185: Through the Ardennes

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While fighting was occurring to the north, it was through the Ardennes that the decisive German forces were moving. 10 Years of Podcasting Update: https://www.patreon.com/posts/10-years-of-107050529

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Hello everyone and welcome to History of the Second World War Episode 185 - The Fall of France - Through the Ardennes. This week a big thank you goes out to Vaughn and Matthew for choosing to support the podcast by becoming members, you can find out more about supporting the podcasting over at historyofthesecondworldwar.com/members. On a bit of a programming note: last week was the 10th anniversary of the start of History of the Great War. Over the last 10 years I have released over 500 episodes and I just wanted to thank everybody who is listening, or has listened to one of those episodes. I would also like to send out special thanks to everyone who has ever been a member, left a review of the podcast online, or told anybody in their life about the podcast you all are the reason that so many new people are listening all the time. Of course 10 years is just a number, and there are still many more years ahead. You can head to the link in the show notes to find out more about the podcast in the next year, and the triumphant return of member only episodes over on the Patreon page for the podcast. These will be monthly episodes covering a wide range of topics outside of the narrative of the show. Currently there are two new member episodes, a deep dive into the development of the Panzer 3 tank and an entire episode where I reconsider some of my views on the French and German war plans of 1914 a decade after I first discussed them on History of the Great War. Again that link is in the show notes or you can find it over at patreon.com/historyofthegreatwar. For the German soldiers of Army Group A that began to move forward for their attacks on May 10th 1940 the following days were a blur of marching, marching, and more marching. Some of the men at the front of the various units did encounter the enemy, but the vast majority of the soldiers were stacked up in endless lines of men, vehicles, and horses as they moved West. The lack of roads in the region did make travel slower, although it was far from impossible, with the greatest challenge simply being the volume of traffic that resulted from the German plans to make their primary point of effort to the west of the Ardennes forest. And while this episode will, as always, take a higher level view of events, it is worth noting that the plans were only known to a very small number of men, and the vast majority of those German forces marching west on May 10th had only the vaguest idea of what was about to happen. The 1st Panzer Division was part of General Heinz Guderian’s 19th Corps, and within that division was Gefreiter Otto Gull, he was an engineer and this is what he would have to say about his understanding of what was happening: “I had no real sense of the general plan – that was for the generals – and only an outline of what our division had to achieve. We had been told the night before that all our training had been done to push us through the Ardennes and across the Meuse. That was our objective. We were given a vague idea that what we were doing was vital to the operation and that speed was vital. No time-wasting.” But even if they did not know the specifics, men like Gull knew the destination, the Meuse, and it would be on the banks of the Meuse that the success or failure of the German plan would be decided.

While the men of units like the 1st Panzer were slogging towards the border, in the early hours of May 10th the war had already started in the air. The German bomber crews were only informed of the invasion in the early hours of May 10th when they were briefed on what was to be done that day before heading to their aircraft. During the early days of the attack the primary point of German effort for the bombers were in the north. This served two primary purposes, the first was to try and eliminate any possible threat from the Dutch and Belgian air forces. The second was to make it seem like the primary German attack was going to come in the north, with the hope being that the French would believe that the Germans were focusing on wherever their bombers were. These bombing attacks in the early hours were a mixed bag of success and failure. They did do a good job of reducing the strength of the Dutch and Belgian forces, but had far less success against the British and French airfields that they also targeted. And they would pay for their efforts, with 126 German medium bombers and 9 dive bombers being destroyed during the first day of operations. When combined with the fighter losses of about 21 this represented roughly 6 percent of the combat strength of the Luftwaffe. Speaking of those fighters, while their bombing efforts were heavily focused to the north, there was always a strong presence of German fighters over the Ardennes, with the hope that they could intercept at least some proportion of allied reconnaissance aircraft. It was always going to be almost impossible to intercept them all, particularly before the widespread presence of radar, but even a reduction of information to the Allied Intelligence staffs would be valuable. On the Allied side, their bombing forces would also be active during the opening days of the