WI: France really fights on from 1940?

[Deleted member 1487]

De Gaulle, Leclerc...

De Gaulle got pretty well hammered in 1940 and wasn't viewed as a particularly good commander:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_de_Gaulle#The_Battle_of_France:_division_commander

The future General Paul Huard, who served under de Gaulle at this time, recorded how he would often stand on a piece of high ground, keeping other officers literally at six yards' distance, subjecting his subordinates to harsh criticism and taking all decisions autocratically himself, behaviour consistent with his later conduct as a political leader. Lacouture points out that for all his undoubted energy and physical courage there is no evidence in his brief period of command that he possessed the "hunter's eye" of the great battlefield commander, and that not a single one of his officers joined him in London, although some joined the Resistance in France.[70]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippe_Leclerc_de_Hauteclocque#Fall_of_France
And Leclerc lost in 1940 and was captured twice. He was good at lying and escaping however, I will give him that.

 

[Carl Schwamberger]

1. Let's look at it realistically? The surviving French fighter cover is not too good. I figure under the circumstances... non existent, as in zero.
1a. French escort vessels of the day? The typical cruiser had 6-9 9 cm AAA guns and 6-10 3.7 cm AAA guns which were linked to a 2 or 3 optical director system that could handle 1 (one) aircraft attack at a time. This is effective to a slant of about 2,000-4000 meters and was H/A ineffective against dive bombers which would be pulling out at bomb release at the moment when the 90s and 37s start to bite; also useless against torpedo attack (not enough shells to cover the threat zone per second with saturation effect) and just inside the Italian bomb/torpedo drop points. ...

Sounds great until you started talking about torpedo drop points. The Germans had no operational air torpedo units at this time. The Italians stood up their first operating torpedo squadron 25 July, with eight SM79 & a initial production batch of fifty air torpedos. Over the next 90 days this unit kept up a operating strength of four aircraft managed approximately fifty sorties and scored hits on three ships. Of course all tag occurs after the evacuation is liable to be over, so other than a hypothetical attack by the experimental torpedo unit of two aircraft, with one off modified test torpedoes th reference to air defense vs torpedo caring aircraft in meaningless. Neither did the Italians have much in the way of dive bombers in June/July 1940. As I described in my earlier post the standard italian air force technique for attacking ships in 1940 was to use level bombing techniques from 3500 to 4000 meters. That had no more success vs moving ships than the US B17s. Despite several hundred sorties vs ships in the last half of 1940 bomb hits were rare. About 1 hit per 70+ sorties.

Attacking docked & anchored ships in ports will lower the sorties per hit ratio, but not decisively. The Luftwaffe bombed the French ports during Operation AIREAL. Do we really need to review the number of ships sunk or damaged, and how many men were evacuated vs how many trapped by the bombing attacks?

 

[Deleted member 1487]

The Luftwaffe bombed the French ports during Operation AIREAL. Do we really need to review the number of ships sunk or damaged, and how many men were evacuated vs how many trapped by the bombing attacks?

Most of the ports weren't attacked, but of those that were:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Aerial

The Luftwaffe attacked the evacuation ships and on 17 June, evaded RAF fighter patrols and sank the Cunard linerand troopship HMT Lancastria in the Loire estuary. The ship sank quickly and vessels in the area were still under attack during rescue operations, which saved about 2,477 passengers and crew. The liner had thousands of troops, RAF personnel and civilians on board and the number of the passengers who died in the sinking is unknown, because in the haste to embark as many people as possible, keeping count broke down. The loss of at least 3,500 people made the disaster the greatest loss of life in a British ship, which the British government tried to keep secret on the orders of Winston Churchill, the British Prime Minister.

Otherwise the ports were either too far away, as the core of the evacuees were LOC troops far from the front and were outside of Luftwaffe range in June, or in the case of Cherbourg were close enough to Britain that the RAF was able to keep the Luftwaffe at bay. St. Naizere and Nantes had CAP, with the RAF fighters flying 6 sorties per day to cover the evacuation, but at Nazaire the Luftwaffe got through and sank the Lancastria. In the end about 55% or so of the people that got out at Dunkirk got out via Ariel. Remember too that the majority of Luftwaffe attention was diverted to other tasks at that point in June too.

