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Transcript of andystricklandsportfolio.weebly.com€¦ · Web viewIt became obvious these weapons were not for...
Andy Strickland
Dr. Susan Grayzel
HIS 450-2
December 3, 2012
World War I Machine Guns and Tanks
There are many things that made World War I different from other wars up
until that time. One of the numerous things that had an immense impact on World
War I, is the usage of machine guns and tanks. Machine guns and tanks added a
whole new dimension to warfare. Who initially invented these weapons and
vehicles? How did these weapons and vehicles change the ways in which wars were
fought/tactics? What were the perception of these weapons and vehicles? How did
each army use these weapons and vehicles? To what effect were these weapons
used in the trenches? By examining their usage, this paper demonstrates the
evolution and immense impact these weapons and vehicles had on the style of
warfare in World War I.
The initial creator of the machine gun was Richard Jordon Gatling; an
American who in 1861 coined what was referred to as a “revolving rifle” or better
known as the “gatling gun”. These revolving rifles contained anywhere from four to
ten barrels. The barrels were placed parallel to each other and arranged on a
common axis about which they revolved in such a manner that each barrel was
brought in succession into the firing position. In 1866 a French man named Reffye,
came up with the “mitraileuse”. These mitraileuses were merely machine guns that
were more mobile.
These are simply a gatling gun being towed around by horses or on a two-wheeled
base somewhat like a cannon. These guns looked good in theory, however, due to
their limited mobility, these guns were unsuccessful and turned out to be an
excellent target for enemy artillery. 1
American Col. I. N. Lewis also produced a machine gun. This was claimed a
revelation for the allied troops in World War I as Lewis’s machine gun was air-
cooled and could be fired for long periods of time without overheating. It was also
only twenty-five pounds, which wasn’t a big burden for a soldier. Even with its
limitations, Lewis’s machine gun was still thought of as the greatest invention
brought into warfare. 2
Throughout World War I many leading Generals did not see a need for
machine guns or a reappraisal of tactical thinking. This was because of the presence
of opposing forces. The machine gun was not invented for the First World War, but
this was the first war that accepted these weapons as a useful piece of military
hardware. The machine gun, which eventually came to dominate and even to
personify the battlefields of World War I, was a fairly primitive device when World
War I began in August 1914. At the beginning of the war, machine guns were
considered by the military as a weapon that did not allow for chivalrous action. It
allowed for no heroes, and therefore was not a weapon that should be used.
1 Ellis, John. The Social History of the Machine Gun. New York: Pantheon, 1975. Print. (16, 25-26, 62,71, 82
2 Ellis, John. The Social History of the Machine Gun. New York: Pantheon, 1975. Print. (40, 74)
However, as the war wore on attitudes changed. Early on, machine guns of all
armies were very large and thus not very mobile. It became obvious these weapons
were not for use by rapidly advancing infantry troops. Each weighed somewhere in
the 30kg-60kg range often without their mountings, carriages and supplies. Some
were so heavy that it took several men to lift them. In 1914, machine guns were
usually positioned on a flat tripod and would require a gun crew of four to six
operators. They could fire 400-600 small-caliber rounds per minute. This figure
would eventually double by the war's end with the invention of a fabric belt or a
metal strip feeding ammunition into the weapon. Yet, these early machine guns
would rapidly overheat and become inoperative without the aid of cooling
mechanisms. This unstable performance led troops to fire the weapon in smaller
burst rather than sustained burst. These smaller burst helped keep the gun cooler,
and helped with the accuracy of the gun with there being less recoil.
Given this performance issue, troops began looking for methods of
cooling. This usually took place in two forms, water-cooled and, as the war
developed, air-cooled. Water jackets would provide for the former (which held
around one gallon of liquid) and air vents would be built into the machine gun for
the latter. Water cooled machine guns would still overheat relatively quickly,
sometimes within two minutes, with the consequence that large supplies of water
would need to be on hand in the heat of a battle. When a crews supply of water ran
out, it was not unknown for them to solve the problem by urinating into the jacket.
The earliest air-cooled machine guns were unsuccessful. Firing just a few rounds
would make the barrel so hot, that cartridges would explode inside of the barrel.
