THE SEEDS OF DISASTER

Robert A. Doughty The framework of French doctrine, organization, equipment, and training came from an emphasis on the destructiveness of firepower, the strength of the defense, the ascendancy of the methodical battle and the unifying power of the commander. The French firmly believed that the new weapons and greater firepower made the battlefield much more lethal than in the past. The great destructive power of the new weapons strengthened the defense, and relatively less man could establish a virtually impenetrable barrier of fire. An attacker could overwhelm a defender only by the closely coordinated employment of massed men and materiel. The doctrine which emerged from this perception of great lethality stressed what the French called the bataille conduite, or the methodical battle. By this term they meant a rigidly controlled operation in which all units and weapons were carefully marshaled and then employed in combat. The French favored a step-by-step battle, with units obediently moving between phase lines and adhering to strictly scheduled timetables. Such methods, they believed were essential for the coherent employment of the enormous amounts of men and materiel demanded by modern combat. A hastily prepared, impulsive fight was doomed to failure. The focus of decision-making was best kept at higher command levels, because centralized control was necessary to coordinate the actions of numerous subordinate units. The French preferred rigid centralization and strict obedience. Their doctrine stressed the necessity of avoiding an encounter battle in which moving armies unexpectedly collided and had to fight in an impromptu or spontaneous fashion. They thus opted for a timeconsuming, intricate process that prized preparation rather than improvisation. As a consequence of this approach, French doctrine envisaged first the weakening of an attacker by a defenders fire, and then his destruction by a massive but tightly controlled battering ram attack. METHODICAL BATTLE: This step-by-step process relied upon the tightly controlled movement of men and materiel, usually between phase lines and according to a rigid timetable. It permitted the production of the maximum amount of firepower from every arm, and ensured that higher-level commanders could completely control or direct the battle. It accorded very little freedom or flexibility to lower-level commanders. Doctrine placed great stress upon the defense. It stated that the defense served to repulse enemy attacks, while the offense routed him from his positions and destroyed his forces. ANTITANK DEFENSE: The antitank gun, rather than the tank, accorded more with Frances approach to national defense, since it was less expensive, was primarily a defensive weapon, and could easily be handled by the citizen-soldiers. By 1940, the French possessed an excellent series of antitank weapons. Their 25mm cannon was

effective up to 800 meters against heavily armored vehicles (40mm of armor), and up to 1,500 m against lightly armored vehicles. The 1938 infantry regulations specified that the 25mm cannon, however, was not to be fired at targets beyond a thousand meters because of difficulties with target acquisition. By 39-40, the old 75mm cannon was gradually being replaced by the new 47mm cannon, which was undoubtedly the best anti tank cannon employed in the battle of France. The limitation of military service to only one year necessitated considerable simplification. One area that was simplified was the number of possible infantry formations for the squad, platoon, and company was reduced and less flexibility in their application was expected. Greater emphasis was placed on fire rather than manuever. Regulations explained the importance of placing a sufficient number of projectiles on specially selected enemy positions instead of trying to move around them by subtle maneuvers. The platoon was the small4est unit that was capable of performing an elementary manuever It was easier to train the short-term recruit in the firing of their weapons than it was to train them to manuever. Rather than seeing a need for tank units, the French foresaw a need for much greater motorization of the infantry and artillery units that would be moved forward. They consequently led the worlds military in motorizing their forces. The cavalry could accomplish an economy-of-force mission and guard the infantry-heavy forces as they occupied their positions. From their analysis of WWI, the French concluded that increases in firepower had greatly altered conduct on the battlefield. Separate and powerful attacks along converging lines. The enemy could not reinforce one area without weakening another, and thereby could not prevent the attacker from pressing forward. While attacking across abroad front might appear to be a linear attack, it actually consisted of concentrating powerful means along several areas in a defenders line and then attacking This type of operation ensured that the attacker was always stronger than the defender, and that the defender could not mass sufficient forces to halt the attack. The single axis attack sought dept. It could be used in the opening of a campaign before a strongly organized defensive front had been established or in striking at the boundary between different armies or the e armies of different nations. The attack was divided into three separate operational phases: the preparation, the attack, and the exploitation. Within the planning for the divisions and corps in the battle, several bounds and phases had been foreseen for the operation. These controlled the forward movement of the divisions and prevented accidental bombardment of french units by friendly artillery. Even though they preferred a restrained attack, they believed a limited attack could serve useful functions. Such attacks could improve an unfavorable situation, could gain objectives the enemy could not recapture except buy a concerted and costly effort, or

could destroy enemy forces without using the enormous means normally required for a more extensive attack. The French military placed the greatest emphasis on the requirement for firepower. The reliance on firepower supported the need for the methodical battle, fought offensively or defensively. The vast curtains of fire could only be coordinated and delivered through tightly centralized, successive actions in which the artillery played a large role. The attack is the fire that advances, the defense is the fire that halts the enemy. Fire permitted the maneuver or movement of infantry which remained the queen of battle. Whether from tanks, aviation, artillery, gas, or the infantry, supporting fires assisted the infantry with the principal mission of combat> thus the machines of war appeared as the auxiliaries of the infantryman. The concept of centralization of artillery assets corresponded with the concept of maneuvering masses of fire. Such control was necessary for maneuver, since it enabled the commander to concentrate his fires on the decisive point in the battle. The decisive point, however, was one defined by larger unit commanders, and maneuver was viewed in terms of the movement of larger units, rather than smaller ones. While the need for decentralization during the advance was recognized, the military leaders preferred to have a major portion of the artillery for the use of the larger unit commanders. A central reserve of artillery provided the higher commander the means to exercise a major influence over the battlefield, and it was a readily available reserve that could be r rapidly shifted to another area. The requirement for such a reserve meant that a major portion of the artillery was long-range, heavy artillery under the control of corps and higher headquarters. But the use of artillery in this manner favored a more stable battlefield, rather than a highly mobile one, and it viewed mobility predominately from its strategic rather than its tactical aspects. Centralization affected not only the overall allocation and control of artillery, but also the ability of tactical units to receive immediate and responsive artillery fire. This effect can be seen in the relationship among the units being supported, the forward observers, and the commander of the artillery unit. Forward observers did not have to accompany the units being supported. They remained to the rear, observing from a vantage point, so that they could identify centers of enemy resistance. As soon as an observer collected information about a potential target to his front, he passed the information to the artillery battalion, where the commander decided if rounds would be fired. If the commander decided not to fire, or if he believed more artillery support was needed, he passed the information to his higher headquarters, where that artillery commander decided if his unit would engage the target. Apparently the unit being supported had little influence over the artillery fires it received. Such methods placed the greatest emphasis on massed fires favoring larger units rather than smaller ones. Even requests for direct support fires were not passed directly from the unit needing support to the artillery units. Requests were passed from a battalion to the commander of a regiment and if the request affected only his units, he passed it to the artillery supporting his regiment. If it affected the maneuver of units in another regiment, he

passed the request to division HQ, which could place all the artillery fire from the division on a target if it desired. once again, massed fires on targets identified by higher-level commanders. In 1936, the manual concentrated on improving the rate of fire by using preplanned firing points. Tanks are only supplementary means of action placed temporarily at the disposition of the infantry. They considerably reinforce the action of the infantry, but they do not replace them. The action of the tanks can substitute for the direct support and close protection demanded heretofore of the artillery. Armored units tend to move too quickly, thereby losing part of their offensive capability and becoming vulnerable to counterattacks. The solution of the problem of tanks moving forward too quickly lay in successive objectives. If these objectives were placed about fifteen hundred meters apart, the infantry and artillery could provide protective fires and the tanks movement could be closely controlled. CHARS DE MANOEUVRE ENSEMBLE: The tanks for mass maneuver were not constituted into units larger than a battalion. Apparently, a variable number of tank battalions would be grouped into larger units according to the needs of a specific mission. They would normally be deployed ahead of the infantry and their accompanying tanks in order to destroy the stronger defenses of the enemy. After they overran the enemy position, the following infantry and their tanks would then move forward to destroy the enemy resistance completely. They could also be committed against an enemy flank in an oblique fashion, or they could thrust more deeply into the enemys rear. The chars de manoeuvre ensemble, therefore, were little more than a leading wave of tanks that prepared the way for the infantry, which was the decisive arm, or that enabled an infantry unit to move. The speed of the attack was conditioned by the ability of the artillery to provide support. Large armored formations could move no faster than their artillery, which would remain under centralized control at as high a level as possible. The French placed great importance on the various arms cooperation together. They thought an infantry attack could be decisive only if carried out with tank support and if supported by artillery. In the name of combined arms, they preferred to subordinate each arm to the others, and rejected the possibility of the tank acting relatively independently. The French wanted the tank to be bound tightly to the infantry and to be restrained by the tether of artillery support. Their emphasis on combined arms on the battlefield overruled any possibility of the tank performing a function other than supporting the infantry. As the tank was made more vulnerable by slower speed, French tanks were more heavily armored than were the Germans. Gamelin described the best use of armored divisions was in an action on the decisive point of the battle. They were obliged to advance in successive jumps according to the classic process of slow attacks based on the movement of infantry and artillery. Armored divisions were to operate in the same manner as other tanks in a mass manuever. . in a

step-by-step, carefully controlled fashion within the methodical battle. Gamelin failed to recognize the ability of the armored division to restore mobility to the battlefield, but he did recognize tank units to be most valuable for their ability to add considerable firepower to an attacking force and for their potential for crushing any opponent in their path, and believed a tank division provided more firepower and mass than any other organization. The 1939 manual concentrated on the employment of the armored division to assist the maneuver of a larger unit, which was obviously an infantry unit. It also discussed the actual employment of the division as if it were simply a much larger grouping of massmanuever tanks. The French still intended to employ the large tank units to increase the offensive power and assist the maneuver of the infantry, which remained the decisive arm. The manual also included a concept for successive objectives, but the bounds were increased to three or four kilometers because of the great size of the division. The tanks would be habitually organized into two echelons with tow or three battalions in the first echelon and one or two battalions in the second echelon. While the first echelon fought its way to the next objective, the second echelon protected its flanks or reduced centers of enemy resistance bypassed by the first echelon. The DLM was designed to fulfill the traditional roles of cavalry units on the battlefield and also to be able to accomplish, with appropriate reinforcement, missions usually assigned to infantry or armored divisions. Ironically, the wartime doctrine for the employment of the DLMs, except for the emphasis on cavalry-type missions, closely resembled the eventual doctrine of most Western powers for the employment of mechanized units during the battles of WWII. The cavalry was viewed as being particularly suited for rapid engagement on extended fronts for abrupt and violent action by fire, and for the conduct of the exploitation. The cavalry division could be employed on security or reconnaissance missions and as a highly mobile reserve of fire. While the division could be employed in the offensive, it was best suited of r employment in weakly defended intervals on exposed flanks, or against unprepared defenders. The regulation emphasized that an attack by a cavalry division was different from that by an infantry division, for a cavalry division attack was based on the exploitation of the effect of surprise, while an infantry attack was based on a succession of efforts. Defensive combat, however, was like that of the infantry division; it was based on the establishment of barrages of continuous fire. As for the effect of firepower, the regulation strongly emphasized that fire and movement were intimately bound together. There was on inordinate emphasis placed on firepower, since the cavalry had depended on mobility is one if its distinct characteristics for centuries. The DLM was given the mission of security and reconnaissance operations, the exploitation of a breach of enemy lines, and the sealing of a breach in friendly lines by occupying a defensive position or by counterattacking. Although capable of the

offensive, the division was thought most suited for movements to contact, operations on an enemys flank, and for exploitation after a front had been ruptured by other units. The manual emphasized that such an attack should be closely supported by the artillery and infantry and should not be conducted against an enemy in a strongly held position. The DLM could accomplish the same sort of mission for a large motorized unit that a non-mechanized cavalry unit could accomplish for a normal large unit. The defense was described as a necessary form of operation, so long as it contributes at the least cost to the success of the offense. Defense could therefore contribute, but only the offense could gain final success. The recognition of the importance of the offense did not mean that the French always preferred to attack rather than to defend. The perception of an immense amount of fire available on the battlefield contributed to the armys belief that the defense was stronger than the offense. The employment of automatic weapons and artillery permitted the establishment of a curtain of fire that would extract a terrible toll from any attacker. For an attack to succeed, a larger number of troops and materiel were required than for the defense. A hasty attack against a well-prepared defender would probably lead to failure, since the defender had the advantage and could inflict heavy casualties on an attacker. The only way for an attacker could penetrate a deadly curtain of fire would be to create a much greater concentration of fire with three times the infantry, six times the artillery, and fifteen times the ammunition. The complexity of such an n effort limited the possibility of maneuver dramatically. The manual: The offensive battle thus assumes the form of successive actions of force, preceded by indispensable delays for their preparation, and followed by periods of movement more or less long. The French perceived maneuver predominantly in the sense of moving units in order to have them deliver fire or of moving fire without moving units. They rarely emphasized the advantages of moving units to gain something other than an advantage in firepower over an enemy. The physical destruction of the enemy was stressed to destroy his will to fight, not the movement of a unit so it could have a decided advantage over the enemy. Manuever therefore, did not necessarily mean movement. The key to the methodical battle and its frequent pauses was the role to b e played by the artillery, since the successive actions were necessary to permit the forward displacement of the artillery during an attack. France had 5,412 75mm guns left over from the Great War. It therefore remained the major artillery piece of the division.