 

[Tchitchix]

With what forces? The French won't have an offensive force for months and the Spanish aren't exactly a pushover.

Spanish army in Morroco:
http://www.niehorster.org/080_spain/40_army/corps_09.html

No tank, no anti-tank, no AA, few obsolete planes...
Plus the Rif mountain to split the collony: no way to transfer forces from Mellila to Ceuta or vice-versa.
And remember, the French helped the Spanish to win the rebellion tens years ago (in fact, they won the war for the Spanish).
French have three infantry divisions in Morroco and Algeria, plus tank, plus heavy artillery, plus modern planes (2 GC on MS 406, two GB on DB-7...) without taking into account any evacuated forces.

If Mellila would be a quite hard nut, Tangier and Ceuta will soon fall through coastal plain. Then isolated Mellila.

Claimed, but not proven. What was on the way, what was on order, what was the timeline for delivery?

Are you jocking? Never head about "Cash&Carry"? have a look on Wikipedia to Vindicator, Dauntless, P-40, Béarn... Thousands of planes ordered, Béarn en route with lots of... Already said, easy to check!

How much of it was known IOTL when the forces were training for it?

Aren't we talking about ITTL? Of course French resistance will give a lot of intelligence on German moves and reinforcement as soon as summer 1940.

 

[merlin]

Claimed, but not proven. What was on the way, what was on order, what was the timeline for delivery?

The first American military supplies for Britain & France were being loaded on board ship at the United States Army docks at Raritan, New jersey. Six hundred railway freight cars had brought their precious cargoes to the dockside; these were the supplies authorised by Roosevelt ten days earlier, including 900 field guns and 80,000 machine guns. there were also 500,000 rifles, with 250 rounds each.
May 30th, Arthur Purvis in Washington had purchased a vast armoury ; five hundred mortars, five hundred field guns, some thousands of anti-aircraft guns, 10,000 machine guns, 25,000automatic rifles, 500,000 Lee Enfield rifles and 100 million rounds of ammunition. Also, he was able to tell Churchill the next day that General Marshal had agreed to 'stretch a point' to make substantial quantities of US munitions 'surplus' to make them available.

With all that - ten days wasn't bad going, this apart from the aircraft shipments.

Interestingly, on the same page as the above agreement, was a conversation on May 31st while Churchill was with Petain, 'another of the Frenchmen present, Roland de Margerie, spoke of fighting it out in French North Africa if France were to be overrun, the look on Petain's face, Churchill later recalled, was detached and sombre, giving the feeling that he would face a separate peace'.
With that thought spoken even then, who else more amenable to the idea, could it have been voiced - a better more viable option than some Brittany redoubt!!

Also, in early June in Charleville Hitler said to General von Rundstedt 'Now that Britain will presumably be willing to make peace, I will begin the final settlement of scores with Bolshevism'.

Source Second World War by Martin Gilbert.

 

[Ruth Habaga]

De Gaulle got pretty well hammered in 1940 and wasn't viewed as a particularly good commander:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_de_Gaulle#The_Battle_of_France:_division_commander


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippe_Leclerc_de_Hauteclocque#Fall_of_France
And Leclerc lost in 1940 and was captured twice. He was good at lying and escaping however, I will give him that.

This has been reported as insulting.

 

[Deleted member 1487]

Spanish army in Morroco:
http://www.niehorster.org/080_spain/40_army/corps_09.html

Thanks for the OOB.

No tank, no anti-tank, no AA, few obsolete planes...

I don't see how you can draw that conclusion from that table, as it doesn't break down equipment, plus it does say there is artillery present and most importantly where are the French tanks with spare parts coming from? Just as Britain left most of theirs behind in the evacuation, most aren't coming along with France when they leave and what is brought or there already will lack spare parts and take some reorganizing before they are ready.
As Merlin lists below for orders from the US in May tanks and spare parts aren't on the list.

Plus the Rif mountain to split the collony: no way to transfer forces from Mellila to Ceuta or vice-versa.
And remember, the French helped the Spanish to win the rebellion tens years ago (in fact, they won the war for the Spanish).
French have three infantry divisions in Morroco and Algeria, plus tank, plus heavy artillery, plus modern planes (2 GC on MS 406, two GB on DB-7...) without taking into account any evacuated forces.

