The Battle of Verdun in 1916 was the longest single battle of World War One. The casualties from ... The area around Verdun contained twenty major forts and forty smaller ones that had historically protected the eastern border of France and had been modernised in the early years of the Twentieth Century. read more
Only the World War I Western Front could have produced the rationale for the Battle of Verdun. In his so-called Christmas Memo of 1915, Erich von Falkenhayn, the chief of the German General Staff, made a uniquely cynical proposal: not to take territory but to take lives, to cause the French army to “bleed to death” defending the fortress complex around Verdun on the Meuse heights. read more
Battle of Verdun, (February 21–December 18, 1916), World War I engagement in which the French repulsed a major German offensive. It was one of the longest, bloodiest, and most-ferocious battles of the war; French casualties amounted to about 400,000, German ones to about 350,000. read more