I also agree that it takes longer to train a soldier in fire and movement than it does to train him in going forward blindly towards the mouth of the guns, but I don't recall hearing much about British fire and movement at the Somme.
Pre-war infantry training manuals described how a company attacking would be divided into a firing-line and supports. The firing-line, reinforced from the supports as the occasion demanded, was to establish fire superiority over the enemy, in a process that generations of British soldiers have come to know as 'winning the firefight'. Artillery would make its contribution, the object being 'to demoralize the defenders and reduce their volume of fire'. However, the firefight was a means and not an end, for:
"The object of fire in the attack, whether of artillery, machine guns, or infantry is to bring such a superiority of fire to bear on the enemy as to make the advance to close quarters possible .......as the enemy's fire is gradually subdued, further progress will be made by bounds from place to place, the movement gathering renewed force at each pause until the enemy can be assaulted with the bayonet."
Richard Holmes: Tommy quoting from Infantry Training 1914 with the emphasis in the original training manual.
This was the way the Brits expected to fight in 1914, and did fight in the early going. Keep in mind that that was intended to be used by troops that could generate 1500 rounds down range per minute from half a company (equivalent to something like 10 C6s firing at 150 RPM) accompanied by 2 to 6 18 pounders firing over open sights against an enemy operating in open country in dispersed packets.
What was supposed to happen if the enemy's fire WAS NOT gradually subdued because he was fighting from a linear defence, with mutual support, lots of ammunition on hand and ready reinforcements available to take up the place of the dead, the dying and the demoralized?
Between August 1914 and June 1916 the BEF had expanded from four infantry divisions to fifty-eight, to say nothing of all those units and formations that did not exist in 1914
Corrigan: Mud, Blood and Poppycock. p.257
Those "units and formations" included Corps, Armies and "Army Group" as well as all the support units as well as specialists like miners, aerial recce, heavy machine gun brigades....... And the 58 number doesn't include garrison forces in Britain and Overseas, nor does it include divisions diverted to other fronts like Gallipoli, Mesopotamia, Italy, .......
The staff had not expanded commensurately. In 1914 there were twenty-two general staff officers at GHQ of the BEF (4 Divisions). Now there were thirty (58 Divisions). The Engineer-in-Chief's staff at GHQ had admittedly increased ninefold, but as there was only one staff officer in 1914, nine in 1916 was hardly excessive. In 1914 the headquarters of the various administrative services had forty-five staff officers, whereas now they had 129; and a corps headquarters had grown from nineteen staff officers to twenty-four. Staff officers at division and brigade headquarters had not increased at all
Corrigan; p. 257
Of the eleven British divisions of ..... Rawlinson's Fourth Army......three..... were composed of regular battalions, five.......were New Army formations and three....were a mix of regular, Territorial Force and New Army battalions. The Territorial Force battalions had little experience, the New Army ones virtually none and even the regulars had been brought up to strength by recruits recently out of training, and with officers and NCOs two or three ranks higher than they had been in 1914. It was a very inexperienced and undertrained army
Corrigan
. 259
If all the peripherals are cut out, it was and is possible to train a man to a standard where he can take his place in a rifle section in a few weeks. In the Great War he needed to be able to march, to shoot and to perform tactical manoeuvres directed by his officers and NCOs. To produce those officers and NCOs takes far longer. They cannot be made; they must be grown, and growing takes time. With only two or three officers and perhaps half a dozen NCOs with any experience in a battalion of 1,000 men, only the simplest of tactics could be employed - the battalions were just too inexperienced for anything more complex.
Corrigan: p.259.
Machine Guns:
The example of the Welsh Guards shows how the Lewis gun spread throughout the infantry. The battalion received a single gun in November 1915, another in December, six more in March 1916, another eight that August, eight more in January 1918 and a further eight in April.
Holmes
.393
So on the opening day of the Somme one of the premier battalions in the British Army had a total of 8 light machine guns which had been introduced 6 months previously but only supplied in sufficient numbers for tactical training 2-3 months prior to jump-off. Not a lot of time to develop innovative tactics. During the battle (August 1916) the complement was doubled to 16 and tactics were adjusted accordingly. It is notable that, IMHO, the LMG is the key to the modern section/platoon. This element which drove modern platoon tactics was only being introduced at the time of the Somme.
Artillery:
.... In addition to their field artillery, XX Corps would have thirty-two batteries of heavy artillery, I Colonial Corp sixty-five heavy batteries and, and XXXV Corps thirty-two (all French formations). In contrast the British XIII Corps had eighteen batteries.
Corrigan: p.259
The Brits, with their small army, did not have the same need for artillery that the French and the Germans did. It took them a long time to tool up to be able to make the necessary guns and shells.
