Why didn't Germany just defend their border with France

>>2698604
>Hey yeah lets just wait on our border while we wait for the second most powerful military in Europe to invade us

>>2698604
Because they needed to end the war quickly and could not afford to get dragged into a war of attrition.

They underestimated the British response to the invasion of Waffleland while overestimating the readiness of the Russian Army.

>>2698617
A military so powerful that even with Britain's help, Germany BTFO France and nearly took Paris.

>>2698604

On the seconf question, i assume germany remembered the polish-soviet war of 1919. The Soviets tried to invade poland but were pushed back in warsaw and lost west ukraine and belarus to poland...

a) Germany had no idea the Russian army would perform as poorly as it did. People still remembered it as the army that beat Napoleon, the Russo-Japanese war notwithstanding, so Germany planning assumed they would need both hands free to deal with Russia.

b) Germany had no idea how effective trench warfare is at blunting offensives, and hence would have assumed that it would take a lot more troops to hold the French border than it actually would.

>>2698652

Alternatively, the successful defence of the Soviets stopped the Poles from taking all of Belarus and Ukraine.

france was weak and spain was mined, the actions were logical under the context of all in war

also republic hinge beachhead memes

>>2698604
Germany neither had the resources nor the manpower to get into a trench war against France and Britain and hold the upper hand in it. What they needed in order to win was a victory in France like in 1870. Fast and risky advance and a fast victory. They could not bring in as much men or supplies as the Entente could as they stood alone.

>>2698604
>Why didn't Germany let or encourage the USSR to attack Poland first?

Because Soviets weren't stupid. They had nothing to gain from attacking first.

At the other hand, Germany needed the war, if they had not attacked Poland, their economy would have crashed with no survivors.

>>2698681
>Germany had no idea the Russian army would perform as poorly as it did.
As soon as they started fighting they would have noticed the poor organization and performance of Russian troops. Don't forget Russia's marred reputation because a non-European power beat them militarily and their backwardsness in economy and industry.
>Germany had no idea how effective trench warfare is at blunting offensives
As soon as they started fighting they would have noticed this and could have adjusted plans accordingly.
>>2698713
>Germany neither had the resources nor the manpower to get into a trench war against France and Britain and hold the upper hand in it
But they did all of those for 4 years

File: 1469381913908.jpg (66KB, 300x287px) Image search: [Google]

66KB, 300x287px

>WWI map
>OP and posters mixing up the two wars

>>2698604
Because the assumption was that Russia was the bigger threat and that germany could not fight both russia and france at the same time, so france needed to be eliminated as quickly as possible to allow the germany to focus all its efforts on russia

>>2698745
>But they did all of those for 4 years
They never had the upper hand and got their asses handed to them in the end

>>2698745

>As soon as they started fighting they would have noticed this and could have adjusted plans accordingly.

Do you have any idea how long it takes to move four million men?

>>2698755
Germany managed to fight the entire western front on French territory and nearly took Paris even while fighting numerous fronts and severely outnumbered, all while France is receiving military troops and supplies like crazy. At the end their was an armistice, not a surrender.

>>2698758
Much less time than it takes for said men to trek 400 kilometres through enemy troops and foreign territory.

>>2698745
>As soon as they started fighting they would have noticed the poor organization and performance of Russian troops
They did. The army fighting the russians was intended as a holding force to delay the russian invasion of germany while france was defeated. It ended up destroying the russian empire

>As soon as they started fighting they would have noticed this and could have adjusted plans accordingly.
They did, and got bogged down into 3 years of trench warfare which they could neither win nor disengage from

>>2698763
>The army fighting the russians was intended as a holding force to delay
The question in the OP is if the German troops fighting Russia would have become the main force instead of the side ones.
>Bogged down
They nearly took Paris twice, meaning they could have won the war basically. If they just defended the border, France would not have received British and American troops.

>>2698760
Germany's invasion of france had initial success but was halted before it could knock france out. Once the line stalled it never meaningfully advanced into france again. Germany never had the upper hand in trench warfare

At the end the german army was utterly outclassed and falling apart. Germany just threw in the towel before they could be annihilated, doesnt make them any less beaten

>>2698777
>The question in the OP is if the German troops fighting Russia would have become the main force
They didnt need to be, the forces there were already completely adequate to defeat russia

>>2698777
>They nearly took Paris twice, meaning they could have won the war basically. If they just defended the border
They only really came close once, and it wasnt even that close. The second point is possibly correct, germany may well have been able to hold france at the border

The point is that they didnt know that. They didnt know russia would be so incompetent, they didnt know trench systems were so defensible, they didnt know france would be so hard to beat.

>>2698745
>As soon as they started fighting.
Thrench warfare only started after they went through Belgium and were halted before Paris. At that point Britain had declared war, and they had a huge frontline stretching from the channel to Switzerland.

>>2698748
Underrated post

>>2698681
>People still remembered it as the army that beat Napoleon
Napoleon destroyed the Russian Army and successfully took Moscow.