Why Friendly Fire was (almost) a Good Thing in World War I

[@mrcant7970]

I recently discovered that my great-grandfather Pte William Cant was possibly one of several 'Other Ranks' killed by friendly artillery fire while serving with the 4th Bn Royal Fusiliers near Arras. The entry in the battalion War Diary for 15.12.1917 reads: "1st Lieut. Goddard killed while holding front line block on right - Our own artillery was continuously shooting short into this block - 3 OR's killed, 1 OR died of wounds and 5 ORs wounded" While your fascinating video focuses on friendly fire within the context of the creeping barrage, this and other entries in the War Diary indicate it was a sufficiently frustrating aspect of defensive operations that the duty officer would make a point of mentioning it. My own family had been completely unaware of this, so it is doubtful relatives would have been informed of the circumstances.

[@TheManofthecross]

tell the decendents.

[@imadequate3376]

I recently recieved a great uncle's CEF WWI paperwork and medals, his journal had a bunch of information, battalion locations, names with serial numbers, names with units. Was able to draw up with a highlighter over a printing of the area at that time and kinda map where he was. He was a runner when the radio lines got cut by artillery so he was hand delivering orders and sprinting a mile between supply trenches, reserve trenches, 2nd line, the front, into sapps etc etc delivering orders and information to people. Few named in his journal have a name crossed out and "killed" written next to it with a new name below it.

[@mrcant7970]

@@imadequate3376 I came across the information about my great-grandfather when helping my daughter with a school research project. Very little was passed down in the family other than a pre-deployment photograph, his name and that he was killed at Arras in 1917. He had a Fusilier cap badge in the photo and that, coupled with his date of death from the CWG website/Arras memorial led me to 4RF. Now that WWI war diaries have been digitised and made available from the Kew National Archive I have been able, hopefully, to start filling in some of the gaps. I have so far been unable to track down any further military records of him by name. The 1911 census has him listed as a farm labourer from Suffolk and he was away by mid-1915 and stayed in France for the next 2 years (my grandfather was born in September 1915 and never saw him), so I would imagine he was one of the many early volunteers sent out as replacements before the Kitchener battalions started being formed. 4RF was a London-based territorial battalion, so if he had signed up in Ipswich he might well have been posted there to the Fusiliers as he was a bit on the short side by all accounts (4'10"). They were deployed to the western front in March/April 1915, so the dates are a good fit.

[@MikeJones-ip5zk]

Me in 1914 when my commanding officer asks why my K/D is so high

[@jetsflyingoffatrain4338]

"How do you have -12 kills"

[@SickDayPlayer]

-15/0

[@johnpoole3871]

Imagine being an attacking infantryman in WWI. "Our own guns are firing on us! Thank goodness, now we have a chance."

[@stevencooper4422]

"FOR IT'S HI HI HEE IN THE FIELD ARTILLERYYYYY"

[@Rynewulf]

Thats military genius dont you know boy!

[@leod-sigefast]

You misunderstand the whole point of the video and of WWI artillery practice. It wasn't due to negligence or callousness. Having your infantry as close as possible to your own creeping barrage bursts is overall more worthwhile than letting the enemy man his trenches and fire at will at you. Keep the enemy cowering down in their trenches and bunkers with your artillery, while you 'sneak up' to their lines right behind your creeping barrage. Soldiers even commented in letters about this: "If you are not taking minor casualties from your own artillery bursts, then you are not close enough", one Australian soldier stated. So important was it to suppress the enemy that a few friendly fire casualties from your artillery would be insignificant compared to the damage that a fully manned and machine gunned up trench line firing non-stop at your advancing infantry.

[@randomperson4198]

​@@leod-sigefast He didn't? Thats the whole joke

[@TiegonBerry]

@@leod-sigefast I think he did understand. if a shell falls short that means most likely the other shells are not.

[@rodolfomiranda5933]

A video on artillery trigonomics would be great at explaining some of the difficulties of coordinating a rolling barage

[@mill2712]

Though he should get someone who knows about and understands the mathematics of artillery of the time to help.

[@mikeoxelonge3714]

Bro is a historian, not a mathematician. Unless he's both, which would be cool.

[@rodolfomiranda5933]

@@mill2712 Definitely, and showing the advancements and developments of artillery maths would demonstrate the care and worry officers had in improving its effectiveness and reducing friendly fire instances

[@Zoroff74]

As the russian and North Korean garbage states have so aptly shown us recently, one big problem of controlling artillery is the quality, consistency and control of the propellant and shells. With lesser consistency in the force upon and thus the acceleration of the shell, the lengthwise variation of where the shells will land is going to be larger, and much worse, unpredictable. Mathematical errors may put shells in the wrong place, but they will at least stay there and can be avoided. Inconsistencies in the propellant is going to be randomizing when shells land long or short, making them totally unexpected.

[@233kosta]

​​@@mill2712 Hi, I'm someone who knows about the mathematics and is willing to help 😅

[@Bipolar.Baddie]

In the WW1 game Isonzo, staggering your artillery is hugely important when pushing into positions where the enemy has high ground. At the beginning of a push, it's best to use creeping smoking, player controlled mortars, and snipers to dislodge MG nests and spawn points. Once your men reach about the breach the final line towards the objective, you call in your artillery or bomber support. I didn't even know that this was the best way to push in real WW1 combat, I just figured out it through trial and error and learning why some officers on other teams essentially guaranteed a win on offense

[@deadzone4155]

It could be argued that this was the beginning of combined arms, I played the game myself and it could not be understated how these tactics are very much needed when it comes to the machine guns and spawn points.

[@ArturoLopez-ly2pn]

Dear God the gamers are reverse engineering proper trench warfare

[@RogerBaxely]

Hell, that’s essentially how these tactics were devised. The only difference is the stakes.

[@IPlayWithFire135]

Erich Maria Remarque in All Quiet on the Western Front has Paul Baumer talk about how demoralizing it is for their lines to receive friendly fire - but only because they knew it meant the gun barrels were wearing out and their side’s heavy barrages couldn’t be sustained much longer. The reduced accuracy was a byproduct of that.

