Hitler Loses Battle of France

Cook

Banned
The Single biggest reason for the Nazis total victory was Manstein's relentlessness in driving the Panzers through pass their line of support, if Hitler had listened...
Manstein wasn't even in the chain of command at the time. He commanded an infantry corps in Von Kluge’s Fourth Army during the Battle for France.
 
The French had a larger army and more tanks than the Germans but the Nazis had technological innovation, audacious generals able to think and command freely and would have been on the offensive. The original Nazi plan would have incorporated the Schliffen Plan which would have sacrificed millions of soldiers on both sides to the horrors of trench warfare but 1940 was not 1914 and with the inventive use of tanks in the battlefield there is a good chance the Nazis would have broken through at any point in the line and driven all the way to Paris.

No. This is a silly view of the evolution of Plan Yellow. The Generals were timid souls who felt any offensive against France was doomed to fail. The original plan was not that of the Nazis but that of the generals. They, naturally, in keeping with their Dolchstosslegende tradition of "history" refused to admit any of this. Too, it ignores that repeating the Schlieffen Plan would put German tanks, badly underarmored, and the German Luftwaffe, right smack in the teeth of the Allied defense with superior firepower and mobility and thus it would have been a disaster for the Germans.

Germany's generals were a bunch of petty, treacherous, murderous backstabbing scum and filth who disgraced a tradition already seedy enough from the WWI army's penchant for shooting civilians at the drop of a hat if one soldier heard a farmer shooting a small game.

The Single biggest reason for the Nazis total victory was Manstein's relentlessness in driving the Panzers through pass their line of support, if Hitler had listened to his more cautious generals there was a good chance the Allies could have been able to regroup and stage a counter attack as at the Marne and led to static warfare for a few years with this time much of the devastation in Belgium not France.

Strategically, yes. The reality is that this was a tenuous victory at best and this when the Germans *did* have the improbable chain of circumstances in their failure. Even a slight reinforcement of the armies in the Ardennes or one high-quality French force in the region skewers the Nazi plan wholesale and it becomes 1870 in reverse.

It was not Hitler who was cautious, it was his generals. Plan Yellow was his idea, he promoted the people who backed it, and stomped his generals into doing what he wanted done as he wanted done. For a reckless gambler this success to top all successes created many of the other problems that helped ultimately transform Hitler into the raving Omnicidal Maniac of 1944 who wanted Germany razed to the ground by his own party for failing him.

I think you are underestimating the French morale, and in particular command and control problems. Even using the original plan the Germans would have found a weak spot in the Allied line and exploited it. The French in particular simply were not capable of reacting fast enough. If your replace Gamelin, that will help. But, the paper superiority of the Allies simply disappeared in 1940 against a foe that could ruthlessly exploit any weakness. The Belgians, French, and British were simply unable to do the same to the Germans.

In addition, you can't ignore the fact of German air superiority. Allied air forces were ineffective until Dunkirk, conversely the Germans significantly disrupted Allied movements. That would not have changed regardless of the ground plan used.

Nonsense. The French problem was not morale, but hubris as far as psychological factors. Militarily their system was far too cumbersome and inflexible, strategically they were drawn into the wrong sector of the front on false information. They were flatly outgeneraled at a strategic level, but we can see from the massive losses sustained by Army Group B that the Nazi offensive of 1940 on the line wanted by Hitler's mealy-mouthed generals would have been a massive clusterfuck and 1870's perfect mirror.
 
Didn't the British almost accidentally kill Rommel during the Arras attack? Imagine the disorder in 7th Panzer if that had happened, or indeed the chaos if the attack had been properly supported and hadn't been repulsed so quickly?

For that matter would Belgium have held out longer and tied up more troops if the German airborne attack at Eben-Emael had missed its target?

Either of these might have had a disproportionate effect on an increasingly skittish German High Command.

Nah, the High Command had the vapors right up to the point where France surrendered. In their standard Damned if Hitler Did, Damned if Hitler didn't approach they were completely sure the failure in 1940 was inevitable and then bashed Hitler for not following up a success they themselves didn't believe in. Germany's generals in this war were a flat disgrace the whole way through, what passed for brains in the Nazi outfit were the odds and ends of the Bohemian Corporal's latest enthusiasm. The generals flat-out lose the war in any number of occasion if given free rain. The generals had their way with this there would not be an invasion of France until 1942.
 
From Wikipedia, it would appear that an obvious POD would be the 13th of May crossing of the Meuse. The Meuse line was reasonably well defended by pill boxes and artillery: though some of the pill boxes were incomplete and the forces manning the defences were second rate and poorly organised. The German “flying artillery”, which was used to prepare the attack, apparently failed to directly destroy any of the defensive bunkers: it effect was mostly to morale and communications (knocking out surface telephone wires) etc. Of the 3 German assaults that day, only 1 managed to successfully cross the river… and it was this one which caused the forces defending the rear of the French line to panic and retreat in disorder, which in turn allowed the German breakthrough.

