One for ham

[Dennis Ruhl]

Off topic but ham enjoys a good "quirks of history" story.

Nathan M. Greenfield wrote a book called "Baptism of Fire" about Canadian participation at the Second Battle of Ypres in 1915. It recounts the story of how French troops broke under a German gas attack and the 1st Canadian Division plugged the gap and saved the free world. It is essentially the story from school history books that usually employs moral indignation against the Wicked Hun for using gas. Note that Greenfield is a historian, not a moralizer.

In an appendix Greenfield expounds on Canadian use of gas. While history books mention the lopsided victories of Canadian troops, they usually fail to mention that Canada was the biggest user of gas in WWI. In the "Hundred Days" that sealed the victory 4 Canadian divisions destroyed 47 German divisions and advanced 87 miles with use of massive amounts of gas. Holy crap.

The victory at Vimy Ridge was one that did not use gas, probably because we were fighting uphill and gas flows downhill and the extent of the planned advance was short ie. to the top of the hill.

[ham]

Paul Fussell in his famous book about WWI talks about 'high diction' and camouflage names...for example it was forbidden to explicitly mention the gas engine officially...the UK preferred names such as 'the engine'...

In the "Hundred Days" that sealed the victory 4 Canadian divisions destroyed 47 German divisions and advanced 87 miles with use of massive amounts of gas. Holy crap.

There is probably a typo in there.
47 divisions?
Impossible.
The Hindenburg myth about the 'back stabbing' essentially stemmed from the true fact that the German army was more or less intact...and the German soil still out of the enemy's reach...
No doubt gas was utilized profusely, but over time it tended to loose its edge...everybody was using it profusely, but none was winning...actually in 1918 Germany (according to some) was doing well enough thank to supplies coming from the territories Russia had officially surrendered after Brest-Litovsk...

[Dennis Ruhl]

47 divisions?
Impossible.
The Hindenburg myth about the 'back stabbing' essentially stemmed from the true fact that the German army was more or less intact...and the German soil still out of the enemy's reach...
No doubt gas was utilized profusely, but over time it tended to loose its edge...everybody was using it profusely, but none was winning...actually in 1918 Germany (according to some) was doing well enough thank to supplies coming from the territories Russia had officially surrendered after Brest-Litovsk...

47 divisions - accurate?? - not a typo as he compares it to a similar American effort with mega times the troops.

The Germans almost won in the spring of 1918 with the movement of troops from the eastern front.  Once the spring offensive failed, I suspect the German army knew defeat was inevitable and motivation to continue the war ended, at least among the troops.  Putting one's life on the line when defeat was only a matter of time would be demoralizing.  

Canada's 4 divisions were oversized with 12 infantry battalions plus a machine gun battalion plus essentially a mortar battalion instead of the normal 9 and were kept up to strength despite heavy casualties.  Motivation was always excellent.

Canadian generals were not employing tactics from Waterloo.  They actually planned battles and co-ordinated the different arms, especially artillery.  Currie, the top general, was a real estate agent from Victoria, not aristocracy and tried to minimize casualties.  At Vimy Ridge unbelieving Canadians saw attached British battalions dressing their troops (putting into ranks) under fire.

[ham]

47 divisions - accurate?? - not a typo as he compares it to a similar American effort with mega times the troops.

Sounds highly unbelievable, but I cannot comment further.

[Dennis Ruhl]

47 divisions - accurate?? - not a typo as he compares it to a similar American effort with mega times the troops.

Sounds highly unbelievable, but I cannot comment further.

The 4 divisions of the Canadian Corps had 100,000 troops which may have been equal to 10 full strength German divisions.

Note the following Wiki article which I did not write, although probably a Canadian did.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada's_Hundred_Days

My surprise is that the evil Hun was constantly chastised for gas but it was a common Canadian tool which isn't all that common knowledge.

[Albert Hidel]

The 4 divisions of the Canadian Corps had 100,000 troops which may have been equal to 10 full strength German divisions.

That's what I like about Canadians.  It's the multiplier effect in everything they do.  If one beer is good, two is better, so they have four, and a six pack to go.  God bless 'em!

[ham]

The 4 divisions of the Canadian Corps had 100,000 troops which may have been equal to 10 full strength German divisions.

Hey!
It sounds like Gollin or Bear describing their place in the DL history...