Description of typical battle When the attack began, the infantry advanced on or two km before halting in order to readjust the artillery fire. The attack again commenced and, after advancing one or two km, another readjustment was necessary. In order to control

the advance of the infantry and to ensure artillery support, a number of intermediate objectives were established which corresponded to theses advances of one to two km. After a total advance of the infantry of about four or five km, a displacement of the artillery and a halting of the infantry advance was required. This displacement ensured that the infantry remained under the cover of the artillery and did not go beyond its maximum range. For control purposes, the maximum advance was sometimes limited to three or four km before the artillery began its displacement by increments. One rule of thumb stated that the distance of the advance ought to be half the maximum range of the artillery supporting the attack. Yet another aspect of the methodical battle affected by the artillery was consideration of the proper frontage of units in the attack. The width of the attack depended upon the amount of available artillery. A rule of thumb was that the depth of the attack would equal about one half of its width. If the front of the attacking troops begins to shrink appreciably, the range of artillery permits the enemy to execute concentrations of fire under the pressure of which the attack is weakened and finally is stopped. The greater the initial frontage upon which an attack is made, the more desirable the results obtained from it. Standard densities were also used for specific types of fires. A rolling barrage, for example, that was two hundred m wide required one battalion of artillery, consisting of three batteries. Consequently, a division supported by its own artillery and that of another division, could attack on a front of about two thousand m. A density, even against an unfortified front, of at least four battalions per km was essential. With its organic five battalions of artillery, a divisions maximum front would still be from twelve to fifteen hundred m. anything beyond this forced the commander to break down his operation into different phases. Obtaining the proper density of artillery was the prime factor in determining whether to employ phasing. The artillery could be massed for the support of one attack; after that phase ended, it could be massed in support of another attack and the completion of another phase. Another result of the emphasis on the artillery and the methodical battle was that infantry units became burdened by the requirement to move heavy equipment. Infantry units therefore became less, rather than more mobile. In 1914 a division of four regiments would be thirteen km long when conducting a road march. A 30s division of only three regiments would be thirty-four km long because of the additional number of trucks and horses. The newer division was much more complex and heavy and consequently less supple and less tactically and strategically mobile. Mobility was sacrificed for greater firepower; the onerous burden of displacing massive amounts of artillery seriously limited the possibility of any wide-ranging or sweeping operations. The motorized divisions were different from normal infantry in their strategic mobility, not in how they fought once they disembarked from their trucks. They required protection

while they displaced and had to disembark in a protected area. Essentially this was the same concept of motorization that was practiced in the Great War. It is by lateral fire that the infantry makes the enemy feel his advance, it taking him from the flank, the diagonal, the rear. It is by this fire that he will aid the progression of neighboring units that have been held up. The smallest infantry unit capable of maneuver was the rifle platoon and that the maneuvers should always be simple. A squad would never try to maneuver by using a few of its men to provide a base of fire while the remainder moved forward. If a platoon encountered fire from an enemy position, it should try to outflank this resistance, rather than; make a direct assault. While one squad placed fire on this point, the rest of the platoon would use favorable paths of approach toward it, move to its flanks, and then place oblique fire upon it. Companies used their platoons in the same manner. The platoons might move by bounds, but they moved slowly and eliminated enemy resistance as soon as they encountered it. After reaching the company objective, the company was supposed to halt so the commander could issue a verbal order to his platoon leaders describing how the next objective would be attacked. The company would utilize a succession of efforts and a succession of attack until it reached the battalions objective. French doctrine assumed that once a defenders front was broken, he could reestablish positions to the rear which could be taken only after the employment of large and powerful forces. The defender would be able to establish subsequent defensive positions rabidly and solder together the broken pieces of the front. This was not simply a process of reinforcement but one of sedimentation in which the defenders augmented the depth of a position of resistance and reestablished the continuity and depth of the front. Only after the successive enemy positions had been penetrated would the exploitation or pursuit begin. The French doctrine suggested a completely different tempo and approach. The preference for short-range attacks with numerous phases and bounds, the lengthy time required to displace artillery, and the use of standard densities to compute the amount of work demanded by such an operation. German: On the field of battle, the individual soldier fought bravely and well in this war, but the fundamental training of the French army was faulty. It was not trained and educated in the war of movement.

On attack-The "Deliberate Advance" Their experiences in 1914-1918 had convinced the French High Command that mobile warfare was unlikely. Instead, they based their idea of an offensive on a plan called the "Deliberate Advance". This was designed to give a slow but extremely safe method of attacking, designed to maximize enemy casualties and minimize friendly casualties. Of course it also minimized the chance of rapidly winning the war. There was a common saying in vogue at the time that "The Artillery conquers, the Infantry occupies", and the Deliberate Advance certainly mirrored this theory. The basic idea of the DA was for friendly artillery to pulverize enemy front line positions and neutralize the enemy artillery, after which friendly troops would occupy their trenches. If this seems similar to what happened in World War I, it is not coincidental! The deliberate advance was to be done in distinct stages: 1. Reconnaissance Using infantry patrols, air reconnaissance, and sound-ranging equipment, the French would determine the German (the French had a pretty good idea of who they were going to be fighting: front line and artillery positions. 2. Preparation Divisional and corps artillery assets would be brought forward and carefully sighted. A comprehensive fire plan would be developed designed to attain artillery supremacy. Prewar planning specified the extensive use of chemical weapons, and it is one of the few small mercies of WWII that they were not employed. 3. Bombardment and Attack The plan would be put into effect. After the artillery plan had smashed the enemy artillery and forward positions, the infantry, accompanied by tanks, would occupy the enemy positions. Tanks were never seen as a breakthrough weapon, but were designed to act as mobile artillery platforms to overcome local strongpoints that survived the initial artillery concentrations. 4. Consolidation After advancing 6-10km (the limit of the artillery support), the friendly forces would stop (ignoring that annoying Charles De Gaulle screaming for them to continue on to Berlin), dig in and establish new trench lines and artillery positions. A new fire plan would be developed for the next stage of the advance. The deliberate advance cycle could be repeated about once every 7-10 days. Although an adequate fire plan to defend the positions could be developed within a day, the reconnaissance necessary to for the next deliberate attack would take longer. This would give an average advance of 1km/day which was quite respectable by WWI standards. The key to the Deliberate Advance was the word

Deliberate. During the "phony war", the French used this a couple of times but then stopped (Poland had disappeared and there was no hurry). The basic defensive mindset of the French in 1939-40 meant that the Deliberate Advance was never really put to the test. However, it relied on its power upon a certain amount of cooperation from its opponent. If the enemy front-line trenches were heavily occupied and batteries fired from fixed positions, the DA could cause severe casualties. However, the build-up needed for a DA would be fairly easy to detect, and by deception operations the Germans could ensure that the massive blow would fall mainly on empty ground. They could then counterattack when the French attempted to consolidate. On Defense-Forts and Concrete The French could see World War II coming, but spent much of their defense budget on concrete instead of tanks and mobile forces. In hindsight, the Maginot line was a waste of money, especially as it was not extended along the entire Northern frontier (for both political and budgetary reasons). The Germans simply went around the end of the fortification line. However, at the time, the idea of an impregnable shield on the border supported by mobile forces to the rear seemed to be sound doctrine. By the standards of 1939, the Maginot line WAS formidable, and the Germans did not really attempt a break-through. One of the features of the Maginot line was that almost every inch of ground around it was plotted for artillery support. It would have been very difficult to take by direct assault. When defending static positions, the fire plan should be comprehensive and well developed. On Defense- Mobile situations The key to defending in mobile situations is whether the French have been allowed time enough to register their artillery. As stated earlier, it took the French about 24 hours to establish a basic fire plan.

A PERSPECTIVE ON INFANTRY
John A. English FRANCE The French army tended to think in terms of artillery dominating the battlefield. Described by some as a clumsy army, still beladen with much equipment from 1918. Tactically the French remained convinced that the artillery-infantry array was all but invincible. The defensive orientation of the French army naturally placed great stress upon the dominance and development of firepower. Weight of metal was considered paramount for both attack and defense. A standard division comprised three or four infantry regiments, each of three battalions, supported by two regiments of organic artillery. An infantry battalion consisted of three rifle companies and a close support

company, which included a section of antitank guns and close support mortars. Within a rifle company there were four sections (Platoons) each of three groups. The tactical distribution of the division was effected in three echelons; the battle echelon, entrusted to the divisional infantry commander; the artillery; main body, under the divisional artillery commander; and the divisional reserve. It was more a rigid fighting machine, with artillery openly regarded as the decisive arm, than a flexible instrument. The combat and fire unit of the French infantry was its Great War innovation, the groupe de combat, 12 strong. Its members were virtually tied to the light machine gun according to whether their individual role was to move it, service it, feed it, or protect it. Not surprisingly, the tactical training of automatic-rifle and machinegun teams was maintained at a reasonable standard, the technique of creating a tidal wave of small-arms fire ahead of advancing infantry being developed to a particularly high pitch. The rifle, on the other hand, was regarded as very much a subsidiary weapon and the standard of shooting was universally low. The further subdivision of the groupe into an automatic rifle squad and a rifle team partially reflected their priority since the latter, commanded by a corporal, was not strictly a rifle team but rather a specialized bombing cell of grenade thrower, grenade firer, and three riflemen-cum-grenadiers. Ideally suited for clearing the firebays and traverses of a trench system, the French groupe remained essentially indivisible and untrained to manuever within itself. French defensive thinking, based on the preeminence of firepower, remained essentially linear in conception. Superiority of fire was thought of as superiority along the whole front, not in a localized sense. Defensive tactics thus stressed stringent centralized control and the protection of flanks. Antitank weapons, of which a division in 1940 had 52 on paper, but in reality only 12, were to be placed well forward. Reinforcement of forward positions by reserves was considered normal practice, though little reliance was placed on the counterattack. Practically no emphasis was given to preparation of strong points in depth. In offensive operations the French that the offensive power of the unit was to be maintained by the gradual fusion of the reserve into the echelon of fire. The doctrine of direct reinforcement rather than outflanking manuever indicated a distinct French preference for deliberate methods of attack. French military opinion advocated attacking with preponderant fire on a narrow frontage of from 300 to 800 meters, the principle being that such concentration would ensure a dense volume of fire. The initiative of small units was restricted to a minimum. The role of tanks was thought to begin at the moment the infantry were held up or reached assault distance. Although normally controlled at a high level (corps) tanks were treated essentially as a subdivision of infantry. Because of the perceived antitank threat, the 1937 manual stated that tanks should never move out of the range of artillery support. It was common practice, therefore, to attach a tank company to an infantry regiment for extra firepower. The task assigned tanks would usually be to reduce centers of resistance encountered by foot soldiers. In the assault, they would advance immediately in front of the infantry, which on point of honor were never to let a tank fall into enemy hands.

The French tanks were thus employed, in fact, as but armored pillboxes on tracks, and so endowed with the power of movement at a foot soldiers pace.

STRANGE DEFEAT
Marc Bloch

More than once during the First War it was brought home how inefficient the High command could be when calculating accurately the length of time needed for an order, once issued from HQ to pass through its various recipients until finally it reached the formations who would have to act upon it. No amount of instructions will ever succeed in convincing the unimaginative that a runners pace is slow, and that he will often go wrong when roads and tracks have been turned into sea of mud. One simple and obvious remedy for this state of affairs would have been to establish a system which would have made it possible for small groups of officers to serve, turn and turn about, in the front line and at HQ. But senior generals dislike having the personnel of their staffs changed too often. What drove our armies to disaster was the cumulative effect of a great number of different mistakes. One glaring characteristic is, however, common to all of them. Our leaders, or those who acted for them, were incapable of thinking in terms of a new war. Faced with the undisputed evidence of Germanys new tactics, we ignored, or wholly failed to understand the quickened rhythm of the times. The relative value of distances had changed. For example, a unit pulled back to reform and reorganize, would not be pulled back far enough and would be over run sometimes even before all its sub-units had arrived. Supply depots were so close to the front that they were commonly over run. But it would not be fair to confine these criticisms to the High Command. Generally speaking, the combatant troops were no more successful than the staff in adjusting their movements or their tactical appreciations to the speed at which the Germans moved. From the beginning to the end of the campaign, the Germans showed the same embarrassing skill in appearing where they ought not to have appeared. The Germans took no account of roads. They were everywhere. They felt their way forward, stopping whenever they ran up against serious resistance. Where, however, the resistance was not serious and they could find a soft spot, they drove ahead, exploiting their gains and using them as a basis from which to develop the appropriate tactical movement of, rather, as it seemed, to take their choice of a number of alternative possibilities already envisaged in accordance with that methodical opportunism. They relied on action and on improvisation. Many of our military pundits were profoundly suspicious of armored units, judging them too heavy to be moved easily (and their rate of progress as shown in official statistics was, it is true, very slow, but only because it was assumed that they must move by night for security reasons---whereas, as things turned out, the war of speed was conducted almost uniformly by day); because those attending the Cavalry courses at the Staff

College had had it drilled into them that, though tanks might be tolerably useful in defense, their value for attack was nil. Rear area support troops were not armed or trained for their own defense. Army promotions---with very few exceptions---was, generally speaking, slow, and the old men at the top, even when they did show willingness to help their juniors up the ladder, were inclined to pick their men from among those who had shown themselves to be model pupilsalmost excessively model. They were defending a country, which they did not seriously think could offer any genuine resistance. The soldiers under their command were the sons of that People which they were only too glad to regard as degenerate.

