One of Europe's greatest militaries utterly defeated in little over a month

Shit leader, shit doctrine, poor intelligence, shit transmission.

The worst is that the idea of using tanks like the germans did was a frency idea.

They also wanted the maginot line along belgium, but belgium was scared and shit.

Also don't underestimate the effects of ww1, french industrial region has been rekt, as a lot of soldiers, germany was intact.

The point was to funnel the German into Belgium
They didn't expect them to send tanks through the Ardennes though

>fuck it up in ww2
they've basically been fucking up since Napoleon

they used blitzkrieg on Poland though

>Germany
>intact after WWI

The Germans REBUILT faster, after they starred rearmament. There's a difference.

All memes and hyperbole aside. Why the fuck did the French surrender when the Germans had barely seized ten percent of the country and hadn't even captured the capital city?

because most of their troops were cut off from their supply lines. there was no way they could win when they were surrounded at Dunkirk

I hope Nolan's Dunkirk movie conveys how unthinkably disastrous this defeat was.

The 4th Republic was weak and Pétain was a war hero. Shame he was also a huge fan of the nazis and an ambitious prick.

But on a pure tactical level ? Supply lines were cut, moral was low and the leadership unfit to lead. De Gaulle told everyone about how the tanks, but no one listened.

If he finished them off at Dunkirk instead of showing them some mercy. England would of signed his peace offer and he could focus on Russia.

No the Germans weren't rebuilt 100%. They couldn't of defeated Poland without Russian help from the other-side.

He caught the allies by surprise and they weren't able to mobilize their colonial troops in Europe by the time he defeated the homeland guards.

Hitler wasn't interested in defeating the UK, he wanted their approval, their peace. The Prussians married Queen Victoria, why would he?

He was angry at the communists for kicking out the Czar and then going after German Russians. The officer corp in Russia was Prussian (link related).

youtube.com/watch?v=P4kQvkvGi9M

>They couldn't of defeated Poland without Russian help from the other-side.
wat? they absolutely could have. Poland didn't stand a chance against Germany. the Soviets hardly did any fighting and just came in to take control of the territory they were promised

>showing them some mercy
This was a story invented by Hitler much later in the war to absolve himself. The great conquering hero being laid low by showing mercy on perfidious Albion, is much more romantic than "My generals were giving me conflicting advice so I just went with what seemed the least risky at the time."

Hitler couldn't of beaten Poland they had formidable forces.
Russia divided their forces in two. The allies would of mobilized in time to defeat Hitler if he fought a protracted war. Furthermore if the war lasted more than a month Lend Lease Shipments would of arrived.

By the time Poland was defeated French were mobilizing and the British were landing in Calais. If the war with Poland lasted three months? It would of been a two front war.

Hitler signed the Non-aggression pact because he needed it.

My grandfather was from Lodz, he clearly remembers the day the Germans came.

"They had many horses and rifles, very few machine guns or vehicles as they marched through the streets as the Germans in Lodz said "Heil.""
"The Germans gave Candy, Chocolate, coffee cake, and canned meat to the crowd as they shouted "Heil Hitler""

If the Hitler's War in Poland wasn't decided in former West Prussia the troops would of not had the support of the people needed for intelligence and routing out partisans. Hitler fought the Poles on his own turf, west Prussia. Had the Poles been able to retreat towards the Polish side, it would of been a different turf to fight on, much more deadly.

The Poles had good tanks at the time.

Hitler could of not won against Poland had it not been for diplomacy.

>What's particulary horrible is that the french government was dissolved and replaced by a strange regime who actively tried to help the invaders.

This. Look at Yugoslavia, the armed resistance there started as soon as it got occupied, and wasn't even deterred when Germans started killing civilians.

The French could've waged guerrilla war in the cities, the forests, the mountains, but they didn't bother. Instead they shaved the heads of the woman "who slept with the enemy" after the war - while in fact all of France was sleeping with the enemy. It's disgraceful.

No. Who cares about your hero stories, the heroes are all dead now, and they didn't stand up to the Hippies they're almost all dead now with no-one to continue their heroic bloodlines.

