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Hentsch, Richard (December 18, 1869, Cologne – February 13, 1918, Bucharest), German officer. After a private education in Berlin, Hentsch joined the 103rd Infantry Regiment (4th Saxon) in Bautzen in 1888. In 1899 he was posted to the Imperial General Staff, initially for two years, and then transferred there in 1902. He was promoted lieutenant colonel on April 20, 1914, and at the outbreak of war took up the post of head of the intelligence department to the chief of the General Staff of Field Fo…

Race to the Sea Popular metaphor for the military operations on the northern flank of the Western Front between September 15 and late October 1914, in the course of which both sides hoped to outflank the opponent, and which eventually came to an end with the onset of positional warfare in November of 1914. Following the German withdrawal to the Marne, the new chief of the Supreme Army Command (Oberste Heeresleitung, OHL), General Erich von Falkenhayn, planned to renew the offensive on the German rig…

Cadorna, Count Luigi (September 4, 1850, Pallanza, now part of Verbania – December 23, 1928, Bordighera), Italian general and chief of staff. The son of a prominent general, Cadorna joined the cadet corps at the age of ten. A lieutenant in 1870, he rose to major-general in 1898, lieutenant-general in 1905. In 1909 he was given command of the army corps at Genoa, and in 1914 Cadorna received the appointment to serve as chief of staff, succeeding the late Alberto Pollio. Cadorna used the ten-month pe…

Moltke, Helmuth Johannes Ludwig von (the Younger) (May 25, 1848, Gersdorff [Mecklenburg] – June 18, 1916, Berlin), German general; chief of the Army General Staff and nephew of Field Marshal von Moltke. In 1869 Moltke joined Fusilier Regiment the Queen’s No. 86 (Schleswig-Holstein), taking part in the Franco-Prussian War as a lieutenant. In 1872 he succeeded in transferring to the 1st Foot Guards Regiment. Moltke’s later military career was shaped by his closeness to his famous uncle – Moltke was his a…

Sarajevo Capital of the Austro-Hungarian provinces of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Austria-Hungary’s annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1908 had aroused strong hostility against the dual monarchy among the Serbian population in Bosnia. Radicalization had led to the emergence of secret societies that were prepared to use violence. One of those societies, the “Black Hand,” enjoyed the protection of Serbian military circles, and planned to assassinate Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir apparent to the Austrian throne, on the occasion of his visit to Sarajevo on June 28, 1914. In the pro…

Alberich, Operation Code name for the planned German rearward movement to the Hindenburg Line in February and March of 1917. Preparations for the withdrawal from the salient between Arras and Soissons had begun in the autumn of 1916 with the aim of disrupting Allied plans for an offensive in the spring of 1917 and shortening the German front line. Prior to the actual retreat, during the so-called Alberich period (February 9–March 15), the scheme called for the systematic devastation of the withdra…

Military Historiography, Official German Immediately after the end of the war, nearly all the states that had participated in the war began elaborating an official military historiography. These early efforts to produce standard official publications were not only a consequence of historical interest or of the wish to honor the achievements of one’s respective army, but should also be viewed in the light of the international debate on war guilt, which began with the Treaty of Versailles. Hence, the …

Positional Warfare A form of warfare conducted along permanent and fortified front lines. The war of positions came to characterize the First World War in contrast to other forms of combat. All major military powers had based their pre-1914 war strategies on a war of movement. This was the case despite the fact that positional warfare was not unfamiliar. Siege warfare had been ubiquitous in the Middle Ages and the Early Modern period. Even in recent conflicts such as the Russo-Japanese War of 1904…

Wild von Hohenborn, Adolf ( July 8, 1860, Kassel – October 25, 1925, Malsburg-Hohenborn [near Kassel]), German general and politician (minister of war). A schoolfellow and close friend of Kaiser Wilhelm II, von Hohenborn joined Infantry Regiment No. 83 in 1877, and became a lieutenant in 1880. His further career took him into the Guards and onto the General Staff. He was elevated to the nobility in 1900. He was chief of staff of the XIIIth Army Corps from 1906 to 1909, then colonel and commander of …

Einem, Karl von (January 1, 1853, Herzberg [Harz] – April 7, 1934, Mülheim an der Ruhr), German colonel general. Educated in the cadet corps, in 1870 Einem joined the 14th regiment of Uhlans, with whom he took part in the war against France. Never having attended military academy, Einem was ordered to the general staff while still a first lieutenant. In 1898 he was transferred as a colonel to the Prussian ministry of war (where he was director of the general war department from 1900). Lieutenant Ge…

