Attaque à outrance (french: Attack to excess) was the expression of a military philosophy common to many armies in the period before and during the earlier parts of

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

. This philosophy was a response to the increasing weight of defensive firepower that accrued to armies in the nineteenth century, as a result of several technological innovations, notably breech-loading rifled guns, machine guns, and light field artillery firing high-explosive shells. It held that the victor would be the side with the strongest will, courage, and dash/energy (élan), and that every attack must therefore be pushed to the limit.
The Philosophy of Trench Warfare on the Western Front in the Great War
'' – Payne, David, from westernfront.com, retrieved Monday 29 May 2006 The lethality of artillery, combined with the lack of mobility of infantry, as well as the subsequent development of

trench warfare Trench warfare is a type of land warfare using occupied lines largely comprising military trenches, in which troops are well-protected from the enemy's small arms fire and are substantially sheltered from artillery. Trench warfare became ar ...

, rendered this tactic extremely costly and usually ineffective. The philosophy is particularly associated with the French, due to its adoption by Noël de Castelnau in the First Battle of Champagne (1914), and by

Robert Nivelle Robert Georges Nivelle (15 October 1856 – 22 March 1924) was a French artillery general officer who served in the Boxer Rebellion and the First World War. In May 1916, he succeeded Philippe Pétain as commander of the French Second Army in th ...

in the

Nivelle offensive The Nivelle offensive (16 April – 9 May 1917) was a Franco-British operation on the Western Front in the First World War which was named after General Robert Nivelle, the commander-in-chief of the French metropolitan armies, who led the offensi ...

(1917).

Joseph Joffre Joseph Jacques Césaire Joffre (12 January 1852 – 3 January 1931) was a French general who served as Commander-in-Chief of French forces on the Western Front from the start of World War I until the end of 1916. He is best known for regroupi ...

, French chief of general staff from 1911 on, had originally adopted the doctrine for the French military and purged the army of 'defensively-minded' commanders.''First World War'' – Willmott, H.P., Dorling Kindersley, 2003, Page 52 However, all sides launched large, costly and futile frontal offensives in this style: the British at the Battle of the Somme (1916), the Germans in the

First Battle of Ypres The First Battle of Ypres (french: Première Bataille des Flandres; german: Erste Flandernschlacht – was a battle of the First World War, fought on the Western Front around Ypres, in West Flanders, Belgium. The battle was part of the Firs ...

(1914), the Russians in the Brusilov offensive (1916), and so on. The origins of this doctrine are traced back to the increasingly militarized 'Warrior Culture' that most European nations developed during the 19th century, where the ideal citizen was the soldier employed by his homeland. This predisposed officers and soldiers towards narrow ideals focusing on blind courage in the face of war's adversity.''

A History of Warfare ''A History of Warfare'' is a book by military historian John Keegan, which was published in 1993 by Random House. Summary Keegan discusses early warfare, the proliferation of Bronze Age warfare and then Iron Age warfare (Greek hoplites and pha ...

'' – Keegan, John, Vintage, Thursday 1 November 1994

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Attaque a outrance Military doctrines World War I

See also

Further reading

English

French

References