Coastal shipping for one, the road for the other.
Plus it doesn't seem to be that big of an issue for the defenders as much as any attacker from the East where the majority of French troops would have to come from:

If Mellila would be a quite hard nut, Tangier and Ceuta will soon fall through coastal plain. Then isolated Mellila.

That's some wishful thinking there. How many French troops were west of the Atlas Mountains? The Brits weren't in a position to help, because as soon as the shooting start the Straits are closed to the Allies and Gibraltar is under siege. There isn't French armor in Morocco, nor a substantial air force as least per Operation Torch. That's not to say that none of Spanish Morocco would fall, but the entire thing being taken quickly is unlikely especially given that Spanish troops are highly experienced and what was left in Morocco from the French were the units that weren't fit to fight in Europe. The experienced troops in French North Africa would be in Algeria and not organized to fight after the evacuation for some time and even then they'd have to deal with the fact that they'd be attacking into mountains from the east with limited support.

Are you jocking? Never head about "Cash&Carry"? have a look on Wikipedia to Vindicator, Dauntless, P-40, Béarn... Thousands of planes ordered, Béarn en route with lots of... Already said, easy to check!

I know about it, I'm asking for details for what was on order at the time of the armistice. Since you're the one making the claims about what is on order it is up to you to provide the details, not demand others to do your work for you.

Aren't we talking about ITTL? Of course French resistance will give a lot of intelligence on German moves and reinforcement as soon as summer 1940.

What resistance in 1940? It didn't exist yet as an organization capable of passing on intel. As it was the early movement required Vichy territory to actually move information out, which is not going to happen in this case, because the Axis would control the entire country and SOE and other external support was not yet formed. Eventually yes info would be able to be moved out of the country as resistance was organized, but that also takes time and French intelligence didn't have much time to establish a stay behind force in 1940 to do that. From what I can find the successful resistance intelligence needed the Marseilles route through Vichy to get info out...in 1941. The organization to get out intel seems to have been founded only in December 1940:

In December 1940, the Organisation civile et militaire (OCM), which consisted of army officers and civil servants was founded to provide intelligence to the Allies.[48]

Also as early as 1940 the Abwehr and Gestapo were getting a lot of informers against early resistance activities, which made life very difficult for people who were interested in doing more than petty sabotage like slashing tires on German vehicles or cutting phone lines in the countryside.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Resistance#1940:_The_refus_absurde

The problem of what the French called indics or mouches as informers were known was compounded by the corbeaux (poison pen letters).[62] The writers of the corbeaux was inspired by a mixture of motivations such as envy, spite, greed, anti-Semitism, and sheer opportunism as many ordinary French people wanted to ingratiate themselves with what they believed to be the winning side.[63] Ousby noted "Yet perhaps the most striking testimony to the extent of denunciation came from the Germans themselves, surprised at how ready the French were to betray each other".[64] The problem of denunciation was always the most serious handicap for the resistance as there were a seemingly endless number of ordinary French people who were desperate to denounce anyone they suspected of engaging in resistance.[64]

Speaking of the resistance:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/books/w...-the-shadows-french-resistance-robert-gildea/

Yet, as Robert Gildea exposes in this comprehensive survey of the French Resistance, the myth that the French freed themselves is largely poppycock, like de Gaulle’s boast that only “a handful of scoundrels” behaved badly under four years of Nazi occupation. (One example: by October 1943, 85,000 French women had children fathered by Germans.) Most of the population didn’t engage with their revolutionary past until the last moment, when the chief thing they recaptured was their pride. The first French soldier into Paris was part of a regiment “called 'la Nueve’ because it was composed mainly of Spanish republicans”.