Whether air or water-cooled, machine guns still jammed frequently. This was
especially true in hot conditions or when used by inexperienced operators. These
conditions led to machine guns being produced in two separate ways. The first
would be the heavy type of machine gun. These machine guns were needed to be
capable of long sustaining fire. The second way was the automatic rifle. These
weapons were expected to be extremely light. Consequently machine guns would
often be grouped together to maintain a constant defensive position. Estimates of
their equivalent, accurate, rifle, firepower varied, with some estimating a single
machine gun to be worth as many as 60-100 rifles. However, a more realistic figure
is around 80, still an impressively high figure. 3
The French adopted the machine gun early in 1910. However, the French
General in charge of Infantry was quoted as saying, “This device makes no difference
at all”. He would soon eat those words. In 1914, there was a limited supply of
machine guns allotted for the French army with only being able to acquire 2,500 of
them. However, the French soon realized the how useful the machine gun was,
which led to more production. 4
The British were just as limited in the number of weapons they had. Only two
guns were allotted per battalion. However, on October 22, 1915, the British army
handed down an order setting up a separate Machine Gun Corps. Heavy machine
guns were formed as companies throughout the new corps. By 1918 these new
companies had accrued 6,432 officers and 124,920 others. Throughout the war the
3 Crowell, Benedict. America's Munitions 1917-1918: Report of Benedict Crowell, the Assistant Secretary of War, Director of Munitions. Washington, D.C.: G.P.O., 1919. Print. (158-177)
4 Ellis, John. The Social History of the Machine Gun. New York: Pantheon, 1975. Print (61)
number of guns in each company increased. In late 1915 each battalion contained
four Lewis light machine guns. That increased to eight in June 1916 and in July, a
battalion headquarters section added four more guns. By December, one out of
every four platoons contained a Lewis gun. Eventually by 1918, that number had
narrowed down to one in every two. 5
With the enormous growth in the use of machine guns, the tactics of using
these weapons became more sophisticated. These new tactics helped the Corps staff
work out complicated forms of supporting fire. This not only helped prevent Vickers
guns from only repelling enemy attacks, but kept constant fire on the trenches and
rear areas. The first day of the Somme Offensive amply illustrated this, although the
lesson appeared to be lost to the British high command. On the opening day of the
offensive the British suffered a record number of single day casualties, 60,000, the
great majority lost under withering machine gun fire.6
Understandably most historical accounts of the First World War have tended
to emphasize the defensive strengths of the machine gun. Throughout the war,
efforts were made to produce an infantry assault version, such as the Lewis Light
Machine Gun. However, these efforts were generally unsatisfactory. Although the
Lewis light machine gun was lighter at around 12 kg they were still considered too
heavy and bulky for rapidly advancing infantry. Attempts to transport light machine
guns by wheeled carriages or pack animals were ultimately unsuccessful. The
infantry eventually did with these methods away.
5 Ellis, John. The Social History of the Machine Gun. New York: Pantheon, 1975. Print (63, 68)6 Ellis, John. The Social History of the Machine Gun. New York: Pantheon, 1975. Print. (114-115, 133, 167)
By 1918 however one-man portable machine guns were put to some use.
These machine-guns each weighed around 9-14kg. As the war developed, machine
guns were adapted for use on tanks on broken ground, particularly on the Western
Front. This is where a majority of the machine guns were deployed.
Light machine guns were adopted too for incorporation into aircraft from
1915 onwards. For example, the Vickers, particularly with the German adoption of
interrupter equipment, which enabled the pilot to fire the gun through the aircraft's
propeller blades. In response to the increasing success of machine guns mounted on
aircraft, it was perhaps inevitable that machine guns should similarly be developed
as anti-aircraft devices (in France and Italy), sometimes mounted on vehicles. 7
In 1915, the French Nieuports had mounted guns shooting through their
propellers. If they did not wreck them, the bullets would eventually chew through
the blades and lead them to wreck. This led to the invention of the synchronizing
device. This device helps in controlling the fire of the fixed machine gun so that the
bullets miss the blades. However, “synchronizing” is not the accurate term. The
device is also referred to as an “interrupter”, which is also an inaccurate term. Most
technicians prefer to use the name “gun control”. The inventor of the synchronizer is
very debatable, however, Germans in the Fokker monoplanes were the first to use it.