Riddle me this, why wasn't the Soviet Union denounced with Hitler for invading Poland? Why was Hitler defamed while the Soviets remained allies?

Hitler wanted Great Britain to stay in power to maintain global stability. He was more concerned with humiliating France for Versailles than he was in defeating Britain.

General Patton said, after seeing the Germans in Bavaria "We had defeated the wrong enemy." In his dairies and letters he was convinced the Soviet Russians were the true enemies and he was convinced Hitler was right about the Soviet Jews.

Hitlers concern was the COMMUNISTS:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalin's_Missed_Chance

>The French could've waged guerrilla war in the cities, the forests, the mountains, but they didn't bother. Instead they shaved the heads of the woman "who slept with the enemy" after the war - while in fact all of France was sleeping with the enemy. It's disgraceful.
literally what happened in every first world countries occupied at the time
how was the resistance in denmark, belgium or the netherlands
and don't tell me they were all heroes because they were able to save 10 jews

Poland arrayed 5 of their 7 armies against Germany.

The Soviets only invaded on September 17th, long after the Germans did. Warsaw was already under siege for more than a week, Kutno, Kraków, and Lodz had all fallen, and what Polish land forces were still coherent were hoping to hide in RomaniaAnd no lend lease could have come, given Germany's occupying the Polish coast on literally the first day of war.

The western allies did counterattack, but the Saar offensive was a pathetic failure. Germany beat Poland. Deal with it.

Its true. Poland was a lot more powerful than people realise and germany was nowhere near as dominant as you would think

i.4cdn.org/wsg/1463789682774.webm

Speaking of lend lease, if Sweden hadn't been so dedicated to neutrality, the Allies would have been able to funnel supplies into Finland during the Winter War. Churchill was chomping at the bit to do it.
It could have changed a lot.

>the poles had good tanks at the time

yeah, 12 of them lmao

Yes, Hitler was emboldened when he saw Russia get its ass kicked by Finland.
It also suggested that the Soviets wouldn't stop at turning Russia communist. They invaded Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania.
Technically they all had belonged to Russia before WWII.

>What's particulary horrible is that the french government was dissolved and replaced by a strange regime who actively tried to help the invaders.

Considering the decade prior saw riots in the street of Paris, numerous government scandals, a cabinet forced to resign, and what came very close to a right-wing coup d'état that left the country internally weakened and bitterly divided, it's not hard to see why.

No, you're wrong, the COMMUNISTS including Polish Communists beat Germany.
East Prussia has been a Russia province now, and Russofied. West Prussia belongs to the Poles, 12 million Germans were exiled, many german-[prussian women raped during the last phase of war and post-phase, East Poland belongs the Belorussian and Ukraine.
We are dealing with the fucked up situation.

The Prussian identity and ethnic lands, heartland of Germany, has been wiped off the face of the earth.

>Sweden hadn't been so dedicated to neutrality

Sweden was hardly neutral during the war. They facilitated the German invasion of Norway, provided naval escort to German ships in the Baltic, supplied tons of war material, knowingly accepted looted gold, and made secret loans to Germany at the same time the allies were engaged with preemptive buying.

The Brisbane line is a much better line

After the Germans surrendered on May 5, 1945 the bloodbath began in earnest. Fifteen million
Germans were forced to leave their ancestral homes in Eastern Europe, including German East
Prussia, parts of Poland, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Hungary and Romania, headed for Germany,
leaving all their property behind. Three million of them died during the trek to Germany as the result
of brutal assaults, mass murder, wholesale rape, starvation and exposure.

the fuck does this have to do with Germany's invasion of Poland in 1939?

