 | This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page. (Learn how and when to remove these messages)
|
Plan 1919 was a military strategy drawn up by British Army officer J. F. C. Fuller in 1918 during World War I. His plan criticised the practice of physically destroying the enemy, and instead called for tanks to rapidly advance into the enemy's rear area to destroy supply bases and lines of communication, which would also be bombed. He suggested a lightning thrust toward the command center of the German Army:
- "... every available bombing machine should concentrate on the various supply and road centres. The signal communication should not be destroyed, for it is important that the confusion resulting from the dual attack carried out by the Medium D tanks and aeroplanes should be circulated by the enemy. Bad news confuses, confusion stimulates panic … (then) a carefully mounted artillery, tank and infantry attack should be launched, the objective of which is the zone of the enemy's guns: namely the secondary tactical zone some 10,000 yards deep."[1]
- "so does an army depend for its power on the will of its Commander and his Staff: cut that will off and the army will be paralyzed." He proposed using Medium D tanks "to disorganise the enemy’s Command in rear of the entrenched zone."[2]
The Allied advance and German retreat across France and Belgium in 1918 had begun to show some of the pace and aspects that would mark later mechanized warfare; British tanks played an increasing role, and German rear-guard defenses focused on stopping their advance. [citation needed] Although never implemented, Plan 1919 would have carried these trends forward earlier.