Why were Germany and her allies unsuccessful in WW1

WW1 is one of the most famous and deadliest wars in history. It was during this War where the main battles may have been fought in Europe but it is considered as a World War as the allies and the colonies of the European countries became involved and were fighting each other. At the time Germany was one of the strongest countries, if not the strongest. However, Germany and her allies were eventually unsuccessful in winning WW1 mainly because of the failure of the von Schlieffen plan and the lack of alternative strategies, the ineffectiveness of her Alliance System, the limitations of Germany’s economy, Germany’s geography and finally the entry of the USA in the War. These reasons will be analysed separately.

One of the key reasons that Germany and her Allies failed was the failure of the von Schlieffen plan and the lack of alternative strategies. Before the war even started Germany prepared the von Schlieffen plan which was that in-case of a European war against France and Russia they will first attack France through Belgium and try to destroy it as soon as possible before Russia could mobilize. This would have enabled Germany to focus on the Eastern Front (Russia). However, when the war started Germany tried to execute the plan but it failed as they underestimated the resistance at the Western Front. At the same time Russia had mobilized much faster than Germany expected. In addition the German attack on Belgium, which was a neutral country, made Great Britain join the war and this also created a bad image of Germany for attacking a neutral country. The Germans persisted in executing such a high risk attack (like the von Schlieffen plan) but when they failed to succeed they were left no other option (they lacked any alternative strategies). For example when the Plan failed, Germany was basically stuck fighting in the trenches and only engaging in small attacks or defending until an opportunity came. The lack of alternative strategies demonstrates that Germany underestimated their enemies and they were over-confident that they will win. This indicates that there was a lack of strong military leadership on the Germany side.

Furthermore, Germany’s Allied system was ineffective. Before the war Germany was allied with Austro-Hungary and Italy. As soon as the war began Italy left and became neutral to Germany’s disappointment. Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire joined Germany’s Alliance later but both were weak and not strong allies as compared to Entente Allies. On the other hand the Entente had a lot of allies and most of them were very strong. Therefore, Germany ended up having to give a lot more than they received from their allies. For example they had to provide money and soldiers. They also lacked communication with their allies. On the contrary, the Entente Allies were much organized militarily in the way that Britain and France had combined their troops in the war. For Germany and its allies every country ended up fighting on its own and uncoordinated.

In addition, although Germany was considered to be very strong, her economy and geography were limited. At the beginning of the war Germany had one of the best economies in the world, at the tie, but her economic resources were limited. A drawback for Germany was that its economy was because it was based on nationalism and it didn’t really have a formal tax system. Germany depended on the people donating money and goods to the government. Also since this was based on nationalism, it created a lot of problems later on when the war caused a lot of casualties and people started to became less nationalistic. Furthermore, their weapon manufacturing companies were privatized so the German government had to pay to get its weapons and ammunition. Although the German Empire was a fairly large empire, the problem was that it was in the middle of Europe and it had very little coastline that was suitable for big ports. When the war started Germany found itself completely surrounded and as a result they had to fight on a lot of fronts. For example they had to fight the Russians to the East, and the French and British to the West. Furthermore, the British fleet created a blockade on German ports which caused huge problems to Germany’s supply. Being totally surrounded and outnumbered, the more Germany waited the greater chance they had of loosing the war. The allies had arithmetically a greater number of people can could sustain the human loss whereas Germany couldn’t. Time was working against Germany…

Another important factor was the USA. Although the USA was not the strongest country at the time it was still considerable force. It had a lot of people, money and supplies whereas other countries like Germany were running out of these resources. Germany knew that if the USA decided to mobilize and started shipping troops to France then they will almost surely not win the war. Therefore knowing this fact, Germany launched a massive attack on France, tried to split the British and the French but this attempt was not successful. Germany could be blamed for causing the entry of the USA in the war as Germany’s U-boat campaign was sinking ships (including American ships) coming across the Atlantic. Germany also provoked the USA when rumors spread that Germany was planning an alliance with Mexico to enable them to taken back from the USA states like Texas and Arizona. The entry of the USA in the War greatly increased the morale of the Allied army as there were fresh soldiers fighting now and they were excited to join the fight. This increased the hopes and the spirit of all the other soldiers who were fighting at the front for so long. As soon as the Americans started bringing over troops to France they were shipping across some 20,000 troops per month which was a significant number. This was very important since a lot of the other courtiers were running out of trained troops and they resorted in putting young untrained people in the war.

Therefore, although Germany was very strong and powerful at the beginning of the war, she ended up paying for her mistakes and eventually lost the Great War. As we detailed above, Germany’s failure of the von Schlieffen plan and the lack of alternative strategies, as well as the ineffectiveness of her Alliance System, the limitations of Germany’s economy and geography and finally the entry of the USA all added up so that the War was lost. It is true however that during WW1 Germany fought really hard and persistent and it was amazing that they resisted defeat for so long given the combined strength of their opponents.