Verdun 1916

by J E Kauffman

  Despite some optimistic reports, the French positions at Verdun did not form a solid line of defence even after more than a year of relative quiet. A couple of French divisions pushed into the Woëvre and formed a line of mere outposts. Their position was much stronger in the Éparges sector. One of four sectors between Avocourt and Ornes in the northern part of the salient included Bois de Caures (Caures Woods) held by Colonel Driant’s chasseurs. The 72nd and 51st divisions occupied other locations on the right bank and their situations were not much different. The 51st Division did not leave the southeast part of the salient to enter the line next to the 72nd Division until 11 February 1916.16 The 67th and 29th divisions on the left bank held positions between Malancourt and the Meuse. The 14th and 132nd divisions held an outpost line in the Woëvre between the Orne River and the Meuse Heights. The 14th Division had only arrived on 12 February after a period of rest as of November 1915. Its troops trudged to their positions during the same period of bad weather that had delayed Operation Gericht. General Herr, military governor of Verdun, commanded the VII Corps (29th and 67th divisions), XXX Corps (14th, 51st and 72nd divisions), and a number of territorial battalions.17 After he had pleaded for reinforcements for months, the 4th Division arrived in Lorraine on 13 January followed by the 37th Division on 12 February. The 48th Division transferred to his Verdun command on 16 February. The II Corps included the 132nd Division in the Woëvre and the 3rd Division, which had held the Éparges Front from December 1915.18 The 67th, 72nd and 132nd divisions spent most, if not all, of their time in the Verdun Salient from the time mobilization in 1914 to 1916.19 Joffre held the I Corps and the XX Corps in general reserve near Bar-le-Duc.

  The two reserve divisions of the XXX Corps bore the brunt of the German assault and stood their ground for four days before their shattered remnants had to withdraw. Colonel Driant was more than justified in complaining about the weaknesses of the front since his worst fears were realized. Falkenhayn’s offensive involved the largest concentration of artillery in the history of warfare up to that time. If he had been less methodical and not restricted the initial attack to a narrow front, the entire salient might have collapsed like a house of cards. However, that appears not to have been his goal.

  The Generals

  Among the generals who emerged as key players in the Battle of Verdun were Joffre, Pétain, Nivelle and Mangin for the French, and Falkenhayn and Crown Prince Wilhelm for the Germans. The two commanders-in-chief – Joffre and Falkenhayn – and the two generals most associated with guiding the course of the battle – Pétain and the Crown Prince – wrote books after the war, allowing historians a glimpse into their thinking. Naturally, since these men tried to vindicate their own actions, their accounts do not clearly explain what actually happened. However, between them, they caused one of the bloodiest confrontations in modern history, which failed to bring victory to either side in 1916.

  Joseph Joffre led France into the war and took credit for the victory at the Marne in 1914. However, his early triumph was followed by one failed offensive after another until the end of 1915 as he ran up the number of casualties among his men without showing any significant gains. In 1914, when the French front was collapsing and the Germans struck at St Mihiel while another pincer advanced through the Argonne threatening a double envelopment of Verdun, Joffre seriously considered abandoning the fortress. Similar thoughts seemed to have run through his mind when the Germans launched their 1916 offensive. French political leaders changed between 1914 and 1915, but Joffre remained in command and exerted complete control over the front. He was not interested in sideshows and made it clear he was not pleased that the government had sent some of his divisions for operations in the Dardanelles in 1915. From 1914 on, he deemed incompetent any general who did not meet his standards or did not agree with him and assigned them to a meaningless position in Limoges. He usually stayed far from the battlefield and maintained a daily routine that made him appear quite aloof from his troops. Although his troops affectionately called him ‘Papa’, he showed little concern for their fate and wellbeing. Other generals tried to replace him, but they were not successful until his image was tarnished. After the failed offensives of 1915, he planned for a major Anglo-French offensive for mid-1916 in which the combined forces of both nations would drive the Germans from northern France. The only impediment to his great 1916 offensive was the Battle of Verdun.

