What is the truth behind world war II, when France, with an army of 1.7 million and a large number of advanced weapons, resisted for only 42 days before surrendering to Nazi Germany?
The Germans invaded Belgium
On May 10, 1940, the German army officially launched an offensive against the Western European countries, a large number of German fighters took advantage of the cover of night to launch air raids on the air transport hubs such as airports and railways in the Netherlands, Belgium and other places, as well as key industrial cities, and then the German ground troops that had been assembled long ago also launched a large-scale attack, and the French were convinced that the German army was still convinced that the German army was still the strategy of continuing the war, so they waited patiently after the Maginot Line, wanting to rely on the so-called battlefield advantage. Block the German army for at least 6 months, then the British will also quickly come to support, germany will inevitably lose in the end.
German air raids
At this time, the French army still firmly believed that the German army must pass through the Maginot Line if it wanted to attack, because in addition to this route, the German army could only pass through the Ardennes Forest, where the road was extremely rugged, even if the large troops could successfully pass, they would inevitably be exhausted in France, the French army could completely wait for work, and Belgium also built the fortress of Eben Emmar, which could wait for French support, so when it knew that Belgium was attacked, the British and French troops immediately sent troops to support, but what they did not expect was that Under German airborne tactics, the Belgian garrison of the fortress had surrendered, and the German general Guderian had successfully deployed 3 panzer divisions on the north bank of the Maas River, while the British and French troops were busy and unaware of the situation.
German airborne troops
At this time, the German army was ready to cross the river, in order to increase the success rate, it also specially sent fighters to bomb the south bank of the Maas River, destroying the positions on it in a short period of time, the French army's will to fight was greatly weakened, the German army took this opportunity to cross, and then the engineers also began to build a pontoon bridge to help the armored troops cross the Maas River overnight, at this time Britain and France learned that the German army was progressing so rapidly, in order to prevent the British and French troops in Belgium from being surrounded, so they immediately sent fighters to counterattack. After the Germans found out, they also sent fighters to the air to intercept them urgently, and at the same time, the ground anti-aircraft artillery units also fired fiercely to kill British and French aircraft, under such firepower, even if the British Air Force was strong, it could not dodge, and could only retreat after a large number of fighters were destroyed.
The Germans crossed the Maas River
The German army no longer had any obstacles, a large number of armored troops crossed Musk, formed an armored group to drive straight in, the French troops could not be stopped at all, the situation was very critical, and at this time Guderian also ordered the troops to advance to Dunkirk on the east bank of the Strait, because at this time most of the British and French main forces were surrounded by the Germans, and if they wanted to escape, there was only a way to retreat from the sea, so if they wanted to cut off their escape routes, they had to quickly lead the harbor, and on May 24, when the Germans surrounded the Anglo-French coalition forces in Dunkirk, Hitler, fearing that the Panzer Division had suffered too much of a loss, suddenly ordered the German ground forces to stop the offensive and have the Air Force dispatch to solve it.
Generator plan
Although Guderian was very puzzled, he could only carry it out, because this was an order issued by the Fuehrer, and the British, after seeing that the German army stopped attacking, also immediately started the generator plan, not only sent a large number of navies to assist in the retreat, but also recruited many people and ships, and at the same time sent a large number of fighters to take off, and the German aircraft that were on bombing missions fought fiercely, covering the retreating army, although still at a disadvantage, but also caused the German air force to suffer huge losses, and at this time Belgium was also unable to resist the German attack. Surrender was chosen on May 28.
Fall back
At this time, the German army also focused on Dunkirk, so it immediately rushed straight from the port of Belgium, and Hitler also allowed the panzer division to participate in the war, but at this time the weather deteriorated and foggy, the German fighters took off as usual, but they could not find the target in mid-air, and finally in order to prevent accidental injury, they could only return with bombs, and the British and French troops also took this opportunity to step up the retreat, although the German army had tried its best to block, but because the weather was difficult to turn better, the bombing of the air force could only be carried out every few days. Therefore, in the end, the offensive task could only be re-handed over to the ground troops.
German bombing
Although the German army successfully attacked the beach on June 5, but at this time, in addition to the last defenders could not evacuate the captured, the other more than 300,000 British and French troops had completed the evacuation, at this time the entire Western Europe was only France still had a certain resistance, but in the face of the German army that was strong enough to rampage, the remaining French army was simply unable to resist, and failure became a matter of sooner or later, and at this time Paris was also conquered by the German army, the French government could only move to the south, and General Pétain, who had just become prime minister at this time, also decided to surrender. An armistice was then formally requested to Germany.