Military Cabinet The bureau that handled personnel matters for the Prussian army. Created in 1883 out of the former Prussian Adjutant General’s Office, the Military Cabinet reported directly to the Kaiser. The Military Cabinet represented the last, official bastion of Prussian military absolutism. In addition to personnel matters, the War Cabinet administered honor courts and the conferring of medals and decorations. Additionally, the chief of the Military Cabinet served as the military advisor to…

Kuhl, Hermann von (November 2, 1856, Koblenz – November 4, 1958, Frankfurt am Main), German general. Kuhl received a doctoral degree from the University of Tübingen for his thesis on the Carmen Saliare in 1878. That same year he joined the Prussian Infantry Regiment No. 53, rising to captain in 1893, and to major in 1899. Having taught at the War Academy from 1898, Kuhl became chief of Department III at the General Staff in 1906. Promoted to major general in 1912, he was raised to the hereditary nobility one year later. In 191…

Frederick Augustus III, King of Saxony (May 25, 1865, Dresden – February 18, 1932, Sibyllenort, district of Oels). After studying in Strasbourg and Leipzig and completing his princely military training, Frederick attained the rank of lieutenant general in 1898. In 1902 the crown prince was named commanding general of XIIth (Saxon) Army Corps. Following the death of his father George he was crowned King of Saxony on October 15, 1904. A major general in 1909, he became a Prussian field marshal in 1912. …

Battle of the Frontiers Collective term for a series of engagements that were fought in Belgium and France in the course of the German invasion between August 20 and 24, 1914. The German operational plan had envisioned a strong right wing enveloping the bulk of the French, British, and Belgian forces in northern France. Following the successful coup de main against Liège this right wing consisting of the First, Second, and Third Armies advanced through Belgium toward the French border. The Fourth and Fifth Armies moved through Luxembourg and the Ardenne…

Tunnel Warfare Warfare by means of planting subterranean destructive charges. Following the onset of positional warfare, the belligerents soon turned to tunneling and mining along the stationary front lines, especially on the Western Front and in the Alps. A distinction must be made between offensive and defensive mining: offensive mining was conducted for the purpose of destroying key positions or entire sections of the enemy’s trenches immediately before a planned infantry attack. This was accom…

Headquarters Command centers for the supreme military, sometimes also political, leadership set up in the field for the duration of the war. Composition, location, and function of such a headquarters depended on the constitutional position of the supreme military command of each belligerent and the demands of modern mass and coalition warfare. – By far the most comprehensive headquarters at the outbreak of the war was the German “Great Headquarters.” Aside from the German Emperor as the nominal c…

Null-Acht-Fünfzehn (Maxim Machine Gun) The designation for the new Maxim machine gun, the Model 8, implemented by the German Army beginning in 1915. On this redesigned Maxim gun, the heavy carriage of older models was replaced by a bipod. It was lighter, and equipped for the first time with a shoulder stock as well as a pistol grip. Great quantities of the Model 8 were produced under very strict fabrication tolerances that resulted in exceptional durability, even when subjected to extreme mechanical stresses. It therefore comes as no surprise that in German soldiers’ slang, Null-Acht-Fün…

Hausen, Max Klemens Lothar Freiherr von (December 17, 1846, Dresden – March 19, 1922, Dresden), Saxon general. After cadet school, von Hausen joined the Saxon Army’s Third Jägerbataillon (Rifle Battalion) in Dresden in 1863. He took part in wars in Bohemia in 1866 and in France in 1870/1871, and was promoted captain in 1871. He was first appointed to the imperial general staff four years later. A major in 1881, in 1893 he was promoted to major general. Between 1895 and 1897 he was back on the general staff as deputy chief ( Oberquartiermeister). Between 1900 and 1902, he served as comma…

Hindenburg Line The name in British and French literature for the German defensive line on the Western Front in 1917/18, known in German as Siegfried-Stellung. After the close of the costly battles of 1916, the OHL (German Supreme Army Command) and the Army Group Kronprinz Rupprecht had decided to pull the front back to the Arras – Saint-Quentin – Vailly line. Their reasons had been strategic and operational: building on successes on the Eastern Front and in the unrestricted submarine war, the war in the West was to be waged defensively in…

