The Failure of The Schlieffen Plan

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Failure of The Schlieffen Plan

Von Moltke assumed four things:

Russia would take at least 6 weeks to mobilise.

It only took Russia 10 days to mobilise so when Germany thought it would be able to defeat France and then turn to the western front and fight Russia. As Russia were able to mobilise in 2 week then they has to fight a war and both fronts. This was not good for Germany as there army was split in half.

Belgium would not resist any German attack.

Belgium did not resist the attack and Belgium and Britain had an alliance so Britain helped Belgium.

France would be easily defeated in 6 weeks.

France were not easy to defeat and Britain helded them once Belgium was defeated so then the British and French were able to hold Germany off

Britain would remain neutral.

This plan did work as they helped a lot

On 2nd August 1914, the German army invaded Luxembourg and Belgium.

The Germans were stopped by the Belgium army helped up by the BEF (British Expeditionary Force) which arrived extremely quickly. Russia also organised their army in just 10 days and Germany was forced to withdraw troops to defend her eastern border. Germany did not take the chance to take Paris, instead decided to attack east of the capital. They were met by French at the battle of the Marne (5-11 Sept) which halted the German advance.