To Lose a Battle

by Alistair Horne

  R.A.F. Bomb Ruhr: Reynaud Pleads for More Hurricanes

  In the air war on 15 May, a number of extremely important events took place. At 0630, General Têtu had rung through from General Georges’s H.Q. to order d’Astier to switch air priority from the Second to the Ninth Army, though it was symptomatic of the self-delusion still prevailing in the higher echelons of the French Command that he should have added: ‘I am told that the situation of the Ninth Army is less serious than one might believe; its withdrawal is a controlled operation.’ But what in fact the Allies were able to put into the air that day in support of this new priority now reflected all too faithfully the grim losses of the previous five days. To cover the whole of the North-East Front and Paris, General d’Astier could mount no more than 237 serviceable single-seater fighters, 38 night fighters and 38 bombers. By midday, he was forced to admit that half of his fighter capacity had been knocked out by enemy bombing. In all, his aviation de chasse could only send up somewhere over 200 sorties that day, compared with 340 on the 14th; they claimed twenty-one enemy planes for a loss of seven. This was hardly enough to shelter Corap’s Army from the Stukas plaguing it as relentlessly as flies upon carrion.

  Of France’s remaining bombers, just six Léo 45s were thrown in to support Flavigny’s counter-attack in the Sedan sector, while nine Bréguets from Groupement 18 bombed Reinhardt’s armour debouching from Monthermé. With all notions of ground-level attack now abandoned, the Bréguets released their bombs from a height of over 1,500 feet; all returned safely to base, a fact which raised the morale of the Groupement – though apparently without its examining too closely just how effective the results had been. Typical of the feebleness of French air effort on the 15th was the nocturnal bombing of one Heinkel base by a solitary French aircraft, which dumped its missiles in woods more than a quarter of a mile from the barracks and then headed for home.

  Meanwhile the relentless bombing of French reinforcements and supply columns continued. All over northern France the roads told the same story of troops caught on the move, the wounded soldiers crying for help amid piles of abandoned equipment. Day by day the sinister Arado observer planes, which seemed immune to small-arms fire and were never chased off by Allied fighters, stalked French reinforcements moving up to the line, until the Heinkels and Dorniers were ready to pounce.

  The British record for the 15th was hardly more outstanding than the French. After their appalling losses of the 14th,11 the vulnerable Battles were in the process of being withdrawn from daylight operations, so that the day’s main effort consisted of some dozen Blenheims striking at Rommel’s columns near Dinant, an attack reported neither by Rommel nor the divisional War Diary. But that night an operation was mounted which, although it did absolutely nothing to influence the course of the battle, was certainly to change the character of the war. Outraged by the Luftwaffe’s razing of Rotterdam, the British War Cabinet banished the scruples that had hitherto restrained it from launching a strategic bombardment of the German Ruhr. It persuaded itself that such a heavy bomber attack by night would, in the first place, force the Luftwaffe to divert fighters from France to protect the Ruhr, and secondly, that the German outcry for retaliation would result in some of the bombers which were breaking up the French Army to such deadly effect being redirected against the British Isles. With somewhat less altruistic motives, the Air Staff also had at the back of its mind the hope that, daylight bombing having been proved so ruinously expensive, cheaper returns could be gained by night. Accordingly, that night ninety-six Wellington, Whitley and Hampden bombers were dispatched to north-west Germany. Of these, seventy-eight were directed against oil plants; but, in the words of the R.A.F. official history, ‘Only twenty-four of the crews even claimed to have found them.’ Like so much of its subsequent history, this first attempt at strategic bombing had only the most negligible results. Not one single plane or anti-aircraft gun was deflected from France. Goebbel’s propaganda machine indeed howled for vengeance, but this would not be exacted until after the fall of France, until the Blitz on London.

