I was looking at a generalised map of the Western front today, and was struck with, what I thought an odd question....... what actually happened to the trench lines on the neutral Swiss border? Were there extensive trench systems right up to the border, and then they stopped? Was there a little old Swiss man sat on a chair with a piece of paper in varying languages saying "no entry"? Or did both sides fronts stop at a natural barrier or perhaps a large and extensive de-militarised zone?

Personally I quite like the idea of there being a little old man shooing off armed to teeth combatants but I can't quite see it!!?

Regards

Mark

I often wondered about that myself. I am sure we have some experts here who will point out some standard reference works, but until then you might look at a few articles on the "Unfortunate Region" website which is found at :

http://www.unfortunate-region.org/

This is not my favourite website for ease of browsing, but if you look at the "Battlefields" section, you will find the articles:


Hot spots on the Swiss border (1914-1918)
Where WW1-front lines reached Switzerland
By Oswald Schwitter

which gives quite an interesting overview of the Franch-Germany-Switzerland boundary, and:

The Northwestern Austro-Italian Alpine front:
A General Overview.
By Francesco Davini


which talks about the Italy-Austria alpine front.

Basically, it seems the geography did not encourage large operations where almost all transport was of the two-legged variety; especially as even a successful advance would not easily have changed the strategic situation. Of course, I don't really know.

Yes, the lines went right up to the Swiss Border. Great care had to be taken to avoid any overshoots or stray artillery or rifle rounds violating Swiss Territory. The Swiss protected their neutrality vigorously with forts, barbed wire and similar fixed fortifications. There were in the region of 450,000 Swiss soldiers deployed for this purpose. For this reason the waring Nations were relatively quiet near the border limiting their operations to holding the line only.

There was an interesting article in Stand To! a couple of years ago on this subject.

Tim

http://homepage.sunrise.ch/homepage/schwitte/
then click ww1 Alsace and you will find the complete Swiss Army with its two soldiers....

many thanks James, Tim and Egbert

I don't have any particular interest in the area but as I said it was just a question that arose when looking at the map! It looks like my little old man wasn't there after all!!!

Regards

Mark

To get an idea of what it might have looked like along the border check out the scenes in the movie "The Great Escape" where Steve Maqueen is trying to escape into Switzerland on a motorcycle. Lots of barbed wire entanglements all along the boarder with Germany, or at least that's how Hollywood portrayed it.

Wow!
Nice to discover six years later one more citation of my article... !

I may suggest another swiss website on this:
http://www.stelvio-umbrail.ch/
If you can't read German, you can anyway see the nice pictures in their gallery:
http://www.stelvio-umbrail.ch/gallery/wanderwege/index.html

Regards,
Francesco

A subject covered before on this forum. I enclose a few links
http://1914-1918.invisionzone.com/forums/i...t&p=1063005
http://1914-1918.invisionzone.com/forums/i...st&p=483087
http://1914-1918.invisionzone.com/forums/i...st&p=880256

Here I'd do my usual rant (albeit a short one) about using the search engine but I haven't the heart as the search on this forum is so p**s poor that I can't even find threads I remember contributing to!

BTW there were two fronts that ended at the Swiss border as the Alpine front also ended this way. So worried were the Italians of a German dash across Switzerland that substantial fortifications were built facing Switzerland (mounting heavy artillery which annoyed the Swiss somewhat)

But this did not prevent the French air force bombing Lausanne in 1917 - by accident. They were aiming for Germany. There was a diplomatic incident, the French apologised profusely and that was the end of it.

Both sides used Switzerland for the movement of spies and others whenever they could get away with it. The Ashenden stories and Rue St. Roche give details.