DBWI: France doesn't fortify the Ardenes.

AS most of you know after General André-Gaston Prételat conducted a military exercise in the Ardenes forest, concluding that the Germans could easily pass through, the area was heavily fortified.
In may the French with British assistance just barely held off an attack from the Germans.
But what if he had been ignored and the defenses had been left as light as they were.
 
Most likely the german spearhead would be cut off and the entente would have won in a year or so, without having to wait for the US to rescue them this time.
 
Bad for the Entente, the succesfull defense of the Ardenne not only caused the Germans to spend a lot of precious equipment but also showed a lot of problems with the French brass that were later, more or less, resolved. Frankly if the Werchmatch succeed in their offensive they can occupy at least a third of France in little less than 2 months before being stopped.

On the other side, an Entente that still occupied with Germany will not launch Operation Pike and bring the URSS in the war; the old band needed to get together so to push the commu-nazi back on the hell from were they come from.

Most likely the german spearhead would be cut off and the entente would have won in a year or so, without having to wait for the US to rescue them this time.

Yep, sure, a medium sized expeditionary forces that the entente had to retraining and equipping mean that the USA as come to the rescue, sorry i think you have seen too much John Wayne movies; try the Pacific front against Japan, at least there were a much greater american presences...even if usually it was the commonwealth troops doing the rescuing like in the Philippines
 
OTL a fortification program was started after the 1938 exercises referred to in the Wiki article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/André-Gaston_Prételat

That program was based on assorted existing contingent plans. Between a shortage of appropriate construction labor, that funds were not immediately available in the autumn of 1938, severe weather in the winter of 1939-40 completion was very slow. To get as far as they did the French Army was forced to use the Series B formations as construction labor from their mobilization in October 1939. That reduced their training time to as little as one day a week through the Winter and Spring of 1940. At that the fortifications that could be built were light compared to the CORF system that is usually labeled Maginot Line, and incomplete. More important is most of these new defenses were manned by stale and poorly trained reservists. That the good quality regiments and battalions were able to stall and seriously delay the enemy on their sectors, until outflanked and overrun shows what might have been had all the army spent the winter training vs digging bunker foundations.

To get to a properly manned fortification in this are you need a PoD much earlier than 1938, and it mostly involves the Chamber of Deputies and cabinets os of the 1930s be willing to raise taxes significantly or indebt the French government in a major way.
 
OTL a fortification program was started after the 1938 exercises referred to in the Wiki article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/André-Gaston_Prételat

That program was based on assorted existing contingent plans. Between a shortage of appropriate construction labor, that funds were not immediately available in the autumn of 1938, severe weather in the winter of 1939-40 completion was very slow. To get as far as they did the French Army was forced to use the Series B formations as construction labor from their mobilization in October 1939. That reduced their training time to as little as one day a week through the Winter and Spring of 1940. At that the fortifications that could be built were light compared to the CORF system that is usually labeled Maginot Line, and incomplete. More important is most of these new defenses were manned by stale and poorly trained reservists. That the good quality regiments and battalions were able to stall and seriously delay the enemy on their sectors, until outflanked and overrun shows what might have been had all the army spent the winter training vs digging bunker foundations.

To get to a properly manned fortification in this are you need a PoD much earlier than 1938, and it mostly involves the Chamber of Deputies and cabinets os of the 1930s be willing to raise taxes significantly or indebt the French government in a major way.

Agreed and a 'more' paranoid French Government might have fortified the Ardennes and done more to cover the Belgium border from 1936 when it was clear that Belgium was 'not up for it' by basically becoming neutral following Frances failure to prevent Germany's remilitarisation of the Rhineland
 
One of the reasons Belgium opted for nuetrality was the French shift to a less energetic strategy. The French intent to sit in fortifications on their own border, vs the proactive & aggressive 1920s strategy left the Belgian feeling screwed. Particularly since they had been spending a lot of money on forward installations to facilitate intervention into Germany.
 
Germany would have taken France and then stabbed the Soviets in the back. A second Great War would then ensue, which would lead to Germany being divided between the East and the west. Or have I been reading too much Turtledove?
 
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