WHY FRANCE FELL

Guy Chapman In April 1917 a law was passed requiring that divisional generals should be retired at age 62 and brigadier generals at age 58. This was rescinded in 1919 and the collection of overage generals began. Each division had an infantry commander and an artillery commander. The CG had to go through both and coordinate both. A British officer who attended a course for divisional and regimental commanders shortly before the war reported that seventy-five percent of the time was devoted to defense. The main theme was artillery. There was no tank officer among the instructors. There was no sense of the time element in war, which was presented as a series of mathematical problems, rules for frontages, numbers, and weight of fire. The defense was ingrained and initiative deprecated. If the active regiments were reasonably equipped, the newly formed A divisions were without many necessities. Most of the requisitioned elements were defective. The army had only 30,000 trucks and the balance was made up by civilian vehicles. One reconnaissance squadron, for example, had cars and motorcycles of twenty-four manufacturers and forty-two types. Weapon availability was equally deficient. Few of the newer weapons allotted to reserve formations actually existed. The failure to rear-echelon elements to defend themselves may, to a large degree, be explained by the fact that there were not enough weapons to arm the entire army and many of these units were disarmed so their weapons could be given to units more nearly expected to see combat. There were 23 active infantry divisions. Then came 16 A divisions made up of reservists aged between 24 and 32 years. These units normally had 19-20 regular officers, 76 NCOs, and 50 or so enlisted specialists. The B divisions (numbered from

51 through 71, were made up of men over 32 years old. These divisions were supposed to have 3 regular officers. normally the CG and the infantry and artillery commanders. The 47mm antitank gun was likely the best piece fielded by any army in 1940, but was horse drawn. Corps artillery included two groups of 105mm guns of two batteries each, and two of 155mm. Corps troops also included a commo group, a regiment of pioneers, and was supposed to have an observation group of eight planes.

THE IDES OF MAY

John Williams

The completion of Frances fortification system had been geared to the year 1935, the first of the annees creuses when, owing to the low wartime birth rate, the annual intake of army recruits would begin to fall sharply from an average 24,000 to 170,000. In response to the mood of a war-weary nation, military service had been reduced to eighteen months in 1923 and to one year in 1928. With the war won, and Alsace-Lorraine recovered, the much-depleted professional cadres of the French Army suddenly found themselves deprived of the sense of purpose that had inspired them in pre-war years. Not only were there no more worlds to conquer, but in the horror of the trenches, war had lost its last vestiges of glory and glamour. Deprived of its old respect, without an inspiring goal, and subject to damaging cuts and economics, the army was falling into a vague malaise militare. The postwar inflation and high cost of living put officers and NCOs at a disadvantage financially. This, together with poor promotion prospects, was causing promising officers to leave the army for more attractive civilian employment and discouraging potential entrants from traditional military families. The older generals were staying on, perpetuating the blockage at the top that was so discouraging to ambitious colonels and majors. Their retirement age, which during the war had been fixed at sixty, rose in the twenties to sixty-two, sixty-five, and finally seventy. The general staff and Ecole were unduly influenced by the rigid military thinking of elderly wartime commanders whose minds were unreceptive to new ideas. Petains dicta, pronounced in his PROVISIONAL INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE COMBAT OF LARGE UNITS (1921) that a continuous front cannot be broken by the attacker, and tanks can only be simple auxiliaries for the infantry, still held sway. Among Frances senior generals the trench-bound Western Front had created its dangerously persistent myth of stasis, impregnability, and defensive supremacy. It was a myth that enshrined not the final success of 1918when defense lines had cracked and concentrations of tanks, used independently, had contributed to the breakthroughbut the long exhausting years of attrition that had gone before. Now, behind the passive concept of the Maginot line, strategy was being neglected; warfare was being reduced to

meticulously worked-out but unimaginative tactics that continued to give the infantry pride of place and subordinate movement to firepowerproducing an army that Captain Liddell Hart described in 1927 as a slow-moving steam-roller of fire. The postwar French army seemed to miss the old moral force. The loss of 80,000 of its officers, dead or disabled in the war, was beginning to make itself felt. A series of cuts in budget, personnel and officer strength prompted Weygand to say upon retirement in 1935, My feeling of impotence at getting the government to see the military situation in its reality made my last years of active service particularly painful. A hard and bitter winter of 1939 slowed down what training there was and in many places stopped work on the defenses. Training was one of the major difficulties of the High Command during these months. Four-fifths of the French Army was composed of reservists; likewise 100,000 of its 128,000 officers were from the reserve. In a number of inferior reservists or series B divisions, the mens average age was as high as thirtyfive. These troops were in poor physical shape and in need of toughing-up, let alone training. Moreover, the officers and NCOs in charge of them had only short peacetime courses and were inexperienced in up-to-date arms and equipment, as well as lacking in training expertise. Gamelin May 18 1940: The French soldier, the citizen of yesterday, did not believe in the war. His interest did not extend beyond the group in his factory, office, or field. Prone to constant criticism of anyone wielding authority, encouragedto enjoy an easy day-today life, in the inter-war years todays call-up man did not receive the moral and patriotic education that would have prepared him for the drama in which the fate of the country was to be enacted. Gamelin seemed to forget that the High Command had had eight months in which to reindoctrinate these defaulting troops. Apart from the disappearance of most able-bodied males, civilian France retained an almost peacetime atmosphere in these waiting months. Troops returning home on leave saw nothing to inspire them with the zeal that was wanting in the Zone of the Armies. Many Frenchmen felt that since Germany had achieved her aims in the East, there was small point in continuing to oppose her. But if the war had to go on they had little doubt about the result. The press, fed with official propaganda, optimistically assumed victory as a forgone conclusion. Germany, it was implied would eventually be beaten by the Allied blockade; and in any case, there was the impregnable Maginot Line. After four months of eventless war, Paris, and with it France, seemed lulled into a comfortable oblivion of danger. The French tanks were ill fitted for modern mobile warfare. They were slow, heavy and unwieldy. The largest, of 35 tons, had armor up to 70 mm thick and mounted two guns, a 47mm, and a 75mm. These could withstand all German tank and antitank fire and pierce all German armor. Firepower and strength were the chief assets of all French tanks, but for these they sacrificed precious mobility and cruising range and speed.

With antiaircraft artillery: compared with the German total of 9,300, the French were to turn out less than 3,000. French antitank gun production, 8000 at the highest estimate, was to be well below the armys needs only in field artillery was France to exceed Germany. In this arm for which she was always famous she would, by May, possess over 11,000 guns of all calibers from 75mm to 280mm, as against Germanys 7,700 odd. But even here France was at a disadvantage, for her artillery was mainly horse-drawn and therefore unsuited to mobile operations. The 55th division, one that was to have a key role, was a Series B reservist division. The average age of all the men in this division was over thirty. Most were married and had children. Many had forgotten much of the soldering that they had learned during their one-year active duty. Many were overweight and in poor physical condition. Whatever enthusiasm they had brought with them when called up had been eroded when they found that not even uniforms awaited them and they had to drill in their civilian clothes for weeks. The 55th and similar formations suffered a lack of regular officers. Out of a total strength of 450 officers, only 20 were active. These 20 were at the end of their careers and had been given an easy last tour of duty. In late May, Weygand introduced a new defense. No longer was there to be a thin defensive line which, if broken, would be re-formed further back. Now the line was designed as a band of strong points, extending in depth as well as length, a qudrillage, or checkerboard, of fortified positions such as villages of small woods, chosen mainly with the aim of denying the roads to German tanks. From these mutually supporting points, counterattacks were to be made; and from them there would be no withdrawal. This system depended on armored forces to destroy whatever Germans that had bypassed these strongpoints and thus restore the front. Divided and Conquered By: Jeffery A. Gunsburg This is the first book Ive read about the fall of France in 1940 that doesnt repeat a bunch of sets of conventional wisdom about the campaign. It uses a variety of new sources to understand what the French generals were thinking, and why they thought it. After reading this book, I still think that the French made some fundamental mistakes in the war, but those mistakes were an entirely different set than the ones the conventional wisdom about the campaign put forward. The conventional wisdom about the fall of France in 1940 says that France prepared to fight World War I again, spreading their tanks out in penny packets to support the infantry. Most importantly, the conventional wisdom says that the French tried to re-fight World War I

by building the Maginot line, and then cowering behind it until the Germans swept around behind it through Belgium and Holland and swept the French army away. There are some elements of truth to some of that conventional wisdom. The French probably did spend too much money on the Maginot line. They did spread a lot of their tanks out in infantry support roles. Thats not the full story though. The French high command understood the advantages of concentrating their armor, and they did have three light armored divisions (DLMs) and three heavy armored divisions (DCRs). Those divisions were not hasty reactions to German successes in Poland. As early as 1930, the French planned to motorize five infantry divisions, turn one cavalry division into a light armored division and motorize one brigade each of the other five cavalry divisions. Those plans were delayed by the Great Depression, but by 1936 the French had a functioning light armored division. In the early 1930s, "Students of the Army Staff College learned that strategic maneuver by motorized and mechanized forces, particularly on the flanks, would dominate at least the early stages of the next war." In the fall of 1936, the French government approved a program that would equip 3 light and 2 heavy armored divisions, along with 7 motorized divisions. The program would also produce equipment for 3 more motorized divisions. That plan called for production of 3200 tanks, 5000 armored utility vehicles, over 6500 25mm and 47mm anti-tank guns, and mechanized artillery for the armored divisions. The French were quite aware that the Germans could and probably would avoid the Maginot line by attacking through Belgium. Channeling the Germans in that direction was the main point of the Maginot line. The French had a plan to counter that attack, and attempted to implement it in May 1940. That plan resulted in the defeat of France, but not because France cowered behind the Maginot line (they didnt), and not because the French high command attempted to re-fight World War I. The French lost primarily because they tried to implement a daring, highly mobile strategy in May 1940 with an army that simply wasnt as good at or as well equipped for that type of war as their German opponents. The French had three fundamental problems as they developed their forces and strategies for World War II. First, the defense of the vital northern industrial areas of France was dependent on Belgium. Meeting the Germans on the France/Belgium border was a prescription for the devastation of Northern France. Unfortunately, even after the experience of World War I, Belgium refused to cooperate with France on defense issues in the late 1930s. Instead Belgium enforced a very strict

interpretation of neutrality, refusing to even covertly talk to the French about coordinating defenses. That made things very difficult for the French. If the French took the offensive on the French/German border, they risked the Germans going through Belgium and cutting off any forces used in that offensive. As long as they respected Belgiums neutrality, the French handed Hitler the initiative. He could chose the time and place that any war got serious. Second, France simply didnt have enough high-quality manpower to match the Germans. They didnt have the population base Germany did, and as a result they had to use people who would not have been in the German army, at least not at this stage of the war. They had a number of Series B divisions composed mainly of flabby shopkeepers in their late 30s, who had last trained ten or fifteen years ago. These men were officered by a minuscule cadre of active duty officers, supplemented by reserve officers who had often also been out of the army for years. The French had enough sense to put that kind of division on sections of the front that they thought would be quiet. Unfortunately, that meant that a couple of Series B divisions ended up taking the initial assault from elite German units like Gross Deutschland, followed by most of the German panzer divisions. Third, Frances main ally, Great Britain, simply was not prepared for a war on the continent. With a population comparable to Frances, and all of the resources of the Commonwealth countries to draw on, they still had an army on the continent about half the size of Belgiums, and an even smaller fraction of Frances. By May 1940, England had less than a dozen divisions capable of actually fighting on the continent. Given their population, they should have had four or five times that number of divisions, and they approached that later in the war. England did have a very good air force, but it wasnt designed to help defend France. Englands fighter aircraft were tied to an elaborate system of air defenses that later proved its worth in the Battle of Britain, while its bombers were designed for a strategic bombing role. Together, England and France had enough aircraft to give the Germans very strong competition. Unfortunately, the majority of Englands aircraft, though not all of them, sat on runways waiting for German attacks on England through much of the battle of France. Given those constraints, French strategy called for bold action as soon as the Germans attacked Belgium. The best, most mobile French army units would dash forward into Belgium, occupying positions along something called the Dyle line. If Germany attacked the Netherlands too, then French forces would make an even longer dash through Belgium to link up with the Dutch army. In theory, that would keep the Netherlands and Belgium in the fight, and make the British more apt to fight seriously