Roland Garros is given credit for the original invention.
There are two different types of “synchronizers”. One is known as the
hydraulic, and the other is known as the mechanical. However, they are very similar
7 Crowell, Benedict. America's Munitions 1917-1918: Report of Benedict Crowell, the Assistant Secretary of War, Director of Munitions. Washington, D.C.: G.P.O., 1919. Print. (158-177)
in how they operate. There are many factors that play into aviation machine guns.
First, these weapons must be reliable in the most extreme of conditions. Having a
gun jam on the ground was bad enough, but it was completely unacceptable for one
to jam in the air. There is absolutely no way in fixing one while in the air, which
leaves the pilot pretty much a sitting duck for his adversary. Secondly, the gun must
be able to fire from any position. Machine guns on the ground are fired from one
normal position, horizontally, but with the movements an airman makes in alluding
enemies, he needs this gun to be able to fire from any position. Third, these aviation
machine guns must operate in a plethora of temperatures. Unlike ground machine
guns, these weapons need to be able to perform smoothly despite the high altitudes
and the contraction of their metal parts. Lastly, these guns need to be able to fire at a
much greater speed than ground machine guns. Five hundred shots per minute is
acceptable for a machine gun used in ground service, but aviation machine guns
have been bumped up to fire as high as 950 to 1,000 shots per minute. Therefore,
the faster rate of fire, the better chance of shooting down the enemy.
The allies used the Lewis gun extensively as the flexible gun for their plane.
These guns were operated on a universal mount which allowed them to point in any
direction. This gun was basically the Lewis ground gun, but modified.8
Similarly machine guns began to be added to warships as a useful addition to
naval armaments. The Germans also found themselves with a need to increase the
number of machine guns as the war progressed. The Germans were already more
8 Crowell, Benedict. America's Munitions 1917-1918: Report of Benedict Crowell, the Assistant Secretary of War, Director of Munitions. Washington, D.C.: G.P.O., 1919. Print. (296-298)
advanced in their usage of machine guns than the allies at the beginning of the war.
However, like the allies, they too found their machine guns were unable to meet the
demands of modern warfare. The Germans began World War I with the same
amount of machine guns in their infantry. However, unlike the British, they had
organized their machine gunners into companies. This act gave the impression of
total guns per thousand men. Like the British, each year, the number of machine
guns in each division increased. In 1916 each division had 72 heavy guns. By 1918
that number had reached 350. The Germans also made good use of light machine
guns and automatic rifles. Whole battalions were equipped in 1915 with 129
Muskete automatic rifles. In 1916 light machine gun sections were also formed and
armed with the Bergmann gun. Each section contained 9 guns. Eventually there
were 111 sections total.
Starting in 1916, the Bergmann was issued in limited numbers to German
troops in the field. However, the Bergmann machine guns found themselves out of
production in 1918, with the end of World War I. The Bergmann MG 15 machine gun
is a short-recoil operated, air cooled, belt fed machine gun. The finned barrel is
enclosed within a tubular jacket with cooling slots. The bolt is locked using a
vertically moving locking-block located within the barrel extension. When forced
down by cams in the receiver, the locking block engages cuts made on the top
surface of the bolt, securely locking it to the barrel extension. Upon recoil, the cams
in the receiver, thus unlocking the bolt, force the locking block up. A lever-type bolt
accelerator helps provide for improved reliability. The Bergmann MG 15 fires from a
closed bolt, and in automatic mode only. The firing mechanism is of the hammer
type, and a manual safety is located at the right side of the receiver. Germans were
led to believe that the British Expeditionary Forces had a larger complement of
machine guns than they really did. A German report said, “Over every hedge, bush,
and fragment of wall floated a thin film of smoke betraying a machine gun rattling
out bullets” (120). No matter how talented a rifleman you were, it was really no
match for the large amount of machine guns.