The magnitude of the French defeat in June 1940, after a mere six weeks, compelled the writer Vercors (Jean Bruller), author of that celebrated novella of passive resistance, The Silence of the Sea, to predict that the Germans might stay on in France for a century. This being a very real possibility, it is not hard to see why the Resistance, in Gildea’s estimation, “mobilised only a minority of French people. The vast majority learnt to muddle through under German Occupation and long admired Marshal Pétain.” Attentisme – “wait and see” – was the most obeyed order of the day. It took until 1971 for a counter-narrative to surface, in the documentary Le Chagrin et la Pitié, which suggested that the French, instead of behaving honourably under the Occupation, “had been supine, cowardly, and only too frequently given to collaboration”.

It bears repeating that an astonishing one and a half million French soldiers remained POWs in Germany until 1945, putting pressure on political activists back home, notably communists, to form the opposition. But French Communist Party bosses, answerable to Moscow, “always controlled an agenda that had little to do with the Resistance”. One contemporary observer sneered: “The PCF led its resisters to the Rubicon – to go fishing.”

Neutralised for the first two years of the war by the Nazi-Soviet pact, which made Hitler their ally, the French communists were led by Jacques Duclos, “who lived a quiet life disguised as a 'country doctor, 1900 style’ ”. Meanwhile, their general secretary, Georges Marchais, worked in a German factory as a volunteer. Hardly models of heroism.

The first American military supplies for Britain & France were being loaded on board ship at the United States Army docks at Raritan, New jersey. Six hundred railway freight cars had brought their precious cargoes to the dockside; these were the supplies authorised by Roosevelt ten days earlier, including 900 field guns and 80,000 machine guns. there were also 500,000 rifles, with 250 rounds each.
May 30th, Arthur Purvis in Washington had purchased a vast armoury ; five hundred mortars, five hundred field guns, some thousands of anti-aircraft guns, 10,000 machine guns, 25,000automatic rifles, 500,000 Lee Enfield rifles and 100 million rounds of ammunition. Also, he was able to tell Churchill the next day that General Marshal had agreed to 'stretch a point' to make substantial quantities of US munitions 'surplus' to make them available.

With all that - ten days wasn't bad going, this apart from the aircraft shipments.

Interestingly, on the same page as the above agreement, was a conversation on May 31st while Churchill was with Petain, 'another of the Frenchmen present, Roland de Margerie, spoke of fighting it out in French North Africa if France were to be overrun, the look on Petain's face, Churchill later recalled, was detached and sombre, giving the feeling that he would face a separate peace'.
With that thought spoken even then, who else more amenable to the idea, could it have been voiced - a better more viable option than some Brittany redoubt!!

Also, in early June in Charleville Hitler said to General von Rundstedt 'Now that Britain will presumably be willing to make peace, I will begin the final settlement of scores with Bolshevism'.

Source Second World War by Martin Gilbert.

How much of that was to Britain, how much to France? That really doesn't seem like enough to reequip both armies given their huge losses in equipment. It sounds like most of that was for Britain, not France. Plus that doesn't provide critical things like fuel, trucks, aircraft, bombs, sundry other important supplies, etc.
As to the offhanded comment by Hitler, Britain wasn't willing to make peace and neither is France ITTL, which that upends Hitler's statement; I fully agree that had Hitler gotten the peace he wanted from Britain he would have turned on the USSR, but that is not the scenario we are discussing, rather Britain and France are staying on and getting all those weapons you quote. Plus of course 80% of the French fleet is continuing to fight on.

This has been reported as insulting.

As far as I know reporting only applies to insults against other members, not historical figures; that said what is insulting about pointing out the historical record of historical figures?

 

[McPherson]

Distance Alexandria to Tripoli 1900km; Tunisian border to Tripoli 200km.

You may not like the infrastructure in Tunisia, but it is a far better option than starting from Alexandria.

You start from Oran and Algiers and bring in supply forward to Tunis by sea from America, Canada and Britain through mountainous terrain and weather that resembles the Apennines but with less rainfall. The roads are TERRIBLE. Railroad network in 1940 is a joke. ATV logistics as the Americans found out the HARD WAY. Recalculate the effort and correct the false start assumptions. That has been the handwavium problem all along. The French colonial army is as logistically fouled up as the army in the Metropole. They are not going anywhere or fighting anyone with mismatched equipment, improper training, no fuel, no transport, no spare parts and no means to fix it. They will be static defense forces at best in place, with limited mobility.

