At the outbreak of World War I, Britain had a relatively small professional
army (247,000 men). Close to half of them were stationed overseas throughout
the British Empire.
Thus, on the home island in
August 1914, Britain’s generals mustered about 150,000 men to be the British
Expeditionary Force (BEF) that crossed the English Channel, to join the French
in fighting the German attackers.
Within three months, that
half of Britain’s professional army was gone. Most of the men in the BEF were
dead.
p.s. Britain’s total WWI
casualties: 673,375 dead and missing,
1,643,469 wounded
Reference:
Howard Zinn, A
People’s History of the United States, 1492- Present (New York: Harper
Perennial Modern Classics, 2005), 360.
See also:
Copyright © Richard Carl
Subber 2016 All rights reserved.
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