Battle verdun crack#

The Germans pressed forward through the outer trench zone toward the forts around Verdun. The German infantry attacked in the late afternoon, the specially trained troops using grenades and flamethrowers to clear French soldiers from their dugouts and bunkers.īy 23 February, French battalions in the forward defenses were reeduced to a half or third of their initial strength and were running out of ammunition and food. To the rear, French artillery batteries were eliminated, and communication and supply links cut. The French forward positions were battered relentlessly. The offensive opened on the morning of 21 February with a bombardment lasting seven hours. This gave the French time to send in two divisions as reinforcements, but they were still outnumbered two to one.

Nonetheless, hints of the German preparations filtered through to French intelligence.īad weather forced the Germans to postpone the offensive, originally scheduled for 10 February. French aerial reconnaissance over the sector was hampered by German fighter planes. It included 1,200 guns, ranging from giant 420mm howitzers to 77mm field guns and 2.5 million shells. Through January and early Febraury 1916, a huge concentration of artillery as built up opposite Verdun on the east bank of the Meuse. The offensive was entrusted to the German 5th Army, commanded by Crown Prince Wilhelm, but Falkenhayn kept overall control of the battle. French morale would be hit by the loss of Verdun or by the huge losses sustained in defending it. German Chief of the General Staff Erich von Falkenhayn viewed the Verdun operation - Germany's only major offensive on the Western Front between 19 - as an attack on France's will to fight. Map of the German offensive, February-April 1916 In December 1915, Verdun was identified by German Chief of the General Staff General Erich von Falkenhayn as the ideal target for a powerful blow against France. In autumn 1915, believing the fortresses outdated, Joffre stripped the Verdun forts of most of their guns and garrisons to feed his Champagne Offensive. French commander-in-chief General Joseph Joffre resisted pressure to strengthen its trench line, which was recognized as weak. Verdun was left surrounded by German-held territory on three sides and supplied by inadequate road and rail links to the rear. In 1914, the initial fighting came to a halt at trench lines outside the fortified perimeter.

In the late 19th century, concentric rings of modern forts armored in steel and concrete had been built around Verdun as part of a defensive line following the Franco-Prussian War.

In 1916, the historic fortress town of Verdun, standing on the Meuse River, was an exposed, lightly held outpost of France's eastern defenses. The battle was a costly French victory, as the French reclaimed the Verdun fortresses, and the German offensive would be halted. The 303-day battle saw around 377,231 French and 337,000 Germans become casualties, with an average of 70,000 casualties being made each month a later estimate stated that as many as 976,000 people were lost at Verdun.

Battle verdun crack#

Over 100,000 French troops were lost at Douaumont alone, and the Germans began to crack as their supply lines were thinned out by the concurrent Battle of the Somme.

120,000 shells were fired at the fort, which was the site of a bloody French assault, and it was not until 24 October that the entire fortress was recaptured by the French. Fort Douaumont changed hands several times, as did the double ring of 28 fortresses around Verdun. French artillery bombarded German troops on the east bank of the Meuse River, and general Philippe Petain ordered that no withdrawals were to be made instead, the French would counterattack until victorious. The Germans captured Fort Douaumont in the first three days of the offensive, but their advance was slowed by a costly French defense. The Battle of Verdun (21 February-18 December 1916) was a major battle of World War I that occurred when the Imperial German Army assaulted the French fortress town of Verdun on the German border, hoping to lure the French Army into a battle of annihilation instead, it would be the largest and longest battle of the war, and it would see catastrophic losses on both sides.