Listen free for 30 days

Listen with offer

Preview
  • The Second Battle of the Marne

  • The History and Legacy of the Last German Offensive on the Western Front During World War I
  • By: Charles River Editors
  • Narrated by: Jim Johnston
  • Length: 1 hr and 38 mins

£0.00 for first 30 days

Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

The Second Battle of the Marne

By: Charles River Editors
Narrated by: Jim Johnston
Try for £0.00

£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Buy Now for £6.99

Buy Now for £6.99

Pay using card ending in
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.

Summary

World War I, also known in its time as the “Great War” or the “War to End all Wars”, was an unprecedented holocaust in terms of its sheer scale. Fought by men who hailed from all corners of the globe, it saw millions of soldiers do battle in brutal assaults of attrition which dragged on for months with little to no respite. Tens of millions of artillery shells and untold hundreds of millions of rifle and machine-gun bullets were fired in a conflict that demonstrated man’s capacity to kill each other on a heretofore unprecedented scale, and as always, such a war brought about technological innovation at a rate that made the boom of the Industrial Revolution seem stagnant.

The enduring image of World War I is of men stuck in muddy trenches and of vast armies deadlocked in a fight neither could win. It was a war of barbed wire, poison gas, and horrific losses as officers led their troops on mass charges across no-man’s-land and into a hail of bullets. While these impressions are all too true, they hide the fact that trench warfare was dynamic and constantly evolving throughout the war as all armies struggled to find a way to break through the opposing lines.

For much of 1917, things went the Germans’ way. With the Bolshevik Revolution underway, the Germans were able to move soldiers to the Western front as the Russians quit the war. Moreover, the Allied powers had failed badly in its Nivelle Offensive in May 1917 and suffered a defeat in November against at the Battle of Caporetto in Slovenia. Unbelievably, the French and British had not bothered to coordinate their commands until after those defeats, but they finally formed a Supreme War Council to coordinate their armies’ movements and strategies.

Despite those successes, when the United States joined the war in April 1917, it began mobilizing four million soldiers to join the war. The central powers knew that it would take months before the United States could land a substantial number of troops in Europe to join the fighting, and the Germans hoped to force the Allied powers to quit before the United States could make a difference.

Thus, the Germans’ spring offensive began in March 1918, using new infantry tactics to move on the most lightly defended points of the Allied trenches. The Germans quickly obtained a breakthrough and broke the Allied lines, pushing the Allied forces back nearly 40 miles, and the Germans were once again within less than 100 miles of Paris. Once again, however, the Allied powers halted the Germans’ drive, with the help of reinforcing American and Australian troops. The Germans were right back where they started by July 1918, at which time about 10,000 Americans were arriving in France each day.

Nestled between green forests and flowing rivers, the country around the French city of Soissons was an idyllic scene of small villages, golden wheat fields, cow pastures, and sloping ravines. It was, and still is, also the site of a convergence of the French railroad and highway system, making it a fiercely coveted area by both sides during World War I. In July 1918, its bucolic milieu stood interrupted here and there by the appearance of blackened ruins of tanks and burned out farm buildings. After five weeks of German possession, Allied commanders decided it was time to take this strategic area back.

After four years of brutal, savage, and devastating fighting, the battle fought there in July 1918 marked the beginning of the end of the war as the Allied forces begin to put the German invaders on the run.

©2020 Charles River Editors (P)2020 Charles River Editors
  • Unabridged Audiobook
  • Categories: History
activate_Holiday_promo_in_buybox_DT_T2

Listeners also enjoyed...

The British Army in World War I: The History and Legacy of the Army Across All Theaters of the Great War cover art
The First Battle of Ypres cover art
Napoleon's Grande Armée cover art
At All Costs cover art
Bloody Verrieres cover art
The Battle of the Somme: A Captivating Guide to One of the Most Devastating Events of the First World War That Took Place on the Western Front cover art
Infantry Attacks cover art
On to Stalingrad cover art
Normandiefront cover art
The Mighty Endeavor cover art
Tank Warfare on the Eastern Front, 1943-1945 cover art
Brave Battalion cover art
Mettle and Pasture cover art
Military Memoirs of a Confederate cover art
The Battle of Verdun: A Captivating Guide to the Longest and Largest Battle of World War 1 cover art
The Confederacy's Last Hurrah cover art

What listeners say about The Second Battle of the Marne

Average customer ratings

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.