France surrendered
On June 21, the French general Henzel officially signed the instrument of surrender, and the signing place was also selected by Germany in the special carriage of Marshal Foch, because this is the place where Germany signed the surrender to France after the defeat of The First World War, which can be described as a successful revenge, just over a month, France, known as the first army in Europe, declared the fall of the country, and its large number of elite army either retreated to Britain, or simply raised their hands to surrender, and the fortress built at great expense did not play a role. Why, then, did France perish so easily? What is the truth behind this?
France after World War I
To understand all this, we must start from the first world war, when France as a battlefield, more than 1.3 million soldiers died, and the number of wounded and disabled exceeded 2.8 million, in addition to the number of casualties in the war, France lost a total of more than 5 million people, most of which are young and strong labor, and because the war was concentrated in the north, its heavy industry in the northeast was seriously damaged, and in order to support the battle, the French government, which was also seriously damaged by agriculture and animal husbandry, had to import in large quantities. This caused a large outflow of money, so after the war, it not only owed huge debts, but also the domestic economy was in a slump.
Paris Peace Conference
And because of such a huge loss, France demanded the complete destruction of Germany at the Paris Peace Conference, but at this time, both Britain and the United States felt that Germany must stay to ensure that the situation on the European continent remained stable, so although France was very angry, it could only choose to accept, but the German threat was not solved and it may be assured, and what made the French even more angry was that the United States began to support Germany shortly after the war, and Britain also agreed that it could resume its military, which posed a huge threat to France. So in order to prevent the war from rekindling to the mainland, it was decided to build a powerful fortress on the border.
Treaty of Versailles
This is the experience of France in the First World War, when many high-level people also believed that even if there is another war in the future, the defense of the fortress is also the most important, so at that time it was decided to carry it forward, and this made its thinking finally go directly to the extreme, and the military also became a complete defense, so although the French army gradually recovered its combat effectiveness later, but the ideology still stayed in the period of the First World War, and at this time, although Germany was still economically difficult, but because of the previous failure, it attached great importance to the military, although it was limited to the Treaty of Versailles, The size of the army could not be expanded, but the German army tactfully took the elite route, and almost every soldier was trained as a non-commissioned officer.
Hitler came to power
In terms of weapons and equipment, although the German army was not allowed to produce and equip heavy weapons such as tanks, nor could it have an air force, so at that time the Germans conducted research in private in various names, and also set up flying clubs to secretly cultivate talents, although because it was secretly developed, and the country was extremely poor, so the progress was very slow, but still a little stronger, and after Hitler came to power, Germany worked hard to get rid of constraints, and put forward a rise plan, in the spring of 1935 was a blatant expansion of the army, Increase the number of troops from 100,000 to 500,000.
Expand the number of troops
This caused anger and protests in Britain and France and other countries at that time, but at this time there were also thoughts among countries, no one was willing to send troops at this time, so in the end it was just a protest, Germany found that there was no sanction, it also began to expand its army, the number of armies increased rapidly, and then began to develop the navy and air force, and then began to fight abroad, continuously annexing several surrounding regions, which made Germany's industrial and economic strength have been further strengthened, and the strength of the army has become stronger and stronger. It had 2.3 million troops before attacking Poland.
French army
At this time, France also had about 2 million troops, and these troops because of the protection of the fortress, so extremely lack of crisis awareness, at that time not only did not train, or very greedy for pleasure, the army almost completely became a place of entertainment, although some French generals rushed to worry about such a situation, wanted to train, but were stopped by the superiors on the grounds of wasting bullets, and finally carried out the punishment, which made many generals who wanted to change choose to give up in the end, and the only advantage that France had was the tank. But it is only a large number, and the degree of advancement is not much higher than that of Germany.
German warplanes
And this is only a figure on the surface, the French army has not carried out any relevant training at all, so how much combat strength can be improved is still unknown, and France for some reasons, the development of the air force and not care, not only very little, but also does not expand the army, which also led to its nearly a thousand sorties of aircraft, but most of them are old and backward, and at the same time extremely lack of excellent pilots, so the military gap between the two countries has long been widened, and France has been so backward, But he still felt that he had enough strength to resist the attack from Germany.
French tanks captured by the Germans
But Germany's strength is obviously beyond the imagination of France, its armor and tanks although the armor is not thick, but the coordination between each other is excellent, so the combat effectiveness is very strong, and France still hopes in the trenches and fortresses, so the thinking of both sides is not at a level at all, and the German army began to be tanks and air force together, although the French air force wanted to resist, but once on the battlefield was destroyed, completely lost the air superiority, so although the French army has tanks, but because the armor is thick and slow, so it almost became a living target, Under the bombardment of the German army, it can be said that it is difficult to move forward.
