Figure 1.-- |
|
The Wehrmacht in 1940 was kmown go be a powerful force. The real shock was that the French Army which many military experts had considered to be the most powefull force in Europe proved to be a hallow shell. It was the French Army which stopped the Germans in 1914 nd which the Allied front in the West was largely structured around in World War I. When the War broke out, Britain hasd only a small professional army. Many believed that the Allied war effort during World war II would largely be based on the French Army. Thus the French collapse within a few weeks was such a momentous outcome. Some French units fought with destinction, but whole French divisions surrendered en masse. Soldiers layed down their arms with fighting and started the treck east to German POW camps where they would spend 5 years while France's future was decided by other countries. This was the great shock of 1940. Historians today still debate what happened to the French Army. It is relatively easy to chart out the factors which led to the destruction of French arms and almost the French nation. Less clear is the relative importance of these various factors. Some have stressed superior German arms and tactics. This was certainly a factor. Petain tended to lay the debacle to years of left-wing ideologists.
The Wehrmacht in 1940 was known to be a powerful force. The Wehrmacht was in the mind of many military historians the finest military force in modern history. The Wehrmact entered World War II with an effective military doctrine-Blitzkrieg. This was essentially the primciples of modern war. And the campaign in Poland (September 1939) enabled the Wehrmacht to test out its theories and perfect them. The French learned little from the Polish campaign. The French reaction was that the Poles were not a creditable opponent.
It had been the French Army which stopped the Germans in 1914 nd which the Allied front in the West was largely structured around in World War I. When the War broke out, Britain hasd only a small professional army. So much of the early fighting was conducted by the French who made ujp the bulk of the Allied force during gthe early years of the War.
The real shock when the Wehrmacht struck was that the French Army which many military experts had considered to be the most powefull force in Europe proved to be a hallow shell. The Germans proceeded to conquer virtually all of Western Europe. After a few months of the "Phony War", France's turn came. The Germans struck on a wide front against the neutral Netherlands, Belgiym, and Luxemburg. The terror bombing of Rotterdam convinced the already hard-pressed Dutch Army to surrender. The British Expeditionary Force (BEF) rushed north to aid the Dutch. The Germans then struck in the Belgian Ardenes which allowed them to avoid the formidable Maginot Line. The French and Belgians considered the Ardenes impassable to tanks. The Germans managed to easily penetrate the rough terraine, crossed two substantial rivers, and the XIX Panzer Corps rapidly reached the English Channel--cutting the BEF off from the French and rendering the Maginot Line uselss. The French entrenched behind the Maginot Line simply could not cope with the exposive highly mobil style of Blitzkrieg warfare. The Panzers surrounded the Belgian Army which King Leopold III surrendered. The BEF was within Hitler's grasp. The Panzers were only a few miles south of Dunkirk and facing no serious opposition. Hitler ordered the Panzers to halt. Some believe that he hoped this gesture would help convince the British to comes to terms, other believe that is was just as it was described at the time, aneeded pause to regroup and prepare for a more coordinated assault. [Davidson, p. 408 and Fest, p. 630.] What ever the reason, this 48-hour respite allowed the British to organize a defensive perimter around Dunkirk and begin an almost miraculous withdawl. Nearly 340,000 men were evacuated from Dunkirk, including French and Dutch soldiers.
Many believed that the Allied war effort during World war II would largely be based on the French Army. Thus the French collapse within a few weeks was such a momentous outcome. Some French units fought with destinction, but whole French divisions surrendered en masse. Soldiers layed down their arms with fighting and started the treck east to German POW camps where they would spend 5 years while France's future was decided by other countries. This was the great shock of 1940.
Most accounts report that the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) fought better than the French Army. Here accounts vary. A HBC reader writes, "It is easy for people with no understanding of the war to blame the French alone, for the early collapse. The British were not prepared for war. The BEF was so small, that it is hard to say whether it was outfought or not, but I believe that, had the entire French army been replaced by similarly equipped British troops, the only difference would have been a (possible) change in the timing of defeat. The British army had not been so adversely affected in morale by communist propaganda as had the French, which might have encouraged them to fight a little harder and longer, but they would still have lost." Other accounts report a more significan difference. There were, however, no mass surrenders of British units as was the case for the French. Here a factor must have been that the BEF was largely made up of the pre-War professional British Army while the much larger French Army was a conscript force. There was also the Channel and the British soldier must have realized that the fall of Britain was not yet imminent.
