Gamelin treats the threat of a Ardennes attack with more seriousness

Deleted member 1487

It's important that while people can and do talk about tactics making a difference to the fall of France what was actually needed (and no tactical change can fix this) is doctrinal adjustment in the French air force.

If the French air force fighters can commit half their planes to the front and sortie twice a day and a third of the time when they sortie be in the right bit air space we can talk tactics. This isn't asking for a miracle. It's asking for a similar sortie rate to that achieved by the raf. It's significantly less than the sortie rate achieved by the Luftwaffe (high but they were all or nothing) drag the battle on for another 3 months and they would have over stretched their logistics and their sortie rate would have fallen.

If you can't do this then it's fun to talk tactics but no matter how much you talk tactics you will end up with the same result.
'Course when they did come out to play they got slaughtered:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Sedan_(1940)#Allied_air_strikes

Wiking,

The weight of ordnance that could be put on the ground in 1940 was nothing compared to 1944.
And?

And in 1944, there were still counter-offensives by the side that did not have air superiority.
And they were all defeated and routed out of France in 3 months with German forces in the west shattered.

"Remove that air support component and the ability to win on the ground for the German in 1940 is not there."

Yeah, ok. Lets play.

You have the Luftwaffe of 1940 and the French Army of 1940, and I have the AAS of 1940 and the German Army of 1940.

I'm punching through the Ardennes with Sickle-Cut, and you're waiting two days for the couriers to arrive with where to send the orders of where to send the air.

Have fun with that.
If I have the Luftwaffe, I also have their aerial recon and courier system, so I have a clear picture of what is going on with hourly updates. I can direct my attack aircraft against you at will and have the benefit of the Luftwaffe AAA system (air defense on the ground was largely a Luftwaffe domain, not a Heer one). You never cross the Meuse and if anything are smashed before you get the majority of your forces through the Ardennes. When the German army approaches me with armistice request, I demand Hitler's head on a platter and parade through Berlin.
 
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'Course when they did come out to play they got slaughtered:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Sedan_(1940)#Allied_air_strikes
That's a combination of factors that would hopefully be addressed.

1. The Germans had more air in theater. Roughly 3/4 of the French air force's front line planes were deployed somewhere other than the front. I asked for half on the front which would double the French presence.

2. Sortie rates. The French historical sortie rate was roughly about .9 a day during the battle of France. I'm asking for 2 a day.

So basically I'm asking for 4 times the French air force presence in the air at sedan. They won't be slaughtered as they were historically against superior numbers every time. They will probably lost the air battle but I reckon they can do well enough to bleed the Germans enough that the Luftwaffe ground support is minimised.

93 fighter sorties in the battle of Sedan means the bombers were left for the slaughter.
 

Archibald

Banned
And that's not possible for the reason I explained earlier. The french Air force was a complete and hopeless mess. The AASF mounted an attack with 71 blenheim and Battles. The French Air Force send a dozen of bombers, each times, for the simple reason there was nothing more.

The root reason reach back to 1938, when the boneheaded French government found they had not enough money to fund a fighter force and a bomber force, and decided to fund the fighter force as a defensive weapon, to not anger Hitler and avoid massive bombing of French cities (as happened to Rotterdam in 1940). No kidding, that's really how things happened in 1938.

Now one can dream of a force of 70 Breguet 693 attacking the Sedan bridgehead above 2000 ft to get out of the most lethal flak (unlike the slaughter in Gembloux).

It should be noted it took the Soviet 36 000 Il-2 Shturmoviks, of which 10 000 were shot down, to crush the German armies...
 

Deleted member 1487

That's a combination of factors that would hopefully be addressed.

1. The Germans had more air in theater. Roughly 3/4 of the French air force's front line planes were deployed somewhere other than the front. I asked for half on the front which would double the French presence.

2. Sortie rates. The French historical sortie rate was roughly about .9 a day during the battle of France. I'm asking for 2 a day.

So basically I'm asking for 4 times the French air force presence in the air at sedan. They won't be slaughtered as they were historically against superior numbers every time. They will probably lost the air battle but I reckon they can do well enough to bleed the Germans enough that the Luftwaffe ground support is minimised.

93 fighter sorties in the battle of Sedan means the bombers were left for the slaughter.
Part of the issue is the lack of operational aircraft, which is why 3/4ths weren't at the front. There was also a lack of pilots as well, which remained a huge problem. Beyond that the French Army didn't know how to use it, so missions offered by the ALA were refused by the army, as they had no idea what to do with them.
You would need to change French air force funding dramatically in the interwar era, which given the zero-sum issues with military funding means either the army or navy suffers serious cuts. Beyond that even when you look at the RAF performance in France, they also performed poorly. So while I agree that one of the keys of French/Allied victory is a radically upgraded French air force, it would require a LOT of changes and money that means a very different France in the interwar.
 