[@GeraldLeeRice]

6:40 This sponsor segment was so well executed that I'm leaving this comment to recommend watching it to anyone who plans on skipping it or already has skipped it

[@GuardDog42]

Genuinely entertaining

[@LiverpoolReject]

Artillery and mortar fire still functions this way! We call it danger close and when you are under direct enemy fire, it is worth taking the risk of "friendly fire" every time!

[@mitamajr]

I think for a howitzer the danger zone is 500-600 meters (depending on nation), so if you want to assault an enemy position you either need a TON of smaller weapons, or just have to accept the friendly casualties. But as many nations discovered, it's better to take losses from friendly artillery than to lose the race to the parapet.

[@KingOfStopMotion]

Bradon trying not to laugh his butt off during the Exter ad is hilarious.

[@mustardjar3216]

i think its less "oh my god they didnt care about friendly fire during ww1! how horrible people they must've been" and more "oh my god they didnt care (as much as we do right now) about friendly fire during ww1! how horrible that war and its circumstances must've been to make people act that way"

[@twistedyogert]

I wonder if it's because weapons were less accurate. HIMARS was a thing of science fiction during WWI.

[@SupremeGrand-MasterAzrael]

If a person didn’t care about killing their own side, then yes they were a horrible person. That is not exclusive to the past nor do I believe it was more or less common than now. Human beings are the only living organism capable of recognizing and perpetrating evil. You can understand and appreciate this without thinking that all humans are evil. But humans that do evil things, are evil in my book. I can recognize, as an American, that genociding the native population of America was evil. So is scalping a living person. So is dropping bombs on children. I suppose my point is, why are you opposed to recognizing evil acts? Because it is uncomfortable? To act like a circumstance can force a person who isn’t evil to do evil is not a commonly accepted idea. Whether it is true or not, it is very much controversial.

[@SecundusInfernus]

I agree, I think we (that is to say, humanity in general) too often use these instances as ways to dehumanize the people of the past. They were no less human than us, they just had different and often more dire circumstances to work with. I don’t think it’s anthropologically useful to just dismiss people of the past as wholly “evil” or “uncaring”.

[@Briselance]

​@@SecundusInfernus Trying to pass friendly fire as just "different circumstances"? Nah, fam. That was just either bad comms moments (and we still have some). Or indeed outright disregard for one own side's troops. One 1st WW French general actually knowingly had howitzers opening on French-held sector, just to "motivate" the troops there to carry on another piss-poor frontal assault on entrenched positions.

[@SecundusInfernus]

@@Briselance I don’t disagree with the assessment of communication, but this was a direct result of the circumstances of the time: there was no such thing as a field radio (at least in the sense of what was used in WW2 and onward), so most of what was done was being reported on and timed by officers and runners. This meant that, in many instances, there was no real ability to avoid the issues arising from collapsing plans and desynchronizing among elements of said plans. Again, this is a result of the period and the horrific crossroads between military technology and tactics able to be implemented. I still contend that this falls under “different circumstances” to those we face even today (though there are cases where they still appear even now, as you said). I will not say there was no disregard for human life during this period, obviously the fact that world leaders were willing to initiate wars like this in the first place is evidence enough of its presence. However, not every tactical decision made was necessarily done simply to kill as many of one’s own troops as possible. Many decisions were (and still are) gambles, where officers and soldiers have to strike a balance between securing objectives, minimizing one’s own losses and keeping morale as high as possible. That is what we see in the primary sources for the video, where decisions to use “danger close” barrages is made because the alternative to a few men potentially being killed by friendly fire is many more being torn to pieces by enemies fully ready to defend their positions. It’s an absolutely terrible decision to make, but what other choice would an officer have? There is no such thing as a war that does not result in abject suffering that is, at some level, avoidable. This doesn’t mean we shouldn’t strive for as many ethics as we can implement in conflict, but there’s only so much that can be done to prevent immorality in something that is inherently morally reprehensible. I want to make clear that I am absolutely not “excusing” friendly fire, I am simply agreeing that there is a reason it happened in this conflict. That doesn’t make it good (I understand that the title of the video does sort of imply it, I will agree that I’m not a huge fan of its wording), but it is the realistic nuance present with its incidence during WW1. Also, I would like to read into the French officer you mentioned if you have their name available. It would potentially be interesting to see this thought process as an example of the many corrupt instances of leadership through the conflict (and all conflicts).

[@steveh7823]

If ever there was a prime example in British military history of artillery failing to support the infantry it was the battle of Magersfontein. Even at then, 15 years before WW1, it became obvious that infantry could not advance against magazine loading rifles and would suffer crippling losses, let alone against machine guns. Smoke shells would have offered infantry protection without the risk of friendly fire casualties, if the wind speed/direction assisted.

[@alganhar1]

The Battle of Magersfontain was NOT a prime example of artillery not supporting the infantry, it was a prime example of a commander not ordering an adequate reconnaissance and ordering the artillery to shell where the enemy were not. The Boers were dug in at the foot of the hill rather than on the slope which is where the British commander assumed they would be, so the artillery hit the slope of the hill rather than the foot, where the Boers actually were. In other words the artillery did their job, the commander however did NOT, thus the supporting artillery fire was wasted. The issue with smoke is not just the wind direction, its the simple fact that you need adequate communications to drop it where its needed and just as importantly WHEN its needed, and that is what was lacking in WWI. People forget that this was a time BEFORE man portable radios. Those did not come about until almost 20 years AFTER the war. So the only communication attacking infantry had with anyone, including their supporting artillery, was to send back messages by runner or animal.... Its bad enough coordinating an artillery fire in contact with the enemy even now with modern communications and fire control. In 1918 that kind of real time communication between artillery and infantry was IMPOSSIBLE. It could not happen. Literally the only way that existed at that time if coordinating artillery and attacking infantry was by timetable, which makes smoke all but useless.

