History of germany

The Russian front: 1916-1917

After thecampaigns of 1915, bringing into German hands the whole of Russian Poland, the German high command can reasonably expect a relatively quiet Russian front during 1916, enabling maximum forces to be deployed against Britain and France in the west.

However Russia springs a surprise in June 1916, with a sudden and completely unexpected advance (the 'Brusilov breakthrough') by a large army under Aleksey Brusilov. In the first three days 200,000 Germans and Austrians are captured on a broad front stretching from Lutsk to Chernovtsy, and for a few weeks the impetus is maintained. It brings the Russians back into the territory of the Austro-Hungarian empire, in eastern Galicia. 

The Brusilov offensive also has a profound effect on the western front. It causes the diversion to the east of seven divisions which the Germans had been hoping to deploy against the British on the Somme.

The casualties suffered by the Central Powers at the hands of the Russians are immense (750,000 men dead, wounded or captured by the time Brusilov's advance is finally halted), but as so often in history Russia herself suffers even more, with an equivalent loss nearer to a million. In a war-weary and ill-provisioned Russian army, the summer's adventure lowers rather than heightens the appetite for a fight. Even more dramatic events in 1917 will have a similar effect. 
The very sudden collapse of the Romanov dynasty, in March 1917, is followed by rival claimants to power (the Provisional Government and the Petrograd Soviet). This has a disastrous effect on the troops in the front line, confronted now by conflicting messages from home. 

The Provisional Government wants the war to continue, being as eager as the tsar to humble Austria-Hungary and to win Istanbul and the Dardanelles from the Turks. The Petrograd Soviet has no interest in the war, except as a seedbed of revolution. On 15 March 1917 its members issue Order No. 1. This states that committees of soldiers and sailors are to be set up in all military units. They are to take control of all arms, which are only to be issued to officers as the committees decide. 

The next stage in the destruction of the Russian army as an effective fighting force follows immediately after the revolution of November 1917. On November 8, the first day after the coup, Lenin issues a Decree on Land, abolishing the private ownership of large estates and assigning the land to the peasants. This has an immediate and debilitating effect at the front. It gives a strong incentive to peasant soldiers to hurry home and stake their claim.

On the same day Lenin also issues a Decree of Peace, offering to come to immediate terms with Russia's enemies on a basis of no annexations, no indemnities and self-determination for all who want it. 

Meanwhile during 1917, confronted with a lack of stomach for the fight in both the Russian army and government, the Germans have continued their advance along the Baltic coast - among the small nations which are already proclaiming independence from Russia.

Lithuania has been in German hands since September 1915. Now a German army advances into Latvia, taking Riga on 3 September 1917. On November 26 Lenin's new government orders all Russian units on the European front to stop fighting. At the same time an armistice is proposed to Germany. It is signed at Brest-Litovsk on December 15. 

During the subsequent peace negotiations the Russian position is inevitably weak - though Lenin confidently hopes that revolution will break out in Berlin and Vienna to strengthen his hand. While he and his deeply divided colleagues prevaricate, the Germans reinforce their negotiating position by continuing to march through Latvia and into Estonia, in blatant disregard of the armistice. 

On 3 March 1918, with only a tiny majority of his government in favour, Lenin signs the treaty of Brest-Litovsk. By its terms Russia loses control over Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and the Ukraine (together representing much of the nation's iron and coal resources). With the treaty signed, Germany is free to concentrate all her efforts on the western front.

U-boats and convoys: 1917-1918

In the spring of 1917, and then again a year later, Germany seems to have two real chances to clinch victory. The first is at sea and the second on the western front.

Germany's advantage at sea early in 1917 is the result of her decision in January to resume all-outsubmarine warfare. Three months later the success rate is 430 Allied and neutral merchant ships sunk during April alone (of merchant vessels leaving British harbours during that month one out of four fails to return). Both the Germans and the Allies calculate that if losses continue at this rate, the Allies will be starved into submission by the end of the year. 

A rapid solution is essential, and it is found in a very simple change of procedure - though one which is considered highly controversial at the time. A proposal is put forward in the British admiralty early in 1917 that merchant ships should cross the Atlantic in convoys. Opponents point out what seems to many at the time blindingly obvious - that such a strategy merely gathers the ships together for a U-boat to pick them off, as a collection of sitting ducks.

But until now each vessel has been setting off on its own for its transatlantic journey, thus dotting the ocean with separate targets which a U-boat is much more likely to encounter. Moreover if ships are grouped together, it becomes feasible to provide an armed escort. 
The argument is won by those in favour of convoys, which begin crossing the Atlantic in June 1917. There is an immediate and drastic fall in the number of ships sunk. In the following six months only ten fall prey to U-boats when travelling in convoy. Like fighter planes and bombers and tanks, the convoy system evolves in World War I before becoming a standard feature of later conflicts.

With the advantage at last turning, the Allies now take much more vigorous steps to retaliate against the U-boats. Vast numbers of mines, laid in the Channel and North Sea, bring many underwater victims. And successful raids are launched to block the Belgian harbours where the U-boats have been returning to refuel.