Trench Warfare

Early Trench Warfare

A trench system may begin simply as a collection of foxholes hastily dug by troops using their entrenching tools. These holes may subsequently be deepened so that a soldier can safely stand up in one of them, and the individual foxholes may be connected by shallow crawl trenches. From this beginning a system of more permanent trenches may be constructed. In making a trench, soil from the excavation is used to create raised parapets running both in front of and behind the trench. Within the trench are firing positions along a raised forward step called a fire step, and duckboards are placed on the often muddy bottom of the trench to provide secure footing.

The tactical ancestor of modern trench warfare was the system of progressively extended trenches developed by the French military engineer Sébastien Le Prestre de Vauban for the attack of fortresses in the 17th century. Trenches remained merely a part of siegecraft until the increasing firepower of small arms and cannon compelled both sides to make use of trenches in the American Civil War (1861–65). The trench lines of the Petersburg–Richmond theatre of operations in the final months of that war were the foremost example of trench warfare in the 19th century.

World War I

The typical trench system in World War I consisted of a series of two, three, four, or more trench lines running parallel to each other and being at least 1 mile (1.6 km) in depth. Each trench was dug in a type of zigzag so that no enemy, standing at one end, could fire for more than a few yards down its length. Each of the main lines of trenches was connected to each other and to the rear by a series of communications trenches that were dug roughly perpendicular to them. Food, ammunition, fresh troops, mail, and orders were delivered through these trenches. The intricate network of trenches contained command posts, forward supply dumps, first-aid stations, kitchens, and latrines. Most importantly, it had machine-gun emplacements to defend against an assault, and it had dugouts deep enough to shelter large numbers of defending troops during an enemy bombardment.

The first, or front, line of trenches was known as the outpost line and was thinly held by scattered machine gunners distributed behind dense entanglements of barbed wire. The main line of resistance was a parallel series of two, three, or four lines of trenches containing the bulk of the defending troops. The defenders' artillery was posted to the rear of the main line of trenches. Each main line of trenches was fronted by fields of barbed wire intended to slow down and entangle attacking infantry. As World War I progressed, both sides, but particularly the Germans, developed trench systems of progressively greater depth and strength in order to ensure that the enemy could not achieve a breakthrough at any particular point. The Germans evolved an extremely elaborate defense system using pillboxes, i.e., concrete shelters for machine guns. Behind the pillboxes were more lines of barbed wire and more trenches and dugouts reinforced with concrete to withstand artillery bombardment. Behind these defenses were still more lines of trenches that were effectively out of range of the enemy's artillery fire. By 1918 the Germans had constructed some trench systems that had a depth of 14 miles (22 km).

Throughout most of World War I, the opposing armies on the Western Front tried to break through the enemy's trench system by mounting infantry assaults preceded by intense artillery bombardments of the defending trenches. These attacks usually failed, partly because the preliminary bombardment alerted the defenders to the imminence of an attack, thus allowing them time to bring up reserves for a counterattack, and because the bombardments themselves turned the “no-man's-land” between the opposing sides into rough, shell-pocked terrain that slowed down the attacking infantry. The crucial elements in attacking a trench system, surprise and overwhelming numbers of infantry, were thus almost impossible to attain. The Allies' increased use of the tank in 1918 marked the beginning of the end of trench warfare, however, since the tank was invulnerable to the machine gun and rifle fire that were the trenches' ultimate defense.

Later Uses of Trench Warfare

Relatively little use was made of trenches in the mobile warfare of World War II in Europe. By contrast, the Japanese in the Pacific theatre, faced with overwhelming American artillery and airpower, heavily fortified many of their islands with chains of deeply dug caves and bunkers. Similar tactics were used by the North Korean and Chinese forces in the Korean War when confronted with American airpower. In the Battle of Dien Bien Phu (March 13–May 8, 1954), which resulted in the French expulsion from Indochina, the communist-led Viet Minh used classic 18th-century siege methods and drove forward an elaborate system of trenches to negate the effects of French artillery and airpower, preparatory to the battle. Classic trench warfare reappeared in the Iran-Iraq War (1980–88), a basically static war in which such mobile weapons as tanks and aircraft were in short supply. In the subsequent Persian Gulf War (1990–91), Iraq built an elaborate system of defensive trenches, ditches, and berms, but it was overwhelmed by airpower, innovative tactics, and the demoralization of its frontline troops.

Copyright © 1994-2009 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. For more information visit Britannica.com.