As the sun set on the Somme battle, over 125,000 Allied soldiers lay dead on the fields of Picardy. Every inch of ground that had been gained had been paid for in blood.
The Germans, badly mauled from their experiences both in Picardy and Verdun, and concerned by Austrian failures against the Italians took the remarkable decision to withdraw their armies from the Somme to a newly constructed defensive line, a remarkable feat of precision German defensive engineering, the Siegfriedstellung or Hindenburg Line.
Codenamed Operation Alberich, after the malevolent dwarf King from German mythology, the withdrawal was a tactical masterstroke, that left the Allies both bemused and stranded in a desolate wilderness of scorched earth. Why did the Germans make this decision? What did their commanders think, and what was the strategic impact on the Allies' planning? Find out all in our first episode of Season 3.
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