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The Schlieffen Plan (German: Schlieffen-Plan, pronounced [ʃliːfən plaːn]) is a name given after the First World War to German war plans, due to the influence of Field Marshal Alfred von Schlieffen and his thinking on an invasion of France and Belgium, which began on 4 August 1914.
He has advanced the controversial thesis that the Schlieffen Plan as generally understood was a post-World War I fabrication. [1] [2] He first described his views about the Schlieffen Plan in a 1999 article in War in History, and further developed them in his 2002 book Inventing the Schlieffen Plan.
The Denkschrift was not a campaign plan, as Schlieffen had retired on 31 December 1905 and the 96 divisions needed to carry out this one-front war plan did not exist (in 1914 the German army had 79, of which 68 were deployed in the west). Rather, it was a demonstration of what Germany might accomplish if universal conscription was introduced.
Germany, facing a two-front war, enacted what was known as the Schlieffen Plan, which involved German armed forces moving through Belgium and swinging south into France and towards the French capital of Paris. This plan was hoped to quickly gain victory against the French and allow German forces to concentrate on the Eastern Front.
From 1899, the Germans viewed Metz as a secure position that could provide an anchor for a pivoting movement into France from the Low Countries. This strategy, which would become known as the Schlieffen Plan, required that the Moselstellung deter an advance by French forces into Lorraine while the German forces mobilized. [4]
On August 4, 1914, implementing the Schlieffen plan, the German army invaded Belgium shortly after issuing an ultimatum to the Belgian government [], requesting permission for German troops to pass through Belgian territory.
For example, German military leaders did not plan to mobilize for war with Russia whilst assuming that France would not come to her ally's aid, or vice versa. The Schlieffen Plan therefore dictated not only mobilization against both powers, but also the order of attack—France would be attacked first regardless of the diplomatic circumstances.
The German Schlieffen Plan is a notable example of the cult of the offensive. Supported by offensively-minded officers such as Alfred von Schlieffen and Helmuth von Moltke the Younger , it was executed in the first month of the war (with some historians maintaining it was nearly victorious, [ 6 ] though others claim the Plan never had any ...