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| - The Second Battle of the Aisne ( or ) was a French attempt to inflict a decisive defeat on the German armies in France by an offensive of several French army groups. The attacks became known as the Nivelle Offensive and began on 9 April with a British attack at Arras. The French attacks began on 16 April 1917 against the German occupied Chemin des Dames ridge, some to the north-east of Paris and just south of the city of Laon. On 17 April the French Fourth Army further south began the Battle of the Hills. Robert Nivelle, Commander-in-Chief of the French army, laid the plan in December 1916 after he had replaced Joseph Joffre, who had lost the confidence of the French government and been removed from office. The objective of Nivelle's offensive was to secure the prominent, long, east–west r
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| abstract
| - The Second Battle of the Aisne ( or ) was a French attempt to inflict a decisive defeat on the German armies in France by an offensive of several French army groups. The attacks became known as the Nivelle Offensive and began on 9 April with a British attack at Arras. The French attacks began on 16 April 1917 against the German occupied Chemin des Dames ridge, some to the north-east of Paris and just south of the city of Laon. On 17 April the French Fourth Army further south began the Battle of the Hills. Robert Nivelle, Commander-in-Chief of the French army, laid the plan in December 1916 after he had replaced Joseph Joffre, who had lost the confidence of the French government and been removed from office. The objective of Nivelle's offensive was to secure the prominent, long, east–west ridge of the Chemin des Dames and then to move north to capture the city of Laon. The Chemin des Dames ridge had been quarried for stone for centuries, leaving a warren of caves and tunnels which were used as shelters by German troops, to escape the French bombardment. The offensive met massed German machine-gun fire, which inflicted many casualties and repulsed the French infantry at many points. The French achieved some substantial tactical successes and took c. 29,000 prisoners in their attacks on the Aisne and in Champagne but failed to achieve their strategic objectives and inflict a decisive defeat on the Germans. The failure to break through the German defences had a traumatic effect on the morale of the French army and many divisions mutinied. Nivelle was superseded by Pétain who adopted a strategy of "healing and defence"; on 19 May Pétain issued Directive No 1 for limited offensives, intended to resume the wearing-out of the German army, while conserving French infantry. The new strategy was not one of passive defence and in June and July the Fourth, Tenth and Sixth armies managed to conduct several limited attacks and the First Army was sent to Flanders to participate in the Third Battle of Ypres. The British prolonged the Arras offensive into mid-May, despite uncertainty about French intentions, high losses and diminishing success, before moving their forces northwards to Flanders. The British captured Messines Ridge on 7 June and spent the rest of the year on the offensive in the Third Battle of Ypres (31 July – 10 November) and the Battle of Cambrai (20 November – 8 December). The French conducted limited attacks at Verdun in August, which recaptured much of the remaining ground lost in 1916 and at Malmaison in October, which captured at the west end of the Chemin des Dames and forced the Germans to withdraw from the ridge to the north bank of the Ailette. French army morale recovered from the strategic failure of the Nivelle Offensive, after Pétain introduced reforms increasing the welfare of French troops and 40–62 mutineers were shot as scapegoats.
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