The Blue Cap Journal of the Royal Dublin Fusiliers Association Vol
THE BLUE CAP JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL DUBLIN FUSILIERS ASSOCIATION VOL. 23. DECEMBER 2018 Reflections on 1918 Tom Burke On 11 November 1917, at a meeting between Ludendorff and a select group of his advisers in Mons where the British and Germans had clashed back in August 1914, it was decided to knock Britain out of the war before any American entry into the war with decisive numbers of boots on the ground.1 As 1918 opened, the Western, Italian, Salonica and Turkish fronts were each the scene of no large-scale offensives but of sporadic fighting characterised by repeated raids and counter-raids.2 In terms of the eastern front, the German defeat of Russia and her consequential withdrawal from the war, presented Ludendorff and his commanders with a window of opportunity to end the war in the west. One result of Russia’s defeat was the accumulation of munition stocks and the release of large numbers of German troops for an offensive in the west.3 One estimate of the number of German troops available for transfer from east to west was put at 900,000 men.4 According to Gary Sheffield, ‘in the spring of 1918 the Germans could deploy 192 divisions, while the French and British could only muster 156.’ 5 However, according to John Keegan, the Allies had superior stocks of war material. For example, 4,500 Allied aircraft against 3,670 German; 18,500 Allied artillery weapons against 14,000 Germans and 800 Allied tanks against ten German.6 Yet despite this imbalance in material, the combination of a feeling of military superiority, and, acting before the Allies could grow in strength through an American entry along with rising economic and domestic challenges in Germany, all combined to prompt Ludendorff to use the opportunity of that open window and attack the British as they had planned to do back in Mons on 11 November 1917 at a suitable date in the spring of 1918.
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