Did the technological advancements in weapons change the course of World War 1?

Change: MYP Moderated Assessment

Figure http://techcenter.davidson.k12.nc.us/group9/tech.htm

Robert 9 Yellow, History Mr. OBrien 3.10.2012

International School of Basel Word count: 1450

Contents
Section A: Introduction ........................................................................................................................... 1 Section B: Trench warfare and main innovations in weaponry in WW1 ................................................ 1 Section C: Gas.......................................................................................................................................... 2 Section D: Tanks ...................................................................................................................................... 2 Section E: Machine gun........................................................................................................................... 4 Section F: Conclusion .............................................................................................................................. 4 Bibliography ............................................................................................................................................ 6 Books ................................................................................................................................................... 6 Websites ............................................................................................................................................. 6

Section A: Introduction
World War I (WW1) saw significant changes in many new types of weapons and technological advances in transportation and communication. As early as in 1915 British Admiral Jacky Fisher stated that the war was going to be won by inventions (Ieee, World War 1 Technology). Indeed, during the four years of WW1 many innovations in different fields were accomplished, but also previous ideas and innovations were developed to their full potential. Examples include submarines, war aircrafts, flamethrowers, hand grenades (invention pop, Inventions of World War 1), and the use of radio and electrical power. I will focus on three advances in weapons for ground troops: the use of tanks, the invention of chemical weapons, and the development of machine guns. The question that I am addressing is, whether the development and use of these weapons had any decisive influence on the course of WW1.

Section B: Trench warfare and main innovations in weaponry in WW1

WW1 was trench warfare at the battle fields (Ben Walsh, 20). The armies built trenches along the fighting lines in order to protect their troops against attacks of the enemy. The area between the enemy trenches was the no mans land, as it was compellingly illustrated in the play War Horse. The land between the trenches was exposed to the longdistance fire of the cannons and other artillery weapons. Open attacks across the no mans land to capture the enemys trenches were very risky and always led to severe casualties. Hence the troops remained in their trenches and followed a defensive strategy. As the war continued, it became increasingly clear that both, new weapons and a new strategy, was needed to overcome the deadlock. At the beginning of the war the development of gas weapons, tanks and machine guns were only three examples out of many that were designed as potential solutions for attacking the enemys trenches.

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Section C: Gas
Already in 1899 the Hague Convention, prohibiting the use of asphyxiating or deleterious gases was signed (Brown, The Avalon Project : Laws of War - Asphyxiating or Deleterious Gases). But at that time, the gas weapons were not fully developed yet. New gases were used in WW1. In order to circumvent the convention, the conflicting parties tried to downgrade the risks and declared that the new gases are only irritants. At the beginning of the war the Germans were in the best position to develop gas weapons. They had a strong chemical industry, which provided the gas used in the war. The gases were chlorine and phosgene gas (both suffocated the lungs), mustard gas. The effect of mustard gas was that the eyes bulked out and the skin blistered. (Neil, Stewart, 82) The gas attacks were expected to cross the enemys trenches and either kill the soldiers or force them to leave their trenches, which could be taken over without own casualties. However the reality was different. The use of gas turned out to be difficult. The gas attacks depended on the wind direction (Trueman, Poison Gas and World War One). If released in the wrong moment or if the winds suddenly changed the direction, the gas clouds could turn against the own army. Moreover, as so often in war, means of protection were quickly developed. At first the soldiers used gauze soaked with urine for protection which they held onto their face (Trueman, Poison Gas and World War One). Later the invention of the gas mask reduced the use of gas weapons significantly. Nevertheless, during WW1 gas was deployed extensively by all sides (Walsh, 24), and WW1 is still the largest case of chemical warfare.

Section D: Tanks
One of developments in WW1 was an invention which is still extensively used in warfare: it is the tank, a mobile fortress (Walsh, 25). It was invented by a farmer in 1912. He attached simple armor plating and guns on his tractor, which was a Caterpillar with chains, not normal wheels. Armored vehicles were already invented and used before WW1, but the

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great change was that the new models with caterpillar were able to drive through all kinds of difficult terrain. Tanks were supposed to bring about the breakthrough in the trench warfare of the WW1 because they should have been able to pass through all kinds of landscape and obstacles. The tank was invented for the purpose to change the defensive trench warfare into a more offensive battle so they would be able to conquer more land. There were two types of tanks in WW1: the Female, and the Male: The female version had 6 machine guns attacked to it and the Male version used two large six pounder guns and four machine guns (Atwater, 2). Tanks were first used by the British Army in a battlefield during the battle of Somme, on September, 15 1916. 49 tanks were deployed. Because the British did not have enough tanks, they had to spread them out widely, so the attack did not have a coordinated affect. When the Germans saw the tank for the first time they started to flee because they have never seen anything like this before.. However, the tanks were slow: they were only able to go 5 mph, and the speed was reduced to 2 mph on the battleground due to bad terrain. This, and also the bad quality of their armor plating, made them very vulnerable, and therefore nearly useless in the battles. Thus the trench war did not change because of this invention, as the soldiers just stayed in their trenches and shot the tanks down with a rifle. The Germans invented an anti tank rifle called the: Tank Abwehr Gewehr M1918, This rifle was basically a big version of the Mauser Gewehr and it was able to shoot through 20 mm of armor plate. The tanks at this time only used 12 mm of armor, therefore these guns could shoot through a tank and destroy important mechanical parts (antitank.com, WW1 anti-tank rifles). Tanks could have made a change in WW1, but they were technologically still underdeveloped. A large part broke down even before they reached the enemy trenches. Moreover, the commanders did not understand how to launch a coordinated tank attack.