  Generals associated with the Battle of Verdun and Colonel Driant.

  During the winter of 1915/16, Joffre ordered defensive preparations to be made in locations where he expected the Germans to direct their offensive efforts. These sites included the area around Amiens where the Germans could drive a wedge between the British and the French, the Oise Valley around the city of Reims where they could take the direct route to Paris, the Argonne from where they could outflank and eliminate the Verdun Salient, the heights of the Vosges and the Porrentruy Gap along the Swiss border south of Belfort. ‘Nor did the front around Verdun – wrote Joffre later – in view of the salient presented by its form, seem to me destined to become the theatre of the gigantic struggle …’ that took place.* This was his justification, in light of a lack of material means, for not preparing Verdun and other positions. Furthermore, at a meeting on 29 December with President Poincaré and other officials, including General Gallieni and General Haig – Joffre claimed – everyone present concurred that the most threatened area was between Amiens and the Oise River.20

  General Philippe Pétain, who had risen to prominence in 1915, was the only general who had achieved some success during Joffre’s failed offensives. His tactics involved the methodical battle, which Joffre was reluctant to adopt in 1915. He often visited his troops on the front and valued their lives. No one could claim that he sat in headquarters moving troops around like pawns in a chess game. He had the skills needed to engage in offensive as well as defensive battle and win if he had the proper support from his superiors. When the Battle of Verdun opened, Joffre told Pétain to handle the situation by giving the 2nd Army responsibility for the defence of the fortress. Between 28 February and 2 May 1916, Pétain exercised control over the 2nd as well as the 3rd Army on the Verdun Front. The 3rd Army held the Argonne sector of the front. On 2 May 1915, Pétain was promoted to command Army Group Centre, replacing General de Langle.21 Army Group Centre at Verdun included the 2nd and 3rd armies after 26 February and acquired the 4th and 5th armies in May.

  General Robert Georges Nivelle took command of the 2nd Army on 1 May 1916, which gave him tactical control of the battle as Pétain assumed a more administrative position. However, Pétain still heavily influenced the conduct of the battle and continued to badger Joffre about rotating sufficient divisions to maintain the situation. Joffre became impatient with the demands of his army group commander, especially since they were taking troops from his planned Somme Offensive. However, he had little choice in the matter since France could not lose Verdun. Nivelle, who was confident that his own strategy and tactics would win the war, achieved some degree of success at Verdun. On 17 December 1916, his star rose even faster than Pétain’s did when he was asked to replace Joffre as Commander-in-Chief. In 1917, finally allowed a free hand, he implemented his ideas with a disastrous offensive at Chemin des Dames which broke the morale of the French army. As a result, Pétain was asked to replace him on 17 May 1917 and to restore order to the army. Nivelle was transferred to Africa.

  One of Nivelle’s subordinates at Verdun was General Charles Mangin, an extremely aggressive officer who rose from division commander at Verdun to commander of the 3rd Army in the last months of the battle. Known as ‘The Butcher’ for the heavy casualties caused by his methods, he was favoured by his superiors and the government as long as he was successful. Pétain disapproved of his disregard for the soldiers’ lives, but Mangin was under Nivelle’s command at Verdun. Mangin led the 6th Army in Nivelle’s failed 1917 offensive, and like Nivelle, he was transferred out. He was brought back in time for the 2nd
Battle of the Marne in 1918 where he redeemed his reputation.

