The Second Battle of the Marne [Hardcover]

The First Battle of the Marne produced the so-called Miracle of the Marne, when French and British forces stopped the initial German drive on Paris in 1914. Hundreds of thousands of casualties later, with opposing forces still dug into trench lines, the Germans tried again to push their way to Paris and to victory. The Second Battle of the Marne (July 15 to August 9, 1918) marks the point at which the Allied armies stopped the massive German Ludendorff Offensives and turned to offensive operations themselves. The Germans never again came as close to Paris nor resumed the offensive. The battle was one of the first large multinational battles fought by the Allies since the assumption of supreme command by French general Ferdinand Foch. It marks the only time the French, American, and British forces fought together in one battle. A superb account of the bloody events of those fateful days, this book sheds new light on a critically important 20th-century battle.

Michael S. Neiberg is Professor of History at the University of Southern Mississippi. He is author of Fighting the Great War: A Global History; Warfare and Society in Europe, 1898Present; Foch: Supreme Allied Commander in the Great War; and other books. He lives in Hattiesburg, Mississippi.

There is very little on the French in the March offensive in any language: how they fought, what they had learned, or not learned, from the past four years. This is an original contribution. I'm only sorry I didn't get the idea first.The Second Battle of the Marne is clearly and poignantly written and based throughout on the most recent research. The spirited writing is supported by six excellent maps and twenty-eight well-captioned photographs.Vol. 42, 2009In all, this is a first-rate work of analysis and an original contribution to the study of the Western Front.August/September 2008[T]his is a first-rate work of analysis, an original contribution to the study of the Western Front.. . . a refreshing monographicl3-