Think of a war, say... World War Two, and you can usually think of a pivotal moment
or battle, say, Stalingrad, where the future of the war could maybe be determined. Well,
this week 100 years ago, the First World War saw not one, but two such moments.
I’m Indy Neidell; welcome to the Great War.
Last week saw the Russians launch a new offensive from the Pripet marshes down to Romania and
it was an incredible success, driving the Austrians back dozens of kilometers and taking
tens of thousands of prisoners. The Germans also had some success, taking Fort Vaux at
Verdun, while the Austrian offensive in northern Italy began to run out of steam. An Arab Revolt
against the Ottoman Empire was proclaimed in the Middle East, and at sea British Secretary
of State for War Lord Kitchener drowned when his ship was mined. Here’s what came next.
Fort Vaux had indeed fallen and the Germans pressed on.
The Allied propagandists told the world that it wasn’t really important to the defense
of Verdun, but that wasn’t true and now French General Robert Nivelle even considered
abandoning the whole Right Bank. Fort de Souville was the last major obstacle between the Germans
and their goal.
Alistair Horne wrote, “The period June 8-12 was indeed potentially the most dangerous
for the French since February 25th; by the 12th, Nivelle had at hand no more than one
fresh brigade in reserve, and there was no indication that the German push had exhausted
itself. Had the Germans thrust on then, they could almost certainly have broken through
to Verdun. As it was, they were within an inch of success... Verdun’s salvation this
time owed itself to an event occurring far away... and event for which - indirectly - it
was Erich von Falkenhayn the French had to thank.”
Falkenhayn, German army Chief of Staff and architect of Verdun, had, when planning it,
not informed his Austro-Hungarian opposite number Conrad von Hötzendorf of his plans.
There are actually historians, Horne among them, who believe that perhaps the major cause
of the Central Powers’ defeat in the war was the lack of coordination and cooperation
between Germany and AH, so they never really made use of their huge strategic advantage
- interior lines of communication. A lot of this was because of the terrible personal
relations between Falkenhayn and Conrad. Conrad was so angry that he hadn’t been told about
Verdun that he had planned his current Trentino Offensive himself, taking away five of his
best divisions from the Russian front, and now that front had collapsed and on June 8th
Conrad had met with Falkenhayn in Berlin, pleading for help. Falkenhayn hastily sent
three divisions from the West, and temporarily suspended the new Verdun offensive just when
it could have gone through. For this whole week Falkenhayn, always cautious, hesitated.
The push toward Fort de Souville was now set for the 23rd.
But those divisions were sorely needed by the Austrians.
On June 12th (Gilbert), General Alexei Brusilov announced that in 8 days his men had captured
2,992 Austrian officers, 190,000 soldiers, 216 heavy guns, 645 machine guns, and 196
howitzers. A full third of the Austrian forces facing him had been captured.
At the beginning of the week, on the south part of the southern front, the Austrian defense
collapsed. The Austrian 7th Army lines were now manned by reserves and dismounted cavalry
units, and with no additional men to call upon and only 54 battalions in the line, when
the Russian 9th Army attacked with 122 battalions, the lines broke. By 1 PM on the 10th, General
Karl von Pflanzer-Baltin, Commander of the 7th Army, ordered the withdrawal of the southern
half of the front behind the Pruth River. He wrote, “There is at present absolutely
no possibility of holding against an enemy attack.” However, the men were incapable
of any orderly retreat - most were taken prisoner at the front. Huge stores of supplies and
munitions were abandoned. During that surge on the 10th and 11th, just the Russian XI
Corps alone took 24,000 Austro-Hungarian prisoners, including 564 officers.
The Russian 9th Army, led by Cossacks, pursued the broken southern wing of the 7th Army,
while just to the north of them the Russian 7th Army began to slowly but steadily steamroll
the northern wing. On the 15th, Pflanzer-Baltin got word that no reserves would come to the
Austrian 7th, and he was expected to hold with what he had, even though some of his
divisions were down to only 3,500 men.
200 km to the North, Alexei Kaledin’s 8th Army pressed on. By the 10th, the Austrian
First army was forced to retreat, even though this opened a gap between them and the 4th
army further north nearly 50km wide. At the same time, Russian armored vehicles had broken
the 4th army lines and it was now isolated and retreating. But Kaledin had outrun his
supply lines and his supply of shells was dangerously low. The Russians broke off the
attack that night having pushed back the Central Powers 45km on an 80km front and creating
a huge salient that nearly reached Vladimir-Volynsk. They had also taken 44,000 prisoners. The
roads to both Lemberg and Kovel lay open.
But with the heavy fighting on the southern part of the front, no forces could be quickly
transferred north to Kaledin, and far to the north, Generals Evert and Kuropatkin had not
made attacks on the Germans to pin them down and prevent them from reinforcing Austria.
They had 90 divisions - three quarters of a million men more than the Germans opposing
them - and two thirds of the Russian artillery. Evert was supposed to attack the 14th, but
he didn’t, citing bad weather. So the frustrated Brusilov now had to proceed with caution,
putting the southern wing of the 8th army on the defensive while preparing for a focused
drive toward Kovel. It remained to be seen which side could regroup and reinforce first.
It was the Central Powers. The German divisions arrived on the 12th and when the Russians
struck again the 14th, the moment had passed. Still, while Kaledin’s offensive was blunted,
it was by no means over.
A note here - many military analysts, and this included Brusilov, agreed after the war
that if the Russian 8th Army could have continued to press its advantage right now, this week,
the Habsburg Empire would very likely have been forced to sue for peace, or collapse
entirely.
But what was happening to Austria’s offensive in Italy?
It was coming to an end. The Italians advanced throughout the week. Conrad withdrew a division
the 13th to send to the Russian front, and on the 16th, he called off the Trentino Offensive,
which he actually called the Punishment Expedition. This wasn’t the only offensive coming to
an end this week, either; in Ypres, the Battle of Mont Sorrel came to an end, as Canadian
forces retook almost all of the ground lost to the Germans last week.
And while those two were ending, something new was getting going.
The Arab Revolt, proclaimed last week, kicked into gear this week. On June 11th two British
Cruisers, the Fox and the Hardinge, shelled Ottoman positions north of Jeddah. The city
fell the 16th, and the Battle for Mecca began this week on the 10th, by week’s end it
was a stalemate.
There was also action in Africa in June.
In German East Africa. Rhodesian troops drove the Germans toward Iringa, the Belgians advanced
Northwest of Tanganyika. They occupied Bismarckburg and Kitega, and on the 13th, the Germans evacuated
Tanga.
And we come to the end of a week of war on three continents. The Germans hesitating at
Verdun, but reinforcing the Austrians on the Russian front, seemingly in the nick of time.
Russia taking an entire city’s worth of Austrian prisoners. The Ottomans losing territory
in the Middle East and the Germans in East Africa.
And we also come to more what if’s. What if Germany had pressed on at Verdun this week?
What if Evert had attacked the Germans in the far north? What if the Germans hadn’t
reinforced the Austrians at the Kovel Road? What if Conrad hadn’t attacked in the Trentino
and had kept his forces in Galicia? What if Conrad and Falkenhayn told each other their
plans? There are YouTube channels for Alternate History and books about what might have happened
had this or that happened, but I’m telling you - you could make an entire documentary
series about the what if’s from just this one week of the war. Think about that for
a while. Incredible.
If you want to know more about Falkenhayn and his plan to bleed the French white at
Verdun, click here to check out our special episode about that.
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