Archibald

Banned
Part of the issue is the lack of operational aircraft, which is why 3/4ths weren't at the front. There was also a lack of pilots as well, which remained a huge problem. Beyond that the French Army didn't know how to use it, so missions offered by the ALA were refused by the army, as they had no idea what to do with them.
You would need to change French air force funding dramatically in the interwar era, which given the zero-sum issues with military funding means either the army or navy suffers serious cuts. Beyond that even when you look at the RAF performance in France, they also performed poorly. So while I agree that one of the keys of French/Allied victory is a radically upgraded French air force, it would require a LOT of changes and money that means a very different France in the interwar.

This sounds perfectly right. The POD would need to be in 1918 because the French Air force (and the aircraft industry) was completely gutted from this moment on ( a case could be make it didn't truly recovered until 1955 and the Algerian war !)
In 1918 France was the Arsenal of democracy, churning SPADS and Breguet XIV by the thousands, exporting them to the Allies. By 1922, NOTHING was left of that. Nothing.

In the 1918 battles they used a terrific concept, "La Division aérienne" a mass of Breguet XIV with a massive escort of SPADs.
Bring back "La Division aérienne " in 1939 with a shitload of Breguet 693s (several hundreds of them) and a solid escort of Dewoitine D-520s, and send it against the bridgehead.
 

Deleted member 1487

This sounds perfectly right. The POD would need to be in 1918 because the French Air force (and the aircraft industry) was completely gutted from this moment on ( a case could be make it didn't truly recovered until 1955 and the Algerian war !)
In 1918 France was the Arsenal of democracy, churning SPADS and Breguet XIV by the thousands, exporting them to the Allies. By 1922, NOTHING was left of that. Nothing.

In the 1918 battles they used a terrific concept, "La Division aérienne" a mass of Breguet XIV with a massive escort of SPADs.
Bring back "La Division aérienne " in 1939 with a shitload of Breguet 693s (several hundreds of them) and a solid escort of Dewoitine D-520s, and send it against the bridgehead.
The Breguet didn't fair well in combat in 1940...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breguet_693#Operational_history
The disastrous results of this first engagement forced the French commanders to reconsider their tactics. Until 15 May, GBA crews performed shallow dive attacks from higher altitude, which resulted in reduced losses, but the attacks had clearly been inaccurate, as the Breguets lacked a bombsight, and they increased vulnerability to German fighters. On subsequent missions, the GBAs re-introduced low-level attacks, but with smaller formations. As the position of the French and Allied armies grew steadily more desperate, the assault groups were engaged daily, still enduring losses to anti-aircraft fire, but also increasingly to German fighters.

By this time, 119 aircraft had been lost, including 68 to direct enemy action, and a further 14 were written off as too heavily damaged. The five GBAs had therefore endured a matériel loss rate of 63%, while crew casualties were nearly 50%.

Otherwise I like the aircraft and think the Germans should have found a way to adopt it post-conquest of France.
 

Anchises

Banned
This sounds perfectly right. The POD would need to be in 1918 because the French Air force (and the aircraft industry) was completely gutted from this moment on ( a case could be make it didn't truly recovered until 1955 and the Algerian war !)

I think that is the central statement we all have to note. I think just changing a french general or some tactical elements isn't going to produce any substantial butterflies.

Sure the Fall of France might be delayed and the Wehrmacht might suffer more casualties but I don't think that the Allies could have won without some drastic changes (either the Wehrmacht is changed OR the French and British Forces).

Discussing single battles is good but for a substantially different outcome we need an earlier POD with substantial butterflies.
 

Deleted member 1487

To be fair, the Avengers got slaughtered just as badly as the Devastators during Midway
As did the Stukas during the BoB. Against well organized air defenses slow light bombers tended to have a bad time.
 
This is what Horne says skimming through their book

So pretty much what I said...

Which is actually a good deal less than Cold War Soviet and NATO standards in Europe [Inadvertent Escalation: Conventional War and Nuclear Risks], and one or more other examples I can list-- so this divisions defense sector, frontage is not necessarily abnormal in any case.

As has been observed, Warsaw Pact and NATO forces in the 1970s and 80s were much more heavily mechanized and armed then their WW2 counterparts. Correspondingly, the frontage of a given force was much larger.

This is the closest I could find, but it is still not close to what is claimed

If by "not close", you mean pretty much exactly what I claimed. It says it right there: "forced to commit piecemeal in the defence".

once again another quote that proves my point in the previous thread we talked

I'm not sure how it proves your point. What does the Grossdeutschland's ability to rapidly employ it's AT guns in response to the threat posed by French armor have to do with whether the French committed their forces to the fight piecemeal or not?

The French were already unable to get into position in that period, in part due to airpower and it's effects (they were inundated by fleeing reservists, psychologically broken in part by air attack).

Except the French were in position on the 14th. Then they threw it away by following their own doctrine.