The Italians laid in a macadam road along the arable coast of Libya from Tripoli to Benghazi. Even crappy British trucks could use that road with ease.

That is a post war topo map with roadnets and flotation worked in. Note the geology? From the Egyptian frontier to Tripoli, a complete hard surface road, linking coastal towns and seaports. HARD GOOD FLAT GOING for tanks. Nice easy coastal distance for naval gunfire support. Lots of nice well engineered Italian airfields, too, with proper runways just begging to be overrun and repurposed. You could be an O'Connor and be in Tripoli in 90 days with only gas, beans and bullets and Churchill being your only impediment. Easy to take care of gas, beans and bullets with dumps on hand. Might need mechanics and engineers and infantry (that is where the French come in.). CHURCHILL is the problem. Had to divert to Greece. Not thinking like a SEAPOWER leader. Roosevelt would have done better.

 

[Deleted member 1487]

snip

https://apps.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a257095.pdf
A study on the logistics of the North African Campaign

From Morocco to Tunis, movement would be concentrated mostly along the coastal plains. Formidable mountain ranges restricted ready access to the interior. The topographics and industrial/transportation infrastructure of Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia were poor and logistical support in theater would be difficult (Map #5). Casablanca provided the only substantial port on the Atlantic coast. This artificial port had been constructed by the French shortly after World War I. It accommodated about 90 percent of the Moroccan pre-war traffic. Lesser ports were available at Safi, Mehdia, and Port-Lyautey. A standard gauge railroad connected the ports with Marakesh, parts of the interior and Algiers. The limited road network primarily supported the coastal plain. 2 5 Algieria's coastline faces the Mediterranean. Artificial ports were constructed or natural harbors had been improved prior to the invasion. The best port and rail transloading facilities were at Oran, Algiers, Bougie, Phillipeville and Bone. Railways and roads ran primarily east-west along the coast, with some access to the interior. One meter gauge branch rail lines additionally connected the lesser ports with the main line. 2 6 Tunisia also provided a somewhat bleak logistical support outlook. Though the ports at Tunis, Bizerte, Sousse, and Sfax were adequate, the country's supporting transportation network was not. Almost all rail lines were narrow gauge. The main highway system consisted of one east-west coastal route and one roughly parallel interior route. Though these highways would support two-way traffic in most places, numerous bottlenecks were found in narrow tunnels, sharp mountain turns, and snowbound passes. 2 7

Seems like any campaign to take the important Spanish territories in Morocco would have to be supplied via Casablanca, as the logistics from rail via the Atlas Mountains were basically impossible. That does means that the eastern most Spanish territories in Morocco would likely be easy to take from Oran, but the main ports closest to Spain would require a move up the western coast...which is going to be tough to organize, as those forces are separate from the rest of the French holdings, bisected by the Atlas Mountains.

Attacking out of Tunisia south into Libya would be a non-starter for quite some time until a lot more trucks were built up and roads improved, because it looks like movement from the main ports in Tunisia in the north have some really crappy infrastructure to get them to even the Mareth Line. That also means Tunisia is safe from Italian attack for quite a while, even assuming Italian shipping into Libya is left unmolested, which was not the case even IOTL.

https://history.army.mil/html/books/070/70-29/CMH_Pub_70-29.pdf
Starting on p.35 the North African campaign logistics mentions that an additional 5000 truck special shipment was required to sustain Allied forces racing to Tunisia because even what was planned for the move wasn't remotely enough and hamstrung the advance until it arrived, since the lack of rolling stock made even the limited rail lines useless and the lack of highways up to European standards created a bunch of problems. Effectively anyone planning on attacking for any distance in French North Africa is going to have a LOT of problems.

 

[McPherson]

Sounds great until you started talking about torpedo drop points. The Germans had no operational air torpedo units at this time. The Italians stood up their first operating torpedo squadron 25 July, with eight SM79 & a initial production batch of fifty air torpedos. Over the next 90 days this unit kept up a operating strength of four aircraft managed approximately fifty sorties and scored hits on three ships. Of course all tag occurs after the evacuation is liable to be over, so other than a hypothetical attack by the experimental torpedo unit of two aircraft, with one off modified test torpedoes th reference to air defense vs torpedo caring aircraft in meaningless. Neither did the Italians have much in the way of dive bombers in June/July 1940. As I described in my earlier post the standard italian air force technique for attacking ships in 1940 was to use level bombing techniques from 3500 to 4000 meters. That had no more success vs moving ships than the US B17s. Despite several hundred sorties vs ships in the last half of 1940 bomb hits were rare. About 1 hit per 70+ sorties.

