Find The Defeat Of Imperial Germany, 1917-1918 Presented By Rod Paschall Available As Publication

really liked this one, Focusing clearly on the last years of the war, the author outlined the key players and the campaigns that culminated in the allied victory.
The author discussed the air, naval, and land campaigns and the allied strategies and technologies that tipped the favor against the Central Powers.
I enjoyed the discussions concerning the infant American Army coming into its own compared to the veteran British and French armies.


Not a large amount of depth, but a good overall discussion across all fronts, The focus was on the Western Front land campaigns, What was discussed about the other fronts, was only so much to add to the focus to the Western Front.
Small performance to the political front is made to back up decisions on the front line commanders,

Overall, I rate this one as a four, Attrition . in the last two years of the Great War, this was the key word, Destroy enough weaponry and troops and the army with the last man standing wins, If you read the entire history of WWI, it appears that Germany could have easily won the war.
. their troops and leadership was superior to that of the Allies, The stark difference between the British and the Germans was that Britain, a democracy, had produced an extremely autocratic army while Germany, an autocracy, appeared to have fielded an army in which individual initiative and lowerlevel discretion were prized.


We get a quick peek at Captain Erwin Rommell leading the mountaineering Wurttemberg Battalion to victory as a precursor for WWII greatness and French General Petain being honored as a hero and who was prosecuted for treason in WWII.


The introduction of the American Army in the last year of

the war provided numbers, not skill or leadership.
The American troops were brave and ready to fight but poorly trained and lacking weapons, But the addition of a million more troops was more than Germany, whose allies were faltering and surrendering, could absorb and the war ended rather quickly.


The author writes in an unbiased manner which is always welcomed by the reader and gives credit or blame where it belongs.
Well written and quite readable, A good book for the WWI buff,

I found this volume a very good overview of the final two years of the Great War.
The author, a retired US Army Col, does an excellent job of laying out the problems confronting the various powers on the Western front.
In some ways he also debunks the current understanding of the state of generalship in the various armies facing each other in Flanders and France.


Col Paschall gives the reader a good high level understanding of the problems the commanders on both sides faced and the forces influencing some of the decisions the Army commanders made that the modern reader could see as incomprehensible someyrs later.
This is especially true of the English commander, Field Marshall Douglas Haig, and the various French commanders,

In discussing the various battles, the author looks at the evolving tactics used in the effort to restore mobility to the western front and break the stalemate.
By the time this book opens, everyone, but the Americans, have abandoned the lineup and step off into the machine guns type of infantry attacks so stereotypical of the accounts of World War I.
These advances included the changes in artillery prep of the battle field, the introduction of armor, the bite and hold infantry attacks by the British Army and the storm trooper tactics of the German Army.


The author also looks at how politics affected the war on the Western front, For example Lloyd George's, the English Prime Minister, efforts to starve the BEF of infantry replacements greatly affected FM Haigs options in his offensives inand.


In telling about the US involvement in the war, Col Pachall tells of the complete unpreparedness of the US Army for a modern war.
There is a shortage of EVERYTHING, When war is declared, the US had,modern rifles,modern artillery pieces andtanks, Along with that there was a severe lack of experienced leadership from the highest level all the way down to company commander and squad leaders.
In fact the author states the French and English were expecting professional soldiers when the firstUS divisions arrived in France.
In reality their ranks were largely filled with untrained draftees, The lack of training is one of the reasons it took so long to get the US units into the battle.
He also looks at the reasons for the large divisions the US fielded,men vs,in a typical Allied Division.
These include lack of experienced leadership and the idea that the US Division could be selfreinforcing in the attack.
He also faults US infantry tactics basically they were a return to those of, All that said, the author's discussion of the American war effort is reletively brief a little more than one chapter.


I found this a well written look at the final two years of World War I.
However, if the reader is looking for an indepth look at the western front and the problems and solutions to those problems, other volumes would be more appropriate.
Because of its length and on occasion reading a little text bookish, I give this,rounded up tofor good reads
Very informative and spellbinding read! A mustread for those learning about WWI! January.
On the Western Front the armies of Imperial Germany, Great Britain, and France were locked in grim stalemate.
Repeated attempts by both sides to achieve breakthrough in the face of machinegun fire, barbed wire, longrange artillery, and poison gas had brought only enormous casualties.
The Defeat of Imperial Germany focuses on the innovative plans created by generals on both sides in their struggles to dislodge the entrenched enemy and to restore maneuver and victory on the Western Front.
In a series of vivid analyses of successive offensives, Paschall examines the problems of command and what happened when the massed soldiery sought to carry out their orders.
These strategies and tactics developed by the military leadership in, though largely failing to shatter the deadlock, would prove successful when implemented twenty years later in World War II.
The first volume in the Major Battles and Campaigns series published under the general editorship of John S.
D. Eisenhower, The Defeat of Imperial Germany has been designed for the "armchair strategist, " Dozens of photographs, many never before published, as well as clearly drawn theater and battlefield maps help to make this book an outstanding, challenging, and original contribution to the history of the Great War.
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