This audiobook is narrated by a digital voice.

The Battle of the Somme, which began on July 1, 1916, emerged from the desperate strategic situation facing the Allied powers as the war entered its third year with no clear prospect of victory despite the sacrifice of millions of lives and the expenditure of vast resources that were draining the economies and societies of all belligerent nations. The Western Front had solidified into an unbroken line of trenches stretching from the North Sea to the Swiss border, creating a stalemate that conventional military wisdom seemed unable to break while the mounting casualties and economic costs of prolonged warfare threatened to exhaust the warring nations before any decisive military result could be achieved. The battle represented the culmination of Allied strategic planning that sought to coordinate simultaneous offensives on multiple fronts to prevent Germany from concentrating its forces against any single threat while achieving the breakthrough that had eluded previous attempts to restore mobility to the Western Front.

The selection of the Somme River valley as the location for the major British offensive reflected both strategic considerations and the practical constraints imposed by the division of the Western Front between British and French forces, as this sector represented the boundary between the two armies while offering terrain that seemed suitable for the kind of large-scale infantry assault that military commanders believed could overcome German defensive positions through the application of overwhelming force.