  That same day a second decision of strategic, indeed of historic, importance was taken in London. At the time of the German onslaught, ten of Britain’s all too few fighter squadrons were committed in France, and on 13 May the equivalent of two more Hurricane squadrons had been dispatched. Accounts by German bomber crews testify to the impact made by the Hurricane pilots, who tended to press home their attacks with much greater energy than the French pilots in their outclassed Moranes; yet this was all a drop in the bucket. On the evening of the 14th, Reynaud telephoned Churchill with a new note of urgency in his voice, to beg that another ten fighter squadrons be sent to help re-establish the line at Sedan. The next day this request became the subject of bitter controversy within the Cabinet. Air Chief Marshal Dowding, of Fighter Command, vigorously objected to the dispatch of any more of his squadrons to France. His face white with strain, Dowding rose from his seat and walked round the long conference table until he came up behind Churchill’s chair. Years later Dowding remarked: ‘I think some of the others thought I was going to shoot him’; but all he did was to place in front of the Prime Minister a single sheet of paper with a graph on it. It predicted what would be the probable rate of loss over the next ten days if further Hurricanes were sent to France. On the tenth day, the graph line touched the zero point. If the current rate of wastage were to continue over another fortnight there would no longer be ‘a single Hurricane left in France or in this country’, Dowding solemnly told Churchill. The graph, he says, ‘did the trick’. In an atmosphere highly charged with emotion, the Cabinet was reluctantly swung over to Dowding’s side.12

  Meanwhile, in France the close of 15 May brought with it a new threat to the A.A.S.F. A score of fighters were lost just protecting the forward bases from the incessant Luftwaffe attacks, and now some of these airfields were seriously endangered by the advancing Panzers. Shortly before midnight Air Marshal Barratt decided to shift southwards a number of the menaced combat units, an awkward move to make in mid battle with the limited transport facilities available to him. At the same time he closed down his own Advanced H.Q. at Chauny and retired back to Main H.Q. at Coulommiers.

  Kleist and Guderian at Odds

  Behind the scenes of the German command, where one might have presumed to find jubilation after such a promising day, contrary to every expectation the prevailing tone was one of uncertainty and discord. Its overt expression took the form of a third fundamental disagreement between Kleist, the commander of the Armoured Group, and Guderian. The more cautious Kleist wanted to confine Guderian to a small bridgehead west of Sedan and to build up forces within it before continuing the next stage of the advance. That night Kleist’s H.Q., says Guderian,

  ordered a halt to all further advance and to any extension of the bridgehead. I neither would nor could agree to these orders, which involved the sacrifice of the element of surprise we had gained and of the whole initial success that we had achieved. I therefore got in touch, personally, first with the Chief of Staff of the Panzer Group, Colonel Zeitzler, and, since this was not enough, with General von Kleist himself, and requested that the order to stop be cancelled. The conversation became very heated and we repeated our various arguments several times.

  Thoroughly enraged, Guderian shouted down the telephone a pointed comparison to the Marne in 1914, when (at least according to the view widely accepted in German military circles) an untimely interference from the High Command had caused the German armies to halt and turn about on the very brink of victory. It was a reminder, notes Guderian ‘that was no doubt not very well received’ by his superiors. However, Kleist, with some reluctance, gave way once again, restoring to Guderian the ‘freedom of movement’ he demanded.

  Chapter 15

  ‘We Have Lost the Battle!’

  16 May

  Only he is vanquished who accepts defeat.

  FOCH

  The enemy has not succeeded in breaking through our ba
ttlefront and emerging from the Sedan–Mézières region. He has thrown wave upon wave, division on division, into the furnace. Our plains, our fields, our roads are filled with his corpses… We must say this and say it again and cry it out to the four winds of France’s skies: ‘He wanted to break through, as he wanted to at Verdun, and he did not get through!’

  L’Époque, 16 May

  South-west of Namur our divisions extended their successes on the west bank of the Meuse and once again struck at French armoured forces. South of Sedan, French counter-attacks, which included the employment of the heaviest tanks, were warded off.

  Wehrmacht communiqué, 16 May

  A certain number of German fighting vehicles were able to push right forward, but they were not strong enough and operated like lost children… The German tanks will soon have no more petrol or ammunition.