United Kingdom
In addition to the gap in strength, the huge losses of the First World War made France unable to recover for decades, so from the government to the people are very afraid of war, just hope to keep themselves from the war, which also makes Britain and France after the German attack, vigorously promote appeasement, want to sacrifice the interests of small countries to protect themselves, by the way can also use Germany to launch an attack on the Soviet Union, because since the October Revolution in Russia, socialism has turned out, in a very short period of events has affected many countries, This made the old capitalist empires of Britain and France feel a great threat.
October revolution
So at that time, in order to resist the spread of socialism, Britain and France began to win over allies, thus relaxing their vigilance against Germany, and also hoped that Germany could go to war with the Soviet Union, wanted to consume the strength of both sides through war, and then sat on the profits of the fisherman, but the Soviet Union and Germany had risen at this time, so both knew that each other was not good, so Stalin in order to protect the security and interests of the Soviet Union, had long decided to give up fighting germany with Britain and France, and Hitler was at this time because he wanted to implement the plan to blitz Poland. Coupled with the fact that he had already set France as the first target, he expressed his willingness to coexist peacefully with the Soviet Union in order to avoid premature conflict with the Soviet Union.
Soviet-German non-aggression pact
Even when his ally Japan launched an attack on the Soviet Union in the Far East, Hitler did not take the opportunity to attack, and even sent foreign ministers to the Soviet Union many times to express his intention to fight with it, and hoped that the two sides could further negotiate to improve relations, and the Soviet Union, in order to prevent the enemy from being attacked in the belly, was very dissatisfied with the war between Britain and France, so it chose to accept it at that time, and the two sides formally signed a non-aggression pact on August 23, 1939, and at this time Britain and France did not know about it, so they also dreamed of disasters and disasters. It wasn't until Germany carved up Poland with the Soviet Union that it realized it had been deceived.
Blitz Poland
And because Britain and France had promised to protect the security of Poland, so at that time immediately asked the German army to stop all aggressive activities and withdraw from Polish territory, but Germany's ambitions at this time had been completely exposed, so it was impossible to accept this ultimatum, Britain and France decided to declare war on Germany, but did not send troops, and France in order to prevent retaliation by Germany, not only did not send troops, but also prevented Britain from sending air force, in such a passive avoidance of war, the German army successfully conquered Poland, and its strength was greatly improved. Then, in order to attack the Western European countries, it began to expand its army again, and in one time the ground troops alone exceeded 3.5 million people.
Maginot Line
So France only wanted to use the Maginot Line at that time to force the Germans to attack The Netherlands and Belgium, and then it could fight a war of attrition with it, because it had intercepted part of the German plan that year, knew that it wanted to attack France through Belgium, but because Hitler himself did not like this battle plan, he knew that the information was leaked, and Manstein therefore proposed a new plan, that is, to attack from the Ardennes, and to ensure that the armored troops could pass, and immediately agreed, and ordered the troops to redeploy for this purpose Then Hitler also decided to put the plan in place, sending a part of the army to pretend to attack the Netherlands and Belgium, attracting the main British and French forces to quickly support it.
Ardennes
At the same time, the German army also sent troops to pose, pretending to attack the Maginot Line, which made the French government dare not transfer back the army in the south, at the same time the German army has carried out a surprise attack on the Ardennes area, and because the Belgian and French troops do not attach importance to this place, so the deployed troops are pitiful, the German army quickly completed the breakthrough, and then it continued to advance, and later broke through the Maas River defense line in one fell swoop, French Prime Minister Renault was shocked and very frustrated at the same time, and even called Churchill at that time to say, France was afraid to lose the war, and even the high-ranking prime minister did not have confidence, so the French army below was even more demoralized.
The Germans entered Paris
And because at this time the french elite were sent to Belgium to fight, so the remaining army is not only seriously insufficient, the will to fight is also very low, so at that time it can be said that it was a touch of collapse, the German army did not encounter decent resistance at all, in the British and French coalition forces to the sea to turn around and attack Paris, the French government did not have the courage to resist, and finally the German army successfully occupied Paris, and at this time there were two voices of war and surrender within France, but because the pain caused by the First World War was vividly remembered. So even though the French now had 65 divisions and 1,200 tanks to stop the Germans, their top brass were reluctant to fight anymore.
Pétain
Because they are disappointed in Britain, even if they try their best to defeat Germany, most of the dead are French, then the loss will not only be a generation, but it is very likely to completely destroy the country, and the last biggest profit is still Britain, and the war is costly, France in the First World War has a huge debt, the country's economy has not improved for decades, and this is still a victorious situation, in case France fails again, then the British army can withdraw again, but France can not escape, Therefore, when The British called and wanted to resist with France to the end, its Prime Minister Renault directly chose to refuse, and then chose to resign, handing over the post of Prime Minister to Pétain to formally announce his surrender.
