Somme - Allied Strategy

Battles of the First World War Podcast

Mike Cunha

History

4.8 • 812 Ratings

🗓️ 12 June 2016

⏱️ 48 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

1915 saw none of the major offensives that rocked the rest of the Western Front, but it was not a quiet sector of the line. Despite the French and Germans having a “live-and-let-live” policy that didn't keep them from killing each other with exploding underground mines and regular infantry battles.

Towards the end of 1915 GEN Joseph Joffre of the French Army worked on coordinating a strategy among the Allies that would see them attacking the Germans and Austro-Hungarians at the same time in order to wear them out. From this, the idea of the Battle of the Somme was born.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	The French offensive would be greatly aided by a simultaneous offensive of the British forces between the Somme and Arras.
0:12.0	I think that it will be a considerable advantage to attack the enemy on a front where for long months the reciprocal activity of the troops opposed to each other has been less than elsewhere.
0:25.6	The ground is, besides, in many places, favorable to the development of a powerful offensive.
0:33.6	General Joseph Joff, French Army commanding. Hey folks, welcome to the Battles of the First World War podcast, episode two, Allied Strategy.
1:10.4	Before we get started, just a quick admin note and clarification.
1:16.0	In the intro episode, I said the following.
1:20.4	I will strive to cover each battle consistently by having the necessary episodes written and recorded beforehand.
1:30.3	Right.
1:31.3	So this is what happens when you go on a little sleep for weeks at a time and think that there won't be any consequences.
1:40.3	You repeat something that you wrote weeks ago and don't connect that you really should not have said it or you should have revised it.
1:49.0	Here's what's happening.
1:52.0	For the psalm battle, I am still feverishly reading and writing episodes.
1:58.0	For the future episodes, post-SahOM, I will look to have everything done beforehand
2:04.3	so that I can release on a regular schedule. As far as posting episodes for our journey through
2:11.5	the Battle of the Psalm, I am just going to put them up as soon as I have them completed.
2:17.6	So releasing will not be on a strict schedule, at least not for the Battle of the Psalm.
2:25.3	Okay.
2:26.3	Throughout 1915, the Psalm Front featured none of the major offensives that took place
2:32.7	that year in France.
2:37.3	But we would be wrong to think it was quiet there.
2:38.8	It was not.
2:43.0	It may not have been the hellish sectors of the line like Ipr,
	...

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