verdun

The German attack at Verdun was just 40km wide, the Russian invalsion now is a >1000km front.

In WWI a prevailing tactic was troop attrition - the infamous Battle of Verdun being a sick but paragon example.

The shelling, in Verdun for example, was so absurd that it's not really relatable to pollution.

Sad to think that many of the young men in uniform probably died in the trenches at Marne or Verdun over the next several years.

When people imagine mass casualty events, they imagine something like Verdun or Hiroshima, where tens of thousands are killed within a relatively concentrated geographic radius.

Just ask how productive the fields of Verdun are.

A million shells fired by the Germans in Verdun in a mere 8 hours and now the entirety of Europe can't make that number in a year.

I passed through Verdun the next day, it's similarly disappointing - you can't see it until you're close by, then it's just a wall.

And while Verdun was a brutal battle, in which Germany had equal losses, it was not the main source of cassualties on the Western Front for either side.

>Just ask how productive the fields of Verdun are.

Tanks were a decidedly underwhelming weapon due to the initial use being squandered by the British - though it was part of the push to relieve pressure on Verdun and thus keep France in the war.

I suspect European listeners will be surprised by less, but for any American who doesn't know what I'm talking about if I mention Verdun or the Somme, I _highly_ recommend the podcasts.

Recall that France had some very serious mutinies around the time of the battle of Verdun.

Verdun has been a major battleground in WW1 because that's where Charlemagne's legacy got split up.

As per the article, approximately 60 million shells were fired at the battle of Verdun.