What were some of the horrors of World War I?

Answer 1

World War 1, The Great War, or at it's end so commonly called "The war to end all wars" was probably one of the most horrendous wars ever conceived by man. At it's start it was to be considered a short war, but when the French dug in to stop the German advance the Germans did as well, creating a front that would remain unchanged for years. On that very field the act of trench hopping became a vain attempt to gain just a few yards of land where most were cut down by machine gun fire. Trenches themselves were just as worse, as the land turned from countryside to mud fields you often had disease spread rampant as sanitation was lacking. Rats consumed the dead that were often left in the fields and skeletal remains were often a result from this. Through the night soldiers would often have to listen to the cries of their fellow injured servicemen and the constant shelling which gave term to the phrase "Shell shock".

If you were lucky to survive the carnage it often was not a feeling of relief. It is said that only one in four soldiers made it back from the war, and those that had come back either became emotionally disconnected or mad. It's difficult to imagine what it really was like back then, but it was obvious enough that its devastation left many nations to pursue isolation and mass disarmament.