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Question: What was the cause of Stalemate of trench warfare in WWI!?
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My take is somewhat different!. Following the U!.S!. Civil War, European war colleges, believing that R!.E!. Lee was the greater general, studied his strategy and tactics!. HIs strategy was defensive: try to stalemate the Union and get it to give up and stop fighting!. His tactics were to dig in--build earthen fortifications and stay behind them, forcing the Union to attack!.

Therefore, when WWI broke out, and after the initial German offensive, both sides settled down to essentially defensive strategies that relied on digging in!. Trenches resulted and, as pointed out above, the types of weapons employed made it almost suicidal to launch an offensive!. Although tragically, both sides kept launching offensives!.Www@QuestionHome@Com

The above answers are right!. Rapid firing weapons such as machine guns created the stalemate!. Prior to their invention, trench warfare was a tried and proven method of fighting a war!. In the American Civil War, most units used one shot muskets that required a long reloading process of up to 90 seconds between volleys!. This allowed trench charges to prove much less costly!. In WWI, a single soldier could fire more than a thousand bullets in less time than it took a civil war soldier to reload!. Even soldiers with regular semi-automatic cartridge rifles, which were introduced to American soldiers in small numbers during the civil war, could wreak havoc on a charging line of soldiers!. Www@QuestionHome@Com

Principally, it was the dual advances of moderately reliable machine guns and rapid firing artillery!. Once a defensive trench was set, assaulting it became virtually impossible!. The articllery helped encourage the digging of trenches to reduce exposure to shellfire!. Www@QuestionHome@Com

Because in trench warfare, defense is easy, but offense is costly and difficult!. Charging headlong into rows of machine guns is almost always a disaster!. So if you can't advance, and neither can your enemy, you get a stalemate!.Www@QuestionHome@Com

Improvements in weapons made mobility difficult- with artillery raining explosive shells, barbed wire hindering movement, and machine guns raking the field, movement was very hazardous!.
The invention of the tank helped open warfare and allow mobility again!.Www@QuestionHome@Com