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BRITISH and FRENCH OFFENSIVES, 1915-16

Like the Germans, the British believed that the war should be fought to total victory, and like the Germans, they wanted the deaths of their young men in combat to account for something. On the Western Front in 1915 defensive warfare continued to demonstrate its superiority over offensive warfare. That year the British suffered about a million casualties, the French about 1.9 million.

For 1916 it was more of the same. To mid-November the British lost over 400,000 men and the French 200,000.

The alternative was patience, strengthening their defenses, building offensive weapons like the tank and aircraft in order to change the nature of the war and trying to negotiate with Germany for its withdrawal from French territory.