laurentnice. Their names are as follows: During World War I, the Chemin Des Dames lay in that sector of the Western Front held by the French Army. North of the farm of La Folie, the Germans were pushed back and three 155 mm (6.1 in) howitzers and several Luftstreitkräfte lorries were captured. Chemin des Dames 1917 Introduction. [11] A rückwärtige Kampfzone (rear battle zone) further back was to be occupied by the reserve battalion of each regiment. Une photo rare, montrant les ennemis d'hier ensemble pour une photo. [42] In the 1939 volume of Der Weltkrieg, the German official historians recorded German losses to the end of June as 163,000 men including 37,000 missing and claimed French casualties of 250,000–300,000 men, including 10,500 taken prisoner. Conduct of the Defensive Battle (Grundsätze für die Führung in der Abwehrschlacht) was published on 1 December 1916. The IX Corps and XVIII Corps took over between Craonne and Hurtebise and local operations were continued on the fronts of the Fourth and Fifth armies with little success. [18] East of the Oise and north of the Aisne, the Third Army took the southern and north-western outskirts of Laffaux and Vauxeny. Vimy Ridge, the Scarpe Heights, the caverns, spurs and plateau of the Chemin des Dames and the Moronvilliers massif had been occupied for more than two years, carefully surveyed by German engineers and fortified to make them impregnable. Le 16 avril 1917 débute au Chemin des Dames l’offensive française commandée par le Général Robert Nivelle. The French should have terminated the offensive after the first day when it became clear that the expected results were not being achieved. Et cela, aussi bien du côté du neuf que des produits Chemin Des Dames 1917 occasion. On n'avance que de 500 mètres au lieu des 10 kilomètres prévus, et ce au prix de pertes énormes : 30 000 morts en dix jours. [29] On the west bank the Moroccan Division was repulsed on the right and captured Mont sans Nom on the left. [21], The Fifth Army attacked on 16 April at 6:00 a.m., which had dawned misty and overcast. Le secteur de front choisi pour laffrontement est le Chemin des Dames, dans le départem… Half of the tanks were knocked out in the German defences and then acted as pillboxes in advance of the French infantry, which helped to defeat a big German counter-attack. Cette espérance est attisée par le repli stratégique ennemi du mois de février 1917. The Third Army began French operations, with preliminary attacks on German observation points at St. Quentin on 1–4 and 10 April. This page was last edited on 31 January 2021, at 21:15. Départ de Roches à sept heures trente. The Fifth Army was not able substantially to advance on 17 April but the Sixth Army, which had continued to attack overnight, forced a German withdrawal from the area of Braye, Condé and Laffaux to the Siegfriedstellung, which ran from Laffaux Mill to the Chemin des Dames and joined the original defences at Courtecon. La bataille du Chemin des Dames (1917) HistoireMotion. [1] The French Prime Minister Aristide Briand supported Nivelle but the war minister Lyautey resigned during a dispute with the Chamber of Deputies and the Briand government fell; a new government under Alexandre Ribot took office on 20 March. The others were interred in ossuaries or into collective graves. The 25th Division was ordered by the army commander, General Humbert to attack again at 6:00 p.m. but the orders arrived too late and the attack did not take place. [13], Given the Allies' growing superiority in munitions and manpower, attackers might still penetrate to the second (artillery protection) line, leaving in their wake German garrisons isolated in Widerstandsnester, (resistance nests, Widas) still inflicting losses and disorganisation on the attackers. A partir de fin avril 1917,le front s'est déplacé sur le plateau du Chemin des dames. Embarquement en auto à Vic, à neuf heures trente ; route par Soissons, Sermoise, Bazoches. By the end of the day the 26th Division had held on to 100 yd (91 m) of the German front trench and the 25th Division had been forced back to its jumping-off trenches. [1] The main attack on the Aisne would be preceded by a large diversionary attack by the British Third and First armies at Arras. [10] To the east of Vauxaillon, at the north end of the Sixth Army, Mont des Singes was captured with the help of British heavy artillery but then lost to a German counter-attack. All are named after the river which flows on the south side of the ridge. The French were inhibited from firing on St. Quentin, which allowed the Germans unhampered observation from the cathedral and from factory chimneys and to site artillery in the suburbs, free from counter-battery fire. The artillery bombardment of the area actually cracked some of the overlying cliffs, which can be seen today. The Chemin des Dames ridge had been quarried for stone for centuries, leaving a warren of caves and tunnels which were used as shelters by