Germany's Mistakes in 1914

Germany would have done better for itself in August 1914 if it had stopped at its border when driving out the French offensive. Germany went to war for defensive reasons. That was the thinking of its ruler, Kaiser Wilhelm II, and the thinking of the German people. They supported the war believing that Germany was defending itself from Russian, French and, later, British aggression.

Germany went to war for defensive reasons. That was the thinking of its ruler, Kaiser Wilhelm II, and the thinking of the German people. They supported the war believing that Germany was defending itself from Russian, French and, later, British aggression.

The plan of Germany's General Staff -- the Schlieffen Plan -- was a mistake. It's purpose was to strike France through Belgium -- the shortest and quickest route to Paris. It was created in the belief that offensive warfare was superior to defensive warfare. Germany's chancellor excused the Schlieffen Plan with an absurdity: that Germany was "in a state of necessity, and necessity knows no law." Military action is politics in action and has a political end, and the plan was a failure politically. Marching through Belgium contributed to Britain entering the war, which would play a role in the U.S. entering the war and Germany's eventual military failure.

Before the first month of the war was over, Germany was successful in its defensive strategy against Russia, smashing the Russian offensive into Germany in late August at Tannenberg and the Masurian Lakes, just a few miles inside its border, securing its eastern border for the remainder of the war.

Unfortunately against France and Britain, the Germans had a passion for revenge and military victory. This prevented them from correcting their mistake as the superiority of defensive warfare left them in a stalemate in trenches on the Western Front. Their passions led them to reject what they called a "rotten peace" -- a compromise settlement. They wanted the 300,000 or so German military men already killed by November 1914 to account for something. That number increased to 1.7 million by the end of the war in 1918.