Passchendaele

The Battle of Passchendaele, otherwise known as the Third Battle of Ypres, was one of the major battles of World War I, fought by British, ANZAC, and Canadian soldiers against the German army near Ypres (Ieper in Flemish) in West Flanders, southwestern Belgium over the control of the village of Passchendaele. The plan was to drive a hole in the German lines and advance clear through to the Belgian coast. The idea being that the offensive would have a two-fold benefit if succcesful. Not only would it allow for a decisive corridor to be opened in a crucial area of the front but it would meanwhile take pressure off of the French forces who, after suffering a series of disastrous defeats were suffering from extremely low morale, which resulted in an alarming increase in cases of mutiny and misconduct. The land on which the battle took place was largely reclaimed bog-land, swampy even without rains. Then it rained from August onwards almost without cease. Add to that the ceaseless, and senseless, preparatory bombardment by the British and the result was a terrain so impassable with deep "liquid mud" that not only the heavy tanks and the men inside them, and the heavy artillery, but countless numbers of unfortunate and doomed foot soldiers were drowned in the mud before they even had a chance to get shot by the Germans. So, being forced to advance through this deadly mud against row after row of heavily armed and manned German pill-boxes meant that when the town of Paschendaele was finally taken by the Canadians allied forces had sufffered almost a quarter million casualties, with about the same number of men lost by the germans by the battle's end, while the original strategic purpose of the battle had long-been forfeited. It was in fact the use of massed tanks which effected the breakthrough, and the Tank Corps finally broke through, quite un-expectedly at Cambrai, east of the old Somme sector, in November. The breakthrough was so un-expected in fact that the British and Canadian high command had no plan in place to capitalize on it and the territory was soon mostly re-captured by the Germans. So while utterly senseless in and of itself, the battle did have very consequential effects. First it convinced Churchill, who had long had serious doubts (see the Dardanelles campaign) that the war could be won on the Western front, and it greatly influenced strategists who began to see the benefits of massed tank warfare in the European theatre, Heinz Guderian in particular, whose ideas came to striking fruition in the Blitzkrieg tactics used some 21 years later.

July 1917

As a second stage of the action, General Sir Hubert Gough was put in charge of the attacks to secure the Gheluvelt Plateau which overlooked Ypres. Huge numbers of guns were moved into the area and started a four-day bombardment, but as always, this simply served to warn the Germans of a coming offensive, allowing them to move in more troops.

Related Topics:
Hubert Gough - Gheluvelt Plateau

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In July the Germans used mustard gas for the first time. It attacked sensitive parts of the body, caused sneezing, followed by eyelids swelling, then inflammation of the eyes, blindness for about 10 days and great pain.

Related Topics:
July - Mustard gas

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One problem in carrying the offensive forward was the Yser canal, but this was taken on July 27 when the Allies found the German trenches empty. (Front lines were often vacated at night to reduce the casualties caused by nighttime shelling.)

Related Topics:
Yser canal - July 27

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On July 31 Haig's offensive opened with a major action at Pilkem ridge, with allied gains of up to 2000 yards (1.8 km). The Allies suffered about 32,000 casualties, killed, wounded or missing in this one action.

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Ground conditions during the whole Ypres-Passchendaele action were atrocious. Continuous shelling destroyed drainage canals in the area, and unseasonable heavy rain turned the whole area into a sea of mud and filled crater holes. In order to walk up to the front, duckboards were laid across the crater holes. Troops walking up to the front often carried up to 100 pounds (45 kg) of equipment: if they slipped off the path they could slide into a crater and drown before they could be rescued. Bodies buried after previous actions were often uncovered by the rain or later shelling.

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