  General Frédéric-Georges Herr was put in command of the Région Fortifiée de Verdun (RFV) before the fateful battle. Joffre had created the Verdun Fortified Region in August 1915 when he had ordered the forts to be stripped of their removable artillery and their ammunition to form new batteries of heavy and field artillery.22 The creation of the RFV meant that Verdun was no longer officially a fortress. As commander of VI Corps artillery brigade, Herr had smashed, with the help of aerial support, eleven batteries of the German army corps led by Bruno von Mudra on 10 September 1914. This action had taken place at the time Crown Prince Wilhelm’s 5th Army had tried to break through the French front in order to isolate the fortress of Verdun. The Germans had launched a mass bayonet attack on Herr’s artillery north of Ste Ménehould, only to be driven back by his gunners.23 At Verdun, General Herr was given limited resources and was unable to improve the defences significantly. The army used the fortress as a rest area for its troops since little action had taken place there after 1914. Joffre had transferred many of the infantry troops from the sector to the Champagne Front for the offensive of September 1915. This slowed Herr’s efforts to build up the defences at Verdun with new trenches and barbed wire until the campaign ended and troops became available in late October. Herr warned General Dubail, commander of Army Group East, of heavy enemy activity in his sector.24 General Herr and General de Langle, Army Group Centre commander, urgently requested reinforcements for the sector to improve and defend the positions. On the day of the proposed German assault, 12 February, which was cancelled due to bad weather, he alerted his subordinates of an imminent attack. When the battle began, Herr pulled back troops from the Woëvre to the more defensible positions on the Meuse Heights. Pétain arrived at Verdun on 25 February, a few days after the Germans launched their attack. He went to Herr’s headquarters at Dugny to find the situation near collapse and to learn that Fort Douaumont had fallen to the Germans that very day. Herr had ordered the forts on the east bank and the bridges to be prepared for demolitions with disastrous results for Fort Vaux. Apparently, Herr, and General de Langle, thought that the east bank was lost and prepared to abandon it. When General Édouard de Castelnau, Joffre’s second-in-command, was informed of the situation, he placed Pétain in charge of both banks of the Meuse.25 Herr’s plan to retreat to the left bank might have foiled General Falkenhayn’s plan for a battle of attrition.

  One more French officer, a colonel, influenced the course of the Battle of Verdun. He was Émile Driant, a commander of two battalions of chasseurs à pied defending Caures Woods. He was a member of the Chamber of Deputies. As a reservist, he was called to active duty in 1914 at the age of 58. In 1915, he called the attention of other politicians to the inadequate state of the Verdun defences. Driant, who still served as a deputy, felt obligated to report the lack of men and materials – including barbed wire – necessary to improve the defences at Verdun. He also openly criticized Joffre’s decision to disarm the forts of Verdun. However, little was done to correct the situation since the general opinion was that the forts would not be able to resist. Driant’s criticisms caused the politicians to look at other weaknesses not only at Verdun, but also at Toul. The President of the Republic alerted the Minister of War, General Joseph-Simon Gallieni, who contacted Joffre on 16 December 1915.26 Irate, Joffre replied in a letter of 18 December that on 22 October he had directed the respective army group commanders to improve all first and second positions on the entire front and to establish a system of fortified regions behind them. Some of the work, he claimed, had already been completed. ‘I cannot permit men in military service – he groused – placed under my orders, to send to the Government … complaints or objection with regard to the execution of my orders’.* At the end of December, Joffre and Dubail, Army Group East commander, met with the president to report that the second line was completed and that they had begun work on a third line. Driant’s complaints, which instigated these actions, may well have saved the situation at Verdun since Joffre had refused to believe that this area was threatened. Joffre sent his second-in-command, General Castelnau, to investigate. Since Castelnau reported few problems, Joffre was able to claim that he was informed that his instructions had been carried out as far as available resources permitted. Despite saying that the situation was satisfactory, he sent two divisions to General Herr. In order to improve coordination, on 1 February, he transferred the fortified region of Verdun to General de Langle’s Army Group Centre. The work continued, but time was not on the side of the French.

