OVERVIEW: 1918
THE 'MICHAEL' OFFENSIVE
Buoyed up by the arrival of new troops from the Eastern Front, Germany launched its 'Michael' offensive in March 1918. It experienced great initial success: 21,000 British troops were captured on the first day of the campaign and the British Fifth Army was pushed back to defensive lines on the Crozat Canal, between the Oise and Somme rivers. Six days later, German forces were still pushing ahead and the situation looked grim for the Allies.
However, despite these successes, the Michael offensive was doomed due to several intrinsic flaws. It lacked clearly defined or realistic strategic goals, German troops quickly outstripped their supply lines, and they took time out from their military duties to loot shops in recently captured French towns.
On 23 March, Ludendorff decided to try and capture Amiens and German forces made repeated attempts to seize this vital part of the French rail network.
However, Ludendorff's efforts were blocked by a combined British, Australian and French force, and the 'Michael' offensive finally ground to a halt outside Amiens in early April. Germany's great gamble of 1918 had failed.
DEFEAT
The Austro-Hungarian emperor Karl I entered into peace negotiations with the Allies in mid-September. Even Turkey - whose performance had belied its reputation as the 'sick man of Europe' - was searching for an armistice. When Ludendorff learned that Bulgaria had requested an armistice on 28 September, he suffered a fit. He knew that, bereft of military partners, Germany could not fight on alone against the Allies.
On 29 September, British troops pierced the Hindenburg Line, a strongly fortified German position running between Arras and Laon in France. Three days later, Ludendorff advised his leading generals that continuing the war was not an option, and pressed the German government to ask for an armistice. Heavy fighting continued throughout October and the two sides exchanged a series of peace notes. Allied ceasefire terms were presented to the Germans on 8th November.
Although they were heavily punitive, Germany had no option but to accept them. At 5am on 11 November, Germany's representatives finally signed an armistice that came into effect six hours later.
The First World War was over. However, the manner in which the fighting had been concluded left a nasty taste in the mouths of many Germans which, in the long run, contributed to the rise of the Nazis.
WHY THE CENTRAL POWERS LOST (By Jonathan Lewis)
In the end, there were a number of reasons why Germany and its allies were defeated:
By mid 1918, the Allies were winning battles; the Central Powers were losing them. The Allies were gaining ground in the Middle East, the Balkans and the Western Front. The Central Powers were on the back foot - retreating on all sides. Even though the German Army was still on French soil and in surprisingly good order, it was only a matter of time before they would be pushed back into Germany.
The Allied generals had gained valuable tactical lessons from the first three years of the war and put them into practice. The Allied command structure was unified under Marshal Foch in spring 1918. Tanks, aircraft, artillery and infantry were integrated into coordinated plans with achievable objectives - something the Germans never fully mastered.
The Allies had won the battles of technology, supply and manpower. The Allies had built over 4000 tanks, the Germans just 20. The Allies had sufficient artillery and manpower on the Western Front to be able to launch a succession of attacks on the German line without having to move and re-group resources each time. The Germans had a manpower shortage: they had guns in France without gun crews to fire them.
The Central Powers were militarily, politically and economically less robust than the larger Allied coalition ranged against them. As the Allies grew stronger, Germany's alliances were crumbling. By March 1918, Austria-Hungary (whose military incompetence had been demonstrated early in the war) was on the verge of bankruptcy and famine - on one occasion, it was even forced to steal a grain barge bound for Germany as it sailed up the Danube. Many on both fighting and home fronts had grown tired of the war; they wanted peace, food, democracy. Turkey-whose performance had belied its reputation as the sick man of Europe - was searching for an armistice by September 1918. When Ludendorff learned that Bulgaria had requested an armistice on 28th September, he suffered a fit. Germany could not fight on alone against the Allies.
The United States' entry into the war made ultimate Allied victory certain. America's contribution to the Allies' success was not the direct result of anything it did on the battlefield, but lay in its vast potential. Following the failure of the 'Michael Offensive', which drained the already depleted German resources, the prospect of endless supplies of American men, money and munitions flooding into Europe completely obliterated all hopes of a German victory.
By autumn 1918 Germany's commanders knew they couldn't hope to win. After years of keeping the politicians in the dark, the military leaders gave them the job of suing for peace, then rejected the outcome.
The Versailles treaty
Representatives of the 27 victorious Allied nations gathered in Paris in January 1919 to thrash out the terms of the peace. The major powers - Britain, France, the United States, Italy - all had slightly different agendas. As a result, the document that eventually emerged was a compromise between US President Wilson's idealism, French desires to cripple Germany and Britain's imperial and colonial concerns.
Under the terms of the Versailles treaty - signed on 28 June 1919 - Germany's military establishment was neutered, her frontiers altered and her empire disbanded. Germany and its allies were blamed for starting the war and obliged to pay huge reparations.
The treaty finally brought the First World War to a close. However, within two decades, the world would be plunged once more into horrendous conflict.
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