[@Rynewulf]

@@alganhar1Thats still on the commanders. They didnt seem to blame 'poor communication technology' when using literal cannons to great effect in previous centuries. If a poor workman blames his tools, a poor military leader blames his technology for his poor decisions

[@Rynewulf]

Dont tell anyone that parallels leading up to WWI were ignored by the leadership, they were underappreciated heroes after all according to Brandon (and not notorious compared to the leaders of similarly massive wars in the century before and after)

[@mistapoli]

@@Rynewulf Nobody is saying that isn’t on the commander, it obviously was on him for not doing adequate reconnaissance. The point was that before modern communications technology these mistakes could not be easily fixed if they could be fixed at all.

[@Rynewulf]

@ Yet the WWI period commanders get treated as a free pass. Blunders during say the Napoleonics Wars were put down to bad commanders not understand their technology, tragically or stupidly killing their own with misused artillery. But during WWI people have this 'oh but the technology, couldnt be helped every time they fired an artillery barrage they had kill a few hundred of their own while shelling their own trenches' kind of unique attitude. You went on to focus on how the technology caused the commanders difficulty, not how the commander didnt understand the technology he was in charge of. Its not some unaboidable twist of fate when a leader of that time ordered infantry to attack when they knew they would still be in a bombarded area, or hadnt waited to recce the enemy to check for artillery success. Its basic military thinking, and that generation of the military clearly lacked it hard

[@BS_heckla3]

From playing Foxhole, Artillery is great at breaking enemy defensive structures and decent at killing/suppressing infantry. Friendly fire happens a lot in that game and you get much of what you'd expect in a WW1 scenario, mostly disjointed communications. Anywhere from messaging the arty squad, "You're killing us" to going directly to them and asking them to stop/move forward. It's quite a game that simulates these battles decently. It would be hard to demonstrate in a video like The Great War game. But it fundamentally works the same, though in Foxhole it's more for buildings/AI. You'd generally be condoned in Foxhole if you are artying trenches/infantry, as it leads to tons of friendly fire, lots of mad players xD.

[@purpleteaisme]

Such scenario happened to the previous war. We had the colonials cornered like chickens after overwhelming their defense... then everything went down hill when our artillery started barraging us to hell. 5 hours worth of progress were lost because of that catastrophic barrage.

[@starkotletka8655]

Yay. Foxhole players in comments

[@233kosta]

It's not so much the trigonometry that's the difficult part (that's to do with angles/etc.), it's the aeroballistics of artillery shells that made it so difficult to aim them well. In a vacuum (i.e. in space), the kinematics of a shell (that is, the mathematics which describe its motion) are relatively simple. Think suvat equations meet F=ma. Actually, technically it's _all_ F=ma, but in 3D and with some calculus thrown in. Transform F=ma into a=F/m, integrate once with respect to time to get velocity, and once more to get displacement. In A-level maths they'd want you to do it algebraically, but some dudes who died looooooong before the great war came up with a way to do it numerically. One absolutely ubiquitous method for this is named after two of them - Runge & Kutta. Only problem is it involves pushing a whole lot of numbers through a mathematical meat grinder, which can get a bit tedious if done by hand. Still, if you're the military - getting people to churn numbers for you isn't a problem The real problem occurs once you introduce the aerodynamics. Left to their own devices, shells try to tip over. Any sort of angle of attack produces a boatload of pitching moment which makes them tumble. So they get spun up. This sort of solves the pitching moment problem, but introduces a bunch of other dynamics. For one thing, it doesn't make the pitching moment disappear, it converts it into precession. That causes a spiral motion you might have seen in long range vapour trails. Additionally, as the shell slows down, the pitching moment reduces a lot, but the spin rate reduces only a little. This can then cause the shell to pitch up significantly more later on in its parabola, so the lift it produces can become quite significant, causing a lot of drift. On top of all that, the Magnus effect comes into play, which can stabilise or destabilise, depending on the design. In terms of dynamic stability, the Magnus moment in particular only has to change a tiny bit to completely destroy a shell's performance. Strictly speaking, throwing all those aerodynamic effects into the equations of motion, while more difficult than ignoring them, is more than doable. It's just a bunch of extra terms and fiddle factors. The truly hard part is figuring out what those fiddle factors are. Not only are they difficult to measure (near-impossible at that time), they change with both speed and pitch angle. Pretty much the best they could reliably do at the time was drag. Everything else was out of the question. That's why they did range testing instead. They'd fire shells, see where they land, and produce ballistic tables on that basis. Those ballistic tables would then be generalised and built into huge mechanical ballistic computers, as implemented on ships, but I imagine for artillery pieces they were just tables in manuals. Maybe those manuals were given to officers and the crew were just given absolute aim instructions - any historians familiar with artillery please chime in. Anyway, as you can imagine, designing shells using rules of thumb and obtaining ballistic tables in limited conditions isn't conducive to accuracy in the field. It was only during the cold war ('50s - '80s) that very reliable methods for measuring the complete aeroballistic picture were widely implemented, and only in the '90s that computer modelling methods became inexpensive enough to widely adopt for these purposes.

[@NeurosenkavalierEmilSinclair]

Picking up another guys comment, the material would wear out over time which could change the performance of the guns used. I mean, after hundreds or thousands of shots where the barrel gets hot and the shells drag along the gun it seams plausible that it changes a part in the equation, even if it was just a smaller factor (don't know if there is truth to it, neither military nor psysics major).

[@233kosta]

@@NeurosenkavalierEmilSinclair Hahaha such an optimist! You'd get a few thousand, maybe some tens of thousands of shells out of a bore before it's completely rooted. No more. Numbers floating around my head are 5000-8000, but don't quote me. On a ship's gun it's closer to 300. Even if nothing goes wrong (i.e. your cannon cracks and blows up in your face), the bore erodes a little with every shot. The bulk of that erosion takes place at the start and end of the rifling. I.e. where there's the most heat & pressure, and where the shell is going fastest. But it _does_ wear along the entire length regardless. "Modern" 155mm shells have a driving band made of copper or some other soft metal. The shell itself sits on top of the rifling lands (a.k.a. the bore) and the driving band fills the grooves. The heat and pressure cause the soft metal to swage and more or less seal the hot gas behind it. How well it does swage is another matter... Anyway, this driving band forming to the bore & grooves effectively compensates for wear... to a point. So you get a bunch of fairly consistent shots out of a barrel before it's scrap. Maybe they used that in the great war, maybe they didn't. I'm an inginerd, not a historian 😅 If they didn't, then there would be more noticeable effect from bore wear throughout the life of the barrel. In terms of ballistic effect, you're going to notice some variation in exit velocity from new to scrap, but that's usually lost in the noise. You get more of that from charge inconsistency and temperature variation. Though significant to the performance of the rifling, the mass reduction caused by bore erosion is relatively so small as to have a negligible effect on barrel harmonics, so its effect on "accuracy", if we will, is nil right up until the rifling doesn't rifle any more and your shells start tumbling. The truth is they just hadn't figured out how to make a very accurate gun back then. But they were making rapid progress. I'm sure that by the end of the war they had much better ballistic data and generally more consistent shells.