because of the threat that German occupation of the Low Countries posed to England. The Netherlands part of that strategy--called the Breda variant--was very controversial among the French high command. The French commander, Gamelin, rammed it through in spite of almost unanimous opposition from the other French commanders. It may have been part of the reason that French Prime Minister Reynaud tried to fire himironically on the day before the German offensive started. The problem was that the Breda variant cut French reserves for the central front in half, taking seven of the most mobile French divisions, including one of the three light armored divisions and putting them in the worst possible position to counter any German breakthrough. The Breda variant also diverted scarce anti-aircraft guns from more important fronts, as the French set up an anti-aircraft screen to protect those divisions as they dashed across Belgium. France had made enormous strides in rearmament from September 1939 to May 1940. Gamelin apparently looked at the large French mobile forces and felt that France had built up to the point where it could match the Germans at mobile warfare, at least under certain circumstances. France had implemented most of the 1936 plans. It had 3 light and 3 heavy armored divisions, (versus 10 panzer divisions) 7 motorized infantry divisions, (versus the same number of German motorized divisions) and 5 partially mechanized cavalry divisions. The Germans would have to go fight their way through Dutch and Belgian defenses, while the French would be arriving at the battle site relatively unscathed. Doing the Dyle plan with the Breda variant was a gamble, but Gamelin though it was worth it. If it succeeded, it would keep Belgium and the Netherlands in the war, and make an allied offensive in 1941, after England built up a real army, a realistic possibility. The Breda variant probably made the German task much easier than it would have otherwise been, but the fundamental problem was that the French command was trying to implement a mobile strategy with an army that really wasnt as well trained or equipped for that type of warfare as the French high command apparently thought. The French training philosophy was one of "Methodical Battle". The French were not taught to go off on impetuous, risky tangents. They were trained to hold a line, bring up massive firepower, then go over to the offensive. That philosophy might have been fatal against the Germans even given more rational deployment of French resources. The point is that an army trained that way was flung into a wild adventure that had to result in an encounter battle between them and the Germansexactly the type of battle they had been trained to avoid. In adopting that strategy, Gamelin also managed to commit every one of his seven motorized infantry

and three light mechanized divisions before he knew where the main German thrust was coming. That proved fatal when the Germans broke through south of the mobile French forces, cutting them off in Belgium. The French did make some major mistakes in weapons design and organization. For example, their heavy armored divisions (DCRs) were built around the B1 series of tanks. The B1 was heavily armored and had a lot of firepower, but it was also very expensive, complex, hard to produce, and not very reliable (The reliability was apparently made worse by some very sophisticated sabotage efforts on the part of French Communists). The B1 tanks had a very short range without refueling, and track life was short. The French intended to get the tanks to the front by railcar, while moving the rest of their armored divisions by road. In the confusion of the German breakthrough, the two components of the armored divisions tended to never link up, and tanks did tend to be used in small packets, but that was not the French intention. Some individual French commanders apparently didnt get the concept of armored divisions, and one vital heavy armored division was squandered when a corps commander scattered it along the flank of the German breakthrough as mobile pillboxes. Again, this was not French doctrine. It was a matter of an individual being stupid. Every peacetime army gets a few people like that in key positions, and spends the first months of active combat getting rid of them. The French didnt get time to get rid of them. Another major French problem was their shortage of radios. They relied on telephone systems to make up for that shortage, which turned out to be a major mistake. Their phone network got cut to pieces by a combination of bombing, military movement, and actions of refugees. The radios they had were not very reliable, and they were overly cautious about using them, at least partly because the French had no equivalent of the German Enigma coding machines, and they suspected that the Germans would be able to monitor radio traffic. As the phone system fell apart, the French command lost contact with their armies to a greater and greater extent. Another problem: all French tanks, including the otherwise very good Somua S35, had one-man turrets. The one man in that turret had so many roles that it was virtually impossible for him to do them all well. The Germans captured quite a few S35s and apparently initially thought they would be valuable additions to their armored force, but ended up realizing that there really wasnt much they could do with them, beyond security work. Yet another problem: as mentioned earlier, the French had five partly

mechanized cavalry divisions. Those divisions each still had a major component of horsed cavalry, along with armored cars and light tanks. These divisions proved to have very little fighting ability. They couldnt move any faster than the horsed component, while at the same time they didnt have the cross-country mobility that a purely cavalry force would have had. The Germans really hammered a couple of these divisions early on, and routed them. That may have played a role in destroying the morale of some of the French "B" divisions who saw the remnants pass through their positions shortly before the main German assault. Bottom line: *Divided and Conquered *claims that the French worked hard and reasonably rationally to prepare for a German attack. The fact that they were defeated so quickly was due in part to mistakes on their part. They had some serious flaws in their weapons and organization. Gamelins strategy made those flaws worse by putting French troops into a situation that they werent trained or equipped for. On the other hand, England and Belgium share a major part of the blame too. French "B" divisions wouldnt have had to be on the front line if England had built a serious land army. The French dash into Belgium wouldnt have been so dangerous if the Belgian government had allowed some covert coordination between the forces. The Germans would not have had as easy a time as they did in the air if the English had been willing to commit the fighter squadrons they had sitting on the runways of England early in the German offensive. The French are still bitter about the fact that hundreds of British fighters were sitting idle while French troops were getting picked apart from the air, and French pilots were flying their inadequate planes against the full weight of the Luftwaffe. The defeat of 1940 was an allied defeat, not just a French one. England and Belgium contributed to it in very major ways. This book paints a picture of a French command that made mistakes, many of them in efforts to make up for the deficiencies of their allies, but which generally acted in a reasonably rational way to prepare for the assault that they knew was coming. French Army of 1940 This was a conscript force with a considerable proportion of regular soldiers particularly in its Colonial units. It depended upon the recall of reservists to bring its divisions up to war strength. Conscript service was for two years followed by part-time reserve service and continuing reserve obligation to the age of 42. Divisions were on several establishments: Active, consisting of regulars, conscripts and the first three-year groups of reservists; 'A' reserve divisions, consisting of the

next year-groups of reservists up to the age of 32; 'B' reserve divisions, of the older reservists, with an average age of 36; Colonial divisions of white regulars, with some black or Arab regiments; and North African divisions, with some white conscripts, and a majority of Arab regulars. The cavalry, mechanized, armored, fortress and alpine divisions were a mixture of regular, active, A and B classes. These establishments provided seven active motorized divisions, ten Active infantry, 17 'A' infantry, 19 'B' infantry (of which three were alpine), ten North African, seven Colonial, five fortress, five cavalry, three mechanized and four armored divisions; two other alpine divisions were a mixture of Active and A reservist classes. There were a number of combat units not formed into divisions, including the Foreign Legion, and Polish and Czech volunteer legions. The infantry divisions were organized into three infantry regiments of three battalions each, with two artillery regiments, given 36 field and 24 medium guns, and a reconnaissance squadron, two engineer companies and services; it had 52 light (25mm) anti-tank guns. Alpine divisions were similar; fortress divisions had infantry only. The cavalry divisions consisted of two horsed and one mechanized regiments and a reconnaissance group ,and its artillery of 12 field and 12 medium artillery pieces and eight 47mm anti-tank guns; it had 20 light tanks and 15 armored cars. The mechanized divisions (division legere mecanisee) had two tank regiments, each of 87 medium or light tanks, a reconnaissance regiment with 40 armored cars, and three motorized infantry battalions; its artillery was 24 field and 12 medium guns and nine 47mm anti-tank guns. The armored divisions (division cuirassee) of which the first three were formed between January and March 1940 and the fourth during the Battle of France itself, contained two light and two medium tank regiments, one infantry battalion in armored carriers and an artillery regiment of 24 105mm guns. Tank strength was 62 medium and 84 light tanks; anti-tank guns numbered 167. There were also about 50 independent tank battalions attached to armies. Equipment was of mixed quality: the 75mm field and 105mm medium guns were improved World War I models; the anti-tank guns varied in caliber from the plentiful but obsolete 25mm to the excellent but scarce 47mm. Tanks were of eight types from the completely obsolete Renault F tanks of 1918 to the excellent modern Somua and B.I. models, both mounting the high velocity 47mm gun, the latter also a 75mm low-velocity gun. Total strength was 2235. The command system was over-complicated and slow moving. At the head stood the Supreme Commander Land Forces (Gamelin), with headquarters located at the Fort de Vincennes, near Paris; subordinate to him were the front commands, the most important of which was the Commander North East Front

(Georges) at La Ferte. Georges commanded three Army Groups, 1st (Billotte), 2nd (Pretelat, with 35 divisions) and 3rd (Besson, with 14 divisions). Besson's and Pretelat's Groups garrisoned the Maginot Line, with the 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 8th Armies. Billotte commanded the field army consisting of 1st, 2nd, 7th, and 9th Armies and the British Expeditionary Force (which, however, took its orders direct from Gamelin). The French Air Force had a separate command system and its headquarters were not co-located with the Army's.

Fall of France 1940 : Strategic and Tactical Blunder By Khan.

Introduction
After the dramatic fall of France in June 1940, many Frenchmen asked themselves whether they had been betrayed. If military ineptitude can be called betrayal, then it is fair to say that France's army betrayed her. At the forefront of this betrayal were the men who led it. Analyzing at all levels; serious command and control differences were the key to the undoing of French defenses. Nobody noticed these differences until after the war was over. The First World War was fought in the grip of rigid doctrine. Since such doctrine hates imagination, all that the both sides could do was throw men at one another. Of course the result was that Germany lost, having fewer men to lose. When WWI was over, the Allies convinced themselves they had won and that the Central Powers had lost. In Germany this broke the power of old theories for some time; whereas in France, it strengthened them. Eventually this formed the basis for leaders like Hitler to come to power and for generals such as Heinz Guderian and Erich von Manstein to rise within the ranks. The German Invasion of May 1940 followed a series of spectacular German victories in Czechoslovakia, Poland and Norway. Contrary to many beliefs, the campaign in Poland was not a rapidly mobilized armored assault like that in France. It was fought more conventionally with foot soldiers led by concentrated tanks in a WWI fashion. Yet this was a campaign that the French should have taken serious note of. Their failure to improve the Army and Air Force command system would have disastrous consequences in the fast paced campaign that was to follow. A rigid adherence to principles of the First World War was also to prove disastrous. Exploiting these lapses on the part of the French army, the Germans were able to penetrate at Sedan and encircle the best armies the Allies could field at the time.

France and her Allies

The France of 1939 was very different from the France of 1914. After the Great War, a wave of pacifism had overtaken the country. While anti-war literature in Germany had been hastily put aside and hidden by Hitler, the citizens of France accepted it wholeheartedly. "Never again!" was the cry in the hearts of the people. From the time of Armistice to the time WWII broke out, 19 governments had been elected and then ousted. Otherwise, the existence of a socialist government by the name of the 'Popular Front' had done much to damage national unity amongst Frenchmen. France in 1939 was a divided country whose people had no idea why they had been suddenly thrown back into a state of serious conflict. As the Army failed and disaster befell them, the general population resorted to accusations of betrayal and the presence of a "Fifth Column" of spies and traitors. This was a way to avoid blaming themselves and their leadership for failure when the critical time was upon them and national unity was required the most.

The French Army: Ripe for Defeat

Generals and Doctrine
While the German army modernized with radical new ideas, the French army was commanded and dominated by a cadre of Generals that had fought the First World War. The great catastrophe that was about to overtake France would require quick and dynamic thinking from its leaders. The French system of command at this time was rigid and inflexible, a relic from the previous war. Bypassing orders and making quick tactical decisions was almost shunned. At the pinnacle of this huge Army was General Maurice Gamelin. He evolved and issued all orders to the entire army. Gamelin's headquarters lacked radio. His method of issuing orders was through dispatch riders and the oftenunreliable telephone network. Thus it usually took 48 hours for his orders to get through to his men. One is shocked upon discovering this; in the fast paced and dramatic campaign that would follow, every minute was precious. Gamelin also had no General Staff to make the passage of commands easy. The 'operational' head of the Army was General A. L. Georges. There was no boundary to demarcate where his powers started and Gamelin's ended. To make matters worse, there was an animosity between the two men. The tactics and doctrine of the French army were as antiquated as its generals. During and after the war, many French officers and leaders alike claimed that they had gone to war in 1939 with a 1918 army. Indeed the concepts of warfare the French generals clung to during the May campaign can be called antique. More than once French senior officers failed to show required aggressiveness in defense against the German armies. Instead they contented themselves (in WWI terminology) to 'sealing off' and 'containing' the enemy where counter attacking would have had devastating effects upon the German columns. It is apparent from the command decisions these men took that they were still caught up in the defensive siege mentality of the previous war. Otherwise, the cumbersome system of command would always mean that orders would be received late

and would not be able to keep up with the rapidly changing face of the battlefield. Matters were made even worse by the use of the unreliable telephone network. Tanks were simply viewed as a support weapon for the infantry. New theories and tactics presented by officers such as Colonel Charles de Gaulle were completely ignored. The theory that tanks should be used as the cavalry of an infantry attack prevailed. This literally meant that these valuable weapons would be dispersed ahead of the infantry and the deadly effect of concentrated armour would be lost. Their duties would be limited to infantry support and reconnaissance, rather than actual breakthrough. Inevitably, a German force applying exactly the opposite tactics defeated the French army.

