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If the Prussian logistical system of the Franco-Prussian War and the corresponding system ultimately led to the Prussian victory, few would have thought that this set of experiences would have a very close bearing on the subsequent history of the war. Pen × fun × Pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 ｉｎｆｏ（.）

In World War I, the Second German Reich continued to use the logistics system specified in the Franco-Prussian War, and improved the details according to some circumstances.

And this effect was evident in the tactical thinking of the Second German Reich in the First World War.

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Prior to the outbreak of World War I, the Second German Reich had improved its military system as a whole based on the experience gained during the Franco-Prussian War and the corresponding increase in the foundation of national power development at that time.

And this key premise is the overall improvement of national strength driven by science and technology.

For Europe as a whole, the year was a period of rapid demographic and economic development. In just 44 years, the population has grown by almost 70 percent, from 29,300 to 49,000. At the same time, industry, trade, and transport developed by leaps and bounds, and by the eve of the First World War, the face of the European continent had completely changed.

In 1870, the combined production of coal (including lignite) in the three leading industrial countries - Great Britain, France and Germany - was less than 160 million tons, and by 1913 it had increased 2.8 times to 612 million tons. Similarly, in 1870, pig iron production in the three countries mentioned above was about 7.5 million tons, and in 1913 it reached 29 million tons, an increase of almost 300%. Needless to say, with the development of population and economy, the way of employment and housing has also changed dramatically. Industry can be said to have begun 100 years before the Franco-Prussian War in 1870, but the Franco-Prussian War was still the beginning of a real entry into the era of coal and steel.

The chimneys of the factories are rising higher and higher, and the scale of the military means of the major powers on the European continent is also increasing. In fact, during this period of our study, and especially in the second half of it, the expansion of European armies and navies was even faster than the development of population and industry. The progress of society, the increase in administrative efficiency, and especially the conscription system, which had become almost universal at this time, created the possibility of building up a large army. Such troops, relative to the scale of the political and economic institutions that sustain them, far exceed the level of any other period in history.

For example, in France, Europe's second-largest military power, the number of trained military manpower increased from less than 500,000 (about 74:1) out of a population of 37 million in 1870 to more than 4 million in 1914, while France's population grew by less than 10 percent during the same period.

Similarly, in the German Empire, although the population increased by almost two-thirds during this period, the expansion of the armed forces was much faster, so that when World War I broke out, 1 in 13 men could immediately perform military duty. In the year, the ratio was only 34:1. For Europe as a whole, the number of armed forces in 1914 was around 20 million (although the level of combat readiness and mobilization varied from country to country), a figure that may never be reached again in peacetime.

As warfare became more and more complex, the amount of baggage that the army brought to the battlefield and the daily consumption of supplies per person increased even faster than the number of troops. Here are just a few figures for Germany, the country most closely associated with this chapter. In 1870, the number of carts carrying heavy loads such as field bakeries, hospitals, and engineering equipment in a German army was only 30, and it doubled 40 years later. The artillery available to the North German Confederation to fight against Napoleon III is said to have reached nearly 8,000 guns in Germany, many of which were much larger and heavier.

Although there was little variation in the number of weapons of each corps (e.g., the number of artillery pieces increased from 64 to 88), most of the weapons in 1914 were fast-fired, some automatic, and consumed much more ammunition than the weapons of 1870. In 1870, each corps carried only 200 rounds of ammunition per rifle, which were distributed among the various transport links (soldiers carrying, battalion carts running, army reserves), but only 56 rifles per rifle were consumed on average during the six-month war.

In 1914, the ammunition per rifle per corps had increased to 280, but it was all depleted in the first few weeks of the war. During the war, the Germans consumed an average of only 199 shells per gun, but in 1914 the German War Office had almost all of its 1,000 shells per gun in reserve, which were almost all used up within a month and a half of the start of the war.

With the growth of ammunition consumption arose the question of replenishment of the weapon itself, which in 1914 was a completely new problem. In the war, as in all previous eras, artillery was always expected to be used until the end of the battle. This is often the case, and artillery fire is hardly powerful enough to destroy it completely. The gun carriage may be shattered, but the barrel is almost indestructible. By 1914, the situation had completely changed, and artillery fire could easily break an entire company's artillery into piles of broken metal.

The regular replenishment of artillery and other weapons and equipment has become a heavy burden on the transportation service.