[@JonBrase]

I think a better treatment of this topic is to look at WWII as well. In WWI, the coordination of barrages with infantry attacks was still at a fairly high level, so these tactics can still be painted as motivated by cold mathematics without a shred of compassion shown by generals to their men. But in WWII, with radios, you had a closer and lower-level cooperation of artillery with infantry, and you see small units hugging barrages that they themselves called in, or units (and even individuals) calling in barrages directly on their own positions over the protests of the artillery unit responsible for delivering the barrage.

[@davehopkin9502]

The reason that the creeping barrage developed was precisely to SAVE the lives of the men....to suggest that generals had no compassion shows a huge misunderstanding of the strategic situation on the Western Front - German had occupied a large swathe of northern France and most of Belgium, the entire objective of the western fron was ti evict german forces from those occupied territories. you cannot do that by defending, you have to attack, the generals were looking far the way to attack at the least allied cost.

[@88porpoise]

Why would you say that Generals had no compassion for their men? I am sure that some didn't, just like some colonels and lieutenants, and sergeants and privates had no compassion for the men under or alongside them. But most would have absolutely cared about the men they sent to die or be maimed. In fact, many of them had been on the opposite end of that in the past (having been junior officers sent into harms way in South Africa, Sudan, or India). Every commissioned and non-commissioned officer in a war is making decisions that get men killed. There is no way around that, and refusing to fight the war would also lead to its own losses. Yes, they knew that a creeping barrage would get men killed by friendly fire. But without that creeping barrage more would die from enemy fire and it was far less likely the objectives would be taken. So they had to do the math, make and decision, and accept the deaths they ordered as they way to end the bloodshed was to win the war.

[@leod-sigefast]

It was actually to the benefit of the infantry themselves to get as close to your own creeping barrage as possible. The soldiers themselves realised this completely from experience: keep the enemy's head down as long as possible so that you can get up close to their lines and then pounce. It wasn't callousness nor incompetence. The WWI myth of uncaring generals really does cloud any fair judgment of WWI combat. So many people are misunderstanding this video...

[@JonBrase]

@@davehopkin9502 Note that I said "...can still be painted as motivated by...". I don't believe that it was so motivated, just that it's a common accusation that is more clearly countered by looking at later wars where artillery planning was done closer to the units involved and those units engaged in the same tactics by choice.

[@calebballantine3402]

Brandon yours is the only channel on the entire platform where I actually pay attention during the ads

[@michaeljfoley1]

I know, his ads/sponsor bits are generally quite hilarious and creative.

[@Nupetiet]

I like your voice. I can understand you clearly and it's not distracting.

[@charlesphillips4575]

One point you missed is quality of the shells. WW1 used vastly more shells that had been anticipated and so desperate measure were taken to increase shell production. This damaged quality and many of the drop shorts were defective ammunition not a mistake by the gunners.

[@Brenticus]

Your recent videos on the Great War are some of my favorites. The video game was actually an excellent way to get a visual for what you’d be explaining. Love it!

[@BrandonF]

Thank you! Glad you enjoy them. Next one will be WW1 too!

[@NickRatnieks]

The book "England, Their England" written in 1933 by A G Macdonell ( a Scotsman born in India who was an artilleryman) is a satirical book about the English but has a great first chapter which describes the Great War experience. It appears whenever the men were shelled they concluded it was their own artillery falling short. To combat this invincible belief, artillerymen were posted into the trenches but this made no difference to the ingrained belief system out in the front lines! A classic book on the English- as they were in the first half of the 20th century.

[@alganhar1]

My Grandfather was an infantryman during WWI, and he thought no such thing. They tended to know if it was friendly artillery from the sound and the direction the fire came from. Those men were not effing stupid you know.... In other words A G Macdonell is talking out of his posterior. The artillerymen posted in front line trenches, or near them, were NOT in fact there to convince the infantry it was not their artillery falling short, but because they were a little thing called FORWARD OBSERVERS....

[@NickRatnieks]

@@alganhar1 It's a humorous book but may contain elements of the phrase: "many a true word is often spoken in jest." I will have to reread the chapter- but he was out there in the middle of it all. It seems he had shell shock and was in Craiglockhart- the most famous shell-shock hospital. Maybe, he wanted to take a light-hearted view of the experiences he had.

[@Rynewulf]

@@alganhar1Ah yes, every critcism of WWI was just witless propaganda stabbing the brave genius military men in the back, preventing them from achieving so much more!

[@tando6266]

Can you do more videos on artillery tactics (particularly Napoleonic) and day to day life. It was certainly different to the infantry. Also about the dogs video: Didn't watch it because I love my puppies and it would break my heart. Which I think is the problem, you either love dogs and don't or cant bear to hear horrific things, or you don't, in which case how much interest is it to you.

[@MarktheRude]

Yeah same, "bad things happening to dogs" just really gets under my skin, no way I'm going to torment myself with that.

[@InspiriumESOO]

Animal lovers don't eat animals. Remember that my friend.

[@haraldisdead]

The most diabolical part of that scene from Braveheart is that THAT'S NOT HOW BOWS WORK THEY DIDN'T FIRE IN VOLLEYS LIKE THAT THEY'RE NOT FUCKING MORTARS GODDAMMIT

[@thevenator3955]

Also the fact that if under-equipped / inexperienced troops were sent into combat with no support and then were getting shot by their own men then would break and run immediately. The bad guy in braveheart was so cartoonishly evil if it was real life he would just be incompetent.