Krafft von Dellmensingen, Konrad (November 24, 1862, Laufen [Upper Bavaria] – February 22, 1953, Seeshaupt), Bavarian general. Krafft joined the Bavarian Army in 1881 as an officer candidate (field artillery) and attended the War Academy from 1891 to 1894. From 1908 to 1911, he served as division chief in the Munich War Ministry with the rank of lieutenant-colonel. Promoted to the rank of major-general and appointed chief of the General Staff in 1912, Krafft became chief of staff of the Sixth Army (…

State of War A “state of imminent war danger” was proclaimed by the German Kaiser on July 31, 1914, at 1 pm, while the mobilization of army and fleet took place on August 1. The constitutional basis of these political actions was provided by Article 68 of the Constitution of the German Empire of 1871. Although an imperial law specifying the manner of proclamation and the consequence of a state of war had originally been planned, it never came to pass until 1914. The Prussian Law of Siege from the y…

Goltz, Baron Colmar von der (August 12, 1843, Bielkenfeld near Labiau [modern Polessk in the Kaliningrad Oblast] – April 19, 1916, Baghdad), Prussian and Ottoman field marshal. After graduating from cadet school, Goltz joined the Fifth East Prussian Infantry Regiment as a lieutenant in 1861. Following active service in the wars of 1866 and 1870–1871, his subsequent career was characterized by extended teaching assignments both at the War School in Potsdam and at the Prussian Military Academy in Berli…

Schmidt von Knobelsdorf, Konstantin (December 13, 1860, Frankfurt an der Oder – September 1, 1936, Frankfurt an der Oder), German general. Schmidt joined the army in 1878. After attending the Staff College he held various posts in the General Staff and in the army, including chief of staff of the Xth Army Corps (1904–1908) and commander of the 4th Infantry Guards Regiment (1908–1911). In 1911 Schmidt was promoted to major-general, and a year later appointed chief quartermaster. At the outbreak of wa…

Mobile Warfare A form of warfare which seeks to bring about a military decision through the tactical movement of forces for the purpose of achieving advantageous territorial concentrations without having to rely on fortified positions at all times. At the beginning of the war in 1914 the military doctrines and operational plans of all belligerent powers were based on mobile warfare. In the first instance these offensive operations were motivated by the strategic and economic objective of ensuring …

Hoeppner, Ernst von (January 14, 1860, Tonnin Island of Wolin [now in Poland] – September 27, 1922, Gross-Mockratz, Island of Rügen), German general. Educated in the cadet corps, in 1879 Hoeppner entered the 6th Regiment of Dragoons, and was appointed major general in 1912. At mobilization he became chief of the general staff of the Third Army, leading its operations during the Battle of the Frontiers and on the Marne, until the Army entered the positional war. On February 14, 1915, Hoeppner took o…

Hutier, Oskar von (August 27, 1857, Erfurt – December 5, 1934, Berlin), German general. Hutier was educated in a cadet school. He joined the Infantry Regiment No. 88 as a lieutenant in 1875. After a successful career in headquarters and field units, Hutier was appointed major-general in 1910 and chief quartermaster of the Great General Staff one year later. In 1912, having risen to the rank of lieutenant-general he assumed command of the 1st Guards Division, with which he went to war in 1914. As pa…

Marwitz, Georg von der ( July 3, 1856, Klein Nossin [Kreis Stolp] – October 28, 1929, Wundichow [Kreis Stolp]), German general. Marwitz joined the 2nd Garde-Ulan Regiment in 1875. He began his career in the Guards Cavalry and later served in the General Staff. He was appointed major in 1894, colonel in 1904, major-general in 1908, lieutenant general as well as commander of the 2nd Division in 1911, and inspector general of the cavalry in 1913. Entrusted with the task of reconnoitering and deceiving …

Army Corps District Official German military command. Each of the 25 active army corps of the German Reich was placed under the command of an army corps districts. As a rule a commanding general of infantry, cavalry, or artillery was placed in charge of an army corps district. German army corps districts controlled the largest combined-arms units of the peacetime army, and the generals in charge of them had the right to report directly to the Kaiser. After the 1914 German mobilization, the army cor…

Nivelle Offensive In the winter of 1916–1917, the new French commander in chief, Georges Robert Nivelle, began to draw up plans for a large-scale spring offensive in Artois, and in the Aisne and Champagne regions. It involved simultaneous operations by British and French forces on virtually the entire length of the German salient between Arras and Reims. Nivelle based his strategy for the most part on the lessons learned at Verdun in the autumn of 1916. He hoped to avert the specter of attrition w…

