The perspective on the war from the Germans is interesting because they can give you a first hand account of what happened when fighting the French and why they saw them as an enemy. They saw them as an enemy because when the Germans wanted to attack Russia they knew that they would stand up for their allies so they attacked France instead. Here is an extract from a German soldiers diary entry.

‘Wake up call at Noon followed by Sauerkraut for lunch. In the evening it’s cleaning rifles followed by an inspection. After that we are ordered to Courcy to dig trenches there. I stay behind because I have problems with my feet. On Sunday there are no duties except muster in full gear and church service. ‘

THE FRENCH

The perspective of the war from a French soldier gives you a view of the Germans attacking France and the French attacking the Germans. Also, they can show you why they saw Germany as an enemy. They saw them as one because Germany had plans to attack Russia first but they changed and said that they will try to attack France instead because the size of Russia meant it would take about 8 weeks to mobilise its troops. That was their window to attack France. Here is an extract from a French soldiers diary entry in ww1.

‘We leave Montrouge [a suburb of Paris] at 9 o’clock in the morning, and arrive at the Gare de Lyon* at noon. The crowd of Parisians is generous and friendly. The knapsack seems heavy to begin with, holding two days’ worth of food. We do not know where we are going. The train travels relatively rapidly until Laroche, where we drink a bowl of hot soup.’