Schlieffen Plan

The Schlieffen Plan, the German General Staff's overall strategic blueprint for victory on the Western Front against France in the years up to 1914, takes its name from its author, Alfred Graf von Schlieffen. It envisaged a rapid German mobilisation, disregard of Luxembourg,Belgian and Dutch neutrality, and the overwhelming sweep of German armies through Belgium southwards in the back of the French defences pivoting on weakly-held left-wing positions in the province of Alsace-Lorraine.

The Schlieffen Plan In Action

• Belgian forces slow the German advance by flooding the land and sabotaging key railways.
• Belgian forts at Liège held back the advance longer than expected.
• Six pre-positioned British Expeditionary Force divisions slow Germany further; BEF exploits 30-mile gap between German First and Second Armies, thereby stopping the German advance at the Marne.
• German troops are exhausted by the time they engage French forces; many horses (towing artillery pieces) dying having eaten green corn.
• German supply lines stretched 80 miles at the Marne; front line of troops in retreat before rear has even arrived.
• Russians mobilise quicker than expected; General Helmuth von Moltke (believing France to have been defeated) dispatches General Ludendorff (and accompanying forces) to the East, further weakening Germany's chances of success on the Western Front.