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Section E: Machine gun

Before the invention of the machine gun, soldiers used bolt-action rifles (like the Springfield), which they had to reload for each shot. The first machine gun was invented by Richard J. Gatling (Hamill, Richard J. Gatling). The expectations of the machine gun were to be a very fast shooting rifle. Thus few soldiers with machine guns could stop the attacks of many soldiers with traditional rifles. However, the machine gun was not a device to overcome the trenches, it was mainly a defensive weapon. To enable efficient use, trenches had bunkers on the top. Protected by the walls of the bunker, few soldiers could prevent attacks on their trenches. The early machine guns of WW1 had a big downside. They overheated after a few rounds and it took a while to cool them down. Water was sometimes poured over the barrel to cool it, and when the soldiers did not have any water, they urinated onto the gun. Even water cooled machine guns would overheat within two minutes (Stewart, 83). During WW1 more and more machine guns were used. The most used British machine gun was the Vickings gun. It was a water cooled machine gun which could fire 450500 rounds a minute. It was developed by the Vicking company and was based on the very successful Maxim gun, which was invented in 1884 (Stewart, 83) The machine gun was the most effective weapon in the war, it killed over 7 million soldiers of a total of 8 million.

Section F: Conclusion
Although many weapons were developed during the WW1 period, they did not change greatly the course of the war. I think that the weapons have failed mostly because the designers were under a lot of time pressure and the weapons were not fully developed yet. Their promise to change the war from a defensive trench based fight, to a more offensive warfare has failed. New weapons changed how the soldiers had to protect themselves, and caused more deaths, but

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did not change the tactics. On the ground the war remained trench warfare. Ultimately the soldiers died from exhaustion, attrition and hunger and a persistent cruel slaughter. WW1 was a great disaster, and technological advances in weapons contributed to it. The new weapons gas, tanks and machine guns were not suitable to change the defensive ground battles. The brutal gas weapons were rightly outlawed by the Hague Convention. Moreover gas masks and the changing of the weather conditions limited the use of it. The same holds true for the tanks and machine guns although for quite different reasons. The tanks remained underdeveloped und accident-prone. Moreover, the commanders of these tanks were not able to organize coordinated tank attacks. The machine gun was an effective weapon, in particular once bunkers were built. It was probably the weapon that killed most of the soldiers in WW1. However, it was also unsuitable to attack enemy trenches. The weapon which finally contributed to a change was the grenade, which could be thrown into the trenches.

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Bibliography
Books
Atwater, William F. "The Measurement and Modeling of a World War I Mark IV Tank Using CLR and CCD Camera/Line Scanning Systems in an Outside Environment." Mark Tank: 1-9. PDF file. Brooman, Josh. The Great War. N.p.: Longman Group UK, 1989. Print. Holmes, Richard. The Oxford Illustrated History of Modern War. Ed. Charles Townshend. N.p.: Oxford UP, 1997. Stewart, Neil. The Changing Nature of Warfare 1700-1945. N.p.: Hodder Education, 2001. Print Trueman, Chris. "Tanks and World War One." Tanks "Bibliography and Citation Maker."

Walsh, Ben. "THE FIRST WORLD WAR." GCSE Modern World History. London: John Murray, 1996. 280. Print.

Websites
"Inventions of World War 1." Invention Pop. N.p., n.d. Web. 01 Oct. 2012. <http://www.inventionpop.com/inventionsofworldwar1.html>. "World War I Technology." IEEE Global History Network. N.p., n.d. Web. 01 Oct. 2012. <http://www.ieeeghn.org/wiki/index.php/World_War_I_Technology>.

"WW1 Anti-Tank Rifles." antitank. N.p., n.d. Web. 2 Oct. 2012. <http://www.antitank.co.uk/ww1_anti-tank_rifles1.htm>.
EasyBib. N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Sept. 2012. <http://www.easybib.com/>.

John, Hamill. "Richard J. Gatling." Http://freemasonry.bcy.ca. N.p., n.d. Web. 02 Oct. 2012. <http://freemasonry.bcy.ca/biography/gatling_r/gatling_r.html>. Scott, James Brown. "The Avalon Project : Laws of War - Declaration on the Use of Projectiles the Object of Which Is the Diffusion of Asphyxiating or Deleterious Gases; July 29, 1899." The Avalon Project : Laws of War - Asphyxiating or Deleterious Gases. N.p., n.d. Web. 02 Oct. 2012. <http://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/dec99-02.asp>. Trueman, Chris. "Poison Gas and World War One." Poison Gas and World War One. N.p., n.d. Web. 02 Oct. 2012. <http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/poison_gas_and_world_war_one.htm>.

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