Re: [OT] French was: [SG]Artillery

At 10:13 PM +0200 5/27/02, K.H.Ranitzsch wrote:
>This could become another of those much-beloved OT discussions,
still...
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "John Atkinson" <johnmatkinson@yahoo.com>
>>  Otherwise the French would have learned something in
>>  the time period between 1870 and 1940 (a mere 70
>>  years, I'll admit) that would prevent their getting
>>  beat twice (and within 2 Brit Corps of getting beat a
>>  third time in between them).
>
>Haven't you conveniently forgotten a minor conflict called " WW I "
that
>happened within that timespan ?
>IIRC, the French won that one. Admittedly, they had allies, but so did
the
>Germans.

The introduction of the US in WWI was what allowed the armistice to 
be arrived at. The French didn't even come close to winning WWI. 
Remember, Germany no longer had to worry abut Russia after a point. 
WWI was not a resounding victory for France despite what ever she and 
Britain said.

However, they learned lots of things before WWI. Use lots of men to 
bull through defences and you will win by use of 'elan' and valor. 
That didn't work in the trench warfare of WWI. Next they learned that 
you invest lots of time and money in strong static defenses and build 
really big tanks (Char2 Bis). Those tanks are to be used piecemeal 
and in penny packets. Of course we know how long the defense of 
France in '39 lasted. What was it a week or two?

>Plus, AFAIK, after 1940, the Free French forces fought quite decently.

After being equipped by US and British sources as well as having been 
retrained by US and British Advisors.

-- 
--
Ryan Gill		  rmgill@mindspring.com
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