Vichy France
Then Germany also supported a number of French dignitaries to establish Vichy France, indirectly controlling the south of France and the French army in it, and these French armies did not contradict, because in their view, resistance is complete annihilation, and if france does not resist, france may exist, so at that time it threw itself wholeheartedly into Germany and began to suppress resistance nationwide, and it was very hard, and because Vichy France controlled the colonies overseas, so in the Free France led by de Gaulle, when it competed with the colony of West Africa, The Battle of Dakar also broke out between the two sides.
Battle of Dakar
At that time, de Gaulle felt that he had the support of Britain, coupled with the fight for France, the French army in the colony would inevitably submit to himself, but the fact was that he was hit hard in the face, and the defenders on it not only refused to surrender, but also decisively launched a counterattack, fighting very bravely, relying on the forts to tenaciously prevent the Allies from landing, and finally severely damaged the British warships, de Gaulle finally had to retreat from Dakar in a gray way, and in addition to this battle, the Vichy French army was also active in other battlefields, fighting with the Germans against the Allies It was even more powerful than Mussolini's Italian army.
Battle of Britain
Brought great obstacles to the Allied plan, and the surrender of France also made Germany's industrial strength extremely strong, so that the German army had further strength, after vigorously arming its own army, military strength also became extremely strong, so when Hitler tore up the non-aggression pact and began to attack the Soviet Union, the Soviet army could not resist for a while, if it were not for the fact that it wasted too much time on Britain, resulting in its attack to catch up with the rainy season and cold winter, coupled with the vast territory of the Soviet Union, the Soviet Union had more troops. At the same time, the strategic depth was extremely large, resulting in the German front being pulled too long, the number of soldiers was also somewhat insufficient, and the Soviet Union was afraid that it would be difficult to escape the fate of the country.
Soviet-German war
And this also proves that although the principle of blitzkrieg is simple, but it is extremely suitable for the battlefield, coupled with the strength of the German army, although the Soviet Union withstood several German attacks, but still paid huge losses, not only the industry was seriously damaged, at the same time a large number of land fell, the number of casualties reached a staggering 60 million, to know that its population was less than 200 million at that time, this World War II can be said to have aired the Soviet Generation, and the tactics used in the final counteroffensive are similar to those of the German army, all rely on the rapid advancement of armored troops, The final successful counterattack to Berlin to win the final victory shows the horror of this tactic.
Captured French troops
So France surrendered at the speed of light for multiple reasons, first of all, Germany did have the advantage in military strength, coupled with the war weariness and negativity in France, followed by the disillusionment of the appeasement policy, which led to insufficient preparation for war, and finally was taken advantage of by the German army, so that France did not even have time to mobilize the whole country, after all, France did not have the depth, as long as the defense line was broken, the German armored troops could quickly advance, and the remaining distance was useless, so after realizing that it was impossible to resist, it simply chose to surrender. In World War II, France also surrendered early, not only did it not become a battlefield on the mainland, but there were not many casualties.
Hitler
Although Hitler occupied France, but did not obtain its powerful navy, because at that time Britain was afraid that the French fleet would fall to Germany, so at that time issued an ultimatum to the French fleet all over the world, asking it not to join Britain, or to go to neutral countries, or it would be attacked, so some fleets loyal to Vichy France were directly sunk at that time, and although the German army had a strong army and air force, the navy was very weak and could not break through the blockade of the British Royal Navy. Therefore, it was impossible to take over the large number of French colonies overseas.
French colonial soldiers
After the American war, France's overseas colonies were not occupied by the free French army led by de Gaulle, and they were not actually controlled by the Allies, and at that time, de Gaulle was supported by the North African colonies, leading the local French army and natives, fighting with the Allies in World War II, and made no small contribution at that time, and officially because of the support of the colonies, after the end of World War II, free France not only had 1.5 million troops, but also many aircraft carriers and warships, becoming the third most powerful country in the Allied forces after Britain and the United States. Finally, with the help of the United Kingdom, he became one of the five permanent members of the United Nations.
Charles de Gaulle returns to Paris
And after its return to France, its domestic economy has not been seriously damaged, but also retained most of the industrial system, it can be said that it has retained its strength in disguise, many people in later generations feel that France is betting on both sides, so that whether it is the victory of the Allied forces or the victory of Germany, it can retain the strength to the greatest extent, but it is undeniable that as a European power, it was also known as the first power of the army, but it could not even do the most basic resistance to the German army, and chose to surrender in just over a month. After the war, it also became the laughing stock of many countries.