as its ally. As crowds cheered their armies on, no one could guess what lay ahead in the First World War: four long years of slaughter, physical and moral exhaustion, and the near collapse of a civilization that until 1914 had dominated the globe. Praise for A World Undone “Meyer’s sketches of the British Cabinet, the Russian Empire, the aging Austro-Hungarian Empire . . . are lifelike and plausible. His account of the tragic folly of Gallipoli is masterful. . . . [A World Undone] has an instructive value that can scarcely be measured”—Los Angeles Times “An original and very readable account of one of the most significant and often misunderstood events of the last century.”—Steve Gillon, resident historian, The History Channel

Author : Max Hastings
Publisher : HarperCollins UK
Page : 588 pages
File Size : 54,8 Mb
Release : 2013-09-12
Category : History
ISBN : 9780007519750

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Catastrophe: Europe Goes to War 1914 by Max Hastings Pdf

A magisterial chronicle of the calamity that crippled Europe in 1914.

Author : Nick Lloyd
Publisher : Penguin UK
Page : 432 pages
File Size : 54,9 Mb
Release : 2017-05-04
Category : History
ISBN : 9780241970119

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Passchendaele by Nick Lloyd Pdf

Between July and November 1917, in a small corner of Belgium, more than 500,000 men were killed or maimed, gassed or drowned - and many of the bodies were never found. The Ypres offensive represents the modern impression of the First World War: splintered trees, water-filled craters, muddy shell-holes. The climax was one of the worst battles of both world wars: Passchendaele. The village fell eventually, only for the whole offensive to be called off. But, as Nick Lloyd shows, notably through previously unexamined German documents, it put the Allies nearer to a major turning point in the war than we have ever imagined.

Author : Allan Mallinson
Publisher : Random House
Page : 400 pages
File Size : 44,9 Mb
Release : 2016-06-02
Category : History
ISBN : 9781409011002

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Too Important for the Generals by Allan Mallinson Pdf

‘War is too important to be left to the generals’ snapped future French prime minister Georges Clemenceau on learning of yet another bloody and futile offensive on the Western Front. One of the great questions in the ongoing discussions and debate about the First World War is why did winning take so long and exact so appalling a human cost? After all this was a fight that, we were told, would be over by Christmas. Now, in his major new history, Allan Mallinson, former professional soldier and author of the acclaimed 1914: Fight the Good Fight, provides answers that are disturbing as well as controversial, and have a contemporary resonance. He disputes the growing consensus among historians that British generals were not to blame for the losses and setbacks in the ‘war to end all wars’ – that, given the magnitude of their task, they did as well anyone could have. He takes issue with the popular view that the ‘amateur’ opinions on strategy of politicians such as Lloyd George and, especially, Winston Churchill, prolonged the war and increased the death toll. On the contrary, he argues, even before the war began Churchill had a far more realistic, intelligent and humane grasp of strategy than any of the admirals or generals, while very few senior officers – including Sir Douglas Haig – were up to the intellectual challenge of waging war on this scale. And he repudiates the received notion that Churchill’s stature as a wartime prime minister after 1940 owes much to the lessons he learned from his First World War ‘mistakes’ – notably the Dardanelles campaign – maintaining that in fact Churchill’s achievement in the Second World War owes much to the thwarting of his better strategic judgement by the ‘professionals’ in the First – and his determination that this would not be repeated. Mallinson argues that from day one of the war Britain was wrong-footed by absurdly faulty French military doctrine and paid, as a result, an unnecessarily high price in casualties. He shows that Lloyd George understood only too well the catastrophically dysfunctional condition of military policy-making and struggled against the weight of military opposition to fix it. And he asserts that both the British and the French failed to appreciate what the Americans’ contribution to victory could be – and, after the war, to acknowledge fully what it had actually been.