[@jerrysmooth24]

even today they say 15% of casualties are blue on blue its still no help to Pat Tillman or Stonewall Jackson but it makes sense given how chaotic and split second combat really is.

[@ulture]

Tillman's death wasn't an accident

[@dashikashi4734]

Right, it was negligent on his part. Standing up and waving your arms while under fire is idiotic.

[@ulture]

@@dashikashi4734 lmao imagine STILL believing the official narrative after the govt got caught lying about what happened, changed its story, and got caught lying about the new version too, 6 or 7 times in a row. His mother knows what really happened....

[@kalechips4564]

Thank you so much for fulfilling your promise of talking about friendly fire during WWI, and so quickly!

[@jamesharrington5571]

This was a really well argued video and really made me rethink a few things I had assumed

[@michaeljfoley1]

That is true for me, as well.

[@214TwoOneFo]

Yo dude, I stayed with your channel ever since you showed off the difference between the actual loaded musket vs a blank charge and your channel recently has taken a turn toward these kind of history questions and I love these videos… but I also would like you getting out in the field more too because that is what originally got you that sweet sweet KZbin cash

[@philipdove6987]

Signal flares were fired from Very pistols, a type of pistol dedicated to the firing of signal flares. i have read accounts of British infantry deliberately advancing into the edge of their own creeping barrage, so as not to give the enemy time to emerge from their shelter before they were attacked by infantry. I imagine this was something only battle hardened and experienced troops would do,

[@michaeljfoley1]

That's very interesting. And terrifying, too 😬

[@schiznit1156]

Small thanks for being articulate on a serious subject.

[@BrandonF]

Thank you as well for your generosity! It is much appreciated!

[@canicheenrage]

I don't think that really fits friendly fire. Rather, arguably, regular fire at the enemy in unsafe conditions, as the benefit/cost would be still favourable for everyone involved at company scale both for defenders ( well protected in their trenches ) and attackers ( glad the enemy has to keep their head down in said trenches even if it means taking some schrapnel ). A unit misidentifying a friendly unit and calling artillery on them, that'd be friendly fire.

[@cmdrwilmot2696]

I would say accidents where friendly artillery bombarded infantry that had already taken an enemy position would also qualify. But agreed, the scenario set up seems like an extreme danger close situation; where the artillery is being used against the enemy properly, but in a way that is rather risky for friendly troops as well.

[@Jon-ox7hk]

Yeah and he also didn't explain why it was a good thing, just explained how it was an unfortunate necessity caused by the technology and tactical needs of the time. Clickbait.

[@NathanM4A1]

How is that not a good thing? As you said it was tactically necessary in order to capture a trench with fewer casualties. Allowing the front line to advance, and doing so without having entire battalions wiped out is certainly a good thing.

[@monkemode8128]

I disagree, if it needs to be intentional fire on a friendly unit (knowingly or not), then what about cases where some idiot flags their buddy and shoots them? In iraq, I personally know of one case where civilians with small arms set up an ambush on an ISIS patrol and the machine gunner wound up hitting some friendlies who wound up between him and the truck.

[@Spartan0430]

@@Jon-ox7hk he did explain why it was (almost) a good thing. repeatedly. If the infantry were too slow with their advance it would allow the defenders time to rally and rip apart the attacking infantry in the open fields. advancing infantry needed the defenders to stay suppressed in their trenches until the last possible moments, when they were virtually on top of the trenches themselves. the cannons were inaccurate and with timing and communication issues this meant inevitable friendly fire because of how close the infantry had to advance with the barrages. because the alternative to being hit with errant shells was open season for german machine guns. and that is hoping for everything to go well. just a horrible situation for everyone.

[@pechudin9086]

Here's why the 12th Isonzo offensive is actually a GOOD thing (I kid, I kid). Still, that's an eye-catching title, gotta say. And no, I have NOT seen the video yet. But id does make me want to see it.

[@Briselance]

Eye-catching title, indeed. Seriously, I do think that friendly fire is never, ever even almost a good thing. It wastes ammo and increases your own casualties. Friendly fire is NEVER even remotely good. Not now, not in 1914, not in 2000 BC, and it just won't ever be remotely good.

[@Rynewulf]

After his video on Haig, he seems to honestly have an 'Isonzo was smarter than you think' and 'Cadorna actually loved his men' in the works. He's going full weeaboo but for WWI Britain instead of the wehrmacht or soviets like we usually see with historu internet nerds

[@pechudin9086]

@@Briselance I suppose in this context friendly fire is more "a side-effect" or "cost of doing business". Cold, very not-nice towards the grunts on the field, but in the context of generalship it's basically cost-cutting?

[@pechudin9086]

@@Rynewulf Now I'd like to see a German perspective (Here's why Verdun was genius pr something like that).

[@Rynewulf]

@@pechudin9086 Honestly the German military has long had the reputation of 'very capable and successful but let down by backstabbing politicians' even on the Entente side since WWI. Obviously we all know where that mindset went come the 1930s, and Im always cautious about any military history nerd that talks like that about their favourite historical military. Ive seen the exact same sentiment but for British generals like Haig in Brandon's own comment section, very eerily similar 'it was the politicians you see not either an inherent tragedy or a result of military decisions' kind of stuff

[@SukacitaYeremia]

12:20 realizing the composition of people that couldn't do this versus those who could is really eye-opening.

[@Andrew-xq7ni]

When of the best users of the timed creeping barage was the canadians. The reason they were so good at it was they actually informed the ncm of the plans. As well as many many dry runs on mock ups of the actual enemy trenches. And on top of this they were constantly drilled so that they could all walk at exsactly the right place to avoid being blasted by artilary and jump into the enemies trench before theyve even had time to reman thier positions. Arthur currie was very forward thinking when it came to letting even regular spldiers have maps to study as well as informing the men of the plan far ahead of time and training them on a spesfic orginized attack. When officers or evrn sgts died lower enlisted men still new exactly what thier roles and jobs were. Kinda similar to how we fight today

[@MarktheRude]

What is the value of an individual is an interesting question in military arithmetics with quite a few variables involved. Like in volunteer armies might put more value on individual lives than conscript armies where value of individual is less than the rifle he is carrying. Or how in platoon level a loss of individual is likely going to be noted, but on a battalion level a loss of a platoon might be glossed over.