German troops to escape the French bombardment. Uffindel wrote that the exclusion of La Malmaison was artificial, since the attack was begun from the ground taken from April to May. Courcy on the right flank was captured by the 1st Brigade of the Russian Expeditionary Force in France but the advance was stopped at the Aisne–Marne canal. Their names are as follows: Le Chemin des Dames aujourd’hui With the gloom of winter still hanging over France, French soldiers were sure the Great War was about to end. [43] In 1962, G. W. L. Nicholson the Canadian Official Historian, recorded German losses of c. 163,000 and French casualties of 187,000 men. During the Second Battle of the Marne, the last fight on the Chemin des Dames occurred between 2 August and 10 October 1918. General Philippe Pétain, who had opposed this offensive, was called in to take over from Nivelle and to re-establish order. On 2 June a bigger German attack began, after an intensive bombardment of the French front, from the north of Laffaux to the east of Berry-au-Bac. [10], In a new manual of 1 December 1916, Grundsätze für die Führung in der Abwehrschlacht im Stellungskrieg (Principles of Command for Defensive Battle), the policy of unyielding defence of ground regardless of its tactical value, was replaced by the defence of positions suitable for artillery observation and communication with the rear, where an attacking force would "fight itself to a standstill and use up its resources while the defenders conserve[d] their strength". On 25 May, three German columns attacked a salient north-west of Bray-en-Laonnois and gained a footing in the French first trench, before being forced out by a counter-attack. Les Britanniques devant attaquer à l'ouest entre Arras et Soissons, les Français quant à eux attaquant entre Soissons et Reims. Alberich freed 13–14 German divisions which were moved to the Aisne, increasing the German garrison to 38 divisions against 53 French divisions. Aujourd'hui sur Rakuten, 152 Chemin Des Dames 1917 vous attendent au sein de notre rayon . Casualties had reached 20 percent in the French armies by 10 May and some divisions suffered more than 60 percent losses. Behind the main line of resistance was a Grosskampfzone (battle zone), a second defensive area 1,500–2,500 yd (1,400–2,300 m) deep, also placed as far as possible on ground hidden from enemy observation, while in view of German artillery observers. After intensive combat, Germans took control of the plateau in November 1914. In six weeks all were lost and the Germans were left clinging to the eastern or northern edges of the ridges of the summits. Le 15 mai 1917, le général Pétain remplace Nivelle et c’est en octobre 1917, lors d’une dernière offensive, que la bataille du Chemin des Dames se termine, face aux Allemands qui cette fois, se voient vaincus. A school was opened in January 1917 to teach infantry commanders the new methods. The French achieved a substantial tactical success and took c. 29,000 prisoners but failed to defeat decisively the German armies. Ludendorff was sufficiently impressed by the Loßberg memorandum to add it to the new Manual of Infantry Training for War. Rouquerol, J., 1934, "Le Chemin des Dames 1917", Editions Payot, Paris 1937. Such methods required large numbers of reserve divisions ready to move to the battlefront. Approximately only half of those who are buried at Chemin des Dames cemeteries could be identified. Après l'attaque du Chemin des Dames, au c… The Tenth Army captured the Californie plateau on the Chemin des Dames, the Sixth Army captured the Siegfriedstellung for 2.5 mi (4.0 km) along the Chemin des Dames and then advanced at the salient opposite Laffaux. Beyond Dallon French patrols entered the south-western suburb of St. The road connects the N2 and D1044 and is commonly known as Chemin des Dames. French aircraft were active over the attack front but at midday large formations of German fighters arrived and forced the French artillery-observation and reconnaissance aircraft back behind the front line. To the north east of the town of Soissons in the Aisne lies a high ridge running west to east and nicknamed the Chemin des Dames: The Ladies’ Road. Resistance from troops equipped with automatic weapons, supported by observed artillery fire, would increase the further the advance progressed. The French infantry had suffered many casualties and few of the leading divisions were capable of resuming the attack. French losses were 2,241 men killed, 8,162 wounded and 1,460 missing from 23–26 October, 10 percent of the casualties of the attacks during the Nivelle Offensive. Le plan prévoit une concentration maximale de … The French took 11,157 prisoners, 200 guns and 220 heavy mortars. [9], During the German withdrawal to the Siegfriedstellung (Hindenburg Line) in March 1917, a modest withdrawal took place in the neighbourhood of Soissons. Its strategic importance made it the staging ground of several major battles that took place between 1914 and 1918. Après les batailles de la Somme et de Verdun, l’IGN poursuit la publication de ses cartes commémoratives, avec une nouvelle parution consacrée au Chemin des Dames en 1917. On the morning of 1 June, after a heavy bombardment, German troops captured several trenches north of Laffaux Mill and lost them to counter-attacks in the afternoon. [6], When Hindenburg and Ludendorff took over from Falkenhayn on 28 August 1916, the pressure being placed on the German army in France was so great that new defensive arrangements, based on the principles of depth, invisibility and immediate counter-action were formally adopted, as the only means by which the growing material strength of the French and British armies could be countered. 