Schematic plan · World War I (Western Front 1918)

Battle of Cravancon Ferme-Chaudun

18 July 1918
France
Victory for USA

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.

USA (US 1st Inf Bde(+), 10,345 men under Bg Hines) attacked Germany (Ger 3rd Bav Inf Rgt(+), 2,420 men under Col Stengel) in France. The CAA Database of Battles records 6.4 hours of fighting on a front of 1.5 km, a frontal attack against fortified defense, and that USA won. Losses: USA 895 (9%), Germany 1,610 (67%).

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

USA

Bg Hines

Unit	Arm	Men
USA left wing	Infantry	2,238
USA centre	Infantry	2,984
USA right wing	Infantry	2,238
USA reserve	Infantry	1,865
USA artillery (58 guns)	Artillery	870
USA armour (30 tanks)	Armour	150
Bg Hines	Commander	—
In this plan		10,345

Germany

Col Stengel

Unit	Arm	Men
Germany left wing	Infantry	494
Germany centre	Infantry	658
Germany right wing	Infantry	494
Germany reserve	Infantry	411
Germany artillery (30 guns)	Artillery	363
Col Stengel	Commander	—
In this plan		2,420

What the sources report

	USA	Germany
Strength, this plan	10,345	2,420
Losses, this plan	895	1,610

In the CAA Database of Battles

CDB90 no. 357, “Cravancon Ferme-Chaudun”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.

Fighting: 6.4 hours
Winner: the attacker
Terrain: Rolling, Mixed
Weather: Dry, Temperate, Summer, Temperate
Defender’s posture: Fortified defense
Front width: 1.5 km (attacker), 1.5 km (defender)

Force	Strength	Losses	Horse	Guns	Plan and outcome
USAattacker	10,345	895	0	58	Frontal attack; Penetration
Germanydefender	2,420	1,610	0	30	Defensive plan; Withdrew with heavy losses

Attacker’s advantages morale +1 · initiative +1 · surprise +2 · air superiority +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

US Army Concepts Analysis Agency; tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold, CAA Database of Battles (CDB90), no. 357 · ODC-BY-1.0Strengths, losses, front widths, hours of fighting, tactics and outcome.

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.