In order to wage these large offensives, all of the armies were forced to rely upon significant manpower and military technology. However, the battles up until this point were very bloody and caused significant casualties to all countries participating. Crown Prince Rupprecht commented on the Entente’s great loss of life saying, “This success cost the English, according to careful estimates, a loss of at least 230,000 men…total losses of our enemies must, therefore, amount to about 350,000” (“The Battle of the Somme by Crown Prince Rupprecht”, 38). Great Britain enacted conscription for the first time for males aged 18-41 because the soldiers on the front were getting worn down and battle plans called for large frontal attacks with thousands of men. Nevertheless, an increasing problem was that new soldiers were “still far from being fully trained,” but the British needed bodies at the front lines so they threw them in anyway (“Sir Douglas Haig, British Commander-in-Chief in France and Flanders, 2nd Dispatch”, 2). The British adopted a policy called Pal’s Battalions, which had men serve with their friends and family from home. The objective was to make the men braver when they were ordered up-over-the-top of the trenches as they marched into death at No Man’s Land, but this strategy proved very deadly. In contrast, Germany had a large army and a significant reserve of officers and trained soldiers of which they relied upon to continuously supply the trench lines. Advances in technology such as the tank, Dreadnaughts, and Fokker Eindekker airplanes allowed for the war to escalate even further and cause more destruction of land, resources, and life than previously ever conceived.

The Battle of the Somme was a large Allied offensive that embodied elaborate battle preparations and military strategies. The original plan for the battle was to attack the Central Powers on three fronts, with Great Britain and France attacking in the West, Russia attacking in the East, and Italy attacking in the South. However, because of the Battle of Verdun, the Battle of the Somme became a predominantly British initiative with French assistance. In order to prepare for the Battle of Somme, the Allies accumulated immense stores of ammunition, improved roads for travel, created numerous wells for water sources, dug shelters for troops, and tunneled miles of trenches to allow for effective communication (“Sir Doug