So perhaps a bomb doesn’t go off, and a telephone line doesn’t get broken, and the forward bunkers are able to call in anti-battery fire to drive off the heavy guns that the Germans brought up to try and take out the bunkers. If the assault on the 13th is repulsed, further French reinforcements arrive by the morning (and they were due). Time isn’t the Germans friend: the longer they are delayed crossing the Meuse, the longer the French have to reinforce, to reorganise units and to prepare better defences.

Now, this isn’t to say the Germans wont try again, but assuming they don’t succeed: there is now a fairly stable defensive front. The French wont panic so much and there wont be such high losses from the airforce trying to take out the bridgeheads.

Now what happens? Do the Germans manage a breakthrough elsewhere, or does the front become more WWI-like?
 

Coulsdon Eagle

Monthly Donor
Go with the simplest option for POD.

The day the Germans try to cross the Meuse has heavy mist / low cloud - a resonable occurrence in Northern France in May. The Stukas either cannot take off, complete their mission, or (as happened on one infamous occasion) they misjudge their height and plunge into the ground.

Without this close aerial support at Sedan more of the bunkers survive, giving time for reinforcements to be rushed to the front.

The French hold the line of the Meuse and the Allies manage to retreat in good order out of Belgium...

Well, actually, I'm not sure they could do even that. The situation in Belgium was confusing as hell for the Allied commanders, along with the refugee columns.

I think we would need something more than a little cloudy weather just to make sure. A better plan than plunging headlong into Belgium at the first opportunity? Better tactical use of Allied, especially French, armour?:D
 

Archibald

Banned
From Wikipedia, it would appear that an obvious POD would be the 13th of May crossing of the Meuse. The Meuse line was reasonably well defended by pill boxes and artillery: though some of the pill boxes were incomplete and the forces manning the defences were second rate and poorly organised. The German “flying artillery”, which was used to prepare the attack, apparently failed to directly destroy any of the defensive bunkers: it effect was mostly to morale and communications (knocking out surface telephone wires) etc. Of the 3 German assaults that day, only 1 managed to successfully cross the river… and it was this one which caused the forces defending the rear of the French line to panic and retreat in disorder, which in turn allowed the German breakthrough.

So perhaps a bomb doesn’t go off, and a telephone line doesn’t get broken, and the forward bunkers are able to call in anti-battery fire to drive off the heavy guns that the Germans brought up to try and take out the bunkers. If the assault on the 13th is repulsed, further French reinforcements arrive by the morning (and they were due). Time isn’t the Germans friend: the longer they are delayed crossing the Meuse, the longer the French have to reinforce, to reorganise units and to prepare better defences.

Now, this isn’t to say the Germans wont try again, but assuming they don’t succeed: there is now a fairly stable defensive front. The French wont panic so much and there wont be such high losses from the airforce trying to take out the bridgeheads.

Now what happens? Do the Germans manage a breakthrough elsewhere, or does the front become more WWI-like?

A 13 may POD is an excellent idea. Good points above.

German crossing of the Meuse was a very close affair. Three Pazer division atempted crossing that day.
1st Panzer had a successful crossing in Gaulier.
2 nd Panzer atempt was a near disaster, and only a VERY bold move by Rubarth saved the day. TWELVE men (yes, only twelve guys, led by Rubarth) knocked off SEVEN bunkers by themselves, yet those bunkers were the exact weak spot in the french defensive nework.
10th panzer crossing was a total failure.

Only 15 km away from Sedan was Stonne and Le Mont Dieu, were entrenched French inflicted horrible losses to the Germans until the end of May.
Stonne was called "a 1940 Verdun" with the ruins of the town changing hands a dozen of times in three days.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Sedan_(1940)#Battle_of_Stonne

And there was actually a French counter attack on May 14, the battle of Bulson
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Sedan_(1940)#Battle_of_Bulson
 
Go with the simplest option for POD.

The day the Germans try to cross the Meuse has heavy mist / low cloud - a resonable occurrence in Northern France in May. The Stukas either cannot take off, complete their mission, or (as happened on one infamous occasion) they misjudge their height and plunge into the ground.

Without this close aerial support at Sedan more of the bunkers survive, giving time for reinforcements to be rushed to the front.
Wiki claims that none of them were destroyed directly by bombing...

The French hold the line of the Meuse and the Allies manage to retreat in good order out of Belgium...
Why would the Allies retreat? In Begium, the Battle of Hannut on the 13th of May was a strategic victory for the French followed by an ordered withdrawl to prepared lines of defence, and in The Battle of the Gembloux Gap the next day the Germans were repulsed. The French armour is largely intact and not exhausted by rushing north, fighting a battle, and then rushing south again in the space of a few days. Without a German breakthrough, the armies in Belgium arn't surrounded, they dont have to spend resources in counterattacks to their south instead of holding the lines in the north. Without a collaspe of the defensive lines and subsequent evacuation at Dunkrik, the Belgiums wont surrender. This is the war that the French, the Belgiums and even the German generals are expecting...
 
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