Those Tactics were ‘Blitzkrieg'  fast advance mobile warfare, known as the ‘Schlieffen plan.

The plan broadly centred on reaching Paris in quick fire time and obtaining a surrender of French Forces thereby all but ending the war before Christmas.

A British Expeditionary force ‘that contemptible little army' as Kaiser Willhelm dubbed them had other Ideas.

At the Battle of Mons in on 23rd of August 1914 the British force made up mainly of rifle marksmen fought one of the greatest tactical retreats in the history of warfare. It alone held up the advance of the German army long enough for General Joffre the French commander in chief to muster his forces .

The French and the retreating British army settled along the Southern bank  of the River Marn, Dug in and waited for the Advancing Germans.

On the 6th of September believing the best form of defence to be attack, Joffre attacked the Germans and managed to split their main army intent on besieging Paris. At the time the Germans were only 30 miles from the centre of the City.

They were forced to divert troops form the siege and the French managed to open a gap in the German line of some 45 kilometres into which the British expeditionary force and French reservists poured.

The gap in German lines was gradually widened and the advance was all but halted .

The battle lasted until 12th September 1914 after which both forces dug in and trench warfare became a factor of the war.

For that fact the  first Battle of the Marne was arguably the most decisive battle of the war. After neither army made significant advances of their lines for the rest of the war.

History has judged  that after the Marne neither army had a chance of defeating the other totally and in fact neither the German army nor its British counterpart was totally defeated in  the field.

It is a salutary factor that on 2nd of August 1914 Corporal Thomas of the Irish dragoons fired the first shot on advancing German forces by any British service man during the war. Four years later a British service man fired the last shot to be fired, only yards from where Corporal Thomas fired his shot.

The war had come full circle  in the second Battle of The Marne.

Four years of slaughter for not a yard gained effectively along the whole western  front  

Good morrow dear  Rat
You are getting rather fat
On your diet of my dead mate and Tac
Hard tac bisquits sent up the line
For the soldiers to eat without any wine
Cos thats for the Generals who are all just fine
Sat in the billets way behind the line

Your whiskers are twitiching
And that nose must be itching
With all them fleas you are host to
You can cut the stench of life in this trench
But the residents here have a mind to
Watch you grow fat oh dear Mr Rat
Cos come yuletide festive well get you

I bet you'll taste nice done in a trice
On the end of my dead mates bayonet
In my belly in time to stop the decline 
In my health and general demeanour
What do i mean sir i mean ta 
Plug you with my dead mates  rifle
So do not trifle just nibble my toes once more
And i'll eat you with your fleas and all