Specifically:

Sounds great until you started talking about torpedo drop points

I wrote "bomb/torpedo" which is a standoff of at least 2000 meters, which is about standard for any competent aerial service fighting at sea in those days. Experience will teach closer is better...

And speaking of torpedoes in the Mediterranean in 1940? I specifically cited Heinkels and Stukas for the Germans (not torpedo capable). I included Cant 1000Z and Br20s with the SM79s (which operated as level bombers at the time.). I specifically mentioned the attack runs against fleeing freighters as being mast height. I pointed out that Italians stayed out of French and British machine gun slant ranges when attacking warships.

Attacking docked & anchored ships in ports will lower the sorties per hit ratio, but not decisively. The Luftwaffe bombed the French ports during Operation AIREAL. Do we really need to review the number of ships sunk or damaged, and how many men were evacuated vs how many trapped by the bombing attacks?

That is a good point.

Virtually no action took place to hinder the evacuation from Brest and we have spotty LW records about it: only strafings and near misses reported.

Fierce air action occurred in and around St Nazaire. Multiple ship hits including the HMT Lancastria (mission loss, 3,000 killed) resulted with massive loss of life and several (8%) sortied vessels receiving substantial damage.

This was an RN operation that rescued maybe as many men as was accomplished during the Dunkirk miracle. Well organized and well led, with British lift carrying 85% of the evacuees.

So fair point. Don't think it applies to the situation in the Mediterranean though. No uncommitted adversary to air flank the escape route along the Bay of Biscay and the Western Approaches. Still the Germans were a bit lazy and lax with TACAIR on hand.

 

[Deleted member 1487]

This was an RN operation that rescued maybe as many men as was accomplished during the Dunkirk miracle. Well organized and well led, with British lift carrying 85% of the evacuees.

190k men in Aerial (several ports) vs. 338k at Dunkirk (one port and beaches).

 

[McPherson]

190k men in Aerial (several ports) vs. 338k at Dunkirk (one port and beaches).

Those stats do not include civilian refugees lifted out, do they (almost 100,000)? Also one must consider that Western Approaches ports had less small shipping available for transfer shore to ship as was found in the Channel evacuation, and due to time distance factors for the Western French ports, we are looking at 4-6 day turnarounds instead of 1-2 day time intervals at Dunkirk. Might want to include additional that the multiple ports meant some convoy lift outs were sent to the wrong ports and so that lift was wasted during Op Aerial. Staff work on both sides, English and German, seems to have been substandard; hence canceled each other out. The French for Aerial were somewhat ineffective. If they had pitched in hard and if their fleet in their Atlantic ports had done the right thing and headed NORTH instead of south, I figure they could have lifted 80,000 all on their own under RAF cover, which was present.

 

[Deleted member 1487]

Those stats do not include civilian refugees lifted out, do they (almost 100,000)? Also one must consider that Western Approaches ports had less small shipping available for transfer shore to ship as was found in the Channel evacuation, and due to time distance factors for the Western French ports, we are looking at 4-6 day turnarounds instead of 1-2 day time intervals at Dunkirk. Might want to include additional that the multiple ports meant some convoy lift outs were sent to the wrong ports and so that lift was wasted during Op Aerial. Staff work on both sides, English and German, seems to have been substandard; hence canceled each other out. The French for Aerial were somewhat ineffective. If they had pitched in hard and if their fleet in their Atlantic ports had done the right thing and headed NORTH instead of south, I figure they could have lifted 80,000 all on their own under RAF cover, which was present.

