Logan N 11/4/2022

NAME _______________________________________ DATE _______________ CLASS _________ SS

Geography and History Activity netw rks
World War I and Its Aftermath, 1914–1920

Military Technology and Trench Warfare

The New Geography of Warfare
Advances in military technology made World War I very different from previous wars.
The geography of warfare was fundamentally changed by the use of powerful artillery
weapons that were capable of hurling huge explosive shells onto battlefields from great
distances. To protect themselves from artillery, troops on both sides dug networks of
trenches that eventually stretched from the English Channel to the Swiss border.
Another new weapon, the machine gun, prevented soldiers from overrunning enemy
trenches. No-man’s-land—the space between opposing trenches—was a barren
landscape filled with barbed wire and other obstacles and pocked with craters from
artillery bursts.

Because this terrain was so difficult to cross, a stalemate quickly developed, with
both sides failing to break through the other’s lines. The stalemate led to further
developments in military technology that made trench warfare even more horrific. In
April 1915 the Germans first used a poison gas that caused vomiting, blindness, and
suffocation. The Allies soon followed the Germans. To counter gas attacks, both sides
developed gas masks.

New Technology to Attack the Trenches

Caption: To help capture
( LC-USZ62-115011)
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division
Copyright © The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. Permission is granted to reproduce for classroom use.

trenches, the Allies built tanks

that were immune to machine
gun fire and able to smash
through barbed wire. Tanks
had tracks instead of wheels,
enabling them to cross the
mud and craters of no-man’s-
land.

Caption: Airplanes offered

both sides a way to counter
trench warfare. Several types
of aircraft, including the
British Sopwith Camel shown
on the left, could carry 4–5
small bombs to drop on
Marc Arundale/Alamy Images

enemy artillery trenches. They

also attacked troops using
their machine guns.

United States History and Geography: Modern Times

NAME _______________________________________ DATE _______________ CLASS _________

Geography and History Activity Cont. netw rks

World War I and Its Aftermath, 1914–1920

Directions: Answer the questions below in the space provided.

Understanding Concepts
1. Why did both sides develop such an extensive network of trenches?

Trenches were the main way of fighting on land during WWI. Trenches were guarded by
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machine guns, mortars, and more, and were nearly unbreachable, so they were the best
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way to defend your land.
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2. How did trenches lead to a stalemate?

Both the Central Powers and the Allies had mostly the same technology, and whatever
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technology one side had that the other didn't wasn't good enough to breach the trenches.
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No other side had a clear advantage over the other, and a distinct advantage was what
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you needed to breach the trenches.

3. Why do you think gas attacks were so effective against trenches?

Copyright © The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. Permission is granted to reproduce for classroom use.
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Gas attacks will destroy anyone on land. Unless you've got a gas mask, you're dead,
because the gas will seep through every nook and cranny it finds to get to you, and you'll
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get poisoned and die before you know it. It can't be countered or used against the enemy,
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you just have to survive it.
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Applying Concepts
4. What other dangers besides the enemy do you think the troops in the trenches faced?

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Because the trenches were probably the most unsanitary place known to man, you would
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have constant diseases and sicknesses ravaging your troops, starvation, rat and insect
infestation, and much more. It wasn't just the guy you were fighting that was killing you in
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the trenches.
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5. Why do you think trench warfare is no longer as prevalent as it was in World War I?

Think about it: people in Germany, the U.S, Britain, and all the countries that fought in WWI signed up for their
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country's military because everyone thought of war as some "game" in which everyone would be home by
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Christmas. But do you really think that after the horrible, gruesome, things that happened in the trenches, anyone
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would want to go to war ever again? Along with this, technology had advanced in such a way that air and sea fights
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were just as common as land attacks, and gureilla fighting was the primary form of fighting on land.
United States History and Geography: Modern Times