Thursday, October 28, 2010
Technology
Did the Central Powers and the Allies really believe that the new technology would turn the tide of the battle? I mean in any case it more or less it prolonged the war much more further than it needed to be. The British only used poision gas to attack a German position and it came back to bite them really bad and the Germans used poision gas and flame throwers to try to take down the fortress and Verdun but that ended as another failure. So I wonder if the commanders put too much trust in the new technology, or if its just bad stratagey, or if the new technology wasn't ready to make a significant break through.
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I think the leaders were too reliant on the technology and didn't have any other plans. They had all these new ideas and technologies available and tey thought they could use them to make winning the war easier. I don't think they really thought it through or recognized the fact that the other side also had advanced technology.
ReplyDeleteIn my opinion, the technology was new so nobody really knew how to effectively implement it into strategy. It sure had it's advantages and technology was used in the war but I feel like it was all still being developed and may not have been practical yet.
ReplyDeleteAlex,
ReplyDeleteur a pretty cool kid. The major technological developments in WWI I think made everyone forget to develop new strategies. Each side thought that the new technology would give them an advantage, which is interesting considering all sides had basically the same weoponry. I think the commanders on each side really would have benefited from some RTS. Starcraft II anyone?
I wrote about this too, I think that leaders originally thought technology would bring the war to a quick end, but you're right- it back fired. There was more new technology at this time in history then there had ever been before and so I thinkthis didn't motivate people to develop even newer, more advanced ideas, resulting in a stalemate. although Countries learned from this experience during WWII as teh world began teh race to build nuclear weapons- resulting in yet another world-scale war. so in conclusion, while I believe people originally had good intentions in regard to technology, it ultimately ended in more destruction.
ReplyDeleteIn my opinion, I think that both sides created new technology. This was a negating factor as when one side got new poison gas, the other would soon have it too. Also I agree with the idea that leaders did not know how to use the technology effectively. Look at Hitler's use of tanks. It allowed him to dominate France and create a new style of war. The technology advanced but not the planners use of it.
ReplyDeleteI think technology was very exciting for war planners, but they didn't really have any real plans for how to use them... or maybe they just didn't know what would happen when they used it and it was a bit of a fun bloody suprise...
ReplyDeleteFrom what I see, using gases was more effective at driving ranks back from the trenches rather than killing soldiers. The book did say that it worked effectively sometimes, killing almost 5000 men in one day.
ReplyDelete