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(ยง "La Marseillaise")
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War began between Germany
and France on August 3rd 1914.
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Five weeks later
the German army had smashed its way
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to within 18 miles of Paris.
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There, the battered French rallied
their forces at the Marne river
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and, in a series of unexpected
counterattacks, drove the Germans back.
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The front was stabilised,
then shortly afterwards
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developed into a continuous
line of heavily fortified trenches,
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zigzagging their way 500 miles from
the English Channel to the Swiss frontier.
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By 1916, after two grisly years
of trench warfare,
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the battle lines had changed very little.
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Successful attacks were
measured in hundreds of yards,