Tactical preconceptions definitely played a big role in World War I. Before
World War I, the higher command had no dealings with the power of an automatic
weapon like machine guns. Their inability to understand what it means to match up
to an enemy with machine guns led to many deaths. One writer is quoted as saying,
“It was as simple as this: three men and a machine gun can stop a battalion of
heroes” (123). British commanders were unable to grasp this concept, and over this
three-year period, this led to many deaths. An example of this would be one of the
first British offensives that took place at Neuve Chapelle in March 1915. The
offensive was initially doomed from the start because of lack of men and equipment,
but really the reason the offensive did not work was because two machine guns and
around a dozen Germans wiped out two battalions of British infantry. This was
something over 1,500 men. Many experiences similar to this one were recorded
throughout the war. However, Allied higher command did not learn anything from
these massacres. Higher command simply thought more men, shells, and more spirit
would simply fix things. This happened again at the Battle of Loos, but still no one
questioned the British tactics. They did however, replace the commander in chief. 9
9Ellis, John. The Social History of the Machine Gun. New York: Pantheon,1975 (120-123)
In Erwin Rommel’s Attacks, there are several instances where he mentions
machine guns and the tactics he and his troops used in the war. Rommel was very
precise in his tactics. In the night attack against Klautana Pass, Rommel located
positions for his company’s machine guns around a hundred yards from the pass at
a higher elevation. Rommel and his troops prepared very hard and carefully.
However, even with all his preparation, Rommel’s attack was a failure. Rommel
states, “I was very angry at this failure. It was the first attack since the beginning of
the war in which I had failed.” 10
Again at Cimolais, Rommel and his men set up position for another attack.
Here, Rommel set up his machine guns in bushes north of Cimolais. At 0900,
Rommel ordered the machine guns to open fire. As the machine gun squad opened
fire and the position Rommel had his troops in, the Italians panicked and begin to
move. This is exactly what Rommel wanted. As the Italians panicked and began to
run, the effectiveness of the machine guns increased. The machine guns did their job
and pinned the enemy down. Most of the Italians trying to escape were mowed
down by the machine guns. With the strategic placement of his men, and the use of
the machine gun, Rommel led his men to victory. The ability to suppress the enemy
and support other troops played a huge role in this victory. 11
10 Rommel, Erwin. Attacks. Vienna, VA: Athena, 1979. Print. (282)
11 Rommel, Erwin. Attacks. Vienna, VA: Athena, 1979. Print. (289-292)
In Herbert Sulzbach’s With The German Guns, Sulzbach states, “The idea of
providing us gunners with machine-gun training is that each German battery is now
being issued with two machine-guns for defence in hand-to-hand fighting”. 12
Now, I would like to talk about the tank. No one individual was responsible
for the development of the tank. Its design can be drawn back to the eighteenth
century. Rather, a number of gradual technological developments brought the
development of the tank, as we know it closer until its eventual form was unveiled
out of necessity by the British army. The motive for developing the tank in World
War I was in response to the stalemate that trench warfare had created. There was
hope that these “armored vehicles”, would bring an end to the stalemate and
hopefully eliminate trench warfare.
An initial vehicle, nicknamed Little Willie was constructed in Great Britain, at
William Foster & Co., during August and September, 1915. The prototype of a new
design that would become the Mark I tank, was demonstrated to the British Army on
February 2, 1916. Although initially termed "land ships" by the Landship
Committee, production vehicles were named "tanks", to preserve secrecy. The term
was chosen when it became known that the factory workers at William Foster
referred to the first prototype as "the tank" because of its resemblance to a steel
water tank. While the British took the lead in tank development, the French were
not far behind, fielding their first tanks in April, 1917 and going on to produce more
tanks than all the other combatants combined. However, the Germans were slower
12 Sulzbach, Herbert. With the German Guns: Four Years on the Western Front, 1914-1918. Hamden, CT: Archon, 1981. Print. (132)
to develop tanks. There main concern being concentrating on anti-tank weapons to
use against British and French tanks, and producing only 20 of their own A7V’s.
