Meuse Argonne - The Most Serious Business

Battles of the First World War Podcast

Mike Cunha

History

4.8 • 812 Ratings

🗓️ 29 November 2018

⏱️ 31 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

At 0230 on the 26th of September, 1918, 2,775 French and American guns opened up on the German lines from the Argonne Forest to the River Meuse. Three hours later, nine divisions of American Doughboys were up out of their muddy trenches and into the mist. The largest battle in American military history was underway.

The AEF 1st Army however, faced a formidable enemy who had spent years turning the Meuse Valley into a 10-mile thick defense zone. All of it would have to be chewed through to reach the target railroad hubs at Sedan, 35 miles away. In this episode we’ll discuss those German defenses as well as the preparations and plans made by the Americans for their attack.

The BFWWP is now on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/BattlesoftheFirstWorldWarPodcast.

Any questions, comments or concerns please contact me through the website, www.firstworldwarpodcast.com. Follow us on Twitter at @WW1podcast, the Battles of the First World War Podcast page on FaceBook, and on Instagram at @WW1battlecast. Not into social media? Email me directly at [email protected]. Please consider reviewing the Battles of the First World War Podcast on iTunes.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Gentlemen, we have reached the time we have all been looking for.
0:07.0	We are about to engage in the most serious business ever undertaken by man, and no one can tell who will come out of it.
0:16.0	Gentlemen, may God be with you.
0:20.0	Major General Adelbert Kronkai, 80th Division, AEF, Commanding, Murs Argonne, 25th September,
0:29.6	1918. Hey folks, welcome to the battles of the First World War podcast, episode 51, MERS Argon, the most serious business.
0:58.5	Let's start with a quick admin note.
1:00.9	Big shout out to listener Doron, our newest patron of the BFWP on Patreon.
1:08.2	Thank you so much, and I hope I pronounced your name correctly. Also, many thanks to
1:14.1	listeners, Charles, and Stephen for their generous donations through PayPal. I am greatly
1:20.3	appreciative of your generosity, and to Stephen, thanks for the baffle advice. I hope you saw what I did there. I couldn't help it.
1:31.7	Ongoing donations through Patreon and one-time donations through PayPal help the podcast immensely.
1:38.5	Podcasts are not free. Libson demands that I pay them a monthly fee to get these episodes out there.
1:44.9	I mean, can you believe that? So any donations go towards the servers, keeping the website up, where I'm slowly
1:51.7	putting up the pictures from my August trip to France, and to the acquiring of new research
1:57.9	materials for episodes.
2:04.1	If you enjoy the show and have the means to do so,
2:06.9	please consider becoming a patron through Patreon.
2:10.2	Patrons there will have early access to episodes,
2:14.0	as well as access to the transcripts used to create the episode.
2:19.5	The transcripts contain detailed bibliographies of the books, articles, and other sources I use to help put these narratives together. Patrons also have other perks, such as submitting
2:26.7	a question that I'll research and answer to the best of my ability and the possibility of naming
2:32.5	a battle you'd like to hear covered on the show.
	...

Transcript will be available on the free plan in -2309 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Mike Cunha, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Mike Cunha and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.