Men and Material

Contrary to what many have said after the war, the French army and her Allies were hardly outnumbered by the Germans. The total number of French divisions fielded was 94. These were of mixed capability. Alongside these were 10 British, 10 Dutch (these were eliminated early in the war) and 22 Belgian divisions. Bringing the total to 136. Against them, the Germans could count upon 136 of the Heer's 157 divisions. Of these, only about a third were first rate offensive material. As to the number of tanks possessed by both sides, the Germans appear to have possessed between 2,400 to 3,000 tanks. At least half of these were Mark Is and IIs, which could hardly be considered tanks, taking into account their light primary weapon and Armour. The Allies on the other hand fielded around 3,100 to 3,400 vehicles of which at least 2,285 could be considered modern and formidable. Thus, there were three French armored divisions and three light mechanized divisions. It is clear that the Allies possessed enough vehicles to match that of the Germans in quality and quantity. (1)The only serious lacking we see in Allied armor is that of radio. This would to lead to much confusion and lack of coordination in the ensuing battles. The only lack of weapons in the French Army was that of anti-aircraft (AA) guns, antitank (AT) guns and anti-tank mines. There was a grave shortage of AT guns, yet in the period up till May 1940, the French were still exporting such guns. 830 AT guns, 500 Artillery pieces were actually exported on the eve of the German attack . Of the last 500 Renault R35 tanks, nearly half were exported. Even till the end of the campaign, supplies of AT guns were far from sufficient. To top these shortcomings, there was a stunning lack of AA weapons. France had only 5 AA regiments, whereas the Germans possessed about 72. Later on this was to prove to be another of many fatal flaws as French troops would not be able to defend themselves against air attack. France had many reasons to doubt the quality of her army in 1939. Much of this was due to the destabilization of French society. There was a huge gap between the workers, communists and the bourgeois. The lack of national unity was bound to affect the men at the front as well. Although there were some excellent professional 'A' class divisions, the bulk of the Army was formed by reservists and conscripts. The discipline amongst these units is hardly worth calling adequate. The reason most historians give for this is boredom. The 'Phoney War' after Poland had left many servicemen with nothing to do. Drunkenness and disorder was common. There was hardly any attachment between the

officers and the men. Both the latter and former were seemingly more concerned with pay and holidays. The question of "Why are we here?" was asked more than oft amongst soldiers. German propaganda also took its toll; with right wing and communist newspapers it managed to instill a strong feeling of Anglophobia amongst the men and officers. This situation contrasts heavily with that of the well trained and well disciplined Wehrmacht. The French Air Force at the time had 3,289 modern aircraft operational. Of these 2,122 were fighters. Although French aircrew were very well trained and morale was high, they had no idea of modern tactics. They knew nothing of extensive ground support and tactics of concentrating air power to maximize sortie success. To make matters worse, there was no coordinated system of command for the Air Force. No specific body was in charge of issuing orders, and the chain of command overlapped in many places; maximizing confusion. These factors were to prove to be the undoing of the French air fleets.

The Maginot Line

Due to the wholesale slaughter of Frenchmen in the fields of World War I, there were approximately 300,000 fewer men to defend France in 1934 than were in 1914. Thus the French built an elaborate system of forts and defenses along the Franco-German border. This was called the Maginot Line. It was a great feat of engineering and a formidable defense against any attacker. The only problem was that the Line could not be extended along the Belgian order and up to the sea due to the dense presence of the French industry in the region. It was along this route that the invaders of May 1940 would come. Thus all the Line accomplished was to lull the French public and leadership alike into a fatal false sense of security.

Rearmament
It has been said by some that the Maginot Line prevented the French army from rearming. This statement seems quite hollow when looking at the amount of credits given to the military to modernize. The Maginot Line was completed in 1934 at a cost of 30 million. During 1933-5 an average of 47% of military credits went unspent. In 1936, the War Minister asked for a 4-year rearmament plan in light of the rise of Nazism in Germany. General Gamelin asked for 9 billion Francs. The minister raised it to 14 billion. In 1938, there was another 12 billion increase, and in 1939 a further 11 billion was added. Thus it cannot be denied that France's generals were given enough resources to expand country's military capability.

The BEF
To aid France, the British Government sent a force of 10 divisions called the British Expeditionary Force. This force was tiny in comparison to the great French and German armies massed at the borders. The size of this force was to cause much bitterness in Frenchmen when viewing the British contribution. The armored elements present could hardly be called an armored division. Due to the tiny size of this force, it was placed

almost entirely under French High Command. General Montgomery later said the entire British Army at this stage was not prepared for the full-scale exercise, let alone a war.

The 'Revolutionary' Wehrmacht

Leadership
General Gauderies is hailed as the father of modern armored warfare. It has been said by many other German generals that without his superb tactical and organizational thinking, the campaign in France would not have succeeded. In General Erich von Man stein, the Germans found their "Finest operational brain". It would be his plan of invasion that would provide the German armored columns to hack their way into France. At the forefront of the German assault, both men understood the need for a combined arms operation and the importance of communications. The leaders of this relatively new army had an advantage; the ability to experiment and innovate. The new breed of German general staff officers rising in the Wehrmacht would lead their men from the front in armored communications vehicles. Command decisions would be made at a local level and time would be the key to everything. The leadership of the French army was dismal in comparison.

Luftwaffe: A New Weapon is realized

As the campaign started, the two invading air fleets of the German air force had 2,670 aircraft. Of these around 1,000 were fighters, many of these were the twin-engined Me110s. From the bomber Gruppen of the Luftwaffe, about 350 aircraft were the new Ju-87 Stuka dive-bombers. Armed with 500 lb bombs and a terrifying siren, this aircraft combined with other bombers would act as the artillery of the Army. The Stuka itself was to be rigorously used for close air support. Taking into mind that twice the number of aircraft as the Stukas available was earmarked for recon duties, we can judge that the Wehrmacht took its information gathering capability very seriously. This role for an air force had never been applied before. The new strategy contrasted deeply with the thinking of the French Army who almost shunned the air force. Gamelin had once said, "There is no such thing as an aerial battle. There is only battle on the ground".

Offence and Defense The 'Dyle-Breda' Plan

Also called Plan D, this was the French strategy for compensating for the lack of coverage of the Maginot Line. It called for the movement of the best 30 Allied divisions into Belgium to take up positions along the River Dyle. The hinge of this swinging doorlike movement would be at Sedan. This strategy was based on countering the Schlieffen Plan of 1914. Since the Germans would have much more to lose if they attacked the heavily defended Maginot Line, it was considered that the blows would come through Belgium. A major problem with this plan was that there had been almost no exchanges between the Allies and the Belgian government about the implementation of it. And when the Germans actually invaded, the Belgians actually protested to Dyle- Breda as a result.

Also, as the French High Command had ruled out the possibility of any enemy movement through the Ardennes forest in Belgium, the weakest units were placed ahead of this vital sector. Gamelin having visited the region many times, declared it impossible for tanks to scale the narrow winding forest roads of the region. Ironically this would be the focus of the German thrusts. Which would then slice through a 40-mile stretch of the Meuse, held by the poorly equipped 9th Army under General Corap. France would be caught completely off guard.

Sichelschnitt
The original German plan for the invasion was a repeat of the Schlieffen Plan. It called for the passage of German forces through Belgium and into France. However, General von Manstein saw things differently. He was not prepared to let this war stagnate into a bloody slugfest like WWI. Contemplating that the Allies would consider the Germans to be using the 1914 plan, he drafted an ingenious offensive plan. Army Group B (North) under General von Bock was to make a frontal assault into Belgium with its 29 divisions; of these 3 were panzer divisions of which 2 would later be handed over to the southern sector. While these were almost diversionary, the main thrust would come through Army Group A (South), commanded by General von Rundstedt, whose armored columns would be proceeding through the Ardennes forest. It would strike a passage across the Meuse approximately 45 miles wide. The key focus would be at Sedan, and as the German had broken French codes, they knew that it was the weak link in the French army. The force would consist of 43 divisions. Of these, 7 were panzer divisions and would be concentrated to provide a huge armored cleaver. Once breakthrough was achieved, the columns would rush across the rear of the Allied armies in Belgium in a Sichelschnitt (sickle) like maneuver and cut them off.

10th May: Hell Unleashed Meuse Crossings

On the 10th of May, Hitler issued the orders for attack. The mobilized German army started offensive operations immediately. Within 36 hours Holland's condition had become irreparable, and the columns of Army Group B were heading into Belgium. In response to this, the Allies rushed their best Armies into Belgium as the Dyle-Breda Plan required. Upon hearing this, Hitler was overjoyed; the trap had been sprung. In the meantime, Army Group South was making its was through the Ardennes forest in a long stretch of traffic jams. Roads were clogged for up to sixty miles in some places. One wonders whether Gamelin was blind. Indeed, French pilots had been flying over the area had made reports of huge massing of German armor. Yet these reports were not believed, and no action was taken. Had the French Air Force taken a serious air offensive against the long immobilized columns of German vehicles, the results would have been horrific. Only by the 11th of May did the German movement start to make sense. Not becoming uneasy and calculating that the Germans would not be there till the 14th and would then have to wait for artillery, Gamelin ordered 11 divisions to the sector. Given the state of the French logistics, it would mean that the first of these would arrive on the

14th and the last by the 21st. Unfortunately, Gamelin had miscalculated the time the German army would take to reach the Meuse. By the 13th, the Panzer divisions were present at the Meuse, ready to cross without delay. Facing them was the grossly overstretched 9th French Army under Corap. Seven divisions were holding 75 miles of front. Sedan was where the 9th met the 2nd Army under General Huntziger. The 55th and 71st Infantry divisions held this critical crossing point. It is hard to understand the High Command's confidence in these troops when most of the units were composed of second-rate reservists. It were men like these who had led to so many stories about the lack of discipline and fighting punch in the French army. Arrayed against them were the finest legions Germany could field. The first crossings took place in the Dinat sector where the 7th Panzer division crossed under the energetic General Rommel. In a display of extraordinary leadership abilities, Rommel personally led assaults across the river and defense against French armour on the other side. These were followed by a breakthrough at Sedan by General Heinz Guderian's panzerkorps. Both of these crossings were accomplished after fierce fighting and heavy bombardment by the Luftwaffe. By the nightfall on the 13th, German bridgeheads had been established. At this point in time the German condition was extremely fragile, a counter attack by even a small armored force would have routed both bridgeheads. The battle at Sedan has been called the battle through which France lost the war. At Sedan, 3 Panzer divisions along with some motorized infantry divisions had to fight through an array of French pillboxes and fortifications to secure a toehold of the western bank. Had the muscle of the Luftwaffe not been behind them, one doubts if the attack would have succeeded. French infantry was tied down by the aerial bombardment and attacked by daring assaults of German troops in rubber boats. Considering that they were up against the best troops the Heer could muster, initially the reservists of the 55th Infantry division did not perform too badly. Yet some artillery commanders in the rear areas panicked thinking that they were being attacked by tanks. This was impossible as Guderian's armor was still sitting on the eastern bank of the river. A general rout of rear echelon infantry and artillerymen followed. Men left everything behind and ran like cowards. And thus, once the artillery stopped firing, the front line troops also routed or surrendered. While at least the 55th made contact with the enemy and held for a while, the 71st Infantry Division withdrew even before they were attacked. And so, Sedan fell into German hands. Even so, the first tanks would not cross till the morning of the14th; meaning that any determined attack before that would wipe out the bridgehead. It is here that we see the French commanders sticking to the old tactics of 'sealing off' the enemy. Counterattacks were planned of course, but the sluggishness and lack of punch showed by French attacks at various levels is all too evident. Everywhere one sees evidence of planned counterattacks being delayed time after time and then, in some cases, cancelled altogether. The mild uncoordinated attack against Rommel's bridgehead is a testimony to this (it was chased away by German infantry firing flare pistols to confuse French tanks). Eventually a strong effort to check the German bridgeheads was never

made. And by the time the French command was thinking of a serious effort to cut the advance, German bridgeheads had not only become quite powerful, the panzers were on the move again by the 14th.

