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To: Altair333
Rommel did not create the breakthrough. After Guderian was already across, he secured an independent crossing farther north. That helped protect Guderian's inward flank as he conducted the encirclement, that is the most that can be said of it. He had little to do with the victory and nothing to do with its conception. The overall plan was Manstein's and the direction of the decisive element was Guderian's.

The forces between Guderian and Paris amounted to at least a corps of armor, a full division of which counterattacked the bridgehead before German tanks were even across (they were stopped by German infantry). But he didn't go to Paris, he went to the channel. He still had to fight off multiple armor brigade size counterattacks and did so easily.

The reason they went to the channel is their doctrine was annihilation battle, not striking for deep political or command objectives. Western armor theorists whose doctrines call for the latter consistently overlook this or downplay it. They don't like to admit that the greatest success in the history of maneuver warfare ignored their advice and followed much older principles. Which the Germans had employed since the 19th century and were in no way dependent on tanks etc.

The Germans coming through both Belgium and Holland were hardly a "feint", and succeeded frontally, along with the breakthrough success. Yes the main effort was in the Ardennes, but half the force was the fixing group in the north countries, and they attacked seriously, not as a feint.

The Arras counterattack was not larger than the French ones, it was smaller, the French made at least 3 of similar scale. Nor was it more successful. It was stopped readily by gun front tactics because allied combined arms was nonexistent. Brit doctrine at the time stressed armor acting independently - as its prewar theorists had called for - and that failed completely in practice.

The portion of the Allied armies dealt with in the northern pocket was about half. The French had forces to form new lines in the south and did so. But the odds left by the previous victory, along with the proven ability to break through at will, readily beat the remaining French in a second operation. There was, however, such an operation and serious fighting occurred during it, there were French forces to block the way to Paris, etc.

109 posted on 05/18/2006 6:06:12 PM PDT by JasonC
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To: JasonC

It sounds like you were just looking for a point to nit-pick on regarding who exactly made the crossing first (both Guderian and Rommel obviously made the crossing). But that clearly wasn't the point of my post.

The point of my post was and is that the French soldier can't be judged too much one way or the other based upon WW II since it was over as soon as the Germans made their strategic breakthrough through the Ardennes and over the Meuse. And that is the way the French president and the French high command judged the situation, as noted by Churchill after the war.

If you have a disagreement with that point, speak up and at least you'll be responding to the thrust of my post instead of scrutinize issues you can disagree and go off on a tangent on. If you say it wasn't over when the Meuse crossing was effected then uour view will be contrary to that of the French high command at the time. I tend to give credence to their evaluation of the situation on this issue.


114 posted on 05/18/2006 6:50:19 PM PDT by Altair333 (Red Rover, Red Rover, Send Mexico Right Over)
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