5:58. This he did without harsh collective punishments. [38] Pétain had 40–62 mutineers shot as examples and introduced reforms to improve the welfare of French troops, which did much to restore morale. It acquired the name in the 18th century, as it was the route taken by the two daughters of Louis XV, Adélaïde and Victoire, who were known as Ladies of France. [3], The Second Battle of the Aisne involved c. 1.2 million troops and 7,000 guns on a front from Reims to Roye, with the main effort against the German positions along the Aisne river. The British Commander-in-Chief, Sir Douglas Haig, supported the concept of a decisive battle but insisted that if the first two phases of the Nivelle scheme were unsuccessful, the British effort would be moved north to Flanders. La bataille du Chemin des dames ou seconde bataille de l'Aisne ou « offensive Nivelle», commence le 16 avril 1917 à 6 heures matin par la tentative française de rupture front allemand entre Soissons et Reims vers Laon,sous les ordres du général Nivelle. Nivelle was superseded by General Philippe Pétain, who adopted a strategy of "healing and defence", to resume the wearing-out of the German Army while conserving French infantry. Then, on 16 April, seven French army corps attacked the German line along the Chemin des Dames ridge. The front trench system was the sentry line for the battle zone garrison, which was allowed to move away from concentrations of enemy fire and then counter-attack to recover the battle and outpost zones; such withdrawals were envisaged as occurring on small parts of the battlefield which had been made untenable by Allied artillery fire, as the prelude to Gegenstoß in der Stellung (immediate counter-attack within the position). Accablement, « jambes pâles ». By April, the French advance had only progressed beyond Neuville-sur-Margival and Leuilly. French losses amounted to 17,000 dead, 20,000 lost in action (including prisoners) and 65,000 wounded; German losses were estimated to be in the region of 35,000 killed, wounded and lost in action. The Entente strategy was to conduct offensives from north to south, beginning with an attack by the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) then the main attack by two French army groups on the Aisne. [2] Note: The following list of national cemeteries does not include the names of municipal cemeteries in France holding burials of soldiers lost in the battles. The offensive met massed German machine-gun and artillery fire, which inflicted many casualties and repulsed the French infantry at many points. A German counter-attack on the Californie Plateau was smashed by artillery and infantry small-arms fire and 350 prisoners taken. Today it is an open-air museum, extending 40 km from east to west, with many monuments along its length.On the D2 secondary road between Soissons and Laon, Laffaux mill was a highly strategic position, fought over by both sides for many months in 1917. [30], Nivelle ordered the Tenth Army forward between the Fifth and Sixth armies on 21 April. Furthermore, during the following 12 days of the battle, French losses continued to rise to 120,000 casualties (dead, wounded, and missing). Success would enable the French to menace the flank of the German forces to the south, along the Oise to La Fère and the rear of the German positions south of the St. Gobain massif, due to be attacked from the south by the Sixth Army of the GAR. On 3 May, the French 2nd Division refused orders, similar refusals and mutiny spread through the armies; the Nivelle Offensive was abandoned in confusion on 9 May. By the time the offensive began in April 1917, the Germans had received intelligence of the Allied plan and strengthened their defences on the Aisne front. [27] German attacks on 27 May had temporary success before French counter-attacks recaptured the ground around Mont Haut; lack of troops had forced the Germans into piecemeal attacks instead of a simultaneous attack along the whole front. The XX Corps attack from Vendresse to the Oise–Aisne Canal had more success, the 153rd Division on the right flank reached the Chemin des Dames south of Courtecon after a second attack, managing an advance of 1.25 mi (2.01 km). The Germans attacked