I don't know if they do are do not. That said what you present doesn't look good for the French getting people out to North Africa. What's even worse is that during the Italian bombing of Marseilles in June the French tried to intercept with D.520s and failed:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_invasion_of_France#Air_campaign

On 17 June, the Italians bombed the centre of Marseille, killing 143 and wounding 136. On 21 June they bombed the port in a daylight raid and a subsequent night raid.[118]

https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombardamento_di_Marsiglia_(1940)

On June 1, 1940 , the German formations of Heinkel 111 bombed the city, killing 32 civilians and wounding 60 others. The port was particularly affected. The cities of Chasse-sur-Rhône , Lyon and Grenoble were also attacked by German aircraft .

On 10 June 1940 Fascist Italy came out of the "non belligerenza" and sided with its German ally declaring war on the United Kingdom and France. On the night of 21-22 June , 6-10 Savoia-Marchetti SM79 bombers of the 104th Group ( 46th Stormo ) attack Marseille in two successive waves. [1] The French anti-aircraft reacted without success and the Dewoitine D.520 fighters of the Armée de l'Air failed to stop the Italian planes. That night, 4,200 kilos of bombs hit the city, making 143-144 civilian victims and 136 wounded. [2] [3]

Apparently they also were bombing Tunisia as well.

 

[McPherson]

I don't know if they do are do not. That said what you present doesn't look good for the French getting people out to North Africa.

Yup. Another nail in that coffin. Op Aerial shows the French Fleet could have run for it, did run for it, but without much positive end result. The Toulon armament did not even do that much, has anyone noticed?

 

[Ruth Habaga]

Mein Kampf was written in the early 1920s when he was in jail, things change with decades.

Whaaaat ? sounds like negationism to me. Next step he will tell us Hitler renegaded Mein Kampf.

Speaking of the resistance:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/books/w...-the-shadows-french-resistance-robert-gildea/

Yeah, citing an ass-wipe to justify your point. Good. That and wikipedia...

Are you jocking? Never head about "Cash&Carry"? have a look on Wikipedia to Vindicator, Dauntless, P-40, Béarn... Thousands of planes ordered, Béarn en route with lots of... Already said, easy to check!

Trolls are just, wait... trolls. They just ignore whatever truth is contrarian to their (flawed) opinion.

Fact is that thread so far is mostly on the FTL side, bar Wiking and McPherson, whose arguments are hardly convincing.

 

[Tchitchix]

Coastal shipping for one, the road for the other.

How marvelous wishfull thinking. No railway, a very bad coastal road and air and naval Allied superiority...

That's some wishful thinking there. How many French troops were west of the Atlas Mountains?

There was one DIM (division d'infanterie marocaine) remaining in Morroco. A class A unit...

There isn't French armor in Morocco, nor a substantial air force as least per Operation Torch.

Yes there was tanks in Morroco, plus 2 GC in Oran and 2 GB in Morroco.

The experienced troops in French North Africa would be in Algeria

I know about it, I'm asking for details for what was on order at the time of the armistice. Since you're the one making the claims about what is on order it is up to you to provide the details, not demand others to do your work for you.

Are you serious? It seems you know nothing about US supply to France and you are talking about the ability for French to continue the fight. And, on top of that, you ask me to teach you! I gave you some example, just open Wikipedia.

Seems like any campaign to take the important Spanish territories in Morocco would have to be supplied via Casablanca, as the logistics from rail via the Atlas Mountains were basically impossible.

Yes, Casablanca was the destination port for aircraft deliveries. The planes in crates was built up in Rabat and Casablanca (Glenn-Martin 167, DB-7 and later H-80/P-40), same for other weapons.

The railroad in standart gauge from Casablanca to Algiers and Tunis with heavy (European standart) workload. No issue to transfer shipment from East to West or vice-versa. And forget TORCH, two years of weak maintenance, divestment of equipement to supply France, "Commission d'armistice" and so on...

BTW, the main roads and railways are not running on the coastal plains (very small apart in Morroco and Tunisia) but in the interior "High Plains" (Hauts Plateaux) between two ranges of high mountains: Atlas Tellien and Atlas Saharien, as you can see on the map you provided. I doubt the author knows well North Africa.

And for the road in south Tunisia, have a look at this video (for your information, El-Hamma is a small village some km West of Gabès), not so bad, isn'it?

