In August 1914, the first month of WW1, the Russian army, scoring an early success against German troops on the eastern front, advanced well into East Prussia. Near the town of Tannenberg, the Germans counterattacked after having secretly encircled the Russian forces.

When the Russians tried to retreat, they found themselves trapped. More than 135,000 were captured and some 30,000 killed, including the Russian commander, General Aleksandr Samsonov, who committed suicide. Shortly after, the Russians suffered another defeat at the battle of Masurian Lakes. What clearly emerged from these battles was a theme that was to be repeated throughout the war on the Allied side: unprepared but courageous soldiers led by incompetent commanders. For the Russians, these demoralizing defeats intensified the growing dissatisfaction with the war in particular and with the czar's regime in general. In retrospect, the defeat can be seen as an early harbinger of the 1917 Russian Revolution.

On the strength of their win, the two victorious German generals, Erich Ludendorf and Paul von Hindenburg, became national heroes and later the joint heads of the German supreme command for the remainder of the war. In 1925, Hindenburg was elected president of the German Republic and reelected in 1932, narrowly defeating Adolf Hitler, who became chancellor. When Hindenburg died in 1934, he was buried in the National War Memorial at Tannenberg, the scene of his greatest victory.

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