In 1916, Tsar Nicholas II, in response to the call of the Anglo-French allies, decided to launch an offensive to exert enormous pressure on Germany and Austria-Hungary, on the one hand, to reduce the military pressure on the Anglo-French allies, and on the other hand, to force Germany and Austria-Hungary to reconsider whether to negotiate an armistice.
For launching a new campaign, although the chief of staff of the Russian army Kuropatkin is a butcher, he has an opposition to this matter, he believes that the current situation on the front line is not optimistic, and the Russian army does not have the possibility of breaking through the German defense line, after all, the German eastern defense line is very strong, and the Russian army does not have enough artillery fire and large-caliber heavy artillery to destroy the German defense line, and if it boldly launches an attack, the Russian army will suffer heavy losses within three months.
Kuropatkin believed that the lives of the soldiers could not be wasted for the sake of Britain and France, and as long as Tsarist Russia did not withdraw from the war, the German army needed to deploy a large number of troops in the east to defend, so that the war potential of Germany could be won by delaying until the war potential of Germany was exhausted. If you have to give an explanation to the British and French allies, then launch some small-scale diversion attacks, and at the end of the point, there is no need for Tsarist Russia to sacrifice itself for Britain and France.
Kuropatkin
Although this Kuropatkin was a cold-blooded butcher, he was considered to be considered for Nicholas II and Tsarist Russia from a strategic point of view. But the generals who supported Nicholas II did not see it that way, and the unruly generals believed that waiting for the Germans to run out of resources in the defense was to make themselves a turtle with a shrunken head. At the same time, the economic situation in Tsarist Russia was deteriorating, and the territories of the nobles were also affected to varying degrees, and it was necessary to fight quickly to end the war.
Brusilov
Due to the dispute between the two sides, Tsar Nicholas II had to consult General Brusilov, who had served in the Warsaw Military District and had experience in fighting against Austria-Hungary. Brusilov believed that a tactical offensive could be launched on the front line, and if the offensive did not go well, he could immediately stop the loss, and he could also attract and contain German forces. However, the General Staff said that only about 600,000 troops could be drawn at most to launch an attack, and Brusilov did not dare to assure Nicholas II that he would win, and he needed enough time to conduct intelligence reconnaissance of the German and Austro-Hungarian armies, but he assured Nicholas II that he would do his best to serve His Majesty.
Before the offensive was launched, Brusilov ordered the commander of the military engineering unit, General Velicko, to reconnoiter the positions of the German and Austro-Hungarian troops, and to mark in detail on the map the location of the enemy's artillery, the defensive line, and the location of the headquarters, and make sure that the commander of the whole army had a copy.
The Russian army carried out reconnaissance and surveillance of the front line for one month, and even dispatched 798 sorties to reconnoiter the enemy's positions and investigate the enemy's deployment at a depth of 15 kilometers. Reconnaissance showed that the German and Austro-Hungarian defense lines consisted of three lines, each of which was about 5 kilometers deep, and there were 2-3 cascade lines in the middle of each line, with a distance of about 1.5 kilometers between the cascades. Pillboxes and civil fortifications were deployed in all trenches, and at least 2-3 barbed wire fences were deployed in front of each trench. According to intelligence estimates, the total strength of the German-Austrian forces may be around 1 million. In fact, the total strength of the German-Austrian army was 1.06 million, with 1,301 artillery pieces and 545 heavy artillery pieces.
Brucy Louvre breakout
Around the end of April, the Russian General Staff and General Brusilov worked together to draw up a military plan, according to Brusilov's plan, the Russian army would launch an attack on the Galician front on June 15, with a total of about 1.73 million troops, including about 510,000 troops from the Southwestern Front, about 750,000 troops from the Western Front, and about 460,000 troops from the Northern Front. After the campaign was launched, the Southwestern Front would storm the enemy's front to attract the enemy's attention, while the Northern Front, with its smaller forces, would be responsible for the main attack.
After each unit breaks through the enemy's first main line of defense, the troops are deployed to divide the enemy's position and prevent the enemy from retreating, while the follow-up attack echelon continues to launch a surprise attack in depth, repeating the above steps. In order to be able to achieve victory in the campaign, at the strong request of General Brusilov, the General Staff mobilized 1770 artillery pieces and 168 heavy artillery pieces for use as a campaign assault force, and this battle was called the Brusilov Breakthrough. Tsar Nicholas II was the nominal commander-in-chief, and General Brusilov was the front-line commander in charge of the battle.