attack. Initially there was focus on the bridges over the Albert Canal and the Meuse river in Belgium, bridges that were critical to the ability of the German forces to continue their attack in the area. But of course the Germans also knew of their importance and had ensured that there was adequate anti-aircraft fire available to ward off Allied bombers. The attacks on these bridges would be a disaster, and it would be a disaster that would repeat itself in different places many times in the days that followed. In the attacks British, French, and Belgian light and medium bombers would try to attack the bridges, although never in large enough number of overwhelm the German defenses. They would also often fly in at a low altitude, as that was the only way they had a real hope of hitting the bridges, but this also made them easy targets for the German gunners. In one attack on a bridge over the Meuse 12 Belgian bombers would arrive at the bridge at roughly the same time, 11 of them would be shot down. But at least those bombers were able to find their objectives, similarly heavy losses were suffered by other squadrons, sometimes without even finding their targets. The German forces in the Ardennes would not be the target for heavy Allied bombing during the first few days of the advance, but there would be a few sorties launched against them. One of these was launched by 8 Fairey Battles a British light bomber that would not serve its crews well over France. Here is the quote about the mission from the official RAF history: “Eight Battles of Nos. 88 and 218 Squadrons were ordered to deliver a low-level attack on a column in German territory moving up towards the Luxembourg border. Whether they managed to reach their target area is doubtful. The only pilot to return saw three of his companions succumb to ground fire in the Ardennes.” On May 11th and 12th air attacks would continue to be launched by both sides, with the Germans shifting their focus in the north to bombing French and British formations moving into Belgium while the Allied efforts continued to target German formations and bridges. On the afternoon of the 12th, with the continued flow of information that German forces were pushing towards the Meuse in the south, the French General Georges, who was in overall command of all Allied forces in Belgium ordered that Allied bombing support would from that point forward prioritize the 2nd Army, which was facing the German advance through the Ardennes. However, this shift would not occur in time to prevent the crossing of the Meuse by those German forces, partially because the commander of the French First Army, General Billotte, ignored the order while the commander of the 2nd Army, which was about to get hit by a German steamroller, was not very concerned about the situation and did not even request additional assistance. By the end of the 12th the Allied air forces were already losing their ability to greatly influence the flow of the battle though. For example the British had 135 bombers in France when the German attack began, and after just two days of fighting that number had almost halved down to 72. The attrition among all of the air forces involved during these early days was horrible, and the campaign had barely begun.

While the battle in the air continued, on the ground the attack would begin in the early hours of May 10th, with the target not being France but instead the tiny country of Luxembourg. Moving through Luxembourg was always going to be important for the German attack, and it occupied about half of the front that Army Group A was going to move through in its attack. Capturing roads through Luxembourg was important for two reasons though. The first was simple, so that the units that were going to move through to attack France could move through quickly. The second was wrapped around the German concerns about the Maginot Line. As the German plans developed in the weeks and months before May 10th, there was real concern that as the German mobile forces pushed west across the Meuse the French would mount a major attack against their southern flank from their positions in the Maginot Line. The attack was designed to skirt around the northern side of the defenses, and so the German 16th Army under the command of General Busch was dedicated to guarding against the possibility of a French attack. It would also be Busch’s forces that would play the primary role in the opening attacks on Luxembourg. To try and ensure that the attack went smoothly the plan called for an airborne attack, something that Busch was not a big fan of. Busch wanted to use two fast motorized forces to quickly move into Luxembourg and capture all of the major points of concern as quickly as possible, but on the ground. Hitler, and others, felt that there was a risk with this plan due to the relatively small number of roads available for the operation. If these roads were blocked or the motorized forces were slowed down it might give time for the French to react, and their solution was an airborne attack. However, with most of the German airborne troops and more importantly transports occupied in Belgium the airborne attacks in Luxembourg would be a bit different. Instead of utilizing the workhorse transport aircraft of the Luftwaffe the Ju-52, these attacks would instead use the Fieseler-Storch Fi-156. I am generally a fan of how aircraft look, and I think even aircraft that many consider ugly to have some level of