War Chronicles The war chronicles were the expression of a changed public awareness of journalism. The Franco-Prussian War of 1870/1871 had already led to a serious boom of popular military literature. Military topics gained a wider appeal in the German Reich due the growing agitation of the colonial unions, navy leagues, and defense associations since the turn of the century. The first war chronicles were printed at the beginning of the World War, usually by book publishers (Beck, Franck, Insel) …

Army Corps Districts When they mobilized, the twenty-five active army corps each left a deputy commanding general behind on the home front. Upon the outbreak of war, the senior deputy commanding general was assigned as the military commandant with full power in his territory (military district), answerable exclusively to the Kaiser. The powers and assigned duties of the deputy commanding general grew considerably in the course of the war. For example, the deputy commanding generals of the XIIIth Ro…

Supreme Army Command (OHL) When Germany mobilized for the war, the chief of the Prussian Army General Staff was named chief of the General Staff of the entire Armed Forces. According to law, of course, the Kaiser was commander in chief of the military. However, the chief of the General Staff actually led military operations. The department established for this purpose was the Supreme Army Command, which was placed under the control of the Supreme Headquarters. Early in the war the Supreme Army Comma…

Committee of Inquiry of the German Parliament On August 21, 1919, the newly formed 15th Committee of the German Constitutional Assembly met as a fact-finding parliamentary committee to consider the central political and military issues stemming from the World War. The legal basis for the committee was Article 34 of the Weimar Constitution. Under Article 34, officeholders and officials were obligated to work together with a fact-finding commission. Furthermore, the committee would have the right to secure expert tes…

Chemin des Dames A prominent ridge running north of the River Aisne between Vailly and Craonne (département Aisne) with a paved promenade dating from the 18th century. German troops held the Chemin des Dames since the start of trench warfare and had taken up defensive positions along the steep slopes and in the numerous caves underlying the ridge. It was not until the Nivelle Offensive was launched in 1917 that the Chemin des Dames became a military focal point. From the middle of April the French Sixth Army commanded by …

Montenegro The smallest of the Balkan states, Montenegro was strategically defined by its borders with Austria-Hungary and Serbia. To the south the kingdom bordered Albania, from which it had won territory populated by Albanians during the Second Balkan War. Since the Montenegrin populace itself was ethnically mainly Serbian, during the July Crisis of 1914 their support for their Serbian neighbors arose. The land had been ruled since 1860 by Nikola Petrović I, who had crowned himself king in 1910…

Nicolai, Walter (August 1, 1873, Braunschweig [Brunswick] – May 4, 1947, Moscow), German officer and leader of the Military Intelligence Service of the German Supreme Army Command. Nicolai joined the 2nd Hessian Infantry Regiment, No. 82 in 1893; in 1907, he was promoted to captain. As a major in 1912, he was entrusted with the directorship of Department IIIb, the Military Intelligence Bureau of the General Staff. In early August 1914, he was named chief of the section. The work of Department IIIb…

Zimmermann Telegram On January 16, 1917, after the German government’s decision to resume unrestricted submarine warfare (from February 1, 1917), Arthur Zimmermann, secretary of state at the German foreign ministry, sent a coded telegram to the German ambassador in Washington, Johann Heinrich Graf von Bernstorff, to be forwarded to the German ambassador in Mexico, Heinrich von Eckardt. The telegram instructed Eckardt to propose to the Mexican government an alliance against the United States. In re…

Stein, Hermann von (September 13, 1854, Wedderstedt – May 26, 1927, Lehnin), German general and politician and minister of war. The son of a Protestant clergyman, he joined the army in 1873 as standard-bearer. In 1875 he became a lieutenant and in 1890 a captain. He served in field artillery units and held post on the general staff. In 1903 Stein was appointed as chief of the deployment planning section. In 1905 he was promoted to colonel and four years later became chief quartermaster. In 1912 he …

War Office The War Office was established by a cabinet order of November 1, 1916, to administer the Hindenburg Program initiated by the Operations Branch of the General Staff. The War Office was to centralize war economy measures and serve as the enforcement authority for the Auxiliary Service Bill. Officially placed beneath the Prussian War Ministry, it was a peculiar mix of military war-economy staff and civilian government boards. Lieutenant General Wilhelm Groener was named the War Office’s fi…

Giolitti, Giovanni (October 27, 1842, Mondovì [Piedmont] – July 17, 1928, Cavour [Turin]), Italian politician who served as prime minister. One of the most influential Italian politicians of the prewar period, the liberal Giolitti practiced Realpolitik with a bureaucratic approach. He served as prime minister for five separate terms: 1892–1893, 1903–1905, 1906–1909, 1911–1914, and then 1920–1921. Indeed, the years from the turn of the century to 1914 are known in Italy as the “Giolitti Era.” During this period Giolitti ushered in…