Poland:
39 divisions (some of them were never fully mobilized and concentrated),[5]
16 brigades,[5]
4,300 guns,[5]
880 tanks,
400 aircraft[2]
Total: 950,000[Note

Germany:
60 divisions,
6 brigades,
9,000 guns,[2]
2,750 tanks,
2,315 aircraft[3]
Slovakia:
3 divisions
Joined on 17 September:
Soviet Union:
33+ divisions,
11+ brigades,
4,959 guns,
4,736 tanks,
3,300 aircraft

They did good work against the Austrians in Italy but most of their major engagements(ie Franco-Prussian war) they fucked it up. Germany isn't unbeatable(obviously) but France has a hard time with it with no help as we see in wwi

> the fuck does this have to do with Germany's invasion of Poland in 1939?
>Nothing, but you're not acting civil so...

the fuck does this have to do with Germany' NEEDING the non-aggression pact?
Germany needed the Russians. Deal with it.

they probably needed the Russians on board so Russia didn't come in against them taking all of that land themselves, but not in order to take out Poland. I'm still confused on what that post on what happened after the war had to do with the discussion on the invasion of Poland

Poles still had mounted pikemen during ww2 kek

>How is pictures of atrocities related?

I have a whole bunch of ww2 pics I could dump. I thought I had a mounted pikeman pic but I didnt.

>>> /pol/
>Instead you post a naked prisoner with no context to derail an intellectual discussion with graphic memes.
> You have contributed SO MUCH to the DISCUSSION. O.O

>american troops in the background
>surrendered german soldiers

How much explaining does the picture really require?

Germany got BTFO of France within a couple of months despite the allies needing to do an amphibious landing.

Yeah, but that wasn't a fuck-up, it was inevitable. An amphibious landing isn't that difficult when you have practically uncontested naval and air superiority.

And the Brits pulled out at Dunkirk leaving them on their own

Yes

>Poles still had mounted pikemen during ww2 kek

Mounted troops were pretty common on the eastern front. All combatants were heavily reliant on millions of horses. It could be a pretty primitive war in the East at times.

Part of it was the huge defeatist attitude that had been simmering within france since WWI. They didnt want another war where they would lose a million men. And this was toxic to their politicians and officer core and greatly reduced their morale and capacity to withstand the psychological impact of Germany's aggressive campaign.

The french military also didnt do things like realise the importance and reliability of radios in the field. For example Maurice Gamelin stuck to using phones which because he was old school. Except phone lines get cut almost immediately during an attack which makes communication impossible. The Germans on the other hand had realised the significance of the radio and used it a lot more.

So the history of SWEDEN YES! goes back for a while now?

>Part of it was the huge defeatist attitude that had been simmering within france since WWI. They didnt want another war where they would lose a million men. And this was toxic to their politicians and officer core and greatly reduced their morale and capacity to withstand the psychological impact of Germany's aggressive campaign.

Sounds like they shouldn't have declared war then. It's not like Germany was coming west unless it had to.

>most of WW1 was mobile warfare
>french front for most of time was very static
>UK and France assumed that front represented new war, instead being exception
>Germany like few others took more correct conclusion

Hitler and a few other generals were the only ones who thought the paradigm had changed. Most of his generals wanted to go through the Maginot Line. It's one of those things were he can't be a genius because he lost... but he's a genius. He was talented in so many ways it's hardly comprehensible.

>lose roughly 2/3 of all men in WWI
>not enough time for regained population to achieve prime fighting age
Gee, I wonder...

It was even worse than that, many commanders insisted on using motorcycle couriers to relay information.

They did, and their calvary charges against INFANTRY fuckin' worked.

And it turns out that machinegun bulets can't stop a fucking calvary charge.

Because a significant portion of the French Army had been surrounded in Belgium and destroyed. After the Dunkirk pocket was eliminated, the Germans actually significantly outnumbered the French.

Of course, this just built on simmering defeatism that was already there. French government officials had already started to burn documents when the first breakthrough happened at the Sedan.

Am I reading this map right? Did the Germans break through the Maginot Line in mid June?

Not really the biggest military fuck up as much as it is the biggest military oversight.
The Maginot line, if extend properly through the Ardennes, likely would have held off the Germans and stopped them in their tracks for a good while, certainly long enough for support to come push them out if needed.

>The 4th Republic was weak
>4th republic
senpai, I...

>if Sweden hadn't been so dedicated to """""neutrality"""""
Ok, I fixed the post.