 

[Tchitchix]

Another footage in Tunisa, Enfilaville (2 min 15) is now Enfinah, between Sousse and Tunis. Look at the trucks on the road (2 min 50).

 

[Deleted member 1487]

How marvelous wishfull thinking. No railway, a very bad coastal road and air and naval Allied superiority...

Got a source about Spanish road quality on the coast? There is rail from Tangiers to the frontier, which is separated from the French fleet and Gibraltar by the Straits, which neither could cross thanks to coastal artillery on either side. Plus again it's not like the Germans won't be there, the Allied fleets are bottled up in the Mediterranean, air power is mostly scattered throughout North Africa along with support infrastructure, which tells us little about their ability to concentrate it quickly and run sufficient sorties to do anything significant (French bombing of Gibraltar twice over several months didn't really do much to impede the British after all). Now the Eastern part of Spanish Morocco near Oran is screwed because of the proximity of French bases and the separation from the rest of the protectorate, I will give you that, but the main ports at Tangiers and Ceuta are a different story and shielded from the majority of the French ability to deal with them. As it is though once the shooting starts the French will probably need to rescue what is left of the besieged British garrison rather than focus on trying to conquer Spanish Morocco, especially given the quality of what you claim are bad roads on the Spanish side of the border as well as the mountains.

There was one DIM (division d'infanterie marocaine) remaining in Morroco. A class A unit...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1st_Moroccan_Division_(1939)
Which division would that be? The 1st Moroccan was in Europe.

The 2nd were created in 1943:
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/2e_division_d'infanterie_marocaine

French wikipedia had little info about the 3rd division.

Yes there was tanks in Morroco, plus 2 GC in Oran and 2 GB in Morroco.

Got a source? I'm not finding anything on google.

Are you serious? It seems you know nothing about US supply to France and you are talking about the ability for French to continue the fight. And, on top of that, you ask me to teach you! I gave you some example, just open Wikipedia.

I'm asking you to prove your claims. It isn't my responsibility to source your claims for you.

Yes, Casablanca was the destination port for aircraft deliveries. The planes in crates was built up in Rabat and Casablanca (Glenn-Martin 167, DB-7 and later H-80/P-40), same for other weapons.

Source? Previous posters said they were being built in Algeria. Why would they be built in Morocco when they'd have to travel quite a bit further into Algeria to be able to be flown directly to France?

The railroad in standart gauge from Casablanca to Algiers and Tunis with heavy (European standart) workload. No issue to transfer shipment from East to West or vice-versa. And forget TORCH, two years of weak maintenance, divestment of equipement to supply France, "Commission d'armistice" and so on...

Source please, that contradicts US army experiences using said rail.

BTW, the main roads and railways are not running on the coastal plains (very small apart in Morroco and Tunisia) but in the interior "High Plains" (Hauts Plateaux) between two ranges of high mountains: Atlas Tellien and Atlas Saharien, as you can see on the map you provided. I doubt the author knows well North Africa.

There were roads on the map of course, the quality however is not mentioned.

And for the road in south Tunisia, have a look at this video (for your information, El-Hamma is a small village some km West of Gabès), not so bad, isn'it?

A propaganda video about a parade through a town? What is that supposed to actually tell us about the real conditions of the roads in the country side. This is handpicked footage to make the American advance look pristine, no different than German propaganda footage for public consumption.

Another footage in Tunisa, Enfilaville (2 min 15) is now Enfinah, between Sousse and Tunis. Look at the trucks on the road (2 min 50).

Another propaganda video show dusty, unpaved roads? Doesn't seem like great infrastructure, especially if it rains, which was historically quite the problem during the Tunisian campaign for all forces there.

 

[Carl Schwamberger]

Specifically:

I wrote "bomb/torpedo" which is a standoff of at least 2000 meters, which is about standard for any competent aerial service fighting at sea in those days. Experience will teach closer is better... ....

Nah, you included torpedoes. Wiggling about over rhetoric wont conceal poor knowledge and lack of research.

 

[Aber]

The Brits weren't in a position to help, because as soon as the shooting start the Straits are closed to the Allies and Gibraltar is under siege.

Really? Operation Menace aimed at Tangier would be a good start.