Why did the French leave the Ardennes undefended? Where did this idea that it was impenetrable come from? Was it from the battles fought there in WW1 or did the Frnech just underestimate the capabilities of German armor?
Either way that seems like a pretty retarded oversight.
>>902694
Well considering the french though pure 'cran" would help them win WWI, I doubt serious tatical planning went into the design of the maginot line.
>>902694
They didn't think the germans could get enough armour through the area without being detected
>>902707
The maginot line was just fine, but it was outdated and useless in blitzkrieg warfare.
In WW1 the area was impossible to move vehicles through, particularly on the French's portion of the forest, so they only put light garrison forces there in case the Krauts sent infantry through the forest.
And ultimately it wasn't "passable" under normal circumstances. The whole movement was a complete clusterfuck and there were traffic jams and tanks getting stuck all over for days, it took them longer than planned to get through the forest and all in all they missed their timetable.
But the French, not expecting that at all, put basically no forces to stop them so even though the German's plans didn't go so well, the French had NO contingency at all in place. As the Germans raced to the channel the British asked de Gaulle why he wasn't counterattacking the exposed, unsupported Panzers with his reserves. He threw his hands up and cried "with what reserves!?"
It was really just the Germans getting lucky they didn't get spotted initially, and that the French couldn't react in time after they were spotted. Airstrikes would have sewn absolute chaos and halted the attack, but all the planes were tied up in the Low Countries, as was most of the armor, infantry, and BEF.
>>902694
Yes, they underestimated German capabilities and overestimated how much they would be slowed down. They also expected a repeat of wheeling attack that would come through Belgium and attempt to take Paris much like 1914. The joke is, the Germans were just as surprised. They had very limited routes of advance through the Ardennes, and von Kleist was being very conservative. If Guderian hadn't pulled some trickery to "recon in force", the breakout wouldn't have happened. Ernest May's Strange Victory is a great read about how the Germans did not expect to win in such decisive ways in both Poland and France.
Germany read Charles De Gaulle's book and France didn't.
So Germany had a mechanized force where tanks were used in great numbers and on their own. While France left all the tanks spread out to support unmounted infantry.
>>902724
This. The Battle of France get's treated too often as a forgone conclusion and not one of the most masterful strokes in military history. And like any master stroke, it could have gone very, very, badly.
If the German move HAD been detected, and they got pinned down in a massive, messy clusterfuck, it's unlikely the Germans would have made any headway into France in 1940.
>>902721
It wasn't outdated. It would have worked fine if it extended to the Atlantic. Also the French having not-awful logistics would have helped.
How much better was French armor than German armor at the time?
>>902942
Seven.
>>902792
This. I don't get what people don't get by the Germans going around it. It was obviously effective for the length, which is why the Germans went around.
>>902982
On top of that, it served it's purpose for it's length.
The thing to remember is that Germany outnumbered France. 88 million to 60 million, with France having a significantly older populace. If the French army fought the Germans and could match them man for man, they would still lose. This was a bitter fact they learned, and had reinforced, by the first world war.
So they needed to substitute equipment for manpower. This was the key success of the Maginot line: in the North of France, the French Army achieved local parity with the Germans. The fortifications meant that they didn't need a strong reserve in the Alsace Region, and could shift those division north, which they did.
They couldn't extend the wall to the Atlantic without pushing the low countries out of their orbit entirely. If it's clear France will be of no help, the Belgians might be inclined to let the Germans through. Cutting the Belgians out of the equation shifts manpower back in favor of the Germans, so it's political unacceptable, and besides which would have been overly costly.
The French KNEW they couldn't just hide behind their walls. They would have to go on the offensive at some point, and a dedicated offensive could crack a defensive line. The central problem for France was having enough men at the front not to get Zerg rushed by the Germans.
>>902757
>While France left all the tanks spread out to support unmounted infantry.
France had its own tank divisions, what are you talking about.
>>903241
Which were much smaller and less numerous as a whole than German tank divisions.
Pound for pound French armor was better, as well as more numerous, but their organization was bumpkus and their deployment erratic.
>>902694
There were just 6 roads through them. French believed that they can wreck them via airforce and Hitler can say goodbye to this attack route. Then, instead of cutting German blitz off the supply routes with their land forces they pretended that their airforce will wreck it, it totally will, just give them more time.
The moral of the story is - interdiction doesn't work.
>>902721
Maginot line was impossible to get through, however it was just too expensive to build and that money would be better spent on improving French economy in one way(inventions) or another(tax cuts) which would stop the demographic crisis or, alternatively, developing different doctrine and bigger armed forces to handle Germans.
>>903504
>however it was just too expensive to build and that money would be better spent on improving French economy in one way(inventions) or another(tax cuts) which would stop the demographic crisis or, alternatively, developing different doctrine and bigger armed forces to handle Germans.
i dont have the numbers at hand but the maginot line cost peanuts
it was literally single digits percentage of the military budget to build it and maintain it (i want to say it was something like 2-3 percent of the budget but i do not have the numbers here)
it was not expensive to build by any means, when considering the potential costs of the standing force covering the same stretch of the border would require
(or considering that the cost of this magical programme to improve the demographic crisis would be immeasurably higher than the cost of building the line)
>>903006
>88 million to 60 million
That's today. At the time it was 40 million French vs 77 million Germans (with as you said an even bigger imbalance for the young population).
How do the german population get to outnumber the french when France has a much better climate and was the most populated country in Europe for a long time?
>>904134
Most countries had what's called a demographic transition during industrialisation, when the mortality rates drop and the birth rates stay high, so the population rises very quickly, until the birth rates drop as well and it stabilises again.
France didn't have that because the birth rates dropped at the same time as the mortality rates already, much earlier than in the rest of Europe, so the population remained stable.
>>903241
They didn't have on-board radios that made their deployment absolute dogshit even if the individual tanks were better than what Huns were packing.
>>903640
Cause I didn't post that.
He's half right. French armor was very watered down, while the Germans were very much a fan of concentrate in their panzer juice. The main issue of course was the majority of their armor ended up encircled but even then the French considered tanks a supplementary force while the Germans considered them a spearhead. Sure, tanks could break through, but in support of the infantry.
The Germans just cut a swathe through France and let the infantry catch up later, it's something the French never saw coming, let alone the attack coming from the Ardennes.