The first tanks were highly mechanically unreliable. There were problems
that caused considerable attrition rates during combat deployment and transit. The
heavily shelled terrain was impassable to conventional vehicles, and only highly
mobile tanks such as the Mark and FT’s performed reasonably well. The Mark I's
unique shape, caterpillar tracks, and 26 feet length meant that it could navigate
obstacles, especially wide trenches, that wheeled vehicles could not. The Mark V
tank was also built with enough space inside for a small squad of infantry.
Colonel Swinton, working together with the Landships Committee and the
Inventions Committee, agreed to with the design of this new weapon with remained
nameless. They commissioned Lieutenant Walter Wilson of the Naval Air Service
and William Tritton of William Foster & Co. to produce the first “landship” in
secrecy. Because of its shape of a shell and its resemblance of water carriers, it was
given the codename “tank”. Assigned in December 1915 the name stuck. Swinton
laid down certain key criteria that he argued must be part of the finished design.
The tank must boast a minimum speed of four miles per hour, be able to climb a
five-foot high obstacle, successfully span a five-foot trench, and critically, be immune
to the effects of small-arms fire. Furthermore, it should possess two machine guns,
have a range of twenty miles and be maintained by a crew of ten men.
As stated earlier, the first tank was given the nickname 'Little Willie' (soon
followed by 'Big Willie') and, as with its predecessors, possessed a Daimler engine.
Weighing around 14 tons and bearing 12 feet long track frames, the tank could carry
three people in cramped conditions. In the event its top speed was three miles per
hour on level ground, two miles per hour on rough terrain (actual battlefield
conditions in fact). However, the 'Little Willie' was notably restricted in that it was
unable to cross trenches. This was a failure because this was one of the main
reasons for the development of the tank. This handicap was, however, soon
remedied under the energetic enthusiasm of Colonel Swinton. The first combat tank
was ready by January 1916. Lloyd George ordered production of the heavy Mark I
model to begin. A year later, the lighter renowned 'Whippets' entered service. 13
Meanwhile the French, who were aware of British tank experimentation,
proceeded with their own independent designs, although they remained somewhat
skeptical as to its potential. Their focus at the time was firmly on the production of
ever more battlefield artillery. Nevertheless, the French had their own Colonel
Swinton, in Colonel Estienne. He persuaded the French Commander in Chief, Joseph
Joffre, that the tank had battlefield potential as an aid to the infantry. Joffre agreed
with the result that an initial order for 400 French Schneider. This was their first
tank, named after the factory that produced them. Also approved was the order for
400 St. Chaumond. These tanks, however, were not used until April 1917. Five
months after its combat demonstration to the British, in June 1916 the first
production line tanks were ready. They were albeit too late for use at the start of
that year's 'big push', the Battle of the Somme, which began on July 1, 1916.
13 Crowell, Benedict. America's Munitions 1917-1918: Report of Benedict Crowell, the Assistant Secretary of War, Director of Munitions. Washington, D.C.: G.P.O., 1919. Print. (154-158)
History was made on September 15, 1916 when Captain H. W. Mortimore
guided a D1 tank into action at the notorious Delville Wood. Shortly afterwards
thirty-six tanks led the way in an attack at Flers. Although the attack was itself
successful, the sudden appearance of the new weapon stunned their German
opponents. These early tanks proved notoriously unreliable. In part this was
because the British deployed them before they were truly battle ready in an attempt
to break the trench stalemate. They often broke down and became ditched, or stuck
in a muddy trench more often than anticipated. Conditions for the tank crews were
also very rough. These tanks generated an enormous amount of heat. Fumes often
nearly choked the men inside. Nevertheless the first tank operators proved their
worth by operating under these treacherous conditions.
In April 1917 the French deployed 128 tanks in their Aisne Offensive.
Unfortunately, however, the tanks did not distinguish themselves in this battle, once
again proving highly unreliable. Tanks were even deployed during the very swampy
conditions of the Third Battle of Ypres. These tanks sank in the mud and the muck
and were essentially useless.
