Mitchell Loughlin’s Reviews > The Guns of August > Status Update

France and English who were called upon both refused to alter their plans, instead making demands of the Belgium that would cost them thousands of lives and go completely against there goals. Belgium, obviously refused.

The French generals were not thrilled with the plan, many of them spoke out against the weak left flank calling out the ignorance of leaving it virtually undefended

The Belgium army intended to
Add 20k troops but they did not have the time to act. They instead positioned the troops behind the fort in the event that it fell.

Germany could not afford to alter the timeline for this but they could not break the fort. They started to go around it to find the city’s nearby abandoned. They also were stuck by the first airplane bomber in history

The leige was a for created in the late 1800s. It was 99% underground at the top of a hill. The portions which were above ground were machine gun nests that mowed through the German lines. The Germans, who had left their siege equipment at home continues to send troops to their death against the fort. At points the body’s were piled up yards high. This was not defended as it could have been

Germany began there invasion of Belgium under the assumption that there would be no resistance. Due to this they did not have there seige weapons ready instead allowing them more preparation time before the real war began.
The Belgium people however were not ready to let an army march right through their country and resisted. At first this was small
Skirmishes wiped out by the Germans but then they reach Leige

This was KINDOF believable because England just stole there boat. Turkish men took over the boat and sent it up to Russia where it attacked the ports. This stopped 95% of Russias trade which is believed to be the major reason the war extended as long as it did

Coal became a big concern as all of these ships used tremendous amounts of coal to power there steam engines. In an effort of speed the Germans ran there men around the clock with serval dying due to heat stroke , smoke inhalation.

Eventually the German boats made it to Turkey where they were welcomed into the mined ports. Turkey trying to remain viability neutral claimed they were buying the German boats

Heading towards the allergy neutral Constantinople instead knowing they would be given safe passage. They stopped in Italy who declared the neutrality and the war officially began. They could now freely fire on each other. One little boat was able to spot the goegan and kept the rest of the army appraised of what was happening.
They had a little skirmish but the German boats wanted to run as fast as possible

Several times English and German boats passed by each other waiting for the start of the war before firing but neither side wanted to be the first to fire.
Germany decided to go against the international treaty for displaying other countries flags on war ships and blew up French trading vessels. This was largely not noticed.
Everyone assumed Germany would go west towards France but they pulled a U-turn instead

Turkey, who had for a long time been a stopping ground for British fleets trading with Asian markets asked B for an official alliance and B basically said “eww your broke” then stole turkeys biggest boat.
Turkey obviously pissed about this sided with Germany secretly while outwards stating they would be neutral in the conflict.

The German dreadnaught Goeban was the main target in the early days of the war

While a lot of the war would be fought on land there was also the sea to contend with. Britain had the biggest navy in the world second being Germany. Britain feared over commitment knowing a full on attack by G to B would be brutal if there ships were in the med.
E did commit 3 big aships to the med + smaller ships with the goal of finding and destroying the Germans dreadnaught class ships at the onset of the war