Ineptitude at its Worst

The French armored assault scheduled at 4am during the morning of the 14th was delayed and rescheduled to 7am. This delay is characteristic of most French counterattacks during the campaign. It meant that the Germans were able to transport a whole brigade of tanks across. Thus the French attack ran into stiff resistance and was wiped out. Yet all hope for plugging the gap was not lost yet. One of France's three armored divisions, the 3rd Armored had been ordered to the areas a few days ago. On the 14th it stood just south of the German bridgehead. The division's orders were to "Counterattack with full force". In the meantime Guderian made the decision to wheel the 1st and 2nd Panzer divisions westwards without waiting for the 10th Panzer to secure his flank. Only the mauled Gross-Deutschland Infantry regiment was present for flank protection. The attack was supposed to take place on the 14th of May on Panzerkorp Guderian's exposed flank as it started to make its vulnerable westward movement. For this attack, Huntziger had the entire fresh 3rd Armored division (with its formidable H-39 tanks) and the A class 3rd Motorized Infantry Division. There is no doubt that if the armored assault had taken place, it would have shattered the flanks of the 1st and 2nd Panzer divisions rushing westwards. Yet General Flavigny, commander of the 21st Corps of armor, postponed the attack for the next day only 30 minutes before zero hour, and ordered the division to "Seal off the area". This meant that the unit would be dispersed and all effect of concentration would be lost. The next day, on the 15th of May, elements of the 10th Panzer had crossed and were moving in to supplement the Gross-Deutschland infantry regiment. Huntziger ordered a rigorous counterattack. Even at this stage, it would have severely set the German plans back. Yet there were delays in putting the units back together and only a few elements participated in the battle for Stonne before the attack was cancelled. In the end Huntziger happily accepted Flavigny's excuses, dismissed the commander of the 3rd Armored division for being incompetent, and gleefully added the divisions to his 2nd Army static defense line. It was these static defense 'lines' that the French generals of WWI loved so much. Thus the one of the golden opportunities of changing the course of the war was lost.

Race for the Channel

After the breakout of all three Panzerkorps; Reinhardt, Hoth and Guderian, the German steel columns raced for the Channel in a mad dash starting from the 14th and 15th of May. They moved with such speed that the rest of the two armored divisions France possessed (1st and 2nd) were surprised and caught in transit. In ensuing action, they were hacked to shreds and scattered into tiny remnants by the advancing Panzers. The fact is that French reconnaissance was so poor; Gamelin had no idea where the Germans were headed! The list of possibilities included everywhere from Paris, Abbeville to the Maginot Line. Advancing, using the Somme as a natural defense, by the 20th, Guderian

had secured Abbeville. Thus, effectively cutting of the Allied armies in the north and creating a 'bulge'. There had been a number of attacks in order to prevent the Sichelschnitt trap from being set. Colonel de Gaulle attacked the columns from the south twice near Montcomet with some armored forces, but was pushed back on both instances. On The 18th of May, the seventy-three year old General Maxime Weygand replaced General Gamelin as the CinC of the French Army. This man was known for his severe distrust for politicians and the British. It took him two days to arrive in France, and then he took a further 2-3 days in 'judging' the situation. This wasted valuable time during which the counter attack south of Sedan Gamelin had planned was shelved. After passing his judgments, Weygand issued a nonsensical series of orders that required 8 Allied divisions to cut a path through the German encirclement. However this attack would never be possible as the BEF had lost quite a bit of its muscle in attacking Arras on the 21st and the trapped French forces had also sustained losses during an attack on the 22nd. The fact that these elements were attacking instead of conserving forces for Weygand's plan shows the complete lack of coordination between Allied HQs. Two more attacks were to take place from the south later, but both would fail to dent the Panzer corridor.

Dunkirk
Eventually the Sichelschnitt trap forced the best troops the French and British armies could muster into a small pocket around Dunkirk. Their situation was given up as being hopeless and plans were made to evacuate as many men as possible. In a mass departure that would sour the German victory, the British evacuated about 337,000 men trapped at Dunkirk with every vessel available for the task. 30,000 men had to be abandoned as the rearguard when the operation ended on the 2nd of June. This in a way marked the definite end for France. Her military lay shattered, 61 divisions had been lost, and her entire northern area was occupied with a ruthlessly efficient enemy. After Dunkirk, the Germans reorganized and the total number of divisions available in the north of France was around 102. Against this, the French could only muster 60 divisions.(2) There were only about 200 combat ready tanks. Of these, most units were second-rate reservists and lacked proper supplies and organization to sustain a tough campaign. Seeing the intact and victorious German armies pitted against them, the inevitable was clear to everyone in France. She could resist all she wanted to, but France would eventually fall. To make matters worse, on June 10, Italy declared war on France.

One last Battle

After Dunkirk, once again French armies were reorganized to for a 'solid front' like that of WWI. General Weygand and Marshal Ptain had already decided that one last battle was necessary to save the honor of the army before Armistice. They had given up hope, whereas the Prime Minister, Paul Reynaud was contemplating fleeing to Africa and

continuing resistance from there. This seemed unacceptable to Weygand who feared anarchy due to the destruction of the Army more than the Germans themselves. Thus the remnants of the French army formed a line behind the river Somme and waited for the German attacks once again. However things were different this time. French infantrymen stayed in their positions and died there no matter how many times they were harassed by the dreaded Stukas. Weygand himself was surprised by the new found courage his troops displayed. If only they had shown the same fighting spirit at Sedan and Dinat. Eventually Guderian and Rommel led their columns past French defenses and eliminated the pockets of resistance, however, casualties this time were much greater. Paris fell on the 14th of June. It was clear to everyone; France was lost. The French Government that had earlier moved to Tours now moved again, to Bordeaux. Premier Paul Reynaud made a desperate appeal to President Roosevelt to declare war on Germany and come to the rescue of France, but the response was negative. (In reply on June 15th, President Roosevelt promised every aid short of military intervention). On June 15th, as 30,600 British troops were evacuated from Cherbourg, and the Germans captured Verdun, the French Army GHQ moved to Vichy. The 220,000 French troops holding the Maginot Line held out until June 25th. Many wished to continue resistance from North Africa. The French ambassador in London suggested a dramatic idea: the political union between France and Britain. Churchill immediately approved, and Reynaud thought it would strengthen the resolve of his cabinet to fight onwards. Unfortunately for Reynaud, his mistress, who favored peace with the Germans, leaked the news. The cabinet reacted strongly and Ptain called such an idea "Like fusion to a corpse". A broken man, Reynaud resigned. Ptain formed the next government and immediately sued for peace on the 17th of June.

War in the Air:

While the Luftwaffe was hard pressed to maintain air superiority, one wonders where the French Air Force was. Looking at the post campaign losses, the Luftwaffe lost 1,284 aircraft. The British RAF losing 931 aircraft, of which 477 were priceless fighters. The Arme de l'Air lost approximately 560 aircraft (235 destroyed on the ground). These figures alone speak the absence of French air power over the front.(3) They also show that Britain went out her way to protect the airspace over France. While the Luftwaffe was terrorizing French troops and actually protecting the flanks of the Panzer armies, the French AASF was nowhere to be seen. Even German fighter pilots noted that most of their air victories were over RAF aircraft. The only explanation is that the evacuations of forward airfields after German aerial attack lead to French aircraft being flown and dispersed into central France in a disorganized manner. This coupled with the cumbersome and inefficient system of command of air assets lead to a logistical and organizational disaster in the air force. To top this, the French knew nothing of the lessons of air power the Germans had learnt during the Spanish Civil War. They were ignorant to the effects of concentration of air

power and thus most of their attacks were piecemeal and ineffective. The failure of the Arme de l'Air meant that the Luftwaffe could easily dominate the aerial battlefield and hence contribute greatly to the German successes.

The Cost
The Battle for France had cost a number of around 90,000 French lives and about a quarter of a million in wounded. Almost 2 million French soldiers were prisoners of war. (4) The British had lost 3,475 dead and 15,850 wounded since the invasion on May 10th, plus many thousands more to German prisoner of war camps. Germany had suffered the loss of 27,074 dead and 111,034 wounded. At least 5 percent of these casualties were officers. The concept of leading from the front had lead to victory, but there was a cost.

Conclusion
Many have argued that France had lost the battle even before it had started. The signs of this are shown in various episodes before the campaign in May 1940. In 1936 when the Germans reoccupied the Rhineland, France did nothing to check the movement of German forces into the region and thus showed her unwillingness to fight. Later on, the signing of the Ribbentrop-Molotov Non-Aggression pact in 1939 would mean that there would be no relief from the east. This was compounded by the fact that France did nothing to help her Polish ally when the Germans invaded. Any movement into Germany would have been disastrous for Hitler as almost the entire Wehrmacht was busy in Poland. Aside from these facts, France in 1940 was a country severely divided by political and social unrest. Some historians such Shirer and Horne have called the domestic situation being almost at the brink of civil war. This certainly did nothing to help the morale and discipline of the Army, which was at its worst in years. The indirect or direct effects of these conditions were the routs at Sedan and other locations. When the invasion started in May 1940, the French army was in the worst possible position to react. Almost the all of first-rate divisions had been committed in Belgium. A famous strategist had once said: 'One fault only in the initial deployment of an Army cannot be made good through the course of an entire campaign'. In order to react to the threat of the Panzers rushing through the Ardennes and concentrate enough French armour, the decision to take immediate action should have come on the 12th of May. However Gamelin took things very lightly and the delay was almost fatal. Had the deployment of the 3rd Armoured division not been interfered with by its leaders, perhaps the outcome would have been different. Any determined assault would have produced some results in terms of stopping or delaying the enemy. This was definitely proved later in the war when the Ardennes offensive in 1944 caused a serious delay to the invading Allied armies. More than she needed weapons, and perhaps even more than morale, France needed time. And when one looks at the way the French system of command worked, the wastage of

time is blatantly evident. Even more evident is the refusal of French generals to modernize. The important figures in this fateful campaign: Gamelin, Weygand, Corap, Huntziger, Flavigny and others who held the fate of France in their hands displayed the siege mentality so associated with the First World War. Where counterattacking would have been the correct approach, they preferred to adopt a defensive posture. This obviously resulted in local defeats all over the French landscape. Needless to say, once the Germans had broken out of Sedan and completed the Sichelschnitt, very little could have been done to salvage the situation. The leaders of France would have to choose between the bloodbath of Verdun in 1940, or slavery under the Nazis. Already plagued by a 'missing generation' of Frenchmen, they chose the latter.

Sources and Bibliography

Horne, Alistair. To Lose a Battle: France 1940:Macmillan, 1969. Shirer, William L. The Collapse of the Third Republic: An Inquiry into the Fall of France in 1940: New York- Simon and Schuster, 1969. Deighton, Len. Blitzkrieg: From the rise of Hitler to the Fall of Dunkirk: London- Cape, 1979. Galland, Adolf. The First and the Last: the German Fighter force in World War Two: London- Methuen, 1955. Cull, Lander and Weiss. Twelve days in May: London- Grub Street, 1995 Manstein, Field-Marshal Erich von. Lost Victories: Translated by Anthony G. Powell. London- Methuen, 1958.

Notes
1) Although the number of armoured vehicles quoted by historians differs, it is clear that the French and British forces possessed an equal, if not greater number of tanks. 2) Figures for remaining forces differ amongst historians. Shirer and Horne place it at 60, while Deighton says 49. 3) It is interesting to compare the number of losses of French aircraft to the number deployed. Negligence of this scale has never been noted in any air force up till today. 4) These are averages combined from figures presented by all historians. German and British Arming Against Hitler. France and the Limits of Military Planning. By Eugenia C. Kiesling. (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1996. Pp. xiv,

