The changes in warfare in 1918
Both sides expected that the war would continue and planned accordingly. But the fighting could hardly have gone on as it had thus far. A new form of warfare was clearly emerging in 1918, one that threatened to render the fighting methods 1914-1917 obsolete in many respects.
The German offensives of Spring and Summer 1918 were notable in that they showed the way to break the deadlock of trench, HMG, and QF artillery on the one hand, against the extreme vulnerability tightly packed infantry trying to advance out of cover on the other hand. The basic problem was the differential in firepower….the weapons of 1914 heavily favoured the defence. This was compounded by the poor understanding of tactics…the generals continued to think in terms of Napoleonic wars really. The best defence against cavalry had been tightly packed formed infantry advancing slowly in close order. And it needs to be remembered, that both sides maintained large bodies of cavalry behind the front lines, waiting to exploit a breakthrough in the lines that never came.
Fundamentally what had been under estimated was the defensive power of the machine gun. Moreover the perceived solution to the problem, planned, long running preparatory artillery barrages caused more harm than good. They were designed to destroy the defences at certain point, but they could never succeed in defeating all of the MGs, and because they lasted days or weeks, gave plenty of warning of an impending attack, allowing reserves to be moved into position to contain any breakthroughs.
The Germans were the first to develop tactical methods to break this deadlock. The main elements to their solution included
1) Surprise. This dictated very short preparatory barrages. It also meant that concentration of troops should, if possible be completed as secretly as possible. This in part meant that air superiority over ones own lines was needed in order to limit or deny the enemy the ability to carry out effective aerial recon.
2) Use of terrain, weather and cover. Instead of advancing along a broad front in clear conditions at a slow pace, with little or no return fire, Hutiers tactics envisaged rapid advances by small groups of Infantry from cover position to cover position, using mutually supporting formations and firepower centred around the Infantry Squad. To this end Infantry was trained to maximise return of fire even whilst advancing .
3) To this end, the Germans made changes to their basic Infantry arrangements and equipment. They maximised the short range firepower of the Infantry squad by introducing a new weapon, the MP 18 Bergmann SMG. Squads were issued a high degree of mortars, and light mountain artillery pieces, so that artillery fire could follow the infantry breakthroughs. AT weaponary, generally in the form of 7.92mm Patrone AT rounds were issued. German Madsen and LMG 08—were more widely issued than before and were treated as mobile, offensive weapons rather than as static, defensive assets
4) There were two significant tactical elements to the new methods of attack. The first was that assaults were targeted at the weaker elements of a defence, rather than the stronger parts, with the idea that a breakthrough would lead to the dislocation of the defence, rather than having to completely overwhelm the defence. The second element, kind of linked to the first, was that strongpoints revealed in a defence were isolated and bypassed, rather than the halting the advance to deal with the strongpoint. This tactic emphasised forward movement and momentum in an offensive
During the German offensive of 1918, small, highly motivated, lightly equipped units of Sturmtruppen had penetrated Allied lines with relative ease. But the Allied armies had not disintegrated. Observers in both camps noted that, wherever clerks, cooks, and stragglers rallied around a field kitchen or an isolated strip of ruined trench, the infiltrators suffered grievously, slowed, and, as often as not, fell victim to organized counterattacks. The multiplication of small defended points caused delays, and delay was the isolated, lightly loaded storm trooper's deadliest enemy. This lesson led both sides to develop formidable defenses in depth. The old, shallow trench lines were replaced by deep, discontinuous belts of strongpoints, arranged for all-around fire and mutual support. On the German side, where this trend was most pronounced, concrete pillboxes and shell-proof infantry shelters shared interlocking fields of fire. Mine fields, wire, and antitank ditches 20 to 30 feet across channeled attackers into fire lanes where pre-laid artillery and machine-gun fire could annihilate them. It was thus clear that the new weapons and tactics could easily replace the 1914-17 stalemate with another, deadlier impasse. To achieve a decisive, war-winning breakthrough, the new weapons and tactics would have to be combined under a new strategy, a strategy calculated to exploit their potential before they could be countered.