"With the retreat from the frontiers showing little sign of ending, Allied generals were reconciling themselves to the seeming inevitability of defeat. As the German Army swung through northern France and approached Paris, Marshal Joffre had, however, realised the essence of the German Schlieffen Plan. He saw that the wheel to the south by von Kluck's and von Bulow's armies had exposed their flank east of Paris and that it was vulnerable to a counter attack. In a masterpiece of military diplomacy he persuaded Field Marshal Sir John French to join the attack back across the River Marne. The exhausted British, who had retreated 235 miles since the Battle of Mons two weeks earlier, got underway slowly against German delaying positions. The resulting Battle of the Marne, with the British Expeditionary Force playing a key part alongside the French, was monumental and at the time the victory did indeed seem to be a 'miracle'. The enemy advance had been halted and the Germans were being driven back beyond the River Aisne but there they stopped, dug-in and reinforced. The pursuing British duly attacked across the river but they were plagued with difficulties against well prepared German positions. For the first time, attacking in the open, they felt the full impact of modern defensive firepower that they themselves had used so effectively at Mons and Le Cateau. II and III Corps were pinned to the river banks and the lower slopes, while Haig's I Corps reached the crest of the open ridges of the Chemin des Dames. Here the Germans held them and on the evening of 14 Sepember, with the British divisions battered and unable to make any headway, Field Marshal French ordered the BEF to dig-in as a temporary measure. This, however, was to be no short lived expedient; it was the beginning of trench warfare for the BEF and the resulting lines of trenches on the River Aisne moved very little during the next four years." -- From the container insert.

16:9 Widescreen presentation.