The battle should not have been fought.
Why was it fought?
Dated 16 June 1916 (Haig's order to Commander Fourth Army), it laid down the aim of the offensive: "Third and Fourth Armies will undertake offensive operations on the front Maricourt to Gommecourt in conjunction with the French Sixth Army astride the Somme, with the object of relieving the pressure on the French at Verdun and inflicting losses on the enemy..."
Corrigan: p.257, italics Corrigan's.
In 1916 the French fed 77 Divisions through Verdun. Thirty Eight of them were then sent to fight on the Somme. In total the French supplied 44 Divisions on the Somme to the Brits 53.
The Somme lasted from 1 July to 18 November: a total of 20 weeks. The Brits committed 53 divisions and lost a total of 95,000 dead. A loss rate for Haig of 89 per division per week.
Normandy lasted from 6 June to 25 August: a total of 11 weeks. The Brits committed 19 divisions and lost a total of 22,000 dead. A loss rate for Monty of 100 per division per week - and that with all the benefits of "modern" combined arms doctrine in a much more fluid environment.
In the year that the Brits lost 109,000 dead, the French lost 270,000 dead: 160,000 at Verdun.
Data from Corrigan: pp.298-300
Before the end of the year (Ludendorff) and Hindenburg would be demanding the use of child labour in Germany to release men for the front
Corrigan p.300
And then, after fighting through the objective comes re-org. Corrigan again.
The British learned much from the Somme, and this was reflected in new methods and structures implemented during the winter. The infantry platoon - the basic building block of that arm of the service on which the bulk of the fighting fell - underwent a radical change. Instead of a headquarters and four sections, each section with the same weapons mix and with the same tasks, the platoon was now reorganised on a functional basis. The new infantry platoon still had a headquarters consisting of a subaltern officer, a sergeant and two private soldiers, and each section had an NCO commander and a minimum of eight men, but each section would now have its own specific role: bombers, Lewis gun, riflemen and rifle bombers.
Corrigan: pp.300-301
To take nothing away from the accomplishment of the Canadian Corps at Vimy, under the command of Lord Byng, the change in tactics that permitted the success there had its origin in the BATTLES (plural) of the Somme and the growth and evolution of the capabilities of BEF generally. The tactics in which Currie trained his division at Vimy were tactics that were being promulgated throughout the BEF between Nov 1916 and Apr 1917.
Tactics had evolved. New kit had appeared to support those tactics. More kit generally was available. And, most importantly, a cadre of officers and NCOS had grown to their trade in a bloody environment and were better prepared for their next battles.
The miracles of the BEF (and the Canadian Corps) were manifold. Raising the numbers and equipping them in 18 months. Having them hang together while they learned their trade on the job one summer (Edit: a summer which 74% of frontline BEF troops survived "without a scratch" Corrigan p.299). Completely reorganizing their TTPs to incorporate new kit over 6 months of winter. Effectively applying the reorg as a winning force in 1917 (The hundred days of 1918 may be more spectacular but it should be remembered that throughout 1917 the German's lost ground, as well as men, on the Western Front from April to November - conveniently bookended by the Canadians: Vimy and Passchendaele). That forced the Germans into their peace with the Russians enabling to release enough forces for one last throw of the dice in the west in 1918.
It should also be remembered that 1917 was also the year of Cambrai - the Combined Arms tank/infantry/artillery/air assault that successfully breached the line but failed in large part because - the guns could not be brought over the broken ground fast enough to support the advance - and - because communications were not sufficientlyl well developed to allow for the guns to be accurately spotted in support or for cavalry units to be directed to exploitable breaches in a timely manner.
Butcher Haig did as well as any man (or woman) could have done with the tools he had available.
Postscript - again from Corrigan
Prior to 1914 the largest number of troops that the Brits had sent overseas was 450,000 to tackle the Boers. 22,000 died - 2/3s from disease.
21,000 died during the Crimean escapade
60,000 died over the 23 years of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars period (2-3,000 fatalities per year).
By contrast, between 1793 and 1815 continental armies lost over 3 Million dead:
Austerlitz 4000 French/7,000 Russian
Wagram 8300 French/6000 Austrian
Borodino 7000 French/10,000 Russian.
All one day battles.
In the Crimea the combined Russian/French/Turkish death toll was 765,000 (against the 21,000 Brits).
Up until WW1 we Brits had waged war on the cheap. Money from the trade supported by the navy financed other peoples' armies who fought in support of our interests.
In WW1, we ended up paying our full share of the Butcher's Bill.
And that was a shock to the psyche.
But the shock to our psyche was still not as great as it was to the French and the Germans who, according to Corrigan's thesis, should have been inured to the losses by long familiarity.
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