in waves, at certain points advancing shoulder-to-shoulder, supported by flame-thrower detachments and gained some ground on the Vauclerc Plateau, until French counter-attacks recovered the ground. As the attackers tried to capture the Widas and dig in near the German second line, Sturmbataillone and Sturmregimenter of the counter-attack divisions would advance from the rückwärtige Kampfzone into the battle zone, in an immediate counter-attack, (Gegenstoß aus der Tiefe). Dès la mi-novembre 1916, le général Joffre, commandant en chef français envisage une double attaque franco-britannique pour le printemps 1917. On 1 April, a French attack along the line of the Ailette–Laon road reached the outskirts of Laffaux and Vauxaillon. The French made a conscious effort to do this for the Chemin Des Dames offensive. Three battles were fought along the Chemin des Dames east-to-west ridge located to the north of Paris during the First World War. The French War Minister, Hubert Lyautey and Chief of Staff General Henri-Philippe Pétain opposed the plan, believing it to be premature. Vic-sur-Aisne. The British captured Messines Ridge on 7 June and spent the rest of the year on the offensive in the Third Battle of Ypres (31 July – 10 November) and the Battle of Cambrai (20 November – 8 December). Le but était de prendre en tenaille les troupes allemandes qui s'y trouvaient. The Chemin des Dames became the scene of great battles. À l'époque, le front allemand présente une avancée dans la région de Noyon. 1:51. Next day, German counter-attacks on Chevreux, north-east of Craonne at the foot of the east end of the Chemin des Dames were defeated. Le plateau parcouru par le Chemin des Dames a fait l'objet de plusieurs batailles au cours de l'histoire de France. On 10 May, another German attack at Chevreux was defeated and the French advanced north of Sancy and on the night of 10/11 May, and the following day, German attacks were repulsed on the Californie Plateau and at Cerny. Mais, le 16 décembre 1916, Joffre, qui commande depuis août 1914 et ne semble pl… The front line then remained static until March 1917, during which time several thousand soldiers died in local attacks or coup de main operations. Positions necessary for the new method were defined in Principles of Field Position Construction (Allgemeines über Stellungsbau). La RD 18 CD traverse dix-huit villages dont sept ont été totalement ou partiellement détruits et classés en zone rouge en 1923. On the east-facing northern flank near Laffaux, I Colonial Corps was able to penetrate only a few hundred yards into the defences of the Condé-Riegel (Condé Switch trench) and failed to take Moisy Farm plateau. The German positions also dominated the southerly slope over which the French attackers were progressing. Chemin des Dames - Avril 1917. As a result, the French took 40,000 casualties on the first day alone. On 25 January 1915 German forces captured the Creute farm (today La Caverne du Dragon or the Dragon's Lair), the last remaining French position on the plateau. He was replaced by the considerably more cautious Pétain with Foch as chief of the General Staff, who adopted a strategy of "healing and defence" to avoid casualties and to restore morale. [36] The operation had been planned as a decisive blow to the Germans; by 20 April it was clear that the strategic intent of the offensive had not been achieved and by 25 April most of the fighting had ended. The right flank guard to the east of Suippes was established by the 24th Division and Aubérive on the east bank of the river and the 34th Division took Mont Cornillet and Mont Blond. Coordinates: .mw-parser-output .geo-default,.mw-parser-output .geo-dms,.mw-parser-output .geo-dec{display:inline}.mw-parser-output .geo-nondefault,.mw-parser-output .geo-multi-punct{display:none}.mw-parser-output .longitude,.mw-parser-output .latitude{white-space:nowrap}49°26′35″N 3°42′37″E / 49.44306°N 3.71028°E / 49.44306; 3.71028, Learn how and when to remove these template messages, Learn how and when to remove this template message, Oise-Aisne American Cemetery and Memorial, Panoramic views of The Dragon's Lair site, the visitors' centre, and the museum, Pictures of Chemin des Dames – Fort de Conde, Caverne du Dragon, Site covering Chemin des Dames in WW1 (in French), https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Chemin_des_Dames&oldid=1004046744, Articles needing additional references from August 2014, All articles needing additional references, Wikipedia articles needing reorganization from November 2019, Articles with multiple maintenance issues, Wikipedia articles needing clarification from March 2019, Articles needing additional references from June 2019, Wikipedia articles with WorldCat-VIAF identifiers, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License. German infantry launched hasty counter-attacks along the front, recaptured Bermericourt and conducted organised counter-attacks where the French infantry had