72-WW1-410 FRENCH INFANTRY 1915/18 OFFICERS

The French officer corps at the start of World War I was undoubtedly one of the most professional and best trained in Europe. At the beginning of the Great War, he implemented the doctrine of the so-called offensives at any cost (French offensive / attaque a outrance), i.e. a violent and decisive attack aimed at breaking the enemy's position, with infantry using little firearms, and supported by its own rapid-firing artillery (especially the famous 75 mm guns Mle1897). A strong supporter of such actions was the French chief of the general staff, General Joseph Joffre. However, these assumptions turned out to be completely wrong in 1914 and 1915, and they cost the lives of hundreds of thousands of French soldiers. The trench war revised these assumptions. The French officer corps had to largely change its views on infantry fighting tactics, which resulted in the notion that "artillery takes-infantry takes". At the end of the war, the French chief of the general staff - Marshal Ferdinand Foch, emphasized first of all on gaining an advantage in technical equipment (tanks and planes) over the German army, which he rightly saw as the key to victory in the war.