How Bruchmüller Revolutionized Artillery in WWI

Welcome back to the Ardent Gunner. Today we will be looking at the birth of modern artillery doctrine and the man that ignited it. World War I maintains a negative reputation as a war of mindless killing brought about by dull, unimaginative generals presiding over the death of their soldiers without a thought. Not fair on a number of counts, it is particularly untrue when discussing advancements in doctrine and the application of new technology. The invention of the tank and its first use. The development of infantry battle drills and infiltration tactics. Changes across the arms in all manner of areas from communications to logistics. The Great War saw rapid improvements over the four years of fighting. This is especially true of the artillery arm. Artillery doctrine in 1914 would be more recognisable to Wellington than Napoleon and to the modern soldier. By 1918 it couldn't have looked more different. Whilst not all down to one individual, one man did more than any other to advance the art of science. His story is all the more impressive given that the officer in question was relatively unknown and would never achieve significant rank or commendation for his work. Likely a product of being on the losing side in the end, but his ideas would live on. Georg Bruchmuller's pre-war career was solid but not glittering and provided little indication of the strides he would make later. He was born in Berlin in 1863 in a family without military connections. He would leave university to join the 1st Foot Artillery Regiment and would be selected as an officer candidate the following year, seeing him commissioned in 1885. Over the next 28 years he would command two batteries and then a battalion of siege artillery, interspersed with periods instructing at various military schools. In 1913 he was medically discharged as a lieutenant colonel. His quiet military career appeared at an end. Artillery doctrine in the opening years of the war had adjusted, but was struggling to prove effective enough to allow the infantry and cavalry to manoeuvre. Following the huge casualties in the opening months and subsequent fortification across most theatres, the aim of the artillery changed. Initially it had focused on the neutralisation of the enemy, to allow the infantry and cavalry to close with and kill him, as had been thought correct in 1914. Now the primary aim was the outright destruction of fortifications and trenches, the personnel and equipment, to enable the infantry to advance. This was a task that they were largely ill-equipped to do properly. Too few heavy guns, the massive logistical scale required to deliver the ammunition needed, and a continued inflexibility in the employment of artillery were all constant issues. Nowhere is this demonstrated more clearly than in the artillery plan for the Somme. The attack on 1st July 1916 was to be preceded by a seven-day bombardment with over 1,500 guns, the scale of which hadn't been seen before. Commanders were certain this would allow for a relatively unopposed advance. Famously, the attack by the British and Dominion forces were largely a complete failure, the artillery bombardment having failed to destroy the deep emplacements the Germans used to shelter their soldiers, whilst also failing to destroy the fortifications and barbed wire entanglements through which the infantry would have to attack. This resulted in almost 20,000 dead and missing, and a further 37,000 wounded, the bloodiest day in combat the British army has ever seen. This is just one example of many, who would include Ypres, Neufchapel and Verdun. War in Europe would also see change for Bruckmüller. Recalled to service in late 1914, and after a short period of comfortable assignments, he joined the artillery staff of a corps on the Eastern Front, before being appointed as the artillery commander of the 86th Division. It was here that his profile would begin to rise, as his genius for artillery operations became clear. Through 1915 and 1916, he would win both the Iron Cross Second and First Class in a series of successful engagements against the Russians. In April 1916, during the 40th Corps' counter-attack at Lake Naroch, Bruckmüller argued that massed, centrally controlled fires, rather than individual, divisional barrages, would be more effective. Despite being rebuffed initially, he was finally given authority to try it, and put in command of the planning and delivery. The counter-attack was hugely successful, largely due to the effects of Bruckmüller's artillery plan. The first chance to demonstrate these tactics at larger scale would come in September 1917, with the German attack on Riga. This was combined with the development and use at scale for the first time of the new German stormtrooper tactics, with ten attack divisions assembled under the command of von Hutier. Rather than attacking Riga directly, the German high command planned to attack east of the city, conducting a river crossing and encircling Riga from the north in order to capture it. The plan saw three attack divisions in the first wave crossing, following a sudden heavy bombardment. This would target the Russian gun positions, before suppressing the first and second line positions of the Russian forces, in the six-phase creeping barrage that would cover the assaulting stormtrooper divisions. Gone were the days of weeks of preparatory fires and bombardments designed to destroy the enemy. Here was an army-level fire plan with the aim of shocking and suppressing the enemy gun positions, before switching to the