THE NATURE OF WORLD WAR 1
'The military mind always imagines that the next war will be on the same lines as the last. That has never been the case and never will be.' (Foch, 1926)
No one had expected the First World War to become the "War to end all wars" as it was hailed at its conclusion. The general consensus in early 1914 was that it would all be over by Christmas of that year. This prediction, however, could not have been more flawed. The introduction of modernised battle techniques and strategies such as trench warfare, the use of poison gas, and machine guns meant that the ideologies, concepts and tactical approaches to war had been radically altered from warfare in the past. Consequently, these technological advances had brought more bloodshed, destruction and immense human cost than any event in the history of mankind. …
