World War One and Modern Warfare.

Table of Contents

The way people fought in battles from the beginning of time to now has changed in a lot of ways by the weapons, techniques, and transportations. Before World War One happened, the people in battles or wars first fought with sticks and stones. Then the people developed bows, arrows, and spears. Which allowed them to fight from longer ranges and made it easier to fight and win the battles. The technique that they used to fight was for them to get into a big group and fire their bow and arrows at their enemies. Then they would get on their horses which were their only way of transportation other than walking and take their spears and charge at the other enemies that were left. The men that used the bows, arrows, and spears for a really long period of time before they made any new weapons.Then after many years of fighting with weapons that took a lot of work the invention of black powder weapons came about.

The black powder weapons allowed people fighting not only to allow them to fight from further range but, allowed them to not waste as much as energy as spears and bows. Also, the new weapons allowed them to kill their enemies faster by just cocking the gun back and pulling the trigger, but then they had to reload which took them a little while. This invention of the gunpowder weapons changed the way we fight in a lot of ways. The gunpowder weapons helped both sides of the war, by being able to move faster and shoot faster. These weapons were used for many hundreds of years but it got a lot of changes and modifications to the weapon itself. Then once the World War One started it changed the way people fought in wars and in battles. In many wars before World War One such as the Napoleonic war in 1803 and the Crimean war in 1853, they fought with better weapons other than just pistols and knives.

In the Crimean war, they fought with muskets that had bayonets on the rifle which were just long blades on the end of the rifle. This allowed them to shoot from even further away. They still used almost the same technique, which was to go in one group then line up and fire their rifles. Also, the men would go down each line and fire then they would charge at their enemies and shoot them, then stab them with their bayonets on the end of their rifles. Then they used trench warfare, which was to go in trenches and fire their weapons. The military also used many artillery, which was cannonballs that left the enemies devastated, and really set the enemies back. They used these weapons for many years leading up to World War On and used some of the same techniques.

Then they used some artillery that was a little advanced but not advanced as many years later like the weapons and technology that they used in World War One. During World War One they used muskets and also used the technique of trench warfare. Also during the war, they developed tanks, machine guns, and many other things that helped them through out the war. Then the military was more creative with the way they think and developed gases which killed many people, tanks, airships, and boats all used in World War One. They spent most of their time in the trenches, making the trenches, and fighting their enemies by using heavy artillery, cannons, and high ranged rifles.Before World War One happened there weren’t as many weapons that people could use in battles and didn’t have the same techniques of this war. Also as this war started they were constantly developed new, and improved weapons and the way that they had to fight. Also, they didn’t have that good quality of uniforms, helmets, or armor that they had before the war. During the war, the nurses were more qualified and knew a little bit more about what they were doing but the sanitation wasn’t the greatest thing either. During the war, they also had many new things such as cartridge belts, barbed wire, rifle grenades, mustard gases, and atomic bombs.

World War One changed modern warfare.During World War One there were many advancements in their weapons that they used. The rifle was equipped by most of the soldiers due to it being a bolt-action rapid-fire rifle. Also, these rifles were very reliable and the armies saw a need for these weapons. The rifles could be shot fifteen times in a minute and it could kill an enemy from over a thousand meters. Some of the rifles were equipped with scopes such as the Mauser Gewerhr 98 and some rifle were like the M91 Moschetto De Cavalleria which had a bayonet attached to the end of the rifle. The troops using these types of rifles have a Cartledge belt that they are wearing for more ammo. There were many different kinds of riles that were used in World War One. The first part of the war the rifle was the main source of firepower of the troops. Also the main weapon for the combat troops were rifles. Many troops used the rifle because it was portable, able to use by one person. The rifle was also used in trench warfare because it allowed the troops to stay hidden and still create danger for their enemies. They were also used to hold or keep their position while their enemies were shooting at them. Then they were able to shoot their enemies from over a thousand meters away. Also, no battle couldn’t have been fought without the riflemen because it provided a great range for them.During the first couple of years, there was a mass production of rifles. In 1915 there was one eight millimeter rifle for 6.8 soldiers. As a couple years past every soldier had a new rifle which was a 2.2 rifle.

There was always a great supply of these rifles because every time one of the troops would die they would be collected, repaired and new troops would use them again. At the beginning of the war, the United States only had 760,000 rifles but at the end of the war they had 2,500,000 rifles. As the war went on they created more weapons so not as many troops used the rifle but, some of the other troops used artillery in the war.During the beginning of the war, they didn’t just use rifles, knives, or pistols they used artillery too. The troops used light artillery which was called “Feild artillery” and it was intended for mobile warfare. They had a problem with the artillery it needed to be transportable for when they march and so it could deal with the terrain. There had to be weight limits so that the horses could carry them so they made the artillery lighter. By the manufacturers of reducing the weight of the weapons, it also reduced the caliber and the range of the artillery. The artillery in 1914 was mostly cannons and trajectories that were 7.5 and 8.4-centimeter caliber.In 1914 mobile warfare wasn’t needed that much so they troops transformed it into trench warfare. Then they started to use the old heavy guns that couldn’t be moved easily because the caliber was much higher and could be shot from a further range.