To meet these needs, the number of horses in service in the field army continued to increase, and the ratio of horses to men in the German army was about 1:4 in 1870 and increased to 1:3 40 years later. However, horses eat about 10 times as much as humans. So, while there may not have been a significant change in the consumption of soldiers, the total daily food requirement for a specific unit increased by about 50 percent.

Thus, in addition to the increase in the quantity of materials caused by the expansion of the army, the weight of the materials and the daily consumption of the army according to the average person required to carry have also increased many times over the year. In response to this additional growth, railways, which have been considered the most important means of strategic transport since the early sixties of the nineteenth century, have also developed considerably. However, the limitations of the railway did not escape the attention of military experts. Although by 1914 the European rail network was so dense that Moltke's famous statement that the mistakes made during the strategic development phase could not be corrected throughout the course of the war had partially failed, the railroad was by its very nature a rather inflexible tool.

True, the Second German Reich itself did not attach much importance to the logistical transport capacity that rail transport could bring.

In 1914, 117 trains on a double-track railroad could transport 600 miles to an army in nine days, but the loading and unloading times were so long that rail transportation over distances of less than 100 miles was considered uneconomical, at least for transporting large units of all arms. The troops transported by the railway, as well as the railway itself, were vulnerable to enemy actions. For these reasons, railways are difficult to use operationally and can generally only be used for transportation from the rear to the front, as well as for transportation from the rear.

With these limitations, can the development of the railroad keep up with the growth of the number of troops?

The answer is to keep up.

In 1870, there were only 65,000 miles of railroad in Europe, an increase of nearly 200 percent, while the major countries of Germany and Russia had an even higher rate of growth and even greater qualitative progress. At the time of the Franco-Prussian War, it was thought that a monorail could run 8 trains a day and a double-track railway with 12 trains, but by the eve of the First World War it had increased to 40 and 60 respectively. In August 1870, 350,000 German troops were deployed in 15 days using nine double-track railways, an average of 1.5 million men per day per railroad were transported to the western frontier of Germany in 10 days using 13 railroads, an average of 11,530 men per railway per day.

In addition, the volume of the carriages and the power of the locomotives were greater, so that only one train was needed to carry two days' supplies for an army, compared with two in 1870. Moreover, by this time, the strength of the army had increased by 50%, from 31,000 to 46,000. These figures are far from exhaustive, but they do show that the development of rail transport has indeed kept pace with the growth in the number and size of the army in terms of mobilization, deployment, and supply.

In addition to the large-scale railway transportation system, in 1914 the armies of all countries had field light railways, and the troops were trained to use such railways, but the passage capacity of field light railways was very small, and generally could only be regarded as temporary replacement transportation routes. The laying of such railways is often extremely limited by time and terrain.

Therefore, the movement of the army and the delivery of materials and supplies must be carried out mainly by other means. In terms of quality, there has been little improvement in shipping.

Because the tactical mobility of the army in 1914 still relied on that time-honored means of movement - the feet of people and livestock. Theoretically, there is no reason why a marching column should not be able to maintain that standard speed that has not changed since time immemorial - 15 miles per day. However, this is becoming more and more difficult to do because of the large proportion of baggage.

Although horse-drawn wagon convoys operating in the rear of the army move much faster than people (25 miles per day is considered to be a steady average), these vehicles are constantly shuttling back and forth between the front line and the rear bases, and they are bound to move farther and farther away from the troops as they march day after day. These factors, combined with the tremendous increase in the consumption of supplies, have made it possible for the so-called "critical distance", that is, the maximum distance that troops can reach from the railway terminal when fighting, to actually decrease during the period we are deliberating.

It was 100 miles in the 60s of the 19th century, and by the beginning of the 20th century, it was reduced by about half. Although all figures of this category are related to a range of other variables of great significance, such as weather, road conditions, enemy interference with transport, etc., the downward trend is certain. This, combined with the fact that in 1914 an army of combat units had to occupy too long sections of road (more than 20 miles), often made it difficult for transport companies to get from tail to end in a day's journey. In other words, the army has become so large that it is difficult to maintain its supplies even when the advance is completely halted. In the years leading up to the First World War, the mobility of the army had been reduced to such an extent by its sheer size.

This change in logistics greatly influenced the development of the military program of the Second German Reich at that time.

Examples of this influence include the famous "Schlieffen Plan".

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Later generations held that the logistical aspects of the Schlieffen Plan, whether conceived by its creators or implemented by other successors, were completely ignored. Did the plan work logistically, and what role did logistical factors play in the failure of the plan, if any?

