Seventy years ago today, Friday May 10, 1940, Nazi Germany launched its long awaited attack in the West. Attacking neutral Holland (using paratroopers) and Belgium, German Army Group A started a diversionary attack (referred to as “the Matadors cape”) through the Low Countries and into North Eastern France. The very best of the Allied armies (the British Expeditionary Force, The French 1st and 7th Armies as well as the French armored cavalry corps ) went forward to meet them just as the Germans planned. However the main German thrust was by Army Group B and went through the Ardennes forest which was considered impassable for tanks. Passing through the impassable Ardennes (and with no allied air attacks on their long stretched out columns) , the Nazis (in which a virtually unknown at the time commander of the 7th panzer division – called the ghost division because they moved so fast- named Erwin Rommel greatly distinguished himself) crossed the Meuse River near Sedan and Dinant on May 13 and then instead of attacking Paris, they swung northeast in a great scythe to cut off the Allied armies fighting in Belgium. Eventually the allies retreated to Dunkirk where the British were miraculously able to evacuate 337,000 British and French troops to England. After regrouping, the Germans then swung South to rout the remainder of the French Army and Paris was occupied on June 14. Eventually France capitulated on June 25, 1940 (being forced to sign the armistice in the same railway car in which French Marshal Foch made the Germans sign their armistice on November 11, 1918). The Maginot Line was never attacked but was merely encircled by German Army Group C. On May 10th another momentous event happened – fed up with the pathetic leadership of Neville Chamberlain as well as being mortified over the failures of the Norwegian campaign, Winston Churchill took over as Prime Minister. As poor as Churchill was as a military strategist, he was brilliant as a political leader and he and he alone, kept Britain still on board in the fight against Hitler until June 22, 1941 when Hitler attacked the USSR and December 11, 1941 when Germany declared war against the United States. Sad to say but there are no more Churchill’s in Britain (Maggie Thatcher was the last) and certainly we cannot look to the White House for Churchill type of leadership. Today, Britain and the rest of the democracies of the world are facing threats from an enemy who while not nearly as competent as Nazi Germany, are just as determined to conquer.
Note – there are a lot of myths concerning the Nazi attack on the West
The Germans had overwhelming superiority in manpower.
False – the allied forces of France, Britain, Belgium and Holland outnumbered the Germans (who had to leave 30 divisions in Poland to keep an eye on the U.S.S.R as well as 7 divisions in Norway).
The Germans had an overwhelming superiority in tanks.
False – the allies had more and better tanks. The Germans however used them in masse at critical points in order to achieve a substantial numerical advantage at critical points.
The Germans dominated the battlefield.
False – the vast majority (90%) of the German army (the same with the allies) was composed of infantry divisions. Where the French and the British infantry divisions went up against German infantry divisions, they held their own. The key factor was the Nazi concentrated use of tanks combined with air support.
The French Army was poor.
False- the individual French solder was good (and the best French soldiers were the Algerian, Moroccan, Vietnamese, and Senegalese colonials who fought brilliantly). The problem was the French military leadership which was stuck in a World War I mindset
by Bruce Walker
Seventy years ago, on May 10, 1940, Winston Churchill became Prime Minister of Great Britain. He had been warning the world about the dangers of Nazism for almost a decade. He had been warning the world about the dangers of Bolshevism since 1918. By the time Churchill became Prime Minister, the British had seen Nazis overrun Poland, Denmark, and Norway. Churchill was watching helplessly as the German Army routed the combined armies of France, Britain, Holland, and Belgium.
The new prime minister did not just face the fury of Hitler’s hordes. Stalin had been a close and effective ally of Hitler since August 1939. Mussolini would quickly pounce and join with Germany against Britain. Japan menaced Commonwealth democracies and British interests in the Pacific. Enemies were everywhere.
Churchill was sixty-five when he first became prime minister. Three days after taking the premiership, Churchill told the British people what to expect: “I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears, and sweat.” His moving words were no exaggeration when he spoke them. Beyond that, few people in May 1940 thought that Britain could actually win the Second World War.
Churchill could have offered something else. Whatever the long-term intentions of the Nazis — and the historians’ battle on that point still rages — there is no doubt about what Hitler was publicly offering: peace, and a peace in which Britain could keep her island and her empire. Churchill, a Conservative, asked Clement Attlee, the Labour Party leader, to join the War Cabinet as Deputy Prime Minister. Attlee remained in the cabinet until Hitler was overcome. (Attlee would go on to defeat Churchill in the 1945 general election.)
Seventy years, almost to the day, after Churchill took over the government of Britain, the nation that produced the most inspiring opponent of totalitarianism and the most courageous politician in the first half of the twentieth century, British political parties contested in a general election, British party leaders showed their mettle and valor, and British voters cast their votes.
Today, Islamic terrorists and militants menace the same Western values that Hitler and Stalin threatened seven decades ago. Like Hitler, radical Islam hates Jews and gobbles up noxious nonsense like Mein Kampf and the Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion and believes that Christianity must be destroyed. Like Stalin, radical Islam sees our traditions of ordered liberty and personal freedom as problems. Like Imperial Japan, radical Islam uses suicide bombers. In short, radical Islam operates much like the enemies in the Second World War that Churchill asked his people to fight.
Yet the costs to the British people of stopping radical Islam are trite compared to the price of defeating Hitler, resisting Japanese Imperialism, or containing Communism. No British leader asks the British people to sacrifice serious creature comforts for a brief period of time to stop radical Islam. Churchill led a nation wishing and willing to be led. His eloquence spoke to minds which understood the evil of their enemy and to hearts which would bet their lives to defeat that evil.
Read the rest here: Blood, toil, tears and sweat
Tags: Bruce Walker, nazis