[@florinivan6907]

Conscripts at a societal level might be more valuable than volunteers. Revolutions never start from volunteer armies but conscript armies can and have done that. If conscripts feel like they're mistreated well they can easily rise up and also find support among civilians. Volunteers rising up usually have civilians say 'you signed up for this nobody forced you so shut up'. And the examples of conscript armies that didn't care almost always include the caveat 'they only avoided revolution through extreme brutality and even then'. Conscripts will always be viewed more favourably by civilians because they were forced and by extension the option of rising up is a genuine option. Volunteers not so much.

The Director of the German Tank museum wrote a book löooking at the development of field manuals of the Germany Army just Prior and into WW1. The last iterations of those pretty much stated the same as presented here. That is, that the troops had to be trained to go into their own artilelry barrage to be able to be on top of the enemy when the last grenades fell on the enemy trench.

[@SolInvictusLeatherWorks]

You gotta bring Timmy back for the ads! I can’t believe I’m commenting on in-video ads 😅 but still! I genuinely look forward to seeing what kind of mess Timmy had gotten himself into this week when you’d do those episodic ads. Lol

[@The_otschi]

There is a big difference in danger close and fradly fire Those terms where mixed up here, hanger close meaning risking to hit friendly units while friendly fire is specigically targeted at a friendly unit (mostly due to missidentification)

[@BrandonF]

According to the definition I found, mis-ranging and inaccurate fire still qualifies, which is why I went with it.

[@soul0360]

Great explanation. Creeping Artillery Barrages are still trained to this day. And I'd be surprised, if not imployed, in the war in Ukraine. I ended my military career, some 10 years ago, as a Forward Observer. I've done the calculations and planning for it, more times then I care to remember. As to friendly fire from artillery. Acceptable risk, depends on the concrete situation. Observation, Communication, procedures, weapons and ammo, have all come a long way since WW1. Yet, I have still had Mortar rounds, land more or less, on top of own troops, including myself, during combat. Luckily in that instance, it was smoke shells, and only 60mm. The key, like with anything in life, is risk mitigation. But still it's impossible to avoid mistakes and accidents. In the case above, it was one Mortar tube, that wasn't positioned correctly.

[@LafayetteCCurtis]

Such barrages were used in the first few months when Russia still had a massive advantage in artillery ammunition supply, especially during the capture of Sievierodonetsk and related actions (most notably at Popasna). But they largely went out of use since late 2022 or so due to shell hunger on both sides - even the Russians are relying on more precise concentrations now, though still not to the same level of precision as the Ukrainians.

[@commisaryarreck3974]

Smoke shells You have no idea how lucky you are that the US doesnt use WP for smokescreens

[@soul0360]

@@commisaryarreck3974 I'm Danish. And yes, we do, or at least did use White Phosphorus, in our smoke granades. And to be clear, so does/did the US. Unlike the US though. Denmark have signed the convention. Hence, our Rules Of Engagement, are extremely strict, as to when and how we utilise them.

[@soul0360]

@@LafayetteCCurtis I can't say for sure, that artillery is still used in this way, in Ukraine. But I would be surprised, if it isn't. Dispite it being a limited resource. Because it always have been. I have seen 'new' footage within the last year, of both creeping Barrages, and cluster munitions, used to suppress the enemy, just prior to forces moving in. So it wasn't just, "in the first few months". While both parties have more precise weapons/ammunition now, and more of it. Then they did in 2022. Both parties still have more 'dumb shells', and they still have more imprecise artillery pieces, then precision ones. As I recall the video, it correctly stated, that an advantage of Creeping Barrages is. That when you reach enemy trenches, they are still stunned. Which is more of an advantage, then sheer destruction, when taking ground. Shell numbers have always been one defining factor, as to when and how often you are able, to attack massive entrenchments. So you ration shells, in preparation of a planned attack. So overall low shell numbers just mean, that either side can do fewer of these, not that they don't do them at all. To be clear, you would newer throw massive amounts of shells at two guys in a ditch. That's not cost-effective. And units on the frontline are generally spread out more now, then in the initial phases. But there still are fortifications, where this is the best, least resource intensive option, for taking ground.

[@gumihyrule1278]

You are the best person for sponsors. So creative and charming

[@theassening4563]

2 ½ cups warm water(600 mL) 1 teaspoon sugar 2 teaspoons active dry yeast 7 cups all-purpose flour(875 g), plus more for dusting 6 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil, plus more for greasing 1 ½ teaspoons kosher salt ¼ cup semolina flour(30 g)

[@InspiriumESOO]

Buddy please use metric next time.

[@alexdietrich7975]

You seem like the kind of person who has enjoyed a few Close Combat or Combat Mission games back in the day. I played a lot of Combat Mission Afrika Korps. WW1 as a video game topic is so unappreciated in every genre. Beyond The Wire and Verdun were amazing too when they were popular. Anyways, just started watching these videos last night, I love getting to hear such great discussion of history and wish I had more people to talk about this stuff with, and be able to ask questions. Awesome videos.

[@taskermorris]

Now ya done it

[@HeftySack]

idec I just love the effort and dedication u put into ur vids. awesome job, very informative

[@nickdeeba1545]

You are absolutely living your best life. Keep up the great videos!

[@PersonalCoach]

I would never before have considered "friendly fire" to be a good thing...

[@benjaminhaupais6470]

not a good thing, a less worst thing

[@Movetheproduct]

it's a dumb title

[@f0rth3l0v30fchr15t]

@@Movetheproduct Is this your first day on KZbin? If not, then you'd know that the platform incentivises dumb titles.

[@Movetheproduct]

@@f0rth3l0v30fchr15t jesus, thats a lame question.