Historians today still debate what happened to the French Army. It is relatively easy to chart out the factors which led to the destruction of French arms and almost the French nation. Less clear is the relative importance of these various factors. Some have stressed superior German arms and tactics. This was certainly a factor. Pétain tended to lay the debacle to years of left-wing ideologists.
World War I was a cataclysm for Europe. The result was the virtual destruction of a generation. The French Army stopped the Germans, but casualties as the War progressed were stagering. The German strategy as developed by German Commander General Eric von Falkenhayn was to break the French Army by bleecing it at Verdun (1916). He planned Operation Judgement to attack Verdun at the corner of the French lines where they would be forced to fight in narrow confined and commit firces in a piece-meal manner. Falkenhayn came closer to his objective than they realized. Verdun held, but the losses on both sides were apauling. French morale plummeted. There were mutinies, a fact that German intelligence failed to puck up and exploit. Petain was called in to revitalize the French Army. He succeeded through a combination of court marials and more humane treatment of the average soldier. The French Army was ruined, however, as an offensive force. When victory came it was British and American forces that cracked the Hindenburg Line (1918). This feeling of malaze and defeat carried over into post-War France and affected the French Army and it conscripts.
The superiority of German arms was a factgory in the French collapse. The Luftwaffe dominated the battlefield which can demoralize to ground troops. The German armor was not as clearly siperior, but yje German tactical doctrine of Blitzkrieg was in essence mpdern warfare and far superior to French tactical doctrine.
The French minful of the terrible losses of World War I were unwiiling to fight pitched battles with the Germans as they had done in World War I. Their strategy was to dig in behind the Maginot Line and let the German expose their infatry to artilley and machinegun fire. The Maginot Line, however, did not strach to the Channel, but ended at the French border. The Germans simply went around it. And the French proved incapable of fghting a mobile war with the German panzers. The French still used motorcycle couriers. The German advamce was so swift that that often orders from the high command would arrive after a position had fallen or a unit surrendered. French tanks were not equipped with radios. The best trained and equipped French units had been sent nort to aid the Dutch and Belgians. When the Panzers broke through to the coat, the French lost their most effective formations and armored units.
One still debated issue is to what extent left-wing ideology undermined the French will to resist. There has always been a pacifist or anti-war ele,ent in socialist thought. Marx described war as the eventual outcome of competing capitalist/imperialist powers. Even the socialist parties, however, generally supported their governments in World war I. After World War I, socialist parties generally came to see the war in iddological terms and oppose military spending. This was one reason Hitler so hated the socialists in Germany, in addition to the favt hat they had been respobsib;e for the "November Crime". The one socialist party tht did not share this view was the Bolsheviks which especially under Stalin began building a massive military force. As Moscow gradually gained control over national Communist parties, their orders was to preach peace and oppose military spending. This began to change with the rise of Hitler to power in Germany and the formation of the National Front. Still the anti-war element was so ingrained in leftish thought that the Ntional Front (1936-39) was a largely ineffectual response to the NAZIs. And when Stalin approved the NAZI-Soviet Non-Agression Pact (1939), the Communist in France and other countries again opposing preparadness and military spending. Pétain after the French surrender to the Germans spoke a great deal about how leftist thought had undermined the French fighting spirit. He wanted to establish Vchy as the legitimare French Government. He also wanted to deflect the responsibility of the French Army for the defeat. One effort in this effort was "le procès de Riom" (the Riom trial). Pétain was the hero of World War I. He was also a arch Catholic conservative who hated the socialists. The rigged trials were designed to blame socialists leaders like Léon Blum for the defeat. Vichy officials in the show trials called many French generals who railed at the socialists. They also claimed that the defeat was not the Army's fault, but that of the Armée de l'Air (French Air Force). The generals also claimed that the British, especially the Royal Air Force, had pulled out of the fight.
Davidson, Eugene. The Unmaking of Adolf Hitler (Univesity of Missouri: Columbia, 1996), 519p.
Fest, Joachim C. Hitler (Vintage Books: New York, 1974), 844p.
Navigate the Boys' Historical Clothing Web Site:
[Return to Fall of France page]
[Return to Main World War II European campaign page]
[Return to Main French World War II displaced persons page]
[Introduction]
[Activities]
[Biographies]
[Chronology]
[Clothing styles]
[Countries]
[Bibliographies]
[Contributions]
[FAQs]
[Glossaries]
[Satellite sites]
[Tools]
[Boys' Clothing Home]