![]() ![]() Location on the Meuse in Lorraine and its fortifications made it a strategic issue and a matter of national honor for the French, and the Germans knew this. The Kronprinz, William II’s eldest son, who was also intent on destroying the French army and who described Verdun as the symbolic “heart of France,” backed him up in this mission. General Erich von Falkenhayn planned to “bleed the French army white” on the Verdun salient with the fire of thousands of cannons, meaning to exhaust it both morally and physically before completely defeating it. Since the Battle of the Marne, the war of movement had been transformed into a war of positions: the combatants buried themselves in trenches, fought in horrible conditions, folded in the mud in the midst of rats, surrounded by corpses that were not always possible to evacuate, and above all survived in fear. France’s victorious offensive at Verdun was widely regarded as a turning point in the World War I (1914–1918). ![]() French resistance forces were able to slow the German advance, but at an unbelievable cost in lives and injuries. ![]() The Germans launched an assault meant to “bleed the French army dry.” In short order, General Pétain was given responsibility for defending this section of the front, and he organized the front’s supply by building the “sacred way,” a road that was widened and maintained to allow two lines of trucks to pass each other without stopping. Combat between German and French forces at Verdun raged from February 21 to December 18, 1916. ![]()
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