260. $35.00.) Another possible title for this well-researched study would be "Defending the French," for not only does Eugenia Kiesling analyze the security dilemmas facing the French military establishment leading up to their debacle in 1940, she also aims to explain sympathetically why military leaders made such bad choices to solve them. The French army did not fail so badly against the Germans because of inferior equipment or doctrine, but it was instead so weakened by interwar national, political, social, and economic policies that it was outfought on the battlefield by a more flexible and better trained adversary. Based on the lessons of victory in World War I and perceived strengths, the French developed a "long-war strategy" predicated on comprehensive national mobilization and universal military training through conscription. In order to reduce risk and operate with conscripts and reservists, they planned to fight methodical battles with centralized control and plentiful firepower. However, political squabbles crippled mobilization legislation and even limited military planners from questioning the plans they had to implement. In addition, other government policies and concerns about fairness produced a severely flawed conscription policy. One-year draftees were brought in every six months, ensuring that active units spent all their time training new recruits. When war started, these organizations had to leave their latest levy behind while reservists were assigned in their places! This practice might have worked if the reserve system had the regional organization and cohesion that planners intended, but, again, political reality intervened and created a truly "unready reserve." French officer training was particularly dismal, and Kiesling argues that fragile, ill-trained, and poorly led reserve units were the greatest single reason for poor overall battlefield performance. On the whole, the French army's formations "lacked the aggressiveness, determination, and fundamental military skills that come from solid units, thorough training, and experienced leadership" (10). Military leaders realized that their instrument was flawed, but, convinced that they could not change the policies that produced it, and, buoyed by optimistic assessments of foreign observers, they chose to be positive to keep up morale rather than complain and risk creating defeatism. "Choosing optimism over cynicism or despair, military and political leaders alike dismissed French weaknesses, exaggerated French strengths, and persuaded themselves of the intrinsic merits of arrangements that they had neither the ability nor the inclination to alter" (3). Page 12 12Large Units (1921),52 is described as the battailleconduite, or the methodical battle. In the 1921Regulations, the French General Staff expressed the viewthat technology had so changed the battlefield thatfirepower was now the primary

element in warfare.53 Firepower made the defense extremely powerful. The FrenchArmy, however, also determined that only the offense couldbring victory and a successful conclusion to the campaign.Therefore, a great part of the French doctrinal thought wastied up in the methodical battle, which is in essence anoffensive doctrine. The French offensive doctrine of theinterwar period had the following characteristics:_ Strict, centralized control by the core and thearmy, with little room for initiative of juniorcommanders;_ Since firepower dominated the battle, artillerysupport would be massive, centralized andconcentrated;_ The infantry would move forward by short bounds of5 kilometers or so, under massive artillery support,and at that point, the advance would halt inaccordance with specific phase lines, so that theartillery could deploy forward, and the battle couldbe rejoined, on successive days.Under the terms of the methodical battle, commanders such asGamelin, Petain and Weygand believed that the correctemployment of doctrine could ensure victory.The methodical battle had its origins in the campaigns andmethodology of 1918. After the disasters of 1916 and 1917,it seemed that the French Army had finally discovered thesecret of success on the battlefield, by carefully plannedoffensives with massive firepower. These forerunners of themethodical battle proved their effectiveness in the Summerand Fall of 1918. In its essence, the tactics of late 1918were geared to the minimization of casualties of the FrenchArmy. Tanks, in fact, played a very large role in theFrench methodical battle. In the interwar period, studieson the armor force developed the corollary to the French52 Ministre de la Guerre, Instruction Provisoire srl'Emploi Tactique des Grande Units, October 6, 1921.53 Ibid., Chapter III, Paragraph 115: "Fire is the mostimportant factor in battle. It destroys or cripples theenemy. Attack means carrying the fire forward. Defense isfire that stops." Page 13 13dogma: namely, that infantry would not in fact be able tosuccessfully advance without strong tank support.54 The French Army doctrine was couched in the terminology ofscience, or more accurately, pseudo-science. Articles anddiscussions within the Army concerning the methodical battlecontained numerous tables and formulae, which were publishedas appendices to the doctrine.55 For example, variousattacks required specific gun frontages per square kilometerbefore an attack could be initiated.56 The effectiveness ofthe Maginot Line defenses, in another case was illustratedby tables demonstrating the number of rounds from Germanheavy guns that were necessary to knock out each armoredcasement. In this example the number of rounds was solarge, one could conclude that the Maginot Line waseffectively unbreakable.57 In yet another case,mathematical formulae were used to prove the effectivenessand superiority of anti-tank guns defending against a Germanarmored attack.58 The French Army spent considerable time, effort and moneyduring the interwar period to develop the necessaryartillery and tank arms which would support the methodicalbattle. The Army, in 1940, given the high priority of theanti-tank gun in French doctrine, was equipped with good54 E. C. Kiesling, "Reform?--Why?: Military Doctrine inInterwar France.", Paper presented to the SMH, April 8,1994, p. 11.55

A typical product of the French scientific approach to waris found in the 1930s writings of General NarcisseChauvineau. An attack on a continuous front required a 3:1superiority in infantry, a 6:1 superiority in artillery and15:1 superiority in shells. See Alvin Coox, "GeneralNarcisse Chauvineau: False Apostle of Prewar French MilitaryDoctrine", in Military Affairs, February (1973), pp. 15-19,especially p. 16.56 Robert Doughty, The Seeds of Disaster, pp. 102-103.57 The French calculated the destruction of each point of afortress' outer works would require 100-150 rounds of 280-400mm artillery shells. An armored strongpoint in afortress required 400 rounds of 320, 370 or 400mm mortarshells to be destroyed. See "Franzsiche Anschauungen berAngriff und Verteidigung an Festungsfronten", inMilitrwissenschaftliche Rundschau, Issue 5 (December 1939),p. 702.58 E. C. Kiesling cites a 1937 French study thatoverestimated the range and stopping power of a 25mm gun.The French posited a 1,000 meter effective range, and a rateof fire of 15 rounds per minute, with a 25% hit rate. Thus,the French estimated, 19 of 30 German attacking tanks wouldbe destroyed by a single French antitank gun in a modelbattle. See E. C. Kiesling, "Reform?--Why?", pp. 14-15. Page 14 14anti-tank guns.59 Since rapid movement and maneuver werenot part of the French interwar doctrine, however, verylittle effort was devoted to developing radio communicationsfor the Army.The development of French motor vehicles provides a usefulillustration of the superiority of doctrine over technology.The Army used early model half-tracks in experiments of the1920s, and these greatly impressed the German observers.60 Half-tracks were most suitable for rapid operationalmaneuver and motorized units, however, which at the timewere not emphasized in French doctrine. Thus, deployment ofhalf-tracks was dropped for lack of interest. Armored carsplayed a relatively minor role in French doctrine as well,because reconnaissance had less importance in the Frenchdoctrine. As a result, the high-quality Panhard armoredcars of the 1930s were given a low priority, although thequality of the product was technically equal to that of theGermans.61 Yet another case of the primacy of doctrine over technologyis the example of antiaircraft guns. Anti-aircraft was theresponsibility of the army's Artillery Directorate. Thearmy placed little confidence in airpower as having adecisive effect upon the battlefield. Gamelin himselfbelieved that the losses of aircraft in the first few weeksof the war would be so heavy, that airpower would cease tobe an important factor in the battle.62 Therefore, the59 On the French antitank gun program, see Ministre de laDefense, Les Programmes d'Armament, pp. 342-351. GeneralGamelin made production of the 25mm anti-tank gun a toppriority in the 1938 army armaments budget. See HenryDutailly, "La Puissance Militaire de la France en 1938", inRevue Historique des Armes, No. 3 (1983), pp. 5-9. Seealso Franz Kosar, Panzerabwehrkanonen 1916-1917, Stuttgart:Motorbuch Verlag (1980), pp. 55-60.60 German officers observing the 1922 and 1924 Frenchmaneuvers were impressed by the new French vehicles andequipment, but held a low opinion of the French tactics forthe equipment. See T-3 Truppenamt, "Die franzsischenHerbstmanver 1922", September 11, 1923, in

BA/MA, RH2/1547, also T-3 Truppenamt, "Die franzsischenHerbstmanver, 1924", December 10, 1924, in BA/MA, RH2/1547.61 In 1940, the Germans had about twice as many armored carsas the French: 350 French to 600+ German. See R.M.Ogorkiewicz, Armoured Forces, pp. 432-434.62 In 1938, General Gamelin commented, "The role of aviationis apt to be exaggerated, and after the early days of warthe wastage will be such that it will more and more beconfined to acting as an accessory to the army", as cited in Page 15 15French lagged behind in the development of antiaircraftguns.

WWII French Artillery

French Theory
At the beginning of World War II, the French artillery system was based on the lessons they had learned in World War I. They refined the techniques learned in the "Great War" and their artillery tactics worked well when given the chance to function as intended. At the Battle of Gembloux, the French Artillery-Infantry defense stopped the German Blitzkrieg, allowing the French to hold their positions until they were outflanked to the South. The fact that the Germans were able to score a quick victory was not due to a deficiency in the artillery, although the battle of movement that occurred in 1940 often prevented the French artillery from being used to its maximum effectiveness. The Fire Plan The mathematics and techniques of bringing indirect fire down on specific locations from separate battery positions had been worked out thoroughly in the 1914-1918 period and were used in some form by almost all nations at the beginning of WWII. Whenever the French moved to a new position, the first priority of the artillery was to establish a Fire Plan. In other places in the tutorial, we use the term fire plan to refer to a pre-game set of barrages and fire missions that will land on specific turns in the game. When considering French Artillery, the meaning is different. It means the integration of artillery assets into an overall control structure. Of course in a Battlefront games, the French can have preplanned fire missions as well, but when discussing the

French artillery practices, we are using the more general meaning. Establishing a French Fire Plan requires that: Forward Observer positions be established from where they could see the area to be attacked/defended by artillery Battery Positions be established and their positions relative to the FOs be determined precisely. Communications be established between the FOs and the firing assets.

Rather than having the FOs connected with specific single batteries, as was often the German practice, the French added a twist by establishing the poste central du groupe which was a small headquarters subordinate to the commander of the artillery battalion. The poste central du groupe calculated the data necessary for firing all three batteries of a battalion at the same target and Battery commanders simply followed the instructions given them. The advantage of this system is that it allowed an artillery battalion to mass the fires of its batteries quickly on a single target. The disadvantage is that it took battery commanders out of the loop. In many ways the poste central du groupe has a similar function to the latewar U.S. Fire Direction Center (FDC), the primary difference being that the French system was still tied closely to the Forward Observer, and the flexibility of the U.S. map system and calculation aids had yet to be invented. If they had been allowed the time, the French Artillery might have evolved into a much more flexible system. In game terms, the effect of the French organization is that offboard artillery should almost always fire by battalion. The Moroccan division at the Battle of Gembloux had an artillery fire plan within 24 hours of occupying their positions in Belgium. This included registering some artillery battalions from an adjacent division that were allocated to support the Moroccans. This indicates that a scenario designer can assume that a basic fire plan has been developed if the French have been in their positions for a day or more. The longer that the French occupied a position, the more sophisticated the fire plan is likely to be. More batteries were registered, and communications were improved. A scenario can specify that some battalion assets are part of the plan and others are not (and are therefore less effective). An extreme example of a fire plan is found in the main Maginot Line positions, where virtually every angle and position had been pre-plotted over the months of construction. Despite our modern contempt for these fortifications, it should be noted that in 1940 they were considered "state-of-the-art" and the Germans never made a serious attempt to force them by frontal attack. Equipment

The basic artillery support of the Infantry Division was 3 Battalions of 75mm Guns (12 in each battalion), one battalion usually assigned to support each infantry regiment. These were often the 75mm Model 1897 gun (the famous "French 75"). While most countries were standardizing on 105mm howitzer as the basic weapon of the artillery the French were unable to do so for political and budgetary reasons:

Small template -1 vs V, 0 vs T, G

They had a lot of 75mm guns left in their arsenal. It was hard to convince politicians to allocate money for new artillery, especially while the bulk of the defence budget was now being allocated to the Maginot line. Also much of the heavier artillery was procured during World War I and was of relatively recent design. Many of the Generals who had advocated the virtues of the 75mm gun were in positions of high responsibility. They were unconvinced that new artillery was needed. After all, they won WWI using this gun, it couldn't be all bad.

Large template -1 vs V, 0 vs T, G Large template 0 vs V, +1 vs T, G In addition to the 75mm guns the French had some battalions of 105mm and 155mm artillery available. Divisions usually had 1 or 2 battalions of 155mm howitzers. Corps artillery had 2 battalions of 105mm guns and 2 battalions of 155mm howitzers. Divisional and corps artillery are usually only in general support as part of an integrated fire plan. On attack-The "Deliberate Advance"

Their experiences in 1914-1918 had convinced the French High Command that mobile warfare was unlikely. Instead, they based their idea of an offensive on a plan called the "Deliberate Advance". This was designed to give a slow but extremely safe method of attacking, designed to maximize enemy casualties and minimize friendly casualties. Of course it also minimized the chance of rapidly winning the war. There was a common saying in vogue at the time that "The Artillery conquers, the Infantry occupies", and the Deliberate Advance certainly mirrored this theory. The basic idea of the DA was for friendly artillery to pulverize enemy front line positions and neutralize the enemy artillery, after which friendly troops would occupy their trenches. If this seems similar to what happened in World War I, it is not coincidental! The deliberate advance was to be done in distinct stages: 1. Reconnaissance Using infantry patrols, air reconnaissance, and sound-ranging equipment, the French would determine the German (the French had a pretty good idea of who they were going to be fighting :-) ) front line and artillery positions. 2. Preparation Divisional and corps artillery assets would be brought forward and carefully sighted. A comprehensive fire plan would would be developed designed to attain artillery supremacy. Prewar planning specified the extensive use of chemical weapons, and it is one of the few small mercies of WWII that they were not employed. 3. Bombardment and Attack The plan would be put into effect. After the artillery plan had smashed the enemy artillery and forward positions, the infantry, accompanied by tanks, would occupy the enemy positions. Tanks were never seen as a breakthrough weapon, but were designed to act as mobile artillery platforms to overcome local strongpoints that survived the initial artillery concentrations. 4. Consolidation After advancing 6-10km (the limit of the artillery support), the friendly forces would stop (ignoring that annoying Charles De Gaulle screaming for them to continue on to Berlin), dig in and establish new trench lines and artillery positions. A new fire plan would be developed for the next stage of the advance. The deliberate advance cycle could be repeated about once every 7-10 days. Although an adequate fire plan to defend the positions could be developed within a day, the reconnaissance necessary to for the next deliberate attack would take longer. This would give an average advance of 1km/day which was quite respectable by WWI standards. The key to the Deliberate Advance was the word Deliberate.

