In the early hours of 1 January 1915, HMS Formidable was sunk by a German U-boat in the English Channel. At the same time, thousands of British soldiers were trying to catch a few hours of rest in the newly constructed trenches of the Western Front. The old phrase that the war would be over by Christmas had been proven very wrong. British soldiers and civilians were beginning to realise that the Great War was going to be a long, hard slog — 1915 would be the year that the First World War started to hurt.
Trench warfare was a new kind of fighting and it took generals on both sides a long time to adapt their strategy and tactics to it. Entrenched soldiers with machine guns were a powerful defensive position and neither side was able to overcome them.
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