Not really because in this case Sweden was helping the aryan supremacists, not letting immigrants in

>what is a puppet state

do you guys seriously not know this?

even if they weren't complete puppet states, it's very easy to install yourself in a position of power if you're sympathetic with the invading enemy's ideology.

the balkans is way more mountainous, and therefore easier to conduct gorilla warfare in

If you talking about the Korsun Massacre from 'Russia At War' and repeated on Dan Carlin's podcast, its a myth. Most of the Germans broke out.

history.army.mil/BOOKS/WWII/20234/20-2344.htm

Dude they send thousands on tanks over mountains and who the fuck knows how many rivers

germans be crazy i tell you

it's not as much the mountains and rivers part as it is literally tens of thousands of vehicles... through four (4) roads
there were traffic jams for hours, days even, it was an incredible risk - but with an incredible payoff
just a teeny tiny bit more competent (or lucky) allied command would have stopped world war 2 there and then

Yup. One of the French generals (forget who) literally got reports from reconnaissance aircraft saying
>hey guys there's a massive column of vehicles stuck in a traffic jam in the Ardennes
And the reports were dismissed as being impossible.

> What's the use of building an impenetrable wall if the enemy is going to walk around it i.e. the Germans through the Ardennes.
Ther Germans are going to have to guard their inpenetrable wall with men, which reduces the number of troops available for Belgium. The French in turn, are free to deploy more troops to the north, secure in the knowledge that the fortifications will provide a nice force multiplier.

What could have been, if they had their shit together, and the British sent some Halifax's over that.

Lack of will on the part of a dissolusioned French citizenry,

French Generals who were still stuck in the past,

German generals who spent years coming up with ways not to get bogged down like the last time.

The Soviets literally declared war on Poland as the Polish Army collapsed. You're either a Russiaboo unable to swallow that fact, or a polefag who likes to "LOL NAZIS AND SOVIETS TEAMING UP TO TAKE US DOWN POLAN STRONG"

The point of the Maginot Line without its extension towards Belgium was literally that - for Germans to walk over it. A meeting engagement not on French soil caused by funnelling the Germans north was the operational plan of the allies. Except the Germans subverted it by striking through the Ardennes which were generally speaking thought to be a bad place for a general offensive.

>to walk over it
*around
obviously

>Is this the biggest military fuck-up of all time?

Nope
Prussia once got conquered in 19 days

Yeah, because that totally not what happens in 90% of cases after you get conquered, right?

Totally didnt happen during the Roman conquests, totally didnt happen during Napoleon's conquests, totally didnt happen during colonization, totally diidnt happen to Central Powers after WW1, totally didnt happen to Germany and Japan after WW2...

I think this whole "gassing the kikes" thing prevents you to see how typical of war the situation actually was

The French fucked everything up. During the initial fighting the Belgian and French flanks failed to hold and since they had commited all available forces to the fight they had no strategic reserves left to maneuver. Churchill himself was in Paris when he heard about the French strategy and was dumbfounded by it.

I'm not even trying to meme. The French fucked up.

The war didn't happened on german territory.

The Russians reached East Prussia for a time at the beginning, but yeah, for the most part the war didn't reach Germany until the peace

The Russiands totally sacked Eastern Prussia.

>I'm not even trying to meme. The French fucked up.

The whole entire German high command was just going to attack through Belgium straight into the Anglo--Franco, Belgian army. The only thing that stopped that was Hitler standing his ground on the attack through the Ardennes until he told everyone to fuck off and found Manstein who was the only person to agree with him.

Wasn't the whole thing due to political reasons?
In the sense that France couldn't extent the line on the Belgium border because this would signal to the Belgians that France was willing to abandon them to potential German invasion.

The Ardennes are not like the Alps. They are smaller and much easier to pass through.

Oh look, it's this thread again, and as usual it's nothing but nonsense.

Top keke pepe

Yeah that's why they didn't extend it.

But even then the allied plan was sound enough, it was not somehow inherently flawed.