advanced the furthest. From 16 April – 10 May the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth and Tenth armies took 28,500 prisoners and 187 guns. [14], Groupe d'armées du Nord (GAN) on the northern flank of Groupe d'armées de Reserve (GAR) had been reduced to the Third Army with three corps in line, by the transfer of the First Army to the GAR. The German retreat to the Hindenburg Line Operation Alberich (Unternehmen Alberich) left a belt of devastated ground up to 25 mi (40 km) deep in front of the French positions facing east from Soissons, northwards to St. Quentin. But, Nivelle had underestimated the enemy's defensive preparations: The Germans had created a network of deep shelters in old underground stone quarries below the ridge, where their troops took shelter from the French barrage. If the immediate counter-attack failed, the Eingreif (counter-attack) divisions would take their time to prepare a methodical attack, provided the lost ground was essential to the retention of the main position. The German retirement was carried out in a rush and many guns were left behind, along with "vast" stocks of munitions. The Third Battle of the Aisne came as a complete surprise to the Allies, including British troops who had been sent there to rest in a quiet sector. [44] A 2003 web publication gave 108,000 French casualties, 49,526 in the Fifth Army, 30,296 casualties in the Sixth Army, 4,849 in the Tenth Army, 2,169 in the Fourth Army and 1,486 in the Third Army. South of the river, the Fifth and Tenth armies on the plain near Loivre, had managed to advance west of the Brimont Heights. Between 31 October and 1 November 1917 the Germans abandoned their positions on Chemin des Dame Ridge to fall back on a new line of defence north of the river Ailette. Celle qui a le plus marqué la mémoire collective est celle qui s’y déroula entre le 16 avril et le 24 octobre 1917. The new French strategy was not one of passive defence; in June and July the Fourth, Sixth and Tenth Armies conducted several limited attacks and the First Army was sent to Flanders to participate in the Third Battle of Ypres. La Grande Guerre 1914 1918 Le Chemin Des Dames. The offensive began on 9 April, when the British began the Battle of Arras. Laffaux was captured and then lost to a counter-attack before changing hands several times, until finally captured on 19 April. 55:02. [28] The attack began at 4:45 a.m. in cold rain alternating with snow showers. Defensive procedures in the battle zone were similar but with greater numbers of men. German work on the Siegfriedstellung (Hindenburg Line) continued but the first line, built along reverse-slopes was complete and from which flanking-fire could be brought to bear on any attack. La bataille du chemin des Dames, le contexte France, printemps 1917 L'année 1917 place le Chemin des Dames au centre des événements militaires. On 16 April, the Groupe d'armées de Reserve (GAR, Reserve Army Group) attacked the Chemin des Dames and the next day, the Fourth Army, part of Groupe d'armées de Centre (GAC, Central Army Group), near Reims to the south-east, began the Battle of the Hills. [47], From 24–25 October the XXI and XIV corps advanced rapidly and the I Cavalry Corps was brought forward into the XIV Corps area, in case the Germans collapsed. The Second Battle of the Aisne (French: Bataille du Chemin des Dames or French: Seconde bataille de l'Aisne, 16 April – mid-May 1917) was the main part of the Nivelle Offensive, a Franco-British attempt to inflict a decisive defeat on the German armies in France. At the time, it was scarcely a carriage road, but it was the most direct route between Paris and the Château de Boves, near Vauclair, on the far side of the Ailette. There are numerous war memorials and cemeteries, German, French and British, all along the chemin. Carte du Chemin des Dames, en novembre 1917. It is some thirty kilometres long and runs along a ridge between the valleys of the rivers Aisne and Ailette. The new manual laid down the organisation for the mobile defence of an area, rather than the rigid defence of a trench line. Plateau of the Chemin des Dames. The French infantry reached the new German positions with an advance of 4 mi (6.4 km). The German artillery was outnumbered about 3:1 and on the front of the 14th Division 32 German batteries were bombarded by 125 French artillery batteries. Sentries could retreat to larger positions (Gruppennester) held by Stoßtrupps (five men and an NCO per Trupp), who would join the sentries to recapture sentry-posts by immediate counter-attack. The cost of the Nivelle Offensive in casualties and loss of morale were great but German losses were also high and the tactical success of the French in capturing elaborately fortified positions and defeating counter-attacks, reduced German morale. Uffindell called this politically convenient, since this excluded the Battle of La Malmaison in October, making it easier to blame Nivelle. [c] On the left flank, V