WW1 or WW2

In terms of soldiers only, what do you think was worse? Exluding civilians and cities.

Trenches of World War 1 or World war 2?


All opinions are welcome!!!!

Well for me it would be WW1 and specifically the battle of the Boars head 30th June 1916, which was a diversionary attack on the day before the Somme, however the battle is considered here abouts and in the History of the Royal Sussex Regiment to be the day Sussex died

" And so closed the youth or maturity... of many a Sussex worthy." Edmund Blunde

From my memory, within the few hours that the battle took place, not one town, village or hamlet in Sussex hadn't expereinced the loss of loved ones.

Edmund Blunden (poet) Officer in the 1st Southdowns Battlion

Can You Remember?
Yes, I still remember
The whole thing in a way;
Edge and exactitude
Depend on the day.

Of all that prodigious scene
There seems scanty loss,
Though mists mainly float and screen
Canal, spire and fosse;

Though commonly I fail to name
That once obvious Hill,
And where we went and whence we came
To be killed, or kill.
Those mists are spiritual
And luminous-obscure,
Evolved of countless circumstance
Of which I am sure;

Of which, at the instance
Of sound, smell, change and stir,
New-old shapes for ever
Intensely recur.

And some are sparkling, laughing, singing,
Young, heroic, mild;
And some incurable, twisted,
Shrieking, dumb, defiled.


[edit on 9/2/10 by thoughtsfull]

I watched the movie 'Passchendaele' the other day and I wouldn't wish that on anybody (lol not the movie, it was quite good...but the trench/mud warfare).

Combined with gas attacks and trying out new tactics it was a misery.

All war is hell though, in my opinion.

WW1,


Trench wars on soldiers is hard.. Not to mention technology was bad as well. Watching Zeitgeist right now.. So I am not going into speach mode about it. Pretty obvious thou..

reply to post by RyanLA123


Well that's a hard one. On the one hand, as many above have already noted, trench warfare is, psychologically speaking, one of the most nervkilling forms of war that ever occured. But one should not forget that time spent in FORWARD trenches (as we remember WW1 from movies) was something that soldiers weren't exposed to for long continious times. Most of the times rotation and replacement rates were so fast that individual soldiers would almost be happy for forward trench duty just to kill the insane boredom of the hinterlands. That's simpified, of course.

In the mobile campaigns of WW2 we have a different kind of stress on the other hand. While there were only seldom any discernible front lines and trenches that produced the psychological effects of WW1, combat was made a hell of a lot more confusing and scary by the cooperation of artillery, air, and tank weapons thanks to communication. Also, at least from the German and Russian perspective, replacement rates were slower and individual combat grew unpredictable - while the average soldier in WW1 pretty much knew when he could expect the # to hit the fan. On the eastern front there were instances of day, even weeklong attacks and counterattacks that were undetaken without any replacements, meaning an individual soldier would be engaged for days and weeks without any time in the hinterlands like in WW1.

Just my 2 cents from the top of my head. Haven't thought about this that much....

Overall, I think that WWI was a lot harder on troops; trench warfare is um-imaginably horrible, not to mention when the whistle blows and your squad, after watching countless others before you get mowed down by machine guns, has to cross no-man's land.

I think that the worst experience out of both wars had to be the German-Russian front. If you were Russian, you almost had to worry about your own side shooting you more than the Germans. The conditions were brutal also- sub-zero conditions mixed with brutality against POW's from both sides.

reply to post by NichirasuKenshin


I understand your point.. tho I pick WW1 based on the impact a few hours had on my county.. hence that one battle is known as the day Sussex died.

But your comments do bring to mind my Grandfathers who served in WW2.

One an officer in R.E.M.E who in the heat of battle was charged getting the damaged tanks back in to battle ASAP.. he only ever spoke once of the mush that where humans he had to scrape out of those tanks.. My other Grandfather was a GI battlefield medic..

Considering neither had weapons I don't think I will ever be able to comprehend the stress and strain of combat without at least the notion in my head I had some form of defense..

Besides being my grandparents I can not help but have the deepest respect for those that went into battle with spanners, syringes and the like..

My great great uncle(My Nans, Fathers, Brother) fought in WW1... During the 1980's his wife died and, due to ill health, he went to live with my Grandparents.

During my visits to see my Grandparent my uncle would often tell me stories about the war... he was very open about it... I would often hear my Nan shout from the kitchen “Jim, stop telling him them war stories, he’ll have nightmares” LOL

My uncle signed up when he was 14 (he lied about his age) along with two friends. He was shot 3 times during the war... Shoulder, Leg and elbow... each time going back to battle after a short stay in a field hospital! Not only did he survive being shot 3 times, he also survived Artillery, Disease and Mud!

The sadist story he told me was about how one of his closest friends died, he only ever told me this story once so it’s a little rusty but...

One afternoon there was a short artillery barrage followed by a gas attack warning. My uncle, along with his friend and the rest of their company, put on their gas masks. They waited in anticipation of an attack from the Germans but it never came. Eventually they were given the all clear so my uncle removed his mask and looked around for his friend. He found him laying face down in the mud with his mask still on. When he lifted him out of the mud he spotted a bullet hole in the front of the mask. The mask must have taken a stray bullet earlier in the day... obviously this meant that it offered no protection against the gas and so, overcome by gas, he collapsed in the mud and died! He was 17 years old!!

Which War was worse... I don’t know... People die in all wars and to try and decide, which is worse, somehow feels like a cheapening of the memories of those who thought!

May all of their souls rest in peace!


[edit on 9-2-2010 by Muckster]

World War 1 and 2 were both very tragic in American History. To even pick the worse is a very tough thing to do. World War 1 we entered very late in the game. Britain took the brunt of that. Trench warfare was very devastating for everyone. World War 2 we were attacked on our own soil. (sorry native Hawaiin's) We also fought a war on two fronts. Over 1 million Americans were wounded and dead by 1945. Whereas over 300,000 were wounded and dead by the end of World War 1. I am going to have to go by the numbers on this one. On American society though the Civil war was far more devastating.



[edit on 9-2-2010 by kenny71]

I personally believe, that fighting in WW1 as a soldier was the more cruel thing because, trench warfare was nothing more then leading fatstock to the slaughter. I mean back then, there sounded a bugle or something, somewhere and therafter, hundreds upon hundreds, even thousands of young men stood up, ran just to reach the nearby trench in front of them but only to get mowed down by a few machine guns within seconds. This is, was, pure madness.

Here are some postcards which were sent from the trenches of France during WW1. Written by some of my ancestors. I've forgotten to scan the back but it's German anyway. And even for me, it's hard to read the lines because of the very old fashioned way they wrote back then.









Anyway, Germans, Frenchmen, Russians, the British, the American soldiers, they all thought, they fight for the right thing, but in fact they only fought and died for the megalomania of their leaders.

And without WW1, there were no Hitler and even a WW2 imaginable.

War is always a crime but sometimes there unfortunately is no other way...



Think twice

What's the price of a mile? I think that's what fits best when talking about WW1...

And this is what happens in case humaneness overcomes hate, rooted in nationalism: