PC/WI: De Gaulle plan put into operation 1940

WILDGEESE

Gone Fishin'
Watching a program last week called "The day (person) went to war.

This episode was about Charles De Gaulle and how he drew up a plan for all French forces to fall back and make a stand in Brittany.

Would this be possible?

Could this salient be defended?

Could British troops be moved from Dunkirk to Brittany to help reinforce this line?

Could the French fall back organised enough to allow this front to be formed?

Could R.A.F assets be moved there to allow a reasonable air defence?

Could this front be used for a counter offensive later that year or the next?

Regard filers.
 

Anaxagoras

Banned
Would this be possible?

Probably not.

Could this salient be defended?

If you could get the troops there, and protect them from air attack. There were many examples of French troops fighting quite well in the 1940 campaign under reasonable conditions. Even after the disaster in the north, French troops fought hard to maintain their positions along the Weygand Line in June. The collapse of the French in 1940 was from the top down, not from the bottom up.

Could British troops be moved from Dunkirk to Brittany to help reinforce this line?

IIRC (and some people on the board know far more about it than I do), all available shipping at the time was allocated to Operation Ariel and were focused on getting troops out of France rather than into it. But if we assume a complete shift of strategy, the story might have been different. Even after Dunkirk, some British and Canadian troops were landed near Cherbourg, I think.

Could the French fall back organised enough to allow this front to be formed?

This is the key point and I think the answer is probably not. The French high command were utterly gone to pieces by the end of May and were barely capable of finding the toilet in which to relieve themselves, to say nothing of engaging in the complex movement this plan would have entailed. The roads were constantly under Luftwaffe attack and reconnaissance, while even basic maneuvers by major units were difficult for the French to pull off. Had they simply said, "Everybody head to Brittany!", I think the result would simply have been to see them all slaughtered. The panzers would have followed upon them like sharks chewing into wounded whales.

Could R.A.F assets be moved there to allow a reasonable air defence?

Probably. They did okay at Dunkirk, after all. But would Churchill have allowed the commitment of such resources?

Could this front be used for a counter offensive later that year or the next?

No. The Germans would have not turned against Russia in 1941 if the war was still raging in France, so the Allies would have had to face the full measure of German power.
 
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