Saint-Mihiel Salient Located southeast of Verdun, this salient was the theater of the first independent World War offensive of the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF), September 12–15, 1918. Created at the very beginning of positional warfare in 1914, the Saint-Mihiel Salient extended from Combres to St. Mihiel, then from there to Pont-à-Mousson. It interrupted the French communication lines running from the south toward Verdun and posed the constant threat of a flanking attack on the fortresses. …

Arz von Straussenburg, Baron Artur (June 16, 1857, Hermannstadt, modern Sibiu in Transylvania – July 1, 1935, Budapest), Austro-Hungarian army general and chief of the General Staff. A member of the Transylvanian Saxon ethnic community, Arz joined the 23rd Feldjäger (Rifle) Battalion in 1877 for one year of voluntary military service. After attending the Kriegsschule (General Staff College) from 1885 to 1887, he was assigned to the General Staff and advanced his career mainly by serving with field units. Within months of attaining th…

Battisti, Cesare (February 4, 1875, Trento – July 12, 1916, Trento), Italian politician and officer. The son of Italian-speaking parents, Battisti grew up in Trento, which belonged to Austria at the time. Between 1893 and 1897 Battisti studied in Graz, Florence, Turin, and Vienna. He became a supporter of irredentism, a movement calling for the separation of all Italian-speaking territories from the Habsburg Empire and their annexation by Italy. Upon earning his degree in geography Battisti began …

Meuse-Argonne Offensive As part of the final Allied offensive on the Western Front the American Expeditionary Force (AEF) had been charged in September of 1918 with launching an assault against the sector of the front held by the German Fifth Army (Georg von der Marwitz) between the Argonne Forest and the River Meuse, and to advance in the general direction of Mézières. Heading the AEF was General John Pershing, who also took command of the newly formed United States First Army. After completing t…

Declarations of War 1914 July 28 Austria-Hungary on Serbia August 1 Germany on Russia August 2 German invasion of Luxembourg1 August 3 Germany on France August 4 German invasion of Belgium* August 4 Great Britain enters the war* August 6 Serbia on Germany August 6 Austria-Hungary on Russia August 7 Montenegro on Austria-Hungary August 11 France on Austria-Hungary August 12 Great Britain on Austria-Hungary August 12 Montenegro on Germany August 23 Japan on Germany August 23 Austria-Hungary on Japan August 28 Austria-Hungary on Belgium October 15 Montenegro on Bulgaria October 29 the …

Michaelis, Georg (September 8, 1857, Haynau [Silesia] – July 24, 1936, Bad Saarow [district Fürstenwalde]), German politician (chancellor of the Reich and Prussian prime minister). As a doctor of law, the young Michaelis rapidly ascended the steps of the Prussian administrative bureaucracy. Having officiated as deputy district administrator in the Lower Silesian city of Liegnitz (current Legnica) from 1902 to 1909, he was then appointed undersecretary of state in the Prussian Treasury Department. Following the outbreak of the war, he became chairman of the board of d…

Switzerland Switzerland experienced the First World War as a small state in an exposed, central geographical position. The Swiss government responded to the tense European situation by proclaiming general mobilization on August 1, 1914, and three days later the neutrality of the Swiss Confederation. The traditional pillars of the state’s self-conception and territorial defenses alike were perpetual neutrality and the readiness to defend that neutrality militarily by means of a militia army. Corps…

Instruction in Patriotic Values (German) The need for a methodical, propagandistic strengthening of the army’s and population’s will to hold out had thrust itself upon the German government since the aggravation of the military and economic situation in the year 1916. Under the impression of the Reichstag’s Peace Resolution, the military leadership decided to take the initiative. On July 29, 1917, the chief of the General Staff issued the Leitsätze für die Aufklärungsarbeit unter den Truppen ( Guidelines for dispensing instruction among the troops), which henceforth regulated …

Rupprecht, Crown Prince of Bavaria (March 18, 1869, Munich – August 2, 1955, Schloss Leutstetten, Bavaria), Crown Prince of Bavaria, German Field Marshal. In 1886 he entered the Bavarian infantry regiment as a lieutenant. He then studied in Munich and Berlin, under Count Hertling and Hans Delbrück among others. His further military training took place according to the aristocratic norms. In 1899 he was made colonel and in 1906, general of infantry and commander of the Ist Bavarian Army Corps. In 1913…