Foch, Ferdinand

Foch, Ferdinand (1851-1929), French general, who commanded Allied armies on the Western Front during the final campaigns of World War I. Born in Tarbes, Foch was commissioned in the artillery corps in 1873 and became Professor of Strategy at the École Supérieure de Guerre (War College) in 1894. His lectures established him as a leading military theoretician of his country.

In October 1914, shortly after the outbreak of World War I, Foch was charged with the coordination of the heterogeneous French, Belgian, and British troops constituting the Allied forces in north-east France. During 1915 and the greater part of 1916, he was the commanding general of the Allied armies in the north. In 1917 he became chief of the general staff of the French army.

The great German offensive in France in the spring of 1918, which threatened the Allies with defeat, impressed on them the urgent need of appointing a supreme military commander and in April Foch became commander in chief of all Allied armies, including the American, which was then fighting in France. After a number of initial setbacks, he launched the series of counter-offensives that led to final victory. In 1918 Foch was made a marshal of France and was elected to the French Academy. “This is not a peace treaty, it is an armistice for 20 years”, was his prophetic response to the punitive clauses put in the Treaty of Versailles by the Allied victors against Germany.