  Havas, 17 May

  Round Sedan the French were still holding the positions they took up yesterday after containing the enemy attack there. On the left bank of the Meuse the situation is less clear, though such progress as the Germans may have made there has been relatively slight.

  The Times, 17 May

  On this seventh day of the campaign, abruptly the scene of predominant interest shifts from Corap’s and Huntziger’s broken fronts to the higher councils of war on either side, where from now on leaders would find themselves striving desperately to keep up with the incredible tempo of events. For the Germans, the rapidity of the advance was accompanied by fresh doubts and fears of setbacks to come. For the Allied High Commands, it was the night of 15 May and the early morning of the 16th which at last brought home the extent of the disaster on the Meuse. But before coming to this tardy moment of awakening, it may be as well to retrace the activities which had ensued at Vincennes and La Ferté on the preceding days.

  Was Gamelin to Blame?

  Having made his plans and troop dispositions, Gamelin, as C.-in-C., had then in effect left it to General Georges, the North-East Front commander, to do the best he could with them. The relationship was not unlike that of Generals Alexander and Montgomery at Alamein (except that one must not forget the deep-seated dislike Gamelin and Georges held for each other), and doubtless if Sedan had gone as well as Alamein, historians would now regard Gamelin as a warlord of distinction. On 10 May, Gamelin revealed himself as well pleased with the apparent form the German offensive was taking, and during the first three days had busied himself with ‘matters of overall organization’, with a particular emphasis on Holland, to which, through his ‘Breda Variant’ brainchild, he felt personally committed. Although we have seen how badly informed he was kept on the course of the battle, he refrained from making more than one trip (on 11 May) to see Georges at La Ferté. Then he had learned with ‘some astonishment’ of Georges sub-delegation to Billotte of his ‘powers to co-ordinate’ the movements of the B.E.F. and the Belgian Army. Although criticizing Georges’s order as an ‘abdication’, he went along with it on the grounds that ‘it is often better to accept a fait accompli than to risk hampering a commander’s actions’. On the 12th he deliberately kept away from La Ferté, explaining that it would have been ‘improper’ for him to go there while Georges was away visiting the front in Belgium. The next morning, when Guderian was about to cross the Meuse at Sedan and Rommel already had a toe-hold at Houx, Gamelin revisited Georges and claims (in his memoirs) to have been ‘shaken by the realization that no major reserves appeared to have been sent to the front’. But nothing is on record to indicate that Gamelin intervened, or made any alternative suggestion at this point. On the 14th, he was at La Ferté both morning and afternoon and records that he was astonished to discover there had been no reserves immediately behind Sedan when the Germans attacked, and also that, ‘for reasons that I have been unable to elucidate’, Huntziger had failed to launch his counter-attack. Again, although he claims that his ‘presence there was necessary from a point of view of morale’, Gamelin still appears to have made no personal intervention at La Ferté that day. On returning to Vincennes, he could do nothing (according to Colonel Minart) to enlighten his own G.Q.G., beyond stating the fact that the Meuse crossings ‘seemed incomprehensible, inexplicable’, and that there had been ‘grave errors of execution’. On the morning of the 15th, during another visit to La Ferté, Gamelin was surprised1 to hear that Georges had given the Ninth Army the order for a general withdrawal from the Meuse.

  Such were the confusion and duplication of duties existing in the French command network, that it is still not entirely clear as to who was ultimately responsible – Gamelin or Georges – for the various orders sent out during the crucial days of 10 to 15 May. If, as Generalissimo, Gamelin was not aware of the specific measures Georges was taking to counter the German threat on the Meuse, the responsibility for this rests upon him, just as, in the final analysis, he cannot escape blame for allowing Georges to keep him so incompletely informed as to the real state of affairs at the front. But Gamelin must have been aware at least of the movements of Army reserves ordered by Georges, and assuming this then either he should have intervened if he disapproved of these movements, or else one has to conclude that they had his tacit support. Gamelin never did intervene, for which, in his memoirs, he advances the rather feeble reason ‘that a commander-in-chief executes badly what he does not understand’.2 On the other hand, nothing in his copious apologia indicates that he would have handled his reserves other than Georges did. Thus although he may criticize (ex post facto) the tardiness with which Georges dispatched his reserves, it seems fair to accept that Gamelin did endorse the direction in which they were sent. Having established this, it may be useful briefly to summarize the troop movements between 10 and 15 May for which Gamelin and Georges were jointly responsible.

