Was There a Real Schlieffen Plan.... New Debate

[oldpop2000]

For the last one hundred and seven years, it has always been assumed that there was a Schlieffen Plan for the German Offensive in the West in 1914.  Now a new debate, started by Terence Zuber in articles and books, is that there never was a Schlieffen Plan. It's a heated debate  and I don't have the answer but I am continuing to investigate and read more. What I do know is that the original plan, if it existed was based on a one front war, not a two front war. This changed the whole paradigm for any plan for the war that the German's knew was coming.  Anyway here is a link to get the debate, if there is one here, started.

terencezuber.com/schlieffen200.php

One of the well known problems for the German Army in this time period was a Socialist Party that was against more divisions and the construction for the High Seas Fleet. When we play RTW2, we actually run into the same issue but in reverse.

[dohboy]

There were lots of Shlieffen Plans. Some for one front wars against France or Russia individually, some for a two front war. The idea of taking France out quickly by flanking their lines to the north, knocking them out of the war before Russia could fully mobilize, was definitely a part of some of his plans. The idea that he had only one plan is the myth.

[oldpop2000]

Aug 7, 2021 12:48:44 GMT -6 dohboy said:

There were lots of Shlieffen Plans. Some for one front wars against France or Russia individually, some for a two front war. The idea of taking France out quickly by flanking their lines to the north, knocking them out of the war before Russia could fully mobilize, was definitely a part of some of his plans. The idea that he had only one plan is the myth.

The original war plans of Schlieffen and Moltke were kept in the Reichsarchive in Potsdam and were secret documents. That archive was destroyed by British bombers on a night raid on 14 April 1945. However, the original text of the plan Denkschrift survived because it had been transferred out of Potsdam and was seized by the US Army and in the 1950's stored in the American National Archives where it was found by Gerhard Ritter. He published the plan in 1958 in english. 

Ritter learned that the Denkschrift had actually been written in January and February 1906 AFTER Schlieffen retired and was backdated to show that he had written it while Chief of the General Staff. Now nothing changed in our historical perceptions until the fall of the Berlin Wall when new documents were found in Russian archives in East Germany. These are and have begun to shed new light on exactly what the plan or plans were. More later.

[dohboy]

Decent summary of the shifting views on the subject,

www.google.com/url?q=http://www.eiu.edu/historia/Kleen.pdf&sa=U&ved=2ahUKEwiokrXo_p_yAhUMpZ4KHacYCjoQFnoECAkQAQ&usg=AOvVaw176c9tpvax7CsDm-QBEYiX

[oldpop2000]

Aug 7, 2021 16:47:49 GMT -6 dohboy said:

Decent summary of the shifting views on the subject,

www.google.com/url?q=http://www.eiu.edu/historia/Kleen.pdf&sa=U&ved=2ahUKEwiokrXo_p_yAhUMpZ4KHacYCjoQFnoECAkQAQ&usg=AOvVaw176c9tpvax7CsDm-QBEYiX

Thanks, I have that but I haven't had a chance to get through it. I am currently reading two other books about the subject. Let's keep this going.

Update: I am reading it, it does a good job so far presenting the different views. Thanks. 

[oldpop2000]

Here is a link to the Ike Skelton Combined Arms Library for the book "The Testament of Count Schlieffen" by General Groener. This is one of the items in the article you provided and in the books that I have. You can download all five PDF's.

cgsc.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/p4013coll7/id/208

[dohboy]

You gave me the Great War bug again. Relistening to Blueprint for Armageddon (Dan Carlin's Hardcore History) at work. No longer free, but well worth $15 in my opinion.

[oldpop2000]

Aug 9, 2021 9:02:33 GMT -6 dohboy said:

You gave me the Great War bug again. Relistening to Blueprint for Armageddon (Dan Carlin's Hardcore History) at work. No longer free, but well worth $15 in my opinion.

Sorry about that, I have it on my server but when I downloaded it years ago, it was free. It is an important document.,

[oldpop2000]

In my research, which is on going, once the German Army was moved into position essentially deployment, it's forces including artillery, supplies and men, moved at about 2 to 3 miles per hour. This should give us an ability examine maps of various deployments and measure how long it would take to move from initial deployments to near Paris. If you have any better information please let me know.

