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Battle of Gunbinnen
Part of Eastern Front (World War I)
Eastern Front, August 17–23, 1914
Date August 20, 1914 Location Gumbinnen, East Prussia (now Gusev, Russia) Result Russian victory
Combatants
Russian Empire	German Empire
Commanders
Paul von Rennenkampf, Alexander Samsonov	Maximilian von Prittwitz
Strength
I Army (200,000 men)	VIII Army (150,000 men)
Casualties
?	6,000 prisoners

Eastern Front
Stalluponen – Gumbinnen – Tannenberg – 1st Lemberg – Krasnik – 1st Masurian Lakes – Przemyśl – Vistula River – Łódź – Bolimov – 2nd Masurian Lakes – Gorlice-Tarnów – Warsaw – Lake Naroch – Brusilov Offensive – Kerensky Offensive

The Battle of Gumbinnen, started by the Germans on August 20, 1914 was the first major offense in the Eastern Front during the First World War.

Contents 1 Background 2 German attack and retreat 3 German countermeasures 4 References

At the outbreak of the war, von Prittwitz's orders were very strict and very clear: with his Eighth Army, he was just to keep his positions in East Prussia, without attempting any offensive action, as all German efforts must concentrate on the Western Front against France, according to the Schlieffen Plan. Not only must he not advance, but, should the Russians increase their pressure, he was authorized to fall back as far as the Vistula River.

Three armies were deployed in the theater: von Prittwitz's Eighth Army (three corps led by Hermann von François, August von Mackensen and Otto von Below, plus one cavalry division) was facing the Russian First Army (under Paul von Rennenkampf) and Second Army (under Alexander Samsonov). The Russians enjoyed considerable numeric superiority.

In the previous Battle of Stalluponen, von François had launched — on his own initiative and orders to the contrary notwithstanding — an attack against the enemy. Then he had to retreat to Gumbinnen, but managed to capture about 3,000 Russian prisoners.

With these premises, von François managed to persuade von Prittwitz to launch an offensive. His arguments were that his troops — many of whom were native East Prussians — would not have been happy to retreat and leave their homeland into enemy hands, and that the Russians were not as strong as they appeared to be. Thus, von Prittwitz decided to engage Rennenkampf's First Army, which meant 150,000 Germans against 200,000 Russians. It must be noted as such a decision went against the orders that von Moltke (Germany's Chief of Staff) had issued, and that categorically ruled out any offensive on the Eastern Front until France's defeat in the West.

Moreover, von François — a restless commander who showed a level of insubordination quite uncommon among the German military — acted in excessive haste, moving his army corps in the morning of August 20, hours before Mackensen's and Below's corps were ready. This premature attack alerted the Russians, which were able to deploy their heavy artillery in such a way as to repel the enemy offensive. The Germans were forced to withdraw in disarray, leaving 6,000 prisoners in Russian hands.

At this point, von Prittwitz feared that his army could be trapped between Rennenkampf and Samsonov, although the former did not seem eager to pursue the retreating German troops. Von Prittwitz panicked and, with a decision out of proportion to the effective severity of the situation, ordered a general retreat to the Vistula River, leaving East Prussia to the Russians.

Part of von Prittwitz's panic contaminated von Moltke as well, who feared Berlin itself could now be threatened by the advancing Russians. The Chief of Staff reacted with two countermeasures: He removed von Prittwitz and his deputy von Waldensee, replacing them with Paul von Hindenburg and Erich Ludendorff; He transferred some divisions from the Western Front. This transfer is generally considered a wrong move, as it weakened (some scholars say fatally) that "marching wing" which — running across Belgium as fast as possible — should have outflanked the French army and caused it to surrender.

On the Prussian front, Hindenburg and Ludendorff — who were far more competent than their predecessors — halted the German retreat, and decided to take the initiative again. This would result in the Battle of Tannenberg, one of Germany's greatest victories.

• Battle of Gumbinnen