Hello and welcome back to Epox. This week I shall be finishing the mini series on Verdun.

Many apologies for those who have been waiting for quite a while for it for various reasons,

for interviews and for timing and technical reasons I won't bore you with.

We've had quite a long hiatus between the first two parts about Verdun and this final part.

So, okay, let's just jump straight into it.

I believe we left off last time,

the story where the Germans had just taken Fort Duomo

outside in the environs around Verdun town.

And that was a really, really important thing,

like really, really sort of tactically and strategically

and in terms

of morale, national morale on both sides. It was a really important thing. The Germans thought

they'd basically won the Battle of Verdun, and it was on to Paris, and they would win the

whole of World War I on the Western Front very imminently after the fall of Fort Duomo. That was their hope. That was their feeling. There was like a national holiday in Germany. Bells ringing all over the country. The French thought, oh no, again, similar thing. Opposite. We thought the similar thing. Oh, no, it's all over. We're going to lose Verdun. The Verdun salient is going to fall. You know, the Germans could be marked.

There's nothing between them and Paris.

We're done for. It's all over.

Although we're still going to try to hold the line as much as possible.

It was like a big deal.

But it turns out, as we all know, the Battle of Vodan ultimately in the end was just one more World War I stalemate effectively.

So let's tell the rest of that story.

Okay, so the Germans take Fult Duomo on the 25th of February, 1916.

We're in 1916, remember.

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