[oldpop2000]

One of the difficulties that I have observed in trying to assess the Schlieffen Plans... notice I said "plans", is that these plans were not operational plans but deployment plans. The idea was to move the forces to the West and East, into position as dictated by the deployment plan or plans, and ready the forces for movement when the political situation had deteriorated. Now, in most definitions, Schlieffen's plans were operational plans but I don't agree. They were deployment plans and they included initial movement. Now after that then the armies would be guided by the enemy force deployments and movements, and geography which would includes weather and topology.

I am reminded of two quotations: A: The enemy has a say in your plans B: No plan survives contact with the enemy. If you examine many maps of the Schlieffen Plan or plans, they resemble nice curved lines. Now, if you examine a map or maps of the actual movement of both forces- the French and German"- they don't resemble those nice neat curves. In fact, the French stopped the German's at the Marne just 35 miles from Paris, because the German's had simply run out of steam including supplies. They did not have the rail way lines that they had in Germany, so everything had to move by roads and I have already show that that movement was at least 2 to 3 miles per hour.

So, do all those nice theoretical maps really define the Schlieffen Plan? My opinion is that they don't. In fact, there is new evidence that Schlieffen did not believe the plan or plans would succeed because of those very reasons.... logistics.

This was not 1870, these were different armies with new weapons which used more ammunition and the armies were much much bigger. Schlieffen, developed successive plans and ran war games using them for testing, but I believe that he did not completely believe in them.

Just some of my thoughts which probably might change as I read more and different authors.

Update: Link to the West Point Atlas showing the Schlieffen Plan. Nice curved lines.

www.westpoint.edu/sites/default/files/inline-images/academics/academic_departments/history/WWI/WWOne03.pdf

And here is what actually happened- WWOne06Combined.pdf (913.65 KB)

[dohboy]

The quote I find most relevant is "Plans are nothing, but planning is everything". The planning of Schlieffen clearly had a major influence on German strategy in the early stages of the war.

[oldpop2000]

Your interesting and accurate quote leads me to something I was going to bring up. We know that every European nation would re-assess the political situation around them every year and this would affect strategic planning. This is a given. It is also true, that each nation would assess the deployment changes of their neighbors each year. The French would monitor German railway and bridge construction which would give them a heads up on any deployment changes.

Each nation would assess the changes in force structure and technology that might change their plans. For the German's, they had to concern themselves with not only the French, whose two-year law of conscription in 1909 changed the game, the British who might land a force in Antwerp or Calais to protect the Belgians but the Russian deployments which did improve by 1914. They also had to concern themselves with the A-H army who was responsible for protecting the southern flank of East Prussia.

For the A-H's, they had to be concerned about the Serbians especially after the annexation of Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1908. They also had the problem of internal politics which was affecting the army and would have an affect when the war started with Serbia.

The Serbian's had to focus on the Ah-H' s but also the Ottoman Turks but did have the support of the Russians so they would have to keep focused on the Russian deployments.

The Ottoman Turks had their own problems and were leaning to wars the German's because they presented not threat to them.

The Italians were moving away from the Alliance and more towards neutrality to keep friends with the British who were strong in the Mediterranean Sea.

As you can see, with the small amount of information I have provided, that the 1905 Schlieffen Plan which was based on a one front war did not last long. Almost immediately, the two-front war became a reality and now planning along with war games had to deal with these changes. After Schlieffen left in 1906, the political environment in Europe became far more volcanic, if you if don't mind the analogy. I believe that Schlieffen did understand that the one-front war was dead but I believe he hoped that the slow Russian mobilization would provide the German's time to attack France, knock them out and then move armies to East Prussia to deal with the Russians. They were also counting on the A-H's. We know that after 1909, this help from the A-H's was not a reality.

All these factors would have forced Von Moltke and the German General Staff to change their planning and deployments.

I have many books on the German General Staff and their history, strategic planning etc. But it will take me some time to build up my case that the 1914 German plan was not really a Schlieffen Plan any longer. The whole political situation especially in Eastern Europe had changed.

I would appreciate your thoughts and ideas. They are important to me.

[dohboy]

I got to be a fly on the stump one time when I was 13 or so to a conversation that opened my eyes to the inside baseball of military planning. It was after Desert Storm when an uncle came out on vacation. He was an Air Force logistics guy that was in for 30+ years. Him and my dad spent hours talking around the campfire about the lead up. He had been involved in joint war games shortly before. He described in detail how they gamed out several scenarios (including a scenario almost identical to Desert Storm) and several responses to each, several chess moves deep. They identified targets, the proper munitions to destroy them, and the right platforms to deliver them. Down to where the bullets, bombs, and bacon they would need were located and how to get them where they would be needed. What training would be necessary. They went as far as generating movement orders and material requisitions. Then they filed it all, made recommendations about possible preparation (training, prepositioning, etc) and moved on.