  Altogether seventeen divisions and two brigades, representing more than 300,000 men, received orders committing them to battle. On 10 May the 1st Armoured was sent to the First Army; 11 May, two more divisions to First Army, and another two dispatched to protect the northern flank of the Maginot Line; 12 May, yet another two divisions to First Army, two (the 3rd Armoured and 3rd Motorized) to Second Army,3 while one (the 53rd) was removed from direct control of the Ninth Army and sent to back up the front behind Mézières. On 13 May, one division (the 2nd Armoured) was sent to First Army, and one (the 36th) to Ninth Army, but only to replace the 53rd removed from it the previous day, and in fact events overtook the 36th before it could ever reach its destination, so that it remained stuck on the Aisne. On the 14th, out of nineteen different movement orders, sixteen involved a change of direction, and among these no less than seven divisions had their missions altered within twenty-four hours, the consequences of which were to prove particularly disastrous to such units as the 53rd Division and the 2nd Armoured. That same day the 14th Division (under de Lattre) was sent to bolster the Ninth Army; but, like the 36th, it too never arrived and was left holding the Aisne under Touchon’s command. By the end of the 14th, orders had been issued dispatching to Huntziger’s Second Army eight fresh divisions, with the object of preventing any rolling-up of the Maginot Line from the north; of these, half were to remain unemployed during the decisive battle. Finally, on 15 May, one division (the 1st North African) was detached from First Army and sent down to reinforce the Ninth. Thus the total reinforcements ordered up by the French High Command read as follows:

  To First Army: 5 divisions, of which 3 were subsequently redirected.

  sTo Second Army: 8 divisions, 4 of which played no part in the decisive battle.

  By contrast, however, the Army most sorely in need of reinforcement – Corap’s Ninth – did not receive one single division until 15 May, when it was far too late. Nothing could illustrate with greater clarity how completely Georges and Gamelin had been deceived by the ‘matador’s cloak’, how completely they had misread German intentions. And the end of the deception was not yet in sight.

  At Vincennes, 15 May hag begun with renewed fears of a German left hook on the Maginot Line
via Switzerland, with Intelligence from Berne reporting the situation along the German frontier now to be ‘critical’. It was, says Colonel Minart, ‘a gloomy day, interminable, smelling of death’. The communiqués arriving from La Ferté continued to be non-committal, but their very laconicism was becoming increasingly suspect, while liaison officers dispatched from Vincennes were treated with a marked brusqueness. On liaison duty between Vincennes, La Ferté and Doumenc’s headquarters staff at Montry himself that day, Minart sensed ‘that our command organization was steadily breaking down, and that a paralysis was creeping up, hour by hour’. Within the grim fortress it was more than ever like being in ‘a submarine without a periscope’. Nevertheless, ugly rumours direct from the front were beginning to filter through to Vincennes in increasing quantity. Although at meals ‘everything was done to avoid painful subjects’, what Minart describes as ‘the obsessing perspective of defeat’ made its way, unspoken, through the dark corridors of G.Q.G. The nervous tension that day was further played upon by mysterious comings and goings, private telephone conversations between Gamelin and Georges, and a call from Reynaud’s office purporting to relate to an urgent intervention made to the British Government. Gamelin himself, though still externally serene, gave the appearance of a man ‘stricken by a dull and pervasive fear’, and increasingly sought the insulation afforded by his chef de cabinet, Colonel Petitbon, and his A.D.C.s. Still he declined to intervene directly in the battle.