charm, but the Storch is not one of those aircraft. It is small, ugly, and each aircraft could only carry a handful of men. But that did not mean that they could not accomplish the job. They would transport small units of men to critical points throughout Luxembourg, which they would then hold while the mobile units under Busch’s command moved as quickly as possible to reinforce them. This operation would begin just after 4AM on the 10th when 25 Storch’s took off from their airfields. They would make multiple trips to bring in more and more men, and the operation would be entirely successful, with no real resistance from the Luxembourg border guards and a complete lack of resistance from the French. There were French forces positioned to move into Luxembourg, as it was well understood that the Germans would almost certainly move through the country, but much like with Belgium they could not move into the country first due to Luxembourg’s neutrality. This meant that the French plan was to wait for the German attack and then quickly move French cavalry forces forward to slow and maybe even stop the German advance. Two things would go wrong with this plan right from the start. The first was that a large number of the men in these units were on leave or were at least away from their units due to a lengthy period of high alert that had occurred just a few weeks early in April. The men had also been dispersed throughout the area. This greatly reduced their ability to quickly move and concentrate their forces. The second problem was due to how long it took them to receive orders to move. Even though reports began arriving almost immediately after the German attack began it would not be until almost 7 AM, around 2 hours after the attack started that orders would arrive for French forces to move forward. This gave them very little time establish themselves in Luxembourg before they were being pushed back by the German forces in front of them. They were heavily outnumbered and so their only hope had been to establish strong blocking positions where the advantage provided by German numbers was reduced, but they never had a chance to put those plans into place. Many of the German troops would not even encounter any resistance before they reached the Belgian or French border on the other side of Luxembourg.

The quick capture of Luxembourg was critical because it helped to unlock Panzer Group Kleist for its move west. The forces under Kliest were the strongest motorized and armored force that had ever been assembled for an attack up to that point in history. It had 5 Panzer divisions and 3 motorized infantry divisions, with two more Panzer divisions under the Fourth Army’s 15th Corps immediately to its north. This collection of forces was to play the pivotal role in the German attack, but that did not mean that everyone saw its plan and role the same way. When the German generals had been planning for the attack of this very large mobile formation the same types of disagreements that had occurred in Poland, and would later occur in Russia were present, exactly how should the infantry and mobile divisions work together. In this area of the front this was an even more important conversion because of the exact organization of the German forces. Kleist’s Panzer group was not given its own sector of the front, and was instead set up simply as the forward units the infantry armies that would follow. In some ways this made sense, as they could move quickly and then would need infantry divisions to come in behind to occupy territory, and might even need infantry support at various moments. However, Kleist was very concerned that the organizational structure would be used to keep a leash on his far more mobile units. This was the great concern of almost even German armored general during these war years, and is something that is discussed at length by men like Guderian in post war accounts. The concern was that with so many of the German generals, especially more experienced commanders like Army Group A’s commander General von Rundstedt, having a long history of infantry leadership there would be a tendency to subordinate armored units to the needs of the infantry. This would reduce the ability of the armored forces to use their mobility and striking power to achieve their objectives. Kleist would not completely remove this risk before the campaign began, however he was able to get von Rundstedt to at least agree that he would have complete operational freedom in the opening phases of the attack, and he would retain that freedom for as long as his mobile units stayed ahead of the infantry armies that followed. However, this freedom would be removed, and his troops would become subordinated to the armies that followed, if they were slowed down by French resistance. With his operational freedom guaranteed at least for the time being, Kleist turned his concern to the other major problem that his troops would have to contend with, roads. For the German attack roads were a problem, and they would continue to be a problem because there would never be enough of them. The lack of roads was one of the reasons that the French discounted the threat of a German attack through this area of the front, and it was a real problem. Essentially Kleist’s entire Panzer Group of 8 divisions had just 4 roads to move forward on. This meant that his forces would, at least initially, be strung out over 400 kilometers of those roads, which was far from