When Iraq invaded Kuwait and they opened up the filing cabinet there were a few things they just had to put a current date on and send, but they were the exception and that wasn't the point of the exercise. The new plan was unique, but influenced by their previous planning at every step.

I would love to see in detail what the German war games were like in the years leading up to 1914. That would be more telling than anything else in my opinion, it would tell us what assumptions they were operating under. It would also be a puzzle of epic proportions considering the scale. Probably best for my sanity that most of the documents didn't survive.

[oldpop2000]

Aug 10, 2021 13:05:53 GMT -6 dohboy said:

I got to be a fly on the stump one time when I was 13 or so to a conversation that opened my eyes to the inside baseball of military planning. It was after Desert Storm when an uncle came out on vacation. He was an Air Force logistics guy that was in for 30+ years. Him and my dad spent hours talking around the campfire about the lead up. He had been involved in joint war games shortly before. He described in detail how they gamed out several scenarios (including a scenario almost identical to Desert Storm) and several responses to each, several chess moves deep. They identified targets, the proper munitions to destroy them, and the right platforms to deliver them. Down to where the bullets, bombs, and bacon they would need were located and how to get them where they would be needed. What training would be necessary. They went as far as generating movement orders and material requisitions. Then they filed it all, made recommendations about possible preparation (training, prepositioning, etc) and moved on.

When Iraq invaded Kuwait and they opened up the filing cabinet there were a few things they just had to put a current date on and send, but they were the exception and that wasn't the point of the exercise. The new plan was unique, but influenced by their previous planning at every step.

I would love to see in detail what the German war games were like in the years leading up to 1914. That would be more telling than anything else in my opinion, it would tell us what assumptions they were operating under. It would also be a puzzle of epic proportions considering the scale. Probably best for my sanity that most of the documents didn't survive.

I love that story, logistics is very vital in today's military. My job was at the Naval Air Depot at North Island. We had to keep the Navy and Marine aircraft upgraded and in flyable condition. Each plane would reach a point in its flight hours where it would be sent to the depot for field stripping, upgrading and major fuselage repairs. The Desert Storm operation did not last long enough for us to get a lot of aircraft out to the fleet. Most of what we sent were spare parts. My buddies and I repaired the avionics gear and it was sent to them to keep their planes flying. However, when the operation ended, then the fun started. Combat flying tends to put a lot more hours on aircraft so they end up at the depot much faster. That's when our numbers of aircraft and avionics really jumped.

I will research the German war games, titled Kriegspiel. Here is a good article on German War Gaming by Milan Vego. German War Gaming.pdf (739.13 KB)
Here is another-0968344519855104.pdf (506.75 KB)
Enjoy

[oldpop2000]

One of the of the foremost military historians was Trevor N. Dupuy. You should read his books. He wrote a book entitled "A Genius for War: The German Army and General Staff, 1807-1945". He has a chapter in this book, ten, about the Schlieffen Plan. Here is some of his information.

Schlieffen was convinced, early, that as opposed to Von Moltke the Elder, that Germany's only hope for victory against the Franco-Russian rapport, as he calls it, was a more effective mobilization system and superior plans but he also believed it's success was based on superior combat effectiveness of the Army. He paid much attention to training, military education and the adaptation of technology for military purposes.

When Von Moltke the Elder retired, his replacement concurred with his defense in the West, but offense in the East. Schlieffen did not agree with this because he reasoned that a small force in the East could stall the Russians at Prussia and Silesia. He believed that he could throw the German Army at the French, defeat them, and then turn on the Russians.

So, where does the encirclement plan originate? In 1894, Schlieffen developed a new plan to drive through Eastern Lorraine. But after that new plan, he studied the 1870 Battle of Sedan which Von Moltke had used the envelopment strategy. He also studied and wrote a treatise on Cannae, the Hannibal battle over the Romans which again used a double envelopment. By 1897, Schlieffen had changed the 1894 plan to a massive version of Von Moltke's strategic envelopment at Sedan. The overall plan was to go around the French armies in Alsace and Lorraine and sweep them back against the Vosges mountains and the Swiss Frontier. So, there was born the Schlieffen plan that we know of and historians have been writing about for over 100 years.

Update: Internet Archive has Cannae by Alfred Von Schlieffen. Just search for Cannae Schlieffen. It comes from DTIC but it is the complete document.