Tanks had been used in many previous battles, including The battle of
Somme, and The battle of Passchendaele. However, these battles were considered
rather unsuccessful with the tanks turning out to be unreliable, heavy, and slow. The
battle of Cambrai is where tanks really reached their potential. This battle is known
as a landmark in the history of warfare. It opened up basically a whole new era of
warfare for tank enthusiast. British Colonel J.F.C Fuller, chief of staff of the Tank
Corps, was responsible for the tanks' role in the battle. They made an
unprecedented breakthrough but, as ever on the Western front, the opportunity was
not exploited. Ironically, it was the soon-to-be-supplanted horse cavalry that had
been assigned the task of following up the motorized tank attack. 14
Tanks became more effective as the lesson of the early tanks was absorbed.
The British produced the Mark IV in 1917. Similar to the early Marks in appearance,
its construction was considered to produce a more reliable machine, the long-
barreled naval guns were shortened and armour was increased just enough to
defeat the standard German armour-piercing bullet.
The continued need for four men to drive the tank was solved with the Mark
V which used Wilson's epicyclic gearing in 1918. Also in 1918 the French produced
the Renault FT, the result of a co-operation between Estienne and Louis Renault. As
mentioned before, it had the innovative turret position, and was operated by two
men. At just 8 tons it was half the weight of the Medium A Whippet but the version
with the cannon had more firepower. It was conceived for mass production, and the
FT would become the most produced tank of World War I by a wide margin, with
over 3,000 delivered to the French Army. The Americans used large numbers and
several were also loaned to the British.
In July 1918, the French used 480 tanks (mostly FTs) in 1918 at the Battle of
Soissons, and there were even larger assaults planned for 1919. The Entente had
hoped to commit over 30,000 tanks to battle in that year.
14 Reid, Brian H. "The Beach, Jim. "British Intelligence and German Tanks,1916-1918." War In History 14.4 (2007): 454-75. Web. 11 Oct. 2012. <http://connection.ebscohost.com/c/articles/27464215/british-intelligence-german-tanks-1916-1918>.
France at the same time developed its own tracked AFVs, but the situation
there was very different. In Britain a single committee had coordinated design, and
had to overcome the initial resistance of the Army, while the major industries
remained passive. Almost all production effort was thus concentrated into the Mark
I and its direct successors, all very similar in shape. In France, on the other hand,
there were multiple and conflicting lines of development which were badly
integrated, resulting in three major and quite disparate production types. A major
arms producer, Schneider, took the lead in January 1915 and tried to build a first
armoured vehicle based on the Baby Holt tractor but initially the development
process was slow until in July they received political, even presidential, support by
combining their project with that of a mechanical wire cutter devised by engineer
and politician Jean-Louis Bréton. In December 1915, the influential Colonel Estienne
made the Supreme Command very enthusiastic about the idea of creating an
armoured force based on these vehicles; strong Army support for tanks would be a
constant during the decades to come. Already in January and February 1916 quite
substantial orders were made, at that moment with a total number of 800 much
larger than the British ones.
French Saint-Chamond tanks had long bodies with a lot of the vehicle
projecting forward off of the short caterpillar tracks, making them more liable to get
ditched in trenches.
Army enthusiasm and haste would have its immediate drawbacks however.
As a result of the involvement of inexperienced army officers ordered to devise a
new tank based on the larger 75 hp Holt chassis in a very short period of time, the
first French tanks were poorly designed with respect to the need to cross trenches
and did not take the sponson-mounting route of the British tanks.
The first, the Char Schneider CA 1 equipped with a short 75 mm howitzer,
had poor mobility due to a short track length combined with a hull that overhung
front and rear. It was unreliable as well; a maximum of only about 130 of the 400
built were ever operational at the same time. Then industrial rivalry began to play a
detrimental role. It created the heavy Char St Chamond, a parallel development not
ordered by the Army but by the government through industrial lobby, which
mounted much more impressive weaponry, its 75 mm was the most powerful gun
fielded by any operational tank up till 1941, but also combined many of the
Schneider CA's faults with an even larger overhanging body. Its innovative petro-
electrical transmission, while allowing for easy steering, was insufficiently
developed and led to a large number of breakdowns. 15
Industrial initiative also led to swift advances. The car industry, already used
to vehicle mass production and having much more experience in vehicle layout, in
1916 designed the first practical light tanks, a class largely neglected by the British.
