Schematic plan · World War I (Western Front 1918)

Battle of 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 3/18th Inf Rgt(+), 1,611 men under Col Parker) attacked Germany (Ger 2/109th B Gren Rgt(+), 800 men under Col Buchholtz) in France. The CAA Database of Battles records 3.4 hours of fighting on a front of 0.6 km, a frontal attack against fortified defense, and that USA won. Losses: USA 130 (8%), Germany 500 (63%).

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

Col Parker

Unit	Arm	Men
USA left wing	Infantry	336
USA centre	Infantry	448
USA right wing	Infantry	336
USA reserve	Infantry	280
USA artillery (14 guns)	Artillery	210
Col Parker	Commander	—
In this plan		1,610

Germany

Col Buchholtz

Unit	Arm	Men
Germany left wing	Infantry	163
Germany centre	Infantry	218
Germany right wing	Infantry	163
Germany reserve	Infantry	136
Germany artillery (24 guns)	Artillery	120
Col Buchholtz	Commander	—
In this plan		800

What the sources report

	USA	Germany
Strength, this plan	1,611	800
Losses, this plan	130	500

In the CAA Database of Battles

CDB90 no. 358, “Chaudun”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.

Fighting: 3.4 hours
Winner: the attacker
Terrain: Rolling, Mixed
Weather: Dry, Temperate, Summer, Temperate
Defender’s posture: Fortified defense
Front width: 0.6 km (attacker), 0.6 km (defender)

Force	Strength	Losses	Horse	Guns	Plan and outcome
USAattacker	1,611	130	0	14	Frontal attack; Penetration
Germanydefender	800	500	0	24	Defensive plan; Withdrew with heavy losses

Attacker’s advantages morale +1 · initiative +1 · surprise +1 · 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. 358 · 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.