[@Briselance]

You wouldn't have, indeed. Because it's not a good thing.😅

[@Barnrathunter]

Alright lmao that was a damn good ad read the animal planet in the wild joke in any context always makes me giggle thank you

[@ermtea]

that picture of the bagpipe players in the middle of a warzone is actually FIRE

[@Waakala]

mr b. this was a clear and informative video, but with a title like that it's no wonder that some people accuse you of being an apologist for the perceived incompetence of the high command

[@ScipionLaurentiend]

Make sense...still must have been pretty damn hard on the fella having to get shot from both side

[@benneem]

Was there the flip side of this? Any treatises about defenders leaping back to the parapet even as the shells keep falling, if it's confirmed the enemy have actually gone over the top? It would seem the mathematics of being more exposed to artillery but needing to thwart the enemy advance would be similar to the "friendly fire is good" maths.

[@r.coburn3344]

Just checked out the native oak website. Both well put together and in algnment with my values! Hurray!

[@stephenpolizzi]

I got to say this first before I talk about the actual video the sponsor segment was great you should do a david attenborough animal documentary skit next. Now to the real video it's like your last video on how you can't stop an attack, you can't stop an attack if you have 1 out of 100 shells under shot. Also you need to now make a video on They Shall Not Grow Old to go with the WW1 theme you been doing and I know you like it because of streams. Final thing hope you make a stream on this video like the last one.

[@DuffTerrall]

I feel that the fact they have to repeatedly remind people "keep shooting even if it seems like you might be hitting our troops" demonstrates that they were very aware that this is something that bothered people, and that it was necessary to remind people that it really matters to do it this way

[@LafayetteCCurtis]

This is far from just a World War I thing. World War II German Panzer manuals still advised tank unit leaders that a few losses to friendly fire was better than lifting the supporting fire too soon. Modern Russian manuals still have procedures for infantry advancing and attacking closely behind creeping barrages (although shell hunger means that such tactics have been rarely used since late 2022 or so).

[@godotnkirill]

**That post is sponsored by the Death korp of Krieg**

[@reaver1414]

How would they know if it was one of their artillery shells or one of the enemies?

[@salmanovitch6702]

Love your content, not sure why I haven’t subscribed. But I’m subscribing after that amazing advertisement

[@HiraethMasonry]

My uncle was killed by friendly fire in WWII. A small price to pay to save the rest of his battalion from a powerful Japanese banzai charge..

[@VersusARCH]

Who was the genius who managed to hit your uncle of all people while facing a mass freaking suicide charge?

[@HiraethMasonry]

@ It was mess. My uncle’s battalion was moving through a narrow gorge on Biak Island, his company in the lead. The Japanese hit them while they were packed in an almost indefensible formation. Air support was called in and the battalion was ordered to withdraw to give a few hundred yards of clearance. They fell back too slowly due to the congestion in the rear. The strafing stopped the Japanese attack but killed two Americans in the process. I was lucky enough to talk to some of the survivors about twenty years ago and learned these details. Otherwise, we would never have known much about the Purple Heart still in the family.

[@daetslovactmandcarry6999]

21:37 _“(A) French piece actually published 1917 and translated a year later into French…” So, ¿it was translated from French to Frence? 6:40 _“You have my phone…”_ Ah, the trials and tribulations of us commoners…

[@daetslovactmandcarry6999]

This superthanks sponsored by Pappa CARRY.

[@BrandonF]

Haha, little verbal typo there- from French to English! Please convey my thanks again for the generosity, it is much appreciated!

[@brunozeigerts6379]

In the militia, our section leader told us that if we charge an enemy position, we should keep moving through the position. The reason being that the enemy would call down artillery on their own position. (there was a code word for calling artillery on your position, but I can't remember. Oscar Zulu, maybe. Canadian military)

[@ChristianDall-p2j]

6:43 ahh, come closer, that is a Wild ekster Wallet!😂

[@Zekyb0y]

not counting that at the start of the war in the western front, it was never predicted that indirect artillery would be so important, often having shortages of shells because the real demand at the front would exceed the projected demand that was planned and fielding more direct fire cannons than needed which were useless and often used only on clearing enemy razor wires. People had to work with what they had on hand in the early war.

[@ericschnipke874]

Lol I enjoyed the Ekster ad!

[@georgekaragiannakis6637]

Another good example of the need for friendly fire is shown in the movie “Danger Close” where the Australian infantry called friendly artillery fire on the position of the leading platoon as it was being overrun by North Vietnamese.

[@tigerade76]

Dzięki za polecenie gierki, wygląda jak rzecz dla mnie. Dodałem do listy życzeń na Steamie, jedynie byłem w szoku gdy zobaczyłem że wyszła w 2023 roku 😮Wygląda jak coś co mogło by zostać wydane 10 lat temu. Oczywiście pomimo tego wymagania sprzętowe ma współczesne 😂

[@TheIrishvolunteer]

Another WW1 doc so soon? Thanks Brandon!

[@hkmp57]

Great video as always Recently i've watched similiar video about modern warfare (lot of studies about first war in Iraq) And even when they counted that friendly fire was couse of significant amount of casulties, becouse compilation of long range engagement and high mobility of the forces, Conclusion was the same. More emphasis on avoiding friendly fire, would couse more casulties overall

[@kahunakorteze2763]

Great job! One question; and how did the defending side act in their defence?

[@mackenshaw8169]

The concept was developped by the Australians with the "creeping barage" technique. Today the RT code for this is "Danger Close". There's a reason why gunners are known as "drop shorts".

[@МихайлоСєльський]

Nice analysis of one particular kind (perhaps the most common one, but still) of friendly fire)

[@River.E.M]

This is perhaps the first person I've seen to properly understand the superiority of suppressing fire over preliminary bombardment in the case of ww1 history.

[@biyurica]

Never knew friendly fire could be beneficial but here we are

[@rtconnelly]

You need trigonometry to account for wind or sea currents depending on the weight of your ammunition and the distance of the target. Artillery can probably ignore it because the shells are so heavy, but please don't take my word for that!

