Adrian Wheeler

14. 07.

Verdun 2015

Adrian Wheeler Přečteno 3804 krát

The contrast is astonishing. In my hand is a photograph of the summit of Le Mort Homme, a hill just outside Verdun. It was taken in 1916 and shows a lunar landscape churned into desolation by thousands of shells exploding in an area the size of a football pitch. But when I look up all I can see is foliage; there are dense woodlands on all sides. It is early summer.

Underfoot the contrast is less marked. There are pathways criss-crossing the hill but on either side, barely hidden by the bracken, shell-holes pock the earth side-by-side, often over-lapping. There are zig-zag indentations among them: the traces of trenches which once protected the French soldiers defending the position. But not very well, and not for long.

The Germans’ surprise onslaught at Verdun was meticulously prepared. On the 21st of February 1916 a hail of one million large-calibre projectiles all but obliterated the French outposts on the right bank of the Meuse. A few brave units somehow survived the barrage and held their positions for a day or so, but the sheer weight of the German shock-troop attack (which used flame-throwers for the first time) forced them into retreat, death or capture. The Germans were on their way to the forts of Verdun.

But, as often happened, their plans contained a fatal flaw. Concentration on the right bank gave the French artillery on the left bank (where I was standing) a priceless opportunity to shoot into their flanks. The French artillery were first-class; the opportunity was not missed. And so, a fortnight after the launch of the assault, Falkenhayn’s grand plan had to be changed. The German army would, after all, have to attack the left bank and wipe out the French guns.

It was easier said than done. Even after the Germans’ artillery bombardment had removed every shred of cover, the terrain favoured the defenders: each slope, each hill captured at unthinkable cost in death and injury simply revealed another slope, another hillside with lines of French troops firmly entrenched. Week after week the battle for the commanding heights continued. The French slowly gave ground, bit by bit, but never gave in. The attack abated in May after 81,000 German casualties.

What happened next is notorious: the battle on the right bank reached unheard-of levels of ferocity. The forts were captured and re-captured. The butcher’s bill grew to unprecedented levels, enough to give the most sanguine commanders pause for thought. The village of Fleury, by now a mere smudge on the landscape, changed hands sixteen times between June and August. Conditions were atrocious: men died of thirst in the height of summer and perished from sub-zero temperatures as winter drew on.

What is extraordinary in this sorry tale of carnage is the relentless determination of the troops on both sides. While the commanders dithered, covering up their mistakes and hedging their bets, the men in the ravines fought like panthers: the Germans would not admit defeat, the French would not be defeated. Two martial nations met head-on; neither would give way. In hindsight we are struck by the similarities which challenge our stereotypes: here we see the French, for whom ‘elan’ was supposedly all-important, resisting superior forces, superior artillery and superior battle tactics in a nine-month display of dogged implacability. The German troops, allegedly dull and robotic, instead showed verve, imagination and flair in ceaselessly trying to outwit their opponents.

The more thoughtful Germans had known since March that they could not win. By December their hopes had evaporated and the most bloody campaign in modern history petered out. The French gained the upper hand and brought the battle to an end by taking 11,387 prisoners in a single day. Some German officers complained about their uncomfortable conditions in captivity. Mangin replied: ‘We do regret it, gentlemen, but then… we did not expect so many of you’.

Standing on that hillside nearly a hundred years later, my friends and I were quiet as we contemplated the endurance, fortitude and – there is no other word – bravery - of the soldiers on both sides. Later we wondered if we were living, as Europeans in 2015, with the echoes of Verdun. Could it have been the memory of Verdun, a battle of mutual annihilation, which inspired the grand idea of the European Union? We are used to thinking of the EU as the outcome of the Second World War, yet the confrontation between France and Hitler’s mad ambitions was embarrassingly brief.