ideal. There were more roads that could have been used, but these were zealously protected by the commanders of other units, for the same reason that Kleist wanted them, every German officer who was assigned to this sector of the front wanted to have as many roads a possible to move their troops forward. To try and reduce the supply problems that would almost certainly result from this lack of roads a few different measures were taken to try and give the forward most units as many supplies as possible during the attack. The first concern for the armored and motorized forces was fuel and so they were given as much fuel as they could carry and then stockpiles were built up right up to the border with Luxembourg. This would ensure that all of the forces would cross the border with as much as they could carry to give them as much endurance as possible. Every other type of supply was also stockpiled near the border, with plans to move those stockpiles forward as soon as possible, but this would take time. Kleist’s forces were also provided with more trucks to send forward with their forward elements, all loaded with as much cargo as they could carry. It was these forward elements that were most at risk of running out of supplies because the roads would be packed with other units trying to move forward and so it would be very challenging to get supply trucks to them after the advance started. Many of these trucks were simply loaded to capacity with fuel cans, with the idea being that they could be placed as far forward as possible in the columns, and then they could just hand the gas cans to the vehicle crews as they continued forward. These arrangements would actually work quick well during the opening days of the attack, although they would eventually reach their limit in the frantic race after the crossing the Meuse. Not everything went perfect for Kleist’s forces though. A particular problem was the movement of the Corps commanded by General Reinhardt which was supposed to move forward and cross the Meuse at the same time as the Corps commanded by Guderian. Instead of being able to move forward on schedule the men under Reinhardt’s command had to wait hour after after because of traffic jams that were occurring in front of them. This meant that they would not even cross through Luxembourg until early on May 12th, far later that expected, but there was nothing that they could do because of the delays of the units in front of them.

It was not just the lack of roads or organizational disagreements that the German forces had to deal with in their advance though, there were also French and Belgian forces in place to at the very least slow them down. In both cases the forces that were in place were given the mission of slowing down the German advance through the use of roadblocks and demolition. On the Belgian side there were two divisions, the 1st Ardennes Light Infantry and the 1st Cavalry Division while on the French side it was a total of 5 cavalry divisions and a few independent cavalry brigades. It is worth noting here that while some of these cavalry troops were the traditional horse mounted troops, during the 1930s a good portion of the cavalry troops in all of the armies had been converted into simply mobile forces with trucks or armored cars. There were still some horse mounted units, and in the case of the Ardennes area this was actually an advantage in terms of overall mobility. In the French army particularly, the cavalry forces were often some of the very best and most modern forces, which I am only emphasizing here because I don’t want you thinking that this is an instances where troops were being sent forward with lances against the German Panzers. One of the challenges that these forces would have is that they had generally different ideas about what their goals were in the Ardennes. When the French and Belgian commanders met on the morning of May 10th to coordinate their efforts these differences would rapidly come to the forefront. For the French cavalry troops the goal was to push forward through Belgium and Luxembourg as quickly as possible, make contact with the German troops and delay them as long as possible. During these delaying actions they would retreat to the west and southwest to continue to screen the primary line of French resistance that extended north along the border. On the Belgian side the goals were slightly different. They were instead planning on minimal resistance to the German advances, and instead they planned to conserve their strength while delaying the German advance by destroying bridges and causing damage to roads. As they retreated, instead of moving west and southwest they instead planned to retreat northwest towards Belgian forces around Namur. For both sides these plans made perfect sense in isolation and they both would accomplish their goals. The French wanted to delay any German advance as long as possible before it reached the French border, the Belgians wanted to commit their strength only in areas where they had any chance of success, which the isolated forces here in far southern Belgium did not have. However, as an area where the two armies needed to work together the differences in their plans as a real problem. The differences would never really be resolved, and over the course of the days that followed there would be multiple instances where this lack of coordination would impact the ability of both armies to defense themselves against German attacks.