Corps was stopped at the Bois des Boches and the hamlet of la Ville aux Bois. A total of 629 men were sentenced to death, but only 28 men, who had fired weapons at their superiors, were executed. [26], On the second day, Nivelle ordered the Fifth Army to attack north-eastwards to reinforce success, believing that the Germans intended to hold the ground in front of the Sixth Army. Yesterday at 11:39 PM Such a decentralised battle by large numbers of small infantry detachments would present the attacker with unforeseen obstructions. [40], The French tactic of assault brutal et continu suited the German defensive dispositions, since much of the new construction had taken place on reverse slopes. The high French casualty count, in so few days and with such minimal gains, was perceived at headquarters and by the French public as a disaster. On 26 May German attacks on salients east and west of Cerny were repulsed and from 26–27 May, German attacks between Vauxaillon and Laffaux Mill broke down. Gas bombardments in the Ailette valley became so dense that the carriage of ammunition and supplies to the front was made impossible. The objective of the attack on the Aisne was to capture the prominent 80-kilometre-long (50 mi), east–west ridge of the Chemin des Dames, 110 km (68 mi) north-east of Paris and then advance northwards to capture the city of Laon. [34], In 2015, Uffindell wrote that retrospective naming and dating of events can affect the way in which the past is understood. French attacks on 17 May took ground east of Craonne and on 18 May, German attacks on the Californie Plateau and on the Chemin des Dames just west of the Oise–Aisne Canal, were repulsed. For other battles of the Aisne, see, Illustration of the German retirement to the, Craonne and the eastern Chemin des Dames, 1917, French territorial gains on the Aisne, Nivelle Offensive, April–May 1917, German retreat from the Chemin des Dames, November 1917, Chemin des Dames Portail official portal, multi-language, Chemin des Dames Virtual Memorial searchable databases soldiers, regiments, battles, cemeteries, monuments and documents, La Caverne du Dragon museum of the 1917 battle at Chemin des Dames multimedia, Armistice between Russia and the Central Powers, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Second_Battle_of_the_Aisne&oldid=998409631, Battles of the Western Front (World War I), Battles involving the French Foreign Legion, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, This page was last edited on 5 January 2021, at 07:06. La bataille du Chemin des Dames, aussi appelée seconde bataille de l'Aisne ou « offensive Nivelle » a lieu pendant la Première Guerre mondiale. During the nights of the 6/7 and 7/8 May, the Germans attacked from Vauxaillon to Craonne and on the night of 8/9 May German attacks were repulsed at Cerny, La Bovelle, Heutebise Farm and the Californie Plateau. The rear edge of the German battle zone along the ridge had been reinforced with machine-gun posts and the German divisional commanders decided to hold the front line, rather than giving ground elastically; few of the Eingreif Divisions were needed to intervene in the battle. [32], On 16 May, a German counter-offensive, on a front of 2.5 mi (4.0 km) from the north-west of Laffaux Mill to the Soissons–Laon railway, was defeated and after dark more attacks north of Laffaux Mill and north-west of Braye-en-Laonnois also failed. The caverns originally were a tunnel system created from excavations of limestone for building purposes in the 17th century. [27], On 17 April the Fourth Army on the left of Groupe d'armées de Centre (GAC) began the subsidiary attack in Champagne from Aubérive to the east of Reims which became known as Bataille des Monts, with the VIII, XVII and XII Corps on an 11 km (6.8 mi) front. French assault on the Chemin des Dames during the Second Battle of the Aisne. When the French armies met the British advancing from the Arras front, the Germans would be pursued towards Belgium and the German frontier. [23], The left flank division of the XXXII Corps and the right division of the V Corps penetrated the German second position south of Juvincourt but French tanks attacking south of the Miette from Bois de Beau Marais advanced to disaster. Pétain began a substantial programme re-equipment of the French Army, had 40–62 mutineers shot as scapegoats and provided better food, more pay and more leave, which led to a considerable improvement in morale. By the spring of 1917, the German army in the west had a strategic reserve of 40 divisions. On 2 April a bigger French attack on Dallon failed but on 3 April the Third Army attacked after a "terrific" bombardment, on a front of about 8 mi (13 km) north of a line from Castres to Essigny-le-Grand and Benay, between the Somme canal at Dallon, southwest of St Quentin and the Oise. The Germans had been forced out of three of the most elaborately fortified positions on the Western Front and failed to recapture them.