At Verdun both countries tried their hardest to murder each other’s young men. Once started, the ‘mill on the Meuse’ was obviously pointless, but neither side knew how to bring the slaughter to an end. Perhaps both France and Germany were frightened by what had been unleashed. Perhaps they realised that a common border works better as a protection for both than as an invitation to either. Perhaps it was the dreadful memory of Verdun that provoked these ancient enemies, two generations later, to bury the hatchet.

11. 07.

The Battle of Britain

Adrian Wheeler Přečteno 3615 krát

When France fell, to universal astonishment, Churchill predicted that the ‘Battle of Britain’ would soon follow. Though Hitler had expected an accommodation with the United Kingdom (‘you keep your colonies – I’ll take Europe’) – and there were many in Westminster who thought this was a reasonable option – Churchill would have none of it.

Britain in 1940 was still a mighty imperial and industrial power. It had the largest merchant navy in the world and the largest fleet of warships to protect it. We like to think of Britain as weak, alone and endangered during World War Two, but it was never so: British tank and aircraft production outstripped Germany’s from 1940 until the war ended. So secure did Churchill’s cabinet feel in their island fortress that, facing the threat of invasion, they had no hesitation in sending ship-loads of tanks and fighter-planes to North Africa and the Far East. They never doubted they would win.

Hitler sensed this. He wasn’t convinced that ‘Operation Sea-Lion’ was viable. Like Napoleon, he was happiest with land warfare, where he more-or-less knew what he was doing. But his aura as a supreme war-lord demanded punishment for the recalcitrant British, so barges were assembled in the Channel Ports and barracks hastily built on the cliff-tops facing Dover.

Two factors stood in his way. The first was the Royal Air Force. No barge would reach Kent unless the RAF’s thousands of aircraft in Fighter Command, Coastal Command and Bomber Command could be neutralised. Goering promised to do this. Like most of Goering’s commitments, it was impetuous and ill-thought-out. The Luftwaffe started by trying to destroy the RAF’s radar chain and airfields. The radar installations were too hard to hit, and too easy to re-build, while – to the Luftwaffe’s surprise – attacks on the airfields were met by swarms of fighters who always seemed to know where the Germans were going.
From July to October the Germans threw everything they had at the Royal Air Force. They felt they were close to victory because they consistently over-estimated their combat successes and under-estimated Britain’s capacity to produce new Spitfires and Hurricanes. They got this completely wrong: the RAF had more fighters at the end of the Battle of Britain than at the beginning.

Morale was another problem for the Germans. Their own morale was excellent, but as nothing compared with the visceral hatred felt by Europeans whose homelands had been over-run by Hitler’s myrmidons. Among the band of fighter pilots who won the Battle of Britain was a large contingent of Czechs, many of whom had escaped by way of France. Born airmen, then as now, they fought with flair and fury: the fourth-top-scoring Battle of Britain ace, with 17 kills, was Josef Frantisek. He and over 2,000 compatriots who fought with the RAF are commemorated by the Winged Lion Memorial at Klarov in Prague.
By the end of September the Germans realised they couldn’t win and switched to bombing civilians in cities: The Blitz. That didn’t work either. The barges were quietly dispersed and the barracks disassembled. Hitler officially ‘postponed’ the invasion.

The second factor standing in Hitler’s way was the Royal Navy. Even if Goering’s air-fleets had beaten the RAF, there was not the slightest possibility of an army crossing the Channel while the Royal Navy existed: it was vast, aggressive, intimidating and unbeatable. We may conclude that ‘Operation Sea-Lion’ was a case of sabre-rattling. Or we may conclude that Hitler was deranged.

But the Battle of Britain was a turning-point in history. It showed the oppressed nations of Europe, and the Americans, and the Russians, that the Germans were not invincible. The RAF – a multinational organisation if ever there was one – had struck a resounding blow for freedom. These young pilots inspired hope and resistance throughout occupied Europe. For the Axis, in spite of many military successes to come over the next four years, it was the beginning of the end.

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Verdun 2015

The Battle of Britain

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