The Battle of Cambrai - 1917

The Battle of Cambrai, from the 20th November to the 7th December 1917, was the first British campaign in World War One that tanks were used successfully by demonstrating the fact that the Hindenburg line could be penetrated. The town of Cambrai is in the North of France near the border between France and Germany. By 1917, Cambrai had become one of the most important railheads and HQ towns behind the German lines. In front of it lay the immensely powerful Siegfried Stellung - better known to the British as the Hindenburg Line. So strong was the defensive position here that German Divisions decimated during the Third Battle of Ypres were sent here to recuperate and refit. It included two lines of fortifications, with barbed wire belts tens of yards wide, concrete emplacements and underground works. A third parallel line was also under construction.

The initial plan proposed by J.F.C. Fuller in June of 1917 and almost