During the "phony war", the French used this a couple of times but then stopped (Poland had disappeared and there was no hurry). The basic defensive mindset of the French in 1939-40 meant that the Deliberate Advance was never really put to the test. However, it relied on its power upon a certain amount of cooperation from its opponent. If the enemy front-line trenches were heavily occupied and batteries fired from fixed positions, the DA could cause severe casualties. However, the build-up needed for a DA would be fairly easy to detect, and by deception operations the Germans could ensure that the massive blow would fall mainly on empty ground. They could then counterattack when the French attempted to consolidate. On Defense-Forts and Concrete The French could see World War II coming, but spent much of their defense budget on concrete instead of tanks and mobile forces. In hindsight, the Maginot line was a waste of money, especially as it was not extended along the entire Northern frontier (for both political and budgetary reasons). The Germans simply went around the end of the fortification line. However, at the time, the idea of an impregnable shield on the border supported by mobile forces to the rear seemed to be sound doctrine. By the standards of 1939, the Maginot line WAS formidable, and the Germans did not really attempt a break-through. One of the features of the Maginot line was that almost every inch of ground around it was plotted for artillery support. It would have been very difficult to take by direct assault. When defending static positions, the fire plan should be comprehensive and well-developed. On Defence-Mobile situations The key to defending in mobile situations is whether the French have been allowed time enough to register their artillery. As stated earlier, it took the French about 24 hours to establish a basic fire plan. Communications Along with most nations during World War II, the French relied on wire communications between their forward positions and their firing assets. These were generally reliable, but could sometimes be broken up by shelling/bombing the rear areas. French Artillery can be classified: Command - High level*. When they were given the time to establish a fire plan, the French were able to allocate artillery from Corps and Division into their fire missions. The poste central du groupe allowed them to control all fire of the battalion from a relatively high level. This was one of the main differences between their artillery system and that of

the Germans, where FOs were often tied to specific batteries. The fire plan would improve while the French occupied the same positions with more assets being tied into the plan. If they were not given time to establish a fire plan, their artillery was considerably less effective. Control - Medium. Dedicated Forward observers made most of the calls-for-fire for the artillery. Communications - Average. As long as they were using their established positions, they could expect relatively good communications. They were not particularly flexible in the advance. If their FOs left their observation posts, their communications would become less reliable until they had the opportunity to string new wire. French Artillery Rules in Battlefront For Battlefront, the scenario designer must decide if a fire plan exists and which assets are integrated into the plan. It is possible to have both fire plan and non-fire plan assets available in a scenario. The French use the call-for-fire table to the right. Also, if a fire mission is called by a forward observer who has not moved from his initial position, and consists of battalions that are part of a fire plan, apply the preregistered

modifier to the call-for-fire roll. Once a fire plan has been established, French Offboard Artillery may only fire by Battalion. However, it may always use ALL of the guns in the battalion (6 templates for the typical 75mm battalion). The French are NOT limited to fire by a single battery when firing a shelling pattern by a battalion that is part of a fire plan. For a typical 12 gun (6 template) battalion, they may arrange them either as a linear (6 wide, 1 deep) or rectangular (3 wide, 2 deep) pattern. The full battalion shelling pattern is the French "special" mission. To

the right are the typical shelling pattern fired by 75mm battalion, where the basic IDF fire strength is -1 vs V and 0 vs T,G,sV. Concentration and thickened concentration fire missions may only be used by battalions that are part of a fire plan. Once again, the entire 12 gun battalion is used as a unit. To the right are the possible concentration patterns fired by a 12 gun 75mm battalion. When firing mixed/smoke patterns by battalion, halve the number of templates in the regular pattern. General Support Artillery is available only if there is a fire plan and may fire only in conjunction with battalions that are part of a fire plan. Battalions that are part of a fire plan cannot be combined with those which are not in the plan within the same fire mission. For battalions which are NOT part of the fire plan, only shelling, smoke, and mixed shelling/smoke fire missions may be fired. Also, no pre-registration bonus is used on the call-for-fire table. However, the types of missions that can be fired depend on how far along the fire plan has progressed. Mark Hayes thinks that they always would fire by battalion, as this is their basic doctrine and training. He recommends that they immediately be allowed to use the 3x2 shelling pattern above (or a 3x1 with mixed shelling/smoke). My (your not-so-humble webmaster's) feeling is to be somewhat

more restrictive, especially at the early stages of the fire plan, because the if the batteries were not located in the same geographic area (and they often dispersed to make them more difficult counter-battery targets), they would not be able to coordinate battalion fire. I would consider limiting them to the almost useless single battery pattern to the right at the beginning of the plan preparation (more to reflect the difficulty of coordinating fire than any specific doctrine) and have them work up to different battalion shelling patterns without pre-registration if they have been in place for a few hours. In any case, the referee should specify the patterns they can use and it would be perfectly reasonable to allow them to use more effective patterns as the game progresses. If anyone has any more definite knowledge of how they developed their plan, let us know and we will incorporate it into this tutorial. It should be noted that the French really did not expect to fight without a plan, as they anticipated battles to develop at a slower pace. Indeed, our sources almost exclusively describe the French doctrine assuming that the plan has been established. e German invasion there) *Regional Infantry made up of men too old for B Reserves but still of military age. They were given the role, along with the Gendarmerie to guard the rear.

*Foreign Legion (Based in Algeria) and other foreign volunteers (in particular Polish soldiers and sailors escaped from the German invasion there)

PETAIN
Richard Griffiths P had developed a technique of small-scale well-prepared attacks with overwhelming strength, to wear down the enemy reserves while preserving his own; of artillery taking far more part than the infantry; and of elastic defense in depth, on which the enemy would flounder.

1921 the PROVISIONAL INSTRUCTION ON THE UTILIATION OF LARGER UNITS (INSTRUCTION PROVOSIRE SUR LA CONDUITE DES GRANDES UNITES) became the doctrine of

the French Army. This document stressed the impossibility of breaking a continuous front, mainly through the strength, which the new forms of firepower had given to even, improvised defenses. Attack was possible only after the amassing of the most powerful forces, in the form of artillery, tanks and munitions Tanks were, however, regarded as merely subordinate to the infantry needs, fighting closely in liaison with them, and clearing the way for them. Aircraft were seen mainly as instruments of observation of the enemy. It was the artillery, supporting the infantry, which did the main fighting The main point of the document was that such offensive tactics, meager as they were, were seen as only possible after a prolonged defensive action, as in the WWI.

You attack with projectiles and it is the artillery, not the infantry, which conquers the ground. By 1937 the French army was still being trained for the defensive. This time, in maneuvers being held in Normandy, the defense won. A German observer commented, These maneuvers have confirmed the impression that one must place the power of the French army very high on the scale for the defensive. Despite their double superiority (forces involved in the maneuvers), the offensive forces, methodically deployed, had no notable success.

THE BREAKING POINT

Robert Doughty

French Doctrine Both 1921 and 1936 Field Service Regulations stressed firepower as The preponderant factor of combat. The attack is the fire that advances The defense is the fire that halts (the enemy). The development of automatic weapons permitted the establishment of curtains

of fire that would extract a terrible toll of the enemy. The only way an attacker could penetrate a deadly curtain of defensive fire would be to create a much greater concentration of fire with three times as much infantry, six times the artillery, and fifteen times the ammunition. Obviously the complexity of such an effort limited the possibility of maneuver dramatically and its coordination could most effectively be done through the use of what the French called the methodical battle. This step-by-step approach to battle became a vital part of French doctrine. By the term methodical battle the French meant a tightly controlled battle in which all units and weapons were carefully marshaled and then employed in combat. The French preferred to have a step-by-step battle in which units obediently moved between phase lines and adhered to strictly scheduled timetables, since they believed that such methods were essential for the coherent employment of enormous amounts of men and material. They preferred the time consuming, intricate process that prized preparation rather than improvisation and that made great allowances for the extreme complexity of massing large amounts of weapons and material. If the French had their way, they would weaken the attacker with their deadly defensive fires, and then destroy him by a massive, but tightly controlled battering ram attack. The methodical battle the artillery provided the momentum and the rhythm for the attack. When an attack began, according to French doctrine, the infantry advanced 1000 to 2000 meters before halting to readjust the artillery fire. The attack again commenced, and, after advancing another 1000-2000 meters another readjustment of fire was necessary. To control the advance of the infantry and to ensure artillery support, a number of intermediate objectives were established that corresponded to these advances of 1000 to 2000 meters. After a total advance of about 4000 to 5000 meters, a displacement of artillery was required. This displacement ensured that the infantry remained under the cover of the artillery and did not go beyond its maximum effective range. For control purposes, the maximum advance was somewhere between 3000 to 4000 meters before the 75mm artillery began its displacement by increments. One rule of thumb was given by an instructor at the Army Staff College when he stated the distance of the advance ought to be half the maximum range of the artillery supporting the attack (usually no more than 7500 meters). Hence the French believed the infantry had to remain under of artillery protection, and only the

methodical battle could ensure the maximum coordination and integration of the artillery and the infantry. The methodical battle resembled the methods used in World War I, but it represented an intensification of those methods. According to the French, the new firepower that had become available after 1918 made centralized control much more important than ever before and made the methodical battle more essential in an offensive.

DEFENSE For the defense, the French emphasized the need for depth. When a French unit (from battalion to corps) occupied a defensive sector, it organized its forces into three parts: an advance post line, a principal position of resistance, and a stopping line. The principal position of resistance was the most important and heavily defended portion of the French defenses. Theoretically, it could be located along an easily protected front, preferably in an area where the enemy could be channeled into carefully selected zones or fields of fire between natural and man-made obstacles. Because of the requirement for depth, the principal position of resistance rarely resembled a line. To its rear was the stopping line, which was supposed to halt an attacking enemy force after it had been weakened by forward defenders. If an enemy managed to penetrate the stopping line, French doctrine called for a process known as Colmater, or filling. A commander expected to meet a penetration by having his reserves, as well as the reserves of larger units, move in front of attacking enemy troops and gradually slow them down until they were halted. By shifting additional infantry, armor, and artillery units laterally into a threatened sector or forward from the reserves, an attacker could be slowed and eventually halted. After sealing off an enemy penetration, a counterattack would follow, but the counterattack would usually rely on the use of artillery and infantry fire rather than the charge of infantry or tanks. To halt an enemy using this procedure, the defender would be able to move units in front of a penetration faster than an enemy attacker could advance. The emphasis on the methodical battle and on the process of colmater resulted in a dangerous degree of rigidity within the French system for command and control. Centralization became the primary cone of higher commanders, especially as they considered how to shift units about the battlefield. The French b believed the focus of decision making had to remain at a higher

level because the higher commander had to have greater control for coordinating the actions of numerous subordinate units. The armys doctrinal and organizational system stressed the power and authority of army group, field army, and corps commanders and left little flexibility or room for imitative to lower level commanders. Each lower level had less room for maneuver than the level immediately above it. The entire system was designed to be propelled forward by pressure from above, rather than being pulled from below. In contrast to the decentralized battle in which officers were expected to show initiative and flexibility, the French preferred rigid centralization and strict obedience. Unfortunately, this resulted in a fatal flaw; the French military could not respond flexibly to unanticipated demands and could hardly capitalize upon an important gain made by a lower level unit. The French also encouraged commanders to remain in their command posts, rather than moving forward and being drawn into the fighting. A commander, in their view, should remain in his command post, being constantly updated on the status of the ongoing battle and frequently making decisions about the movement and commitment of units and supplies. By keeping their hands on the handle of a fan, and by managing units and material, commanders were not available to lead by personal example, but they could theoretically ensure the entire operation proceeded smoothly and efficiently. In all the depth of the position on the principal line of resistance, as well as the stopping line or between these lines, the defense will be organized into circular fighting positions (points dappui) of resistance, capable of defending themselves when isolated, even if bypassed by enemy infantry and tanks. As a consequence the fighting positions or centers of resistance will be interlocked with obstacles of terrain, woods, villages, etc. By holding the centers of resistance, the French expected to break up or disrupt an enemy attack, which would eventually halt under concentrated artillery fire and against newly established defensive positions to its front. According to French doctrine, counterattacks could roll back an enemy penetration but halting the enemys forward movement was the first priority. Increasing the artillery support for a threatened sector accorded completely with French doctrine, for such an action added to the defensive capability of the sector while placing sufficient forces on hand to conduct a counterattack with fire, rather than troops.

French expected Germans to roll flank behind Maginot line after penetration at Sedan. Reinforced sector to prevent this in classic Colmater operation. Fr cav was used in role US considers advance covering forceno movt to contact.

Most of pop and industry were in areas of France near the border. 95% of iron ore and 75% of coal. Men 20-34 1870 slightly fewer than Germany; 1910 Ger 1.6 to 1 advantage; 1939 Ger twice as many