infantry, enabling German infantry to infiltrate onto the defences before the Russian forces could react. The German high command also furnished von Hutier's army with a further 615 guns and 544 trench mortars, as well as stockpiling 650,000 rounds of ammunition for the attack. To maintain surprise, most of these new batteries didn't conduct registration missions, but remained silent on arrival. Normally, a battery would conduct registration missions prior to an attack in order to make their fire more accurate. However, the element of surprise was considered to be more important here, and so plans were put in place to enable batteries to register as the assault began, rather than prior. Here then, you can see a simplified version of the river crossing area, with the German front line marked, and the three divisions that would lead the assault over the river. The 2nd Guards Infantry Division, the 14th Bavarian Infantry Division, and the 19th Reserve Division. To the north of the river sat the 1st and 2nd line positions of the Russian army, along with their supporting batteries. To the south of the river were the major German artillery concentrations, here marking the light batteries, field batteries, normally of smaller calibre and shorter range, and the heavy guns, with larger ranges and more significant impacts created by the large calibre rounds. At 0400 on the 1st of September, the German guns opened fire on the Russian artillery positions, using a mixture of high explosive and gas rounds to suppress the Russian artillerymen. This would continue for the next 2 hours. At 0600, the vast majority of the guns would switch on to the Russian 1st line positions, maintaining a small number of guns that would continue to suppress the Russian artillery, and prevent them from degrading the German batteries. This would continue for the next 3 hours. At 0910, the creeping barrage would begin, suppressing the Russian 1st line positions, and covering the German lead assault divisions as they crossed the river, and closed with and killed or captured any remaining Russian infantry. As the assault progressed, so the creeping barrage would lift towards the Russian 2nd positions. Other elements of the fire plan included the continued suppression of Russian batteries, this time with fewer guns, just maintaining those high explosive and gas concentrations to a significant enough degree to keep the Russian artillerymen occupied, as well as key parts of the Russian 2nd line positions, now getting treated with their own mixture of HE and chemical rounds, as the creeping barrage came towards them. This was a highly complex plan, enabled by the large amounts of artillery the Germans were able to concentrate in this area, with sufficient ammunition, combined with Bruckmüller's attention to detail, especially seen in the particularly detailed plans that each battery would receive, and where and when they would be firing. The creeping barrage would continue onto the 2nd line positions, with the lead German assault divisions hugging it, and continuing to mop up any remaining Russian resistance. Once the Russian positions had been cleared, they moved into the defensive fire plan part of the operation. This involved the continued suppression of any Russian batteries that hadn't yet been captured, as well as the movement forwards of several light batteries on rafts, as had been rehearsed in the weeks prior to the operation. This was designed to allow the light field guns to be able to support the exploitation of the large gap that had now appeared in the Russian lines. From this position, the German army was ready to exploit, and over the next four days they would conduct an incredibly successful attack, encircling and capturing Riga by 5th September 1917. This was the proof Bruckmüller needed to show that his ideas worked. Critical to this success was the detailed planning that Bruckmüller and his artillery staff put in, in developing this fire plan, confirming each target for each battery, and the timings on which they would be engaging. Bruckmüller's work can be considered in four different elements. He wasn't responsible for the original ideas in every case, but he was the first who had drawn them together into such a potent combination. The first element was in a return to the artillery aim of neutralisation rather than outright destruction. The five-hour bombardment preceding the attack at Riga was incredibly short, a fraction of the length of the four days that preceded the Third Battle of Artois in 1915, or the seven-day bombardment prior to the Somme in 1916. The use of high explosive and gas rounds to suppress enemy artillery batteries immediately before the attack, with a creeping barrage covering German infantry as they crossed no man's land and cleared the first positions, were key elements. The use of the creeping barrage was an indication of the move back towards the pre-war thought that artillery should be primarily used to suppress and neutralise rather than destroy. It remains unclear which army did it first. It is claimed that General Nivelle first developed and used this tactic in 1916, although others point to General Rawlinson on the Somme in 1916 as using it first. Either way, by 1917 this tactic had been perfected. The German army made it particularly effective in 1917 and in 1918 by combining it with the infiltration tactics of their stormtrooper divisions. The second element was in the changes to artillery organisation that Bruckmüller oversaw. The British and French had been centralising command of their artillery at higher levels before