It would be Renault’s excellent small tank design, the FT, that incorporated a proper
climbing face for the tracks that was the first tank to incorporate a top-mounted
turret with a full 360-degree traverse capability. In fact the FT was the first truly
'modern' tank having a layout that has been followed by almost all designs ever
since: driver at the front; main armament in a fully rotating turret on top; engine at
the rear.
15 Zaloga, Steve, and Tony Bryan. French Tanks of World War I. Oxford: Osprey, 2010. Print.
Previous models had been "box tanks", with a single crowded space
combining the role of engine room, fighting compartment, ammunition stock and
driver's cabin. A very similar Peugeot prototype, with a fixed casemate mounting a
short 75mm cannon, was trialed in 1918 but the idea was not pursued. The FT
would have the largest production run of any tank of the war, with over 3700 built,
more numerous than all British tanks combined. That this would happen was at first
far from certain; some in the French army lobbied for the alternative mass
production of super-heavy tanks. Much design effort was put in this line of
development resulting in the gigantic Char 2C, the most complex and technologically
advanced tank of its day. Its very complexity ensured it being produced too late to
participate in World War I and in the very small number of just ten, but it would be
the first tank with a three-man turret; the heaviest to enter service until late in
World War II and still the largest ever operational.
French production at first lagged behind the British. After August 1916
however, British tank manufacture was temporarily halted to wait for better
designs, allowing the French to overtake their allies in numbers. When the French
used tanks for the first time on April 16, 1917, during the Nivelle Offensive, they had
four times more tanks available. But that would not last long as the offensive was a
major failure; the Schneiders were badly deployed and suffered 50% losses from
German long-range artillery. The Saint-Chamond tanks, first deployed on 5 May,
proved to be so badly designed that they were unable to cross the first line of
German trenches.16
16 Zaloga, Steve, and Tony Bryan. French Tanks of World War I. Oxford: Osprey, 2010. Print.
The A7V’s were a tank introduced by Germany in 1918, near the end of
World War I. One hundred vehicles were ordered during the spring of 1918, but
only 20 were delivered. It was nicknamed “The Moving Fortress” by the British
because of the shape of the hull. They were used in action from March to October of
that year, and were the only tanks produced by Germany in World War I to be used
in operations. 17
In Sir Albert Gerald Stern’s book, Tanks 1914-1918: the log-book of a pioneer,
he looks at the evolution of the tank. Stern talks about how the tank is very
constrictive. The tanks are very complex, small, and crowded on the inside. He is
quoted as saying, “Again the tank is like a slug. The slug as every biological student
knows, is unexpectedly complicated inside. The tank is crowded with inward parts
as a battleship. It is filled with engines, guns, and ammunition, and the interstices,
men.” These tanks were small and very uncomfortable. They moved at very slow
speeds. If enemy forces had any type of anti-tank weaponry, they could easily take
out these tanks.18
In conclusion, the impact that machine guns and tanks had on World War I
was an immense one. I believe the impact and the evolution of these weapons and
vehicles had a great impact on not only World War I, but future generations of
warfare. Without these developments and the evolution of these weapons and
vehicles, warfare would not be what it is today. From the first Gatling gun, to the
17 Reid, Brian H. "The Beach, Jim. "British Intelligence and German Tanks,1916-1918." War In History 14.4 (2007): 454-75. Web. 11 Oct. 2012. <http://connection.ebscohost.com/c/articles/27464215/british-intelligence-german-tanks-1916-1918>.
18 Stern, Albert Gerald. Tanks, 1914-1918; the Log-book of a Pioneer,. London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1919. Print.
modernized browning machine gun, these evolutions had a great impact on this war.
These new inventions and tactics/concepts that were used throughout this war had
a tremendous impact on the outcome. In my opinion, the “synchronizer” on the
airplane had one of the greatest impacts on the war. These brought a whole new
element to warfare. Now, not only were there planes in warfare, these planes were
equipped with machine guns. These new developments and new technologies had a
huge impact on this war and future wars to come. Without these new technological
developments, the course of World War I and future wars could have been
extremely different.
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