Time Astra

Schematic plan · World War I

Second Battle of the Aisne

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A schematic plan, generated from the statistics of the CAA Database of Battles: the armies' size and width, the hours of fighting, the plan of attack and the outcome are as recorded; the ground and the positions are not.
Rolling, Mixed groundCentreLeft wingRight wingReserveCentreLeft wingRight wingReserveGunsArmour010 km20 kmN

France (Fr 5th & 6th Armies, 1,000,000 men under Gen Nivelle) attacked Germany (Ger 1st & 7th Armies, 480,000 men under Gens Boehn & Below) in France. The CAA Database of Battles records 336 hours of fighting on a front of 64 km, a frontal attack against fortified defense, and that Germany held. Losses: France 118,000 (12%), Germany 40,000 (8%).

This plan is generated from those figures. It shows the shape of the battle the database describes: the size and width of the armies, the plan of attack and the outcome. It does not show where the units actually stood.

The armies

France

Gen Nivelle

UnitArmMen
France left wingInfantry221,410
France centreInfantry295,213
France right wingInfantry221,410
France reserveInfantry184,508
France artillery (5,114 guns)Artillery76,710
France armour (150 tanks)Armour750
Gen NivelleCommander—
In this plan1,000,001

Germany

Gens Boehn · Below

UnitArmMen
Germany left wingInfantry115,200
Germany centreInfantry153,600
Germany right wingInfantry115,200
Germany reserveInfantry96,000
Gens Boehn & BelowCommander—
In this plan480,000

What the sources report

FranceGermany
Strength, this plan1,000,000480,000
Losses, this plan118,00040,000

In the CAA Database of Battles

CDB90 no. 317, “Aisne Ii”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.

Fighting
336 hours
Winner
the defender
Terrain
Rolling, Mixed
Weather
Wet, Heavy precipitation, Temperate, Spring, Temperate
Defender’s posture
Fortified defense
Front width
64 km (attacker), 64 km (defender)
ForceStrengthLossesHorseGunsPlan and outcome
Franceattacker1,000,000118,00005,114Frontal attack; Penetration; Stalemate
Germanydefender480,00040,0000—Defensive plan; Stalemate

Attacker’s advantages technology +1

CDB90 (US Army Concepts Analysis Agency, 1990), tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold; data under ODC-BY 1.0.

Notes

On this reconstruction

Generated automatically from the statistics in CDB90. Frontages, depths, distances, the order of events and the terrain are schematic: they follow the recorded strengths, front widths, hours of fighting, tactical plan and outcome, not maps or accounts of the battle. The sources give no hours; the timing is conjectural.

Sources

Facts gathered from Wikidata (CC0), Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0) and Wikimedia Commons (licence per file); the plan and its text are timeastra’s own.