Great Retreat | |||||||||
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Part of the Eastern Front of World War I | |||||||||
![]() Russian withdrawal in 1915. | |||||||||
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Belligerents | |||||||||
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Commanders and leaders | |||||||||
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Strength | |||||||||
Initially: Central Powers 2,411,353 men[1] Including: 1,165,352 Germans[2] |
Initially: 2,975,695 men[1] | ||||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||||
13 July – 28 August 1915: German Empire: 239,975[3] KIA, MIA, WIA Austria-Hungary: 333,624[3] KIA, MIA, WIA |
13 July – 28 August 1915: Total: 1,005,911 [3] 96,820 KIA 429,742 WIA 479,349 MIA lost:[4] 1,115 machine guns 3,205 guns |
The Great Retreat was a strategic withdrawal and evacuation on the Eastern Front of World War I in 1915. The Imperial Russian Army gave up the salient in Galicia and the Polish Congress Kingdom. The Russian Empire's critically under-equipped military suffered great losses in the Central Powers' July–September summer offensive operations, which led to the Stavka ordering a withdrawal to shorten the front lines and avoid the potential encirclement of large Russian forces in the salient. While the withdrawal itself was relatively well-conducted, it was a severe blow to Russian morale.