the Germans in order to support the larger fences through 1915 and 1916, but the German army on the Western Front had largely maintained its pre-war situation with a lack of integration between the echelons of command. This was especially apparent in the gap between the divisional and corps level. On the Eastern Front however, Bruckmüller was changing this more quickly. He also recognised the difference between the close and deep artillery operations and prefers to do so. Bruckmüller had the division fighting the close battle while corps level and above would fight the deep. Thus, he distributed his artillery as follows. At the lowest level, in the infantry regiments and battalions, there were three types of artillery. Mortars were used in direct support of the infantry battalions with one caveat. In the short bombardment before the first assault, they would be commanded by the division. Once the infantry assault began, they were commanded by the battalions to support them closely. The IBBs, yes I'm not trying to pronounce these German words, were form batteries that provided direct support to infantry regiments, whilst the IGBs referred to individual guns that could be manhandled forward to fire directly on enemy strong points and machine gun nests that might be holding up in advance. In short, the infantry had a plethora of assets that increased their firepower in the assault at the lowest level. At the divisional level, the majority of guns were held, normally around 75% of the total artillery for the battle. These were used by the divisional commander to support his infantry attacks, normally in the form of the creeping barrage, as well as being used to target enemy artillery and strong points. Each attacking division could expect at least two artillery regiments to support them, but they would often have many more. At Riga, the attacking divisions had between 8-10 regiments each in support, a vast amount of firepower. At the core level, there was a split between counter-battery assets. Approximately 20% of the total guns were used solely to suppress enemy artillery throughout an assault, whilst the other part were the other long-range guns that could be used to engage targets at range, including larger headquarters, reserve locations and logistics elements. Lastly were the largest and very long-range guns, often in the form of railway guns and other large calibre weapons, such as the four 20mm Big Bertha howitzers seen here. These were commanded at army level and used on particular occasions where suitable targets were identified for them. Normally these would be bridges, railway junctions and reinforced heavy fortifications. The third element was in further developing combined arms coordination, an element that all armies strived to improve as communication technology developed. Bruckmuller's use of correctly equipped forward observers to feedback information on the situation in real-time was critical to the success at Riga. He also placed heavy emphasis on properly briefing the infantry on the artillery fire plan prior to an attack. This encouraged mutual understanding as well as reducing unnecessary messages on fragile communication systems. If the infantry commanders knew a particular target was due to be attacked with artillery, there was no requirement for them to waste valuable time and effort in requesting artillery support. Lastly were the techniques he introduced to ensure the survival of his batteries in the surprise of the attacks. Batteries would occupy their firing positions just hours before an attack, normally at night, with strict light and noise reduction measures in place. In 1918 the Germans would move thousands of guns into firing positions in a matter of hours, in stark contrast to the early years of the war. As an example, in 1915, before the attack at Artois, it took the French army three weeks to move 350 guns into position. His restriction on the registration conducted by batteries was also important. Registration had been considered vital in order to allow artillery to be effective. Instead, he introduced a method in which guns would only verify the direction of the gun, not the range. This could be done very quickly and was accurate enough to achieve the neutralisation effect that was needed. In 1918 he succeeded in forcing the German army to adopt the Pulchowski method. Captain Erich Pulchowski had developed a system of predicted corrections that accounted for weather conditions, barrel wear and other conditions. This allowed for much greater predicted accuracy without the need to fire the guns. Considered unnecessary by some, Bruckmüller eventually won out. This would quickly spread to other armies and would remain very familiar to the modern gunner. These four elements, combined with Bruckmüller's attention to detail in writing his fire plans, underpinned his success. His first entry on the Western Front was during the counterattack at Cambrai in November 1917. The 23rd Reserve Corps, using his advice and firing a similar preparation to his plan used at Riga, mounted a highly successful attack against the British 7th Corps. This established his credibility amongst the German army in the West with the argument finished when General Ludendorff endorsed his methods in early 1918. Through the subsequent dramatically successful Spring Offensive of 1918, Bruckmüller was instrumental in creating the supporting fire plans that enabled these successes. Operation Michael began at 0440 on 21st March 1918 around St Quentin. It was the most intense bombardment ever. Lieutenant William Carr of the 377 Battery