What were the experiences of AIF soldiers (western front)?
Image of AIF soldiers on the Western front from: http://www.diggerhistory.info/pages-army-today/brigades/09bde.htm
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During the First World War the AIF played a vital role in the war effort. This was done digging the trenches across the Western Front as well as fighting (ww1twarfare.weebly, n.a). The AIF soldiers were also often the ones sent by the British to go into “No Man’s Land” (the space between the trenches) in attempts to capture the enemies’ trenches. These attempts rarely got soldiers into the enemies’ trenches due to the invention of the machine gun. A main battle of which the AIF participated in was the 3rd Battle for Ypres during late 1917. The goal was to capture the higher ground eastward of Ypres where the main objective, the village of Passchendaele. Capturing the village was strategically advantageous because in capturing the town would mean breaking the German line. Eight attempts were made to capture the village, the AIF used in five, ultimately ended in failure. The ending casualties of the Allies were 310,000, 38,000 of which were a part of the AIF; the amount of German casualties were about 270,000 (Department of Veterans’ Affairs, 2014). Another battle the AIF took a major part in was the Bullecourt. This happened in April 1917 just after the USA had joined the Allied forces. The Germans had pulled back to the Hindenburg line, which was viciously fortified. The Australians were sent to attempt to attack the trenches near Bullecourt, but unfortunately the tanks that were supposed to lead the attack broke down, however the attack continued anyway. The Australians faced terrible conditions; they faced major German counter-attacks and artillery. The artillery can both from miss-guided strikes from the British and others from the Germans. This caused the casualties to reach 80%, however, the Australians managed to capture and hold Bullecourt (Darlington, 2012).
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