Nicholas II
Such a large-scale reconnaissance activity, as long as the German army is not blind, can find out that Tsarist Russia is going to attack, but the German army does not know the specific time of the attack, so the German army began to invite Russian officers and soldiers on the front line many times in the name of peace and friendship from April 1916, and detained and interrogated Russian officers in the name of drunkenness, convinced that Tsarist Russia is likely to launch an offensive in late May, the German General Staff ordered all units on the front line to prepare for battle, and pay close attention to building more civil fortifications to resist the attack.
For example, on May 14, the Southwestern Front reported to the General Staff that there was a large shortage of non-commissioned officers, and it was difficult to effectively maintain the attack echelon into operation as planned. It has to be said here that due to the high illiteracy rate in Tsarist Russia, most of the soldiers in the army are illiterate, and those who can read and hyphenate a little are high-level talents, such as the future Soviet General Dmitry Pavlov, who was promoted to senior non-commissioned officer in the Russian army because he had studied for two years in elementary school, and he was also preparing to participate in the Brusilov breakthrough campaign at this time.
To get back to the point, Tsar Nicholas II and Chief of the General Staff Alekseev demanded that Brusilov must overcome the difficulties, launch an offensive according to the plan, and complete the task of containing and attracting the forces of the German-Austrian alliance and sharing the pressure on the British and French allies. On June 1, worse news came, Italy was anxious to Britain, France and Tsarist Russia, and the situation on the Isonzo River front was tense, and Italy hoped that Britain, France and Tsarist Russia could immediately launch an offensive to contain and attract the German and Austro-Hungarian armies and help them share the pressure.
At the strong request of Nicholas II and Chief of the General Staff Alekseev, the battle officially began at 3 a.m. on June 4, 1916 (May 22 in the Julian calendar), and the Tsarist artillery began to concentrate fire on the German-Austrian positions in front of the assault, and at the same time carried out fire strikes on the coordinates of the enemy artillery marked in advance, in order to destroy the enemy artillery and reduce the casualties of the infantry in the assault. Although the German-Austrian forces used poison gas to try to stop the Tsarist offensive, the Tsarist Southwestern Front was the first to break through the Austro-Hungarian defensive positions, and three days later the Tsarist army captured Lutsk.
Russian artillery
In just 5 days, the Russian army captured more than 70,000 Austro-Hungarian prisoners and captured 94 artillery pieces. After the occupation of Lutsk, the Russian 8th Army was counterattacked by the Austro-Hungarian army. Although the Austro-Hungarian army briefly broke through the Russian front, the counterattack came to an abrupt end on June 15, when the Austrian 4th Army collapsed, with at least 40,000 to 50,000 Austro-Hungarian officers and soldiers taken prisoner and 66 artillery pieces as Russian trophies. It is worth mentioning that both the later famous White Army General Denikin and Marshal of the Soviet Union Tolbukhin took part in this battle, when Denikin served in the 4th Division, and Tolbukhin served in the Transbaikal Infantry Company.
Cossack
Subsequently, the Russian 11th Army reinforced the right flank of the 17th Army, destroyed the defenses of the Russian-Austro-Hungarian army, and occupied Pulyashevka, Sitnevka, Ikva and other places. Then the Austro-Hungarian 7th Army also switched to a counterattack, which consisted almost of the Hungarians and had a high combat effectiveness, although they did not achieve the goal of counterattacking, but successfully delayed the Russian army for 3 days, buying time for redeployment.
It is worth mentioning that the Russian army did not launch a campaign at the same time, and the Western Front of Tsarist Russia entered the battle only on June 10, and it is said that it entered the battle on June 17. It is said that this was the reason for the discord between the Chief of the General Staff, Colonel-General Mikhail Alekseev, and General Brusilov, who took advantage of his position and postponed the entry of the Western Front into the war. If it weren't for the fact that the Germans really couldn't spare troops to reinforce the Eastern Front at this time, the Brusilov offensive would have overturned.
