The Price of Glory: Verdun 1916 by Alistair Horne
Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1964 (abridged) (first published 1962)
Here in Australia we can often be very parochial; especially when it comes to our knowledge of the wars in which our people have taken part. Ask any Australian what they know about World War One, and you would of course expect to hear about Gallipoli, Villers Bretonneux, Bullecourt, Beersheba, and the final offensives. What you rarely hear is an understanding of where and how Australia's effort fitted in a broader sense with the wider struggle of the war. This parochialism was initiated by Bean, and has continued to this day. But let's step back for a moment...if you asked any German or French person about what they knew about World War One, they would surely mention Verdun, where - over ten months of fighting - more of their troops were lost than in any other battle, and where - while both the German and the French armies were destroyed - the Allies changed the strategic outlook of the war. By resisting the German hammer-blow, the French ensured Germany's eventual defeat in 1918.
As is often the case in histories of World War One, failures of the highest leadership feature prominently in Horne's retelling of the Verdun story. The initial pretence for the German offensive was a plan by Falkenhayn to "bleed white" the French army through an attack on the fortresses surrounding the town of Verdun, assuming that the French could not afford the psychological blow of their loss. However, as Horne points out, Falkenhayn was too cautious, and the very real chance of victory was crueled by his failure to follow up his initial success - bleeding an army white is not a strategic outcome for a battle, taking territory is, and the confusion between the two objectives became a thorn in the side of German planning throughout the battle.
There was a supreme irony in targeting the forts of which the Germans were unaware: they were not heavily manned or gunned. The French, since the debacle of 1870, had embraced the notion of attack at all costs, and the strategy current in the early 1900s was that forts were just impedimentia. That thinking turned out to be wrong, at least in the case of Verdun, where a few French soldiers stationed in the forts held up German attacks not once, but on multiple occasions. This was only one of the failings of the French higher command, Joffre being too blase, Nivelle too gung-ho, and Petain, after initially halting the onslaught, succumbing to the increasing horror and depression that engulfed him as the casualties mounted.
The one thing the Germans did get right was that the French were going to not only try and hold their ground, but fight very hard for it. This led to the most bitter fighting of the entire war. The shellfire was absolutely horrific and, for the men who had to endure it, their lives were never the same again. Horne - a precursor to Antony Beevor in his vivid descriptions of battle - quotes veterans describing the battle as a living thing, an uncontrollable monster that devoured everything in its path.
The lack of concentration of forces by the Germans did lead to a battle that bled both armies dry: unfortunately for the Germans they were losing men at almost the same rate as the French, which they couldn't afford to do. Over time soldiers on both sides became less-and-less battle-worthy, which led directly to not only the French mutinies in 1917, but to the failure of the German Army when it mattered most in 1918.
Horne also points out the other lingering effects of Verdun - the investment of the French in the value of forts, leading directly to the Maginot line; and the investment of the Germans in the idea of concentration of forces to overcome such fortifications, leading directly to Blitzkrieg. These were the lessons learned by both sides, and put into place by those who had fought in the battle, which includes most German and French military - and many civilian - leaders of World War Two.
The horror that was Verdun saw the first use of phosgene gas (by the Germans) and the creeping barrage (by the French), and endless stories of heroic efforts by both French and German units, which are well described by Horne, who not only had access to the (great amount of) written material about the battle, but also to live interviews with veterans.
At the end of ten months of horrific fighting, casualties across both sides were slightly over three-quarters of a million men - the ground literally heaved with corpses when under fire...at the end of 1916 the front line was not much moved from the start of the year. Such was the type of warfare in 1914-18.
It is actually impossible for the human mind to comprehend what the men who fought at Verdun went through - war is a different country, and those that never go there can only grasp at the fog and mist of what it is like by reading books such as this. Alistair Horne is a skilful writer, and The Price of Glory is a well thought-out history of what is the most horrific battle in a horrific war, with a fine balance drawn between the grand strategy of the leaders and the experience of the humble soldier. Although written over 50 years ago, this is still good reading today.
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