Joseph Joffre

He breathed his last in Paris and was buried on his estate in Louveciennes, in north-central France.

Born in Rivesaltes, Roussillon, France, Joseph Joffre was the eldest of eleven children of a provincial cooper. He completed his graduation from the college of Perpignan with honours in mathematics.

He started his military career by fighting in defence of Paris during the Franco-Prussian War from 1870 to 1871. During the Sino-French War from 1884 to 1885, he played a significant role in the Keelung Campaign.

In 1885, he was responsible for the military control of Formosa. Later, he served as chief of engineers for three years at Hanoi. As part of his military job, he went to Senegal in 1892, to build a railway.

It was Joffre, who successfully led the French Army to attack on Timbuktu. After his transfer to Madagascar in 1897, he built the naval base of Diego-Suarez. Due to his hard work and efforts, he was promoted to the rank of Colonel.

In 1903, he came back to France and took the command of the Thirteenth Brigade. After three years, he took-up the responsibility to control the Sixth Division. In 1908, he was in charge of controlling the Second Corps at Amiens.

During the opening battles of the World War I, he successfully adopted Plan XVII, a military doctrine by General Ferdinand Foch to defend France from Germany.

During the Battle of the Frontiers in 1914, he issued his Instruction Particuliere No. 10 after receiving repeated warning from Charles Lanrezac, a French general, regarding German cavalry spotted at Dinant on the Meuse.

He was confident that the German cavalry could be held by the British and Belgians. As part of his order, French Third and Fourth Armies were making preparation to attack into the Ardennes.

Unfortunately, the French and British were forced to fall back by the German forces towards the Marne, east of Paris for his erroneous military tactics.

During the First Battle of Marne in 1914, he successfully applied his military tactics by issuing his Instruction Generale No. 4. As part of his order, Gallieni, the Military Governor of Paris, took the command of the Sixth Army.

To empower the French Army, he formed a new cavalry corp under Conneau to fill the gap between Fifth Army and the BEF. To ensure success in the battle, he dismissed several unsuccessful generals and replaced them with powerful military personalities like Franchet d’Esperey, Foch and so on.