But in terms of what air attack did achieve against a threatening French counterattack with an armored division:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_France#Central_front

4th DCR and much of the otherwise forces involved were likewise freshly raised forces with poorly trained and demoralized troops hastily thrown into battle following the collapse of the front line, so that doesn't really prove that air power would have caused a determined attack by the 3e DCR and 3rd Motorized divisions to collapse. As has been noted, there were instances where aggressive German counter-attacks in 1944 and a number of Soviet counter-attacks in 1942-43 successfully stopped or even rolled back an enemy attack despite being conducted in the face of serious air attacks. Indeed, I recall this one case where a German counter-attack in Normandy was launched precisely because they realized British air power was inbound and knew they had to get as close to the British as possible in order to avoid the bombs. It worked.
 
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Deleted member 1487

Except the French were in position on the 14th. Then they threw it away by following their own doctrine.
Yeah, certainly the orders were first establish a cordon, then attack, but going by this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Sedan_(1940)#Missed_chance
it seems that the chance was on the 13th, as by the 14th it was already too late:
The race to Bulson ridge began at 16:00 on 13 May. At 07:30 on 14 May, French armour advanced to Bulson ridge with a view to seizing the high ground vacated by the infantry of the 55th Infantry Division on 13 May.[68] But the main, primary objective was to destroy the German bridgeheads. While that may have been possible on 13 May, the odds had shifted against the French.[68]

The X Corps attack involved a strike on the left flank by the 213th Infantry Regiment and 7th Tank Battalion, and on the right flank by the 205th Infantry Regiment and 4th Tank Battalion.[71][74] The right flanking force arrived late, so the 213th Infantry and the 7th Tank Battalion advanced alone on the north axis. It was thought that the 213th could reach an area in between Chéhéry and Bulson in one hour fifty minutes and the 7th Tank Battalion in two hours.[71] Yet it was not until 17 hours after the original order to advance to Bulson that the lead French tanks reached the Bulson ridge. They found the Germans had beaten them there by a few minutes.[71]

Lafontaine had hesitated over the 24 hours since the afternoon of 13 May. He spent hours reconnoitring the terrain, sometimes trying to contain and reason with fleeing, routing scores of French infantrymen and artillerymen of the 55th and 71st Infantry Divisions, and travelling around the area to various regimental headquarters, looking for his Corps commander, General Gransard (whom was deliberately reconnoitring the terrain, for some time, at that relative point in time), for an order to attack, and, in the meantime, extemporarily assessing and conferring with some local command personnel. Owing to this Lafontaine also delayed issuing orders to the tactical attack units until 05:00 on 14 May, by which time the Germans had consolidated their bridgehead and the Panzer divisions' combined arms infantry teams were already advancing inland to Bulson. Lafontaine had had a mission plan since 20:00 on 13 May to defeat the Germans and retake the Meuse bridgeheads, but he waited for an order to proceed. Lafontaine's need for an order was contrary to the unit actions of the Germans, who operated the tactically more efficient Auftragstaktik (Mission Command) system. Ultimately, Lafontaine had squandered valuable hours essential for a prompt, perhaps opportune and timely, perhaps potentially decisive counter-attack effort.[75]

Certainly all the steps Lafontaine took cost him the only chance he had, but it reads like the situation wasn't particularly great to attack given the retreating French reservists and the lack of intel on the situation.

Going by "To Lose a Battle" (my digital copy doesn't have page numbers for some reason) none of Lafontaine's reinforcing armor units were ready to attack on the 13th, so he ordered them to attack at 1:30 AM on the 14th. Then on top of that the units that were to attack couldn't get themselves in gear until 7:30 AM, 3 hours later than they were supposed to attack, and by then it was too late. Apparently retreating French reservists also misdirected the units that were to attack as well.

Edit:
p.210 (or there abouts) also talks about the French forces that clashed with Guderian's on the 14th still being unready and fed in peace meal anyway rather than waiting any longer.

4th DCR and much of the otherwise forces involved were likewise freshly raised forces with poorly trained and demoralized troops hastily thrown into battle following the collapse of the front line, so that doesn't really prove that air power would have caused a determined attack by the 3e DCR and 3rd Motorized divisions to collapse. As has been noted, there were instances where aggressive German counter-attacks in 1944 and a number of Soviet counter-attacks in 1942-43 successfully stopped or even rolled back an enemy attack despite being conducted in the face of serious air attacks. Indeed, I recall this one case where a German counter-attack in Normandy was launched precisely because they realized British air power was inbound and knew they had to get as close to the British as possible in order to avoid the bombs. It worked.
Eh, given how much the 3rd DCR and Motorized division behaved IOTL I'm not that optimistic about their ability to perform that much better, though depending on how much they are attacked they probably could hold up better.

Hugging the enemy can help with air attacks, but generally units that faced serious air attack throughout WW2 did not perform well in a ground engagement soon thereafter, exceptions of course being possible. Panzer Lehr in Normandy though is a classic demonstration of what concentrated air power could do to even a division on the defensive.
 
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