Finally, if the Battle of the Marne had been successful, would the Germans have been able to hold out in the face of the harsh facts of distance and supplies?

The first draft of the Schlieffen Plan in 1897, to the final draft of the project in 1897 that had been fully revised and supplemented by the month, had been primarily concerned with strategic rather than logistical considerations throughout its evolution. The chief of the German General Staff saw that his country was under attack on all sides and sooner or later would be drawn into a war that would be fought on at least two sides. Schlieffen continued the tradition established by Clausewitz, whose aim was not to achieve an incomplete victory over the enemies of Germany, but to annihilate them completely.

For a number of reasons, including the ratio of the number of troops to the size of their territory, and the existence of a good road and rail network, he considered that this aim would be most easily achieved in France. France thus became the target of the huge forces under his command. In East Prussia, however, only a small number of troops were left to deal with the Russian attack, and this part of the force was to try to hold out to the end, and reinforcements could be brought in after the victory in the war against France. In this way, the realization of Schlieffen's entire plan depended on the speed of mobilization, deployment and combat operations, and the total time limit was set at 42 days.

In fact, Schlieffen also made a mistake that was probably a common mistake in the Junkers officer corps at the time, or a misconception, when he made the plan.

That is, they largely ignore the impact of national strength on a country's victory or defeat in a war, and as a result, when formulating an operational plan or even implementing a plan, they will only do "their own work" and will not think about how well the country can bear such a plan or even in terms of operational command.

One of the difficulties in achieving a quick victory on the Western Front was the construction of fortified French positions along the Franco-German border. This led Schlieffen to believe that if a head-on breakthrough was implemented, there was little hope of success. A flank detour through Switzerland was considered, but the terrain was unfavourable.

In this way, rapid and violent interspersing through Belgian implementation is the only feasible option. When the Schlieffen plan was finalized, it was at least audacious, if not reckless. According to this plan, about 85 per cent of the German army was to be deployed on the western borders of the Reich, of which seven-eighths of the forces were to form part of the right flank, including five army groups, a total of 33 and a half corps (two more corps were to be transferred from the left flank in Lorraine) and eight cavalry divisions.

This large phalanx formation was arranged in echelons from right to left, marching west into Belgium and south into France in a wheel-like movement, and capturing Paris from the west, leaving part of the army to surround the city. The army advanced first to the east and finally to the northeast, attacking the French from the rear, nailing the French to the back of their own fortified positions.

Schlieffen's grand plan was criticized for its political and operational aspects, for it was seen as a danger of British intervention on the political side, and on the operational side, it envisaged that the French would sit and wait for death after fortifications had been built on the Franco-German border.

In this respect, the first question to be solved is: how big are the "wheels" of the wheel-like movement through Belgium? Strategically, in order to ensure the rapidity of the advance and the concentration of troops, it is necessary to make a short detour of the flank distance, i.e., to make a rapid advance along the south (right) bank of the Meuse-Lafel line. However, it was feared that moving on such a narrow front would make it difficult for the troops to march and deploy because the area was too small and there were too few roads. In addition, the size of this "wheel" also determines the width and narrowness of the concentration area required by the various armies on the right flank before the start of the war.

Judging from the year of the plan, it seems that Schlieffen had initially intended to change the front of the march from west to south near Namur. If this were the case, the concentration of troops would not exceed St. Vitus in the north. Between St. Vitus and Metz (the center of the right flank) there were only six double-track railways from the east, and according to the experience of 1866, it was urgent to use as many railways as possible for the rapid deployment of the army. The end result, then, was a conflict between strategic and logistical considerations, and Schlieffen's solution was in favor of the latter. In order to make the most extensive use of the double-track railway to the western border of Germany, he decided to disembark his troops in a dispersed manner along the entire front from Metz to Wiesel

In order to avoid undue crowding in the advance, he proposed the seizure of the Dutch province of Limburg (the so-called Maastricht salient), thereby trampling on the neutrality of not only Belgium, but also the Netherlands and North Brabant. Finally, in order to secure sufficient roads in Belgian territory, he extended the front of the march to the front, in his own words, until "the last grenadier on the right flank could reach the Dover Gap with his sleeves".

This also had the advantage of enabling the Germans to encircle not only the Belgian army in their outflanking campaign, but also the British forces that might come to the aid of the Belgian army.

However, the ultimate failure of Schlieffen's plan was that the German army's logistical replenishment was basically unable to meet the attrition of the front line, resulting in the German army's offensive stamina. (To be continued.) )

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