  Crown Prince Wilhelm, the eldest of the Kaiser’s five sons, had a reputation with women that upset his father. In the military he rose to command a regiment, but when the war began, his father appointed him commander of the 5th Army on 1 August.** Since he lacked command experience, the Kaiser told him, ‘I have appointed you Commander of the Fifth Army. You’re to have Lieutenant-General Schmidt von Knobelsdorf as chief of staff. Whatever he advises, you must do.’27 Although he adhered to his father’s instructions, the prince received credit for operations in the Ardennes in 1914 and shared some of the blame for the fiasco at Verdun.28 However, the failure was not his because he followed orders from Falkenhayn, who did not always make his wishes clear. The Crown Prince and Knobelsdorf believed that they could have taken Verdun early in the battle and both were blamed by their troops for the insufficient resources that led to failure and huge casualties.

  General Erich von Falkenhayn, commander of the army, was the youngest general serving as Chief-of-Staff Army (September 1914–August 1916) and as Minister of War (June 1913–January 1915) at the age of 53 in 1914. Before the war, he was promoted over many senior officers and he became a favourite of the Kaiser. Many other officers did not like him or the way he conducted himself. Among his detractors were generals Hindenburg and Ludendorff and Crown Prince Rupprecht of Bavaria, commander of the 6th Army. Falkenhayn was probably solely responsible for the events that unfolded at Verdun. The evidence indicates that his subordinates did not fully understand his goals. His critics often accuse him of incompetency, especially since he believed that he could win a war by fighting a battle that would bleed the enemy to death. According to his critics, his offensive actions in the West in 1914 were failures, but they ignore the fact that he stabilized the front. In 1915, although he had preferred a Western to an Eastern strategy, he gave Hindenburg’s front priority, which led to a massive defeat of the Russian army and he propped up Austria at the same time. Later that year, he engineered the conquest of Serbia. Even after Verdun, he was largely responsible for the conquest of Rumania.29 Thus, despite his critics, he proved to be a largely successful general. Although his battle plan for Verdun seems senseless, if not absurd, there is no way of telling if it might have succeeded if it had been carried out the way he planned it. After all, there had never been a war of this scale in modern history and many experts had predicted that it would end quickly. Falkenhayn, unlike many other high-ranking officers, believed that in this ‘modern’ warfare with massive armies and huge fronts, Germany could not win by the traditional victory on the battlefield. He hoped that his plan for Verdun would whittle down the enemy forces to the point that they would surrender after this battle of attrition. Unfortunately, his new strategy proved to be as bloody and ineffective as those used by the other belligerents in 1915 had been.

  Five Days in February

  The battle opened with an artillery bombardment at approximately 8.00 am (German time) on 21 February 1916.30 The opening shots came from the two huge 380mm Langer Max (Long Max) guns. These big 15in guns, originally intended for a battleship, had gone into service near Verdun in 1915. They fired a 2.2-ton round, had a range of over 22km and could strike almost anywhere in the salient, although it could take as long as 10 minutes between rounds. On that winter morning, they targeted the Verdun bridges and the railway station. The first round just missed one of the bridges, but crashed into the Bishop’s Palace betwee
n the cathedral and the citadel. Another shell came down near the railway station. Then, the trommelfeuer (drum fire) of over 1,200 artillery pieces boomed across the countryside around Verdun. ‘In the clear winter air – recalled Crown Prince Wilhelm – the thunder of the howitzers opened the chorus, which rapidly swelled to such a din as none of those who heard it had ever experienced hitherto.’* The German guns fired in sequence to achieve a continuous barrage for about 9 hours.31 The slow-firing 420mm Big Berthas and Gamma guns joined in.32 The artillery of the German army corps with fronts on the Verdun Salient laid down fire mainly on the French first line on the east and west banks of the Meuse to keep the French guessing. It was becoming clear that the assault would not come from the Woëvre, but from the north against the Meuse Heights on the east bank and between the Meuse and the Argonne on the west bank. That was where Herr had concentrated four of his divisions. However, he was not to know that the left bank was not an immediate target for the Germans, who were about to concentrate on a narrow front. German artillery fire gave no clue until it started to concentrate on the areas intended for the ground assault and some batteries concentrated on counter-battery fire. As the day wore on, the barrages shredded the telephone lines between positions forcing Herr and his subordinates to rely on couriers to maintain contact with front-line units.