Royal Field Artillery wrote This fire plan heralded an advance that saw the front line move more than at any point since the heady days of 1914. By 5th April, the Germans had taken more ground than the British and French had managed during the entire war. There were many reasons why the attack would ultimately fail. Critically, logistics just couldn't keep up with the rate of advance, but the artillery plan that enabled the breakthrough was a triumph. The only area where that wasn't the case was in front of the German 17th Army. Its artillery commander, von Behrendt, disliked Bruckmüller. They had served together as junior officers and as a lieutenant general, he wasn't happy being told what to do by the humble colonel. In his post-war writing, Ludendorff placed this failure directly at von Behrendt's door, saying that The overall success of the fire plan secured Bruckmüller's promotion to colonel and further medallic recognition. The next few months saw marked tactical successes using Bruckmüller's methods at Lee and on the Scheminder Dam. The attack on the Scheminder Dam on 27th May 1918 can be said to have been his masterpiece, using a two-hour, 45-minute preparation. By the end of the first day of the offensive, the German infantry had advanced 22km, exceeding the planned objectives for the entire offensive. However, the Germans were running out of time, and by May 1918, with US divisions pouring into France, the strategic tide had turned. On top of that, Germany's industrial base was struggling to maintain the required production rate, and guns and ammunition were running low. July saw unsuccessful attacks as the Allies adjusted to the new tactics, combined with an overwhelming advantage in men and material. It wasn't over for Bruckmüller's tactics and influence. The British Army had several forward-thinking artillery officers in their ranks, but they had been largely prevented from making the sweeping changes Bruckmüller did by a more conservative military culture that hampered change. Bruckmüller's greatest influence on the British, perhaps, was the final recognition by senior commanders of the full potential of properly employed artillery in the wake of the attack at St. Quentin. This, in turn, probably resulted in the more progressive gunner officers having a freer hand in implementing their own similar ideas. The Allied 100-day offensive in late 1918 put much of this into practice with remarkable results. The end of the war in November 1918 would bring about much soul-searching across all of the armies involved in the conflict. Bizarrely, the German Army would throw away much of what the artillery arm had learnt, in favour, as they saw it, of the tank that heralded a new age of movement in which the artillery would not be able to keep up. They saw this new technology as removing much of the usefulness of artillery. They would relearn their lessons too late. Only by 1943 had they started to re-grasp what they had forgotten, and by then the Soviets and Allies were tightening their grasp. Despite realising the mistake, they never would develop a fully centralised artillery command system of the type Bruckmüller had developed. Most other armies didn't fare much better during the interwar years. The British Army was in many ways even more extreme than the German Army, with armoured officers in particular regularly calling for the end of the artillery completely. Self-support, not close support, as General Wavell would put it. However, the advent of World War II would quickly bring these old lessons back into focus, and by the end of the war the British and the Americans had both developed similar systems for massing fires rapidly, with highly centralised systems that delivered it. This was where Bruckmüller's legacy would live on in the West. In the East, the Soviets were the only ones who didn't forget the bloody time they'd been given at the hands of the Germans. Throughout the interwar years, their focus was on the artillery as their premier arm. By the end of World War II, this position had been vindicated. So it may have taken a further 25 years to cement his legacy, but ultimately it was. For Bruckmüller himself, he was not eligible for the post-war Reichswehr, because the Versailles Treaty prohibited heavy artillery, and so he was retired in 1919 as a full colonel. He wrote several books on artillery that were translated into English, French and Russian, and it was through these that his ideas were remembered, and would be cited in the following years by those officers who still believed in mass, centralised artillery. In 1939, on the 25th anniversary of the Battle of Tannenberg, he was promoted to Major General on the retired list, and would die in Garmisch Bavaria in 1948. In many ways, the greatest accolade Bruckmüller can be given was the faith that the other arms, and especially the infantry, placed in him. He was affectionately named Dirk Bruckmüller by German soldiers, a play on the German for breakthrough and his name. Such was the confidence that his presence inspired. It was in this way, and in the development of his principles of the centralised command of artillery, that he should rightfully be remembered as the father of the modern artillery arm. If you are interested in studying this area further, Steel Wind, by David Sebecki, goes into great detail about how Colonel Bruckmüller implemented his ideas. If you have enjoyed this content, then please consider liking and subscribing to the channel, as there will be much more to follow. Otherwise, this has been the Ardent Gunner, and thank you for your time.