They just didn’t throw out the light artillery it was still used for trench warfare to fire a great number of shells at a fast speed. In the war the German field artillery fire 222 million rounds. The Germans also used many shells such as the gas shell and the 77MM shrapnel shell, and the French also used many 75mm shells.As the war went on the manufacturers making the artillery kept on making it better by putting rifled barrels on the end of the weapons. Also, they increase the range of the artilleries greatly and the troops would practice shooting their enemies from out of their range of sight. Also, they used a hydraulic mechanism that returned the gun to its original position of the artillery was shot. New shells were designed that was packed with nitrate-based high explosive. The shells were designed like this so they were way more explosive and destroy more of the enemies base. All of these inventions really changed the way the artillery was effective.The machine guns were also a very popular weapon in World War One.

At the beginning of the war, machine guns were limited in the number that was produced and they were heavy to carry around while the troops were marching. Towards the middle of the war, the machine gun was getting better by it being a lighter weight and more machine guns were produced. These guns were very effective on defending their base, trenches, and the troops. Also, the machine gun is the most common in World War One but, the artillery was the weapon that was responsible for the most amount of deaths. The machine gun was invented by an American born guy named Hiram Maxim’s which was invented in 1833. By the time 1914 rolled around, most of the armies had machine guns that could fire multiple rounds in a fast amount of time, but some armies had different types of machine guns.The machine gun could fire over 500 rounds per minute but in combat rapid fire was around 250 rounds per minute. Also, it was a great amount of portable firepower that almost every army had. Some of the machine guns were big and had to be on carts with wheels on it and other machine guns were lighter and could be carried by one of the troops. The machine gun also had legs on the end of it so the troops could lay in the trenches and protect their army.

The gun could be carried into the battlefield to lessen the enemies firing at them. The machine gun caused many casualties during World War One whcih was a lot more than the rifle casualties. The development of this weapon left a huge impact on many wars ahead of World War One.Trench warfare was one of the main techniques that the troops fighting in world war one used. The trenches that the troops used were very complex and almost every one of their trenches was connected together. Many of the troops carried many supplies with them including one type of firearm, a knife, clubs, a shovel, wirecutters fr barb wire, and some grenades. The trenches were made up of many parts such as the artillery line, support trench, bunker, front-line trench, and the machine gun nest. Then there was no man’s land which was where nobody goes because it is between the two opposing trenches where the troops are firing a lot of rounds. To help cross no man’s land they developed the Mark V tank that would go right over the trenches and it was faster than walking. The troops customized the trenches by adding barbed wire in them so their enemies couldn’t get in the trenches.

Also, they had machine gun posts scattered around the trenches for defense and to help kill the enemies. The most used trench system was to have four trenches running parallel to each other for about a mile long. The troops also had many diseases caused by the trenches such as trench foot which would just cause your foot to rot away due to the trenches being waterlogged.The machine gun, rifles, and artillery was the main thing that helped trench warfare. The rifles were used to shoot enemies from a very long range over a thousand yards. The rifle also helped the troops to help kill the enemy sniper. The artillery was used for almost the same reason but to destroy their enemy trench and to kill the enemies. Then it would help them to stop large waves of enemies coming at them. But the machine gun was used to shoot at the enemies at a fast rate and a long range. The trench troops equipment would also have many clubs such as the wooden club, a nail club, and a spiked club to protect them if enemies cam in their trenches.

World war One was the first war that they used aircraft on a large scale. The plane was invented by the Wright Brothers in 1903 about 10 years before World War One. At the beginning of the war, the aircrafts played a small role in the war. At first, the planes were used just for observation but as the war went on the planes were modified a lot of time. Such as the mechanic who worked on the planes added machine guns to them so the pilots could fire at the enemies from above. Then the mechanics added bombs so that the pilots could drop bombs on enemy territories and destroy their trenches.At the beginning of the war, the planes could only carry little bombs but as the war went on they could carry bigger and bigger bombs. While more and more planes went into the skies the pilots did dogfights and tried shooting each other’s plane down with grenades and rifles. Then after a couple of months went on they added machine guns and bombs so in the sky they could shoot their enemies down a lot easier. So each of the different countries they had marking on the planes so that the pilots could tell which pilot is an enemy or an ally. The pilot also had many problems while he was in the planes. The pilot would have to wear a scarf to prevent their neck from chaffing. Also, they had no parachutes so if their planes caught on fire they would carry a pistol and they would shoot themselves if it would have happened to them.

Communication between each of the planes wasn’t that good because they didn’t have that goof of technology. The pilots could only communicate by morris code and fly banners at the end of their planes to communicate. The only gauges the pilot had in his pane was the airspeed indicator, fuel gauge, oil gauge, and altimeter to tell if there was something wrong with their planes. Some of the pilots equipped their planes with mustard gasses that were used to drop on their enemies. The gas was so strong they had to wear gas masks just to go anywhere around it. Without these planes, the troops wouldn’t have ever been able to drop bombs on their enemies and destroy their base.