But in any case, the Western Front made a breakthrough after entering the war, and then in the Battle of Baranovichi in early July, the Western Front was repulsed by the Germans, and due to heavy losses among officers and men, the offensive had to be suspended, which allowed the Germans to find time to strengthen the northern and southern fronts. In the first phase of the campaign, the Russian army captured more than 200,000 Austro-Hungarian prisoners and captured 219 artillery pieces and 196 mortars.
The Russian army resumed its offensive on July 9 (June 26 in the Julian calendar), also known as the Second Brusilov Offensive, and the Russian Minister of War Kuropatkin personally commanded the Northern Front to fight the northern front for 6 days, losing up to 15,000 men but failing to make any significant progress, just when the situation was about to reach a stalemate, Nicholas II ordered that Brusilov be allowed to use the general reserve, and the Guards and the Transbaikalgotza Corps were immediately put into battle. Brusilov, having received the order, adjusted the disposition of the Southwestern Front, with the 8th Army attacking Vekovili, the 11th Army attacking Brody and Lviv, the 7th Army attacking Monastiriska, and the 9th Army attacking Stanislav to the north.
Russian troops on the offensive
At the end of July, the Russian army finally broke through the German-Austrian line and penetrated 10 kilometers deep, capturing the Stokhod River crossing, although the Tsarist army failed to capture the German defense line of the Stokhod Pass, but managed to capture Brody and attack Lviv. The 7th Army also managed to capture Monastiriska, and the 9th Army captured Stanislav and Bukovina, capturing a large number of German-Austrian prisoners.
For Brusilov, the regret for his assault on the Pripyat swamps was met with stubborn resistance and counterattacks by the German-Austrian forces in August-September, to the point that almost all of them were wiped out. It is worth mentioning that it was here that veteran non-commissioned officer Dmitry Pavlov was taken prisoner by the Germans and sent to a prisoner of war camp. As a result of Brusilov's erroneous assault on the Pripyat swamps, the Russian army suffered heavy casualties. If he had chosen to stop the offensive in this direction at the outset, join up with the 7th and 9th armies, and launch a third offensive, perhaps the entire Brusilov offensive would have changed the fate of Tsarist Russia.
Due to the overall quality of the Russian army, the lack of heavy artillery support, and the lack of gas masks, the Russian army won the victory at the cost of 517,000 casualties or missing in the entire battle of Brusilov, occupying almost the entire Volyn, Bukovina, and Galicia regions. The German-Austrian army was forced to retreat 80-120 kilometers, and the German-Austrian army lost more than 760,000 people, including more than 616,000 Austro-Hungarian casualties and prisoners, and about 148,000 German casualties and prisoners. There are also two theories about the losses of the German-Austrian army, 1.2 million and 1.5 million, but there is no strong evidence.
As for the losses of the Tsarist Russian army, the German side recorded that the total losses of the Tsarist army in the Brusilov offensive were about 80-1 million people. At that time, the German army on the Eastern Front believed in the telegraph that the Russian army had suffered more than 1.65 million casualties, and the main force was almost lost, and then Tsarist Russia would not be able to continue the war. Again, there is no strong evidence for this figure, but it is certain that both the Russian and Austro-Hungarian armies suffered heavy losses after the battle.
The Brusilov offensive had a huge impact on Austria-Hungary, the morale of the Austro-Hungarian army almost completely collapsed, especially the troops composed of Serbs, Bosnians, and Slovaks almost surrendered to Tsarist Russia in formation, and the troops composed of Hungarians, although they performed relatively well, were also fleeing in the direction of the Carpathians, and these performances of the Austro-Hungarian army left a deep impression on the German army.
At the same time, due to the collapse of the Eastern Front, the Austro-Hungarian General Staff had to transfer the reserves originally assigned to the Isonzo Front to the Eastern Front, which improved the situation in Italy on the Isonzo. In general, the Brusilov offensive satisfied Nicholas II's desire to give an account to his allies and made it famous for the Russian army to win the offensive under the command of the Tsar, for which Brusilov himself was awarded the Order of St. George and a saber awarded by the Tsar himself.
Bibliography:
The Last Battle of the Emperors: A Parallel History of the First World War
"Brusilov Offensive"