[@RustysRevenge]

For as long as ranged weapons has existed *meanwhile Glonk knocks the teeth out of Clonk while trying to hit a sabertooth*

[@advasity339]

Ah I see the sponsor segments have become even more spectacular

[@SubaCenter]

I love the ww1 content so much!

[@brunozeigerts6379]

For American officers in Vietnam, 'friendly fire' was often intentional. Fragging was the name for it. Apparently Russian officers in Afghanistan often suffered from it. Not sure how much of that is true and how much is exaggeration.

[@alansmithee8831]

Hello Brandon. It is tempting to see the phrase "slings and arrows" as small fry in comparison to this barrage, but they were also deadly. The answer must have seemed obvious -- use gas, until the wind changed. Nothing friendly about deadly weapons.

[@xanaxwizard]

The finder card in the wallet is so smart man I might get one for Christmas for myself because I am so silly sometimes… for something I need Every day I’m terrible I’ve lost 2 wallets and I’m only 25 years old!!!

[@washingtonradio]

It wasn't that no one cared about friendly fire it was the technology of the era made friendly fire casualties an inevitability in combat. While more precise munitions will reduce friendly fire incidents the odd malfunction/counter measure means they still occur even today.

[@Astrnauted]

It’s not like they were trying or welcoming of friendly fire. They employed a technique called creeping barrages or walking barrages. It kept the heads down of the enemy and gave friendlies time to advance. In the grandioseness that is war with its immense logistics of course accidents happened. Without modern technology and programs they happened way more often. Killing friendlies wasn’t welcomed or celebrated though.

[@auroraborealissaltmineswarlord]

Regarding the artillery in great war western front, that is heavy artillery which is worse at supression than light (and in my opinion worse at killing too, 3 light artillery barrages in the right spot would wipe that unit in the trenches out)

[@pechudin9086]

Should've had a skit where you try to find the wallet in no Man's land as the artillery starts.

[@TheKiltedGerman]

Ma guy made a 30 min video explaining creeping barrages.

[@SusCalvin]

I always have to imagine them trying to use this combined arms warfare without modern communications. So all of this is held together by runners, field telephones, flags, pigeons, whistles etc.

[@Mailed-Knight]

You captured the animal expert bit perfectly.

[@fabiospasiano9885]

Me when I’m being court martialed for being responsible of several dozen of both enemy, friendly and civilian casualties:

[@vjbd2757]

Lemme guess: someone mistimed the creeping barrage?

[@eliane2743]

Thanks a lot for the video and explanation. I suppose that is the origin of all legends about senior officers having their own trenches bombarded so the men would get out and assault the enemy lines.

[@nahiro12345]

0:40 - Me: Recalls the amount of times I shot with archers over the frontline taking some of mine down but many more enemies. . . . I think I get it.

[@ReedCBowman]

Is the "Guns, Gunners, and their Co-operation with Infantry" by any chance the 1913 lecture on the subject included as an appendix to David Hutchinson's _Mons: An Artillery Battle_ (2018)? I don't have this book to look at it, but the coincidence of the title seems suggestive.

[@TheHej2]

Question: In the diagrams of the creeping barrage, please take a look at the image at 5:52. there are two arches of fire, one on the enemy and one close to the enemy. Why is there one close to the friendly troops? is it necessary to have two "curtains" of shells

[@alganhar1]

Yes. First the second line of the barrage sweeps no mans land of potential enemy patrols prior to your infantry moving forward. That's secondary though, if you notice that second line of fire moves to the rear of the enemy trench as the attacking troops assault it. This is done for two reasons. First, it stops the enemy moving up reinforcements to the trench as they would have to move through not one, but two layers of bombardment. Second is that second line of fire will remain for a while as the first line of fire moves onto the next objective, this is to give the infantry some defence against counterattack while they are disorganised after the assault. WWI barrage plans were insanely complicated, but they had to be as there was no way for attacking troops to contact their supporting artillery to direct fire. There were no man portable radios in those days, so the only reliable ways to get messages back was to send a runner, or an animal with a written message, usually a pigeon or a dog. Which meant the only way to coordinate artillery with attacking infantry was through the use of timetabled barrage plans. There were a few ways to call for pre planned barrages, but they were almost always defensive in nature, not offensive.

[@TheHej2]

Thanks

[@nebojsag.5871]

25:58 That's some proper British humor there.

[@kvltntr00]

gave this video a like for the Ekster ad

[@RdClZn]

I'm not sure if it's your field of expertise, but I read on Anthony Beevors book on the Berlin campaign of 1945 how during the offensive across the spree river the soviet artillery held one of the greatest bombardments in History (perhaps the greatest) before the assault. They did not use this technique. If you have any idea why it was not used and why in the three decades apart the application of artillery in offensive maneuvers was different, I'd be very interested to know.

[@robertkalinic335]

Why would you do creeping barrages past ww1 when every aspect of warfare advanced to cover for limits that made it viable tactic. You want barrage to move or adjust it you literally just call them, no need for pre planned pattern.

[@RdClZn]

@robertkalinic335 you are correct, what I'm trying to say is that it was described as a long barrage followed by an assault, without this intense concern about only ceasing the barrage immediately before the assault troops reached the defense works

[@nicholaswhitman4620]

Just discovered you channel, loving it btw. Do you ever play Foxhole?

[@musicalaviator]

if you accidently charge into an allied unit and kill them with lances or swords, is that still friendly fire?

[@commisaryarreck3974]

That happened shockingly often Even the roman cavalry charged their own men by accident in several battled (that we still have records of)

[@oliverpohlproductions8291]

You play great war: Western front too?! I love that game! It's so sad the devs went AWOL.

[@WoodlandFops]

Nice

[@KarlPHorse]

Oh WW1. What an all around just bad time for everyone involved. Well except for Adrian Carton De Wiart. That dude loved fighting.

[@PrivateRojas]

Hello Brandon as a re-enactor my self I would just like to say if you could review a American revolutionary war, so that is extremely historically inaccurate From the commands to the uniforms, it is called liberty, kids I’m not sure if you heard of it before but it be very interesting for you to see a topic like that

[@Samichski]

Friendly fire stills fire...