>Literally how could this happen? Is this the biggest military fuck-up of all time?
Typical question from a country lacking a ground border with Germany. No, it was not the biggest military blunder of all time (there was way worse, one of them the """"Invasion"""" of Canada by the United States of America in 1812 or around). It ended fast because two giants fighting could never last long on a small terrain. It does not mean however, that there were not a fight put up by the French (despite anglo/german propaganda).
For instance, little do you know that the Luftwaffe lost more planes during the Battle of France than during the Battle of England (1059 vs 1052, from the book "The Battle of Britain", which I dont have here so can't tell the author (sorry I know this lacks precision because there probably are more than one book about the Battle of Britain, given how britbongs like the smell of their own farts)).

I think one has to separate two issues - the result was maybe a contender for one of the biggest fuck ups - a seriously strong military power brought to its knees in less than two months.

The circumstances which lead to it however do not fit the bill of such a fuck up, I think. Certainly underestimating the potential of funnelling thousands of vehicles through a couple of roads in hilly forested terrain (resulting inthe above colalpse) is *a* fuckup, but no way the biggest of all time.

Dude, France never had trouble with Germany, France basically created Germany (Rhine Confederation). 1870 is particular, it's a full modern country fighting their hearts out to finally be acknowledged by France as more than a door rug, fighting a deeply corrupted France (Banana Republic tier, litterally).

Then in WWI, Germany is twice the size/population of France, yet the French took more than half o f the blow, and eventually defeated Germany. We did have allies sure. Then again, no European power could have handled Germany single handedly in that time, given how ridiculously powerfull rich and modern it was.

>The Maginot line worked, the problem is the Maginot line ended at Belgium

Because Germany would never invade France through Belgium twice. Thats just silly.

Dude, it don't deny it was a fuck up. But a contender for the biggest? not fucking even close rolfmao.
Care to compare to Xerses? Just for another really obvious one.

The biggest fuckup in the BoF was superior officers in the Armee de l'Air refusing to acknowledge recon reports of tanks in the Ardennes, twice.

Are you unironically saying the War of 1812 was on par with the mistake made by the French army on the onset of WW2? Jesus fucking christ

The allied command literally counted on the Germans to invade via Belgium. That was the entire, basic, core purpose of building the Maginot line.

It's a complicated thing.

For the plan itself it was very inelastic battle-plan French were using. They've knew that you can't make an invasion through Ardennes so they've ignored it.

Germans decided that they may not expect that route of attack.

Now, the French have thrown ALL their forces and reserves to the low countries and couldn't react in any way to it which then ended up in their army being surrounded and the resistance being futile. The skeleton force they've had guarding the Ardennes just wasn't able to stop there and they've had no means to help them.

Germans in fact had a lot of troubles as well because the region had VERY poor infrastructure, but due to French being too slow to react on their breakthrough, they've managed to succeed.

Obviously the reasons why it happened as it did lies in both old-guard retardation of the French army(they've ignored the need for improving communications which were huge problem during WW1, very costly mistake), political infighting, very low peacetime military budgets and so forth.

That was to be expected from the country that treated Joffre as some kind of war hero and brilliant general though.

One amazing tidbit about supply, German tanks ran on gas, french tanks ran on diesel. When The germans were out of gas they pulled up at french gas stations, Frenchies were fucked if they couldn't get diesel supplied.

I was memeing, friend. However it was still a nice blunder you did up there, don't you think?

Which was backwards shithole even before sacking.

Silesia, Ruhr etc. were left untouched. Meanwhile the most fertile and industrialised part of France had to be partially restricted to military and the funds that were supposed to serve for clearing it didn't even get there.

Put that on top of politicians being generally ignorant towards the fact that Germans were doing stealthy rearmament since the late 20's and you have a recipe for disaster.

Sweden played both sides, I don't remember the allies complaining about their Bofors 40mm cannons, especially when defending against Kamikaze planes in the pacific in late '44. Sweden was loaded with both facists and commies, but russia was the ancestral enemy and we don't do business with ancestral enemies. Can't have them as an ally if they are stronger than you, that's the way you end up like eastern Europe. Our commies went to the spansih civil war and our facists (large part of the officer corps) went to the Finnish winter war.