One of the German units that was advancing through this area was the 1st Panzer Division, which was one of the divisions at the very forefront of the advance. Its goals during the first day were to move through Luxembourg and then all the way to the Belgian village of Neufchâteau. This would require an advance of around 65 kilometers. Due to concerns that this advance could be halted or seriously delayed by the Belgian cavalry troops that were known to be in the area another airborne operation was planned along the route of advance of the 1st Panzer. Here again the ugly Storch would be used, this time with 100 of them making two troops to place German infantry troops along the route of advance in Belgium roughly between Martelange on the Belgium-Luxembourg border, Bodange, and Neufchâteau. These troops were from the Gross Deutschland Regiment and had been specially trained for this operation. These actions would not be executed perfectly, with some of the planes flying to the wrong area due to fog, but they would generally be successful with the German forces under Oberstleutnant Garski gathering together at the village of Witry by mid-day on the 10th. They were then able to begin their advance on their primary object of Bodange later in the day. Witry had been mostly undefended, but Bodange would be a different story, with Bodange defended by Belgian soldiers of the 5th Company Chasseurs Ardennais. But the plan was never for the airborne forces to capture Bodange by themselves, but instead simply to prevent the forces there from being reinforced. Capturing territory and securing the roads was just one of the goals of the German airborne drop though, the other was to sow a bit of confusion and perhaps even fear into the French and Belgian officers in the area, and this is exactly what would happen. It was unclear to the troops in Bodange exactly how many German troops had landed behind them, with reports ranging from a few men to an entire airborne division. The Belgian’s understood that Bodange was important, and had put real effort into building out their defensive positions in the town, with the Germans describing the situation like this: ‘well-camouflaged and carefully fortified positions of fire. The defence was strong. Everywhere there were dense and deep rolls of barbed wire; the roads and trails were all blocked. It was not possible to go around them: that would accomplish nothing. It was necessary that we go directly over them.’ But even with these advantages, with the defending forces split in two to defend from both directions, and with no hope of being reinforced it was only a matter of time before they were overwhelmed. The first German attacks, mounted entirely by infantry, were actually repulsed due to the fierce Belgian defense. But after the German armored forces arrived from the east late in the afternoon the artillery pieces that they brought with them went to work. The last message received from the Belgian commanded, Major Maurice Bricart, would be sent at around 4PM. He reported heavy casualties, that ammunition was running low, but that his men were defending the village house by house. They would old on for a few more hours, but by 7PM the Germans had fully cleared the area. The defenders of Bodange had been destroyed, but they had managed to delay the German advance for around 6 hours. Other small Belgian and French defensive units would also had some success, and in fact the German Panzer forces would almost universally not reach their opening day objectives on May 10th. But in all cases the advances would continue the next day.

For the 1st Panzer this meant launching their attack on Neufchâteau early in the morning on the 11th. But this attack would not be a straightforward assault. The French had moved forces into Neufchâteau and they were supported by artillery that had been positioned to support the defense. Instead of directly attacking these troops the Panzer forces that had moved forward during the night instead bypassed the main French resistance and moved further to the west. Their targets were Warmifontaine, Petitvoir, and then Biourge which could all be reached by advancing to the south of the primary French defenses and then moving west along the road. These attacks would be very successful, and over the course of a few hours the French defending forces in this area had been pushed out of their positions. By 1230 Petitvoir had been captured, and around Warmifontaine German tanks had been positioned to fire on French positions further north to prevent them from cutting off the German forces that were continuing to push west. The 1st Panzer Regiment would become bogged down, but then the 2nd would be able to leap frog them to continue the advance. Biourge would be reached by the middle of the afternoon and this meant that all of the French forces in Neufchâteau were cut off from their planned route of retreat. These actions, combined with the airborne operations around Bodange, are a great example of why the French defenders would have so many problems halting the German advance during these early days of the offensive. The German forces were not just using brute force to push through defenses, they were inventive and reactive to what they saw in front of them. Some of these inventive attacks were pre-planned, like the airborne operations. But others were closer to improvisations on the ground, with the commanders of units like the 1st and 2nd Panzer Regiments mostly just reacting to the situation as they advanced south and west of Neufchâteau. In the end they would all work out very well, and even though in some cases the French and Belgian forces were able to delay the German forces, they were unable to prevent their inexorable march towards the Meuse.