History of the Second World War (8 page)

The mass of the troops and people, if not intoxicated by triumph, were doped by Dr Goebbels’s propaganda about Hitler desiring peace while the Allies were determined on the destruction of Germany. Unfortunately, the Allied statesmen and Press furnished Goebbels with all too many quotable morsels of this kin d that he could use to support his picture of the Allied wolf wanting to devour the German lamb.

While this first wartime plot against Hitler was stillborn, he did not succeed in launching his offensive in the autumn as he had hoped. Ironically, that proved fortunate for him and unfortunate for the rest of the world - including the German people.

The date provisionally fixed for the offensive was November 12. On the 5th Brauchitsch made a fresh attempt to dissuade Hitler from invading France, setting forth at much length the reasons against it. But Hitler rebuffed his arguments and rebuked him severely, while insisting that the attack must start on the 12th. On the 7th, however, the order was cancelled — when meteorologists forecast bad weather. The date was put off three days, and then postponed again and again.

While the bad and bitter weather that set in was an obvious ground for postponement, Hitler was furious at having to acquiesce, and far from satisfied that it was the only cause. He summoned all the high commanders to a conference, on November 23. Here he set out to dispel their doubts about the necessity of taking the offensive — expressing anxiety about the looming menace of Russia, while emphasising that the Western Allies would not consider his peace offers and were multiplying their armaments. ‘Time is working for our adversary.’ ‘We have an Achilles’ Heel — the Ruhr. . . . If Britain and France push through Belgium and Holland into the Ruhr, we shall be in the greatest danger.’

He went on to reproach them with faint-heartedness, and let them know that he suspected them of trying to sabotage his plans. He pointed out that they had opposed each of his steps from the re-occupation of the Rhineland onwards, that he had been justified by success each time, and that he now expected them to follow his ideas unconditionally. Brauchitsch’s attempt to point out the differences and greater risks in the new venture merely drew down on his head a harder rebuke. That evening Hitler saw Brauchitsch privately and gave him a further ‘dressing down’. Brauchitsch thereupon tendered his resignation, but Hitler brushed it aside, and told him to obey orders.

However, the weather proved a better saboteur than the generals, and led to a fresh series of postponements during the first half of December. Then Hitler decided to wait until the New Year, and grant Christmas leave. The weather was again bad just after Christmas but on January 10 Hitler fixed the start of the offensive for the 17th.

But the very day he took that decision the most dramatic ‘intervention’ took place. The story of it has been mentioned in numerous accounts, but was most succinctly put in that of General Student, the Commander-in-Chief of the German Airborne Forces:

On January 10 a major detailed by me as liaison officer to the 2nd Air Fleet flew from Munster to Bonn to discuss some unimportant details of the plan with the Air Force. He carried with him, however,
the complete operational plan for the attack in the West.

In icy weather and a strong wind he lost his way over the frozen and snow-covered Rhine, and flew into Belgium, where he had to make a forced landing. He was unable to burn completely the vital document. Important parts of it fell into the hands of the Belgians, and consequently the outline of the German plan for the Western offensive. The German Air Attache in the Hague reported that on the same evening the King of the Belgians had a long telephone conversation with the Queen of Holland.*

* Liddell Hart:
The Other Side of the Hill,
p. 149.

Of course, the Germans did not know at the time exactly what had happened to the papers, but they naturally feared the worst, and had to reckon with it. In that crisis Hitler kept a cool head, in contrast to others:

It was interesting to watch the reactions of this incident on Germany’s leading men. While Goering was in a rage, Hitler remained quite calm and self-possessed. . . . At first he wanted to strike immediately, but fortunately refrained — and decided to drop the original operational plan entire. This was replaced by the Manstein plan.*

* Liddell Hart:
The Other Side of the Hill,
p. 149.

General Walter Warlimont, who held a key post* in the Supreme Command headquarters, recorded that Hitler made up his mind on January 16 to change the plan, and that ‘this was chiefly due to the air accident’.†

*
He was Deputy Chief of the O.K.W. Operations Staff, under General Jodl.

† Liddell Hart:
The Other Side of the Hill,
p. 155.

That proved very unfortunate for the Allies, even though they were given a further four months’ grace for preparation — since the German offensive was now put off indefinitely while the plan was being completely recast, and did not come until May 10. When it was launched, it threw the Allies completely off their balance and led to the speedy collapse of the French armies, while the British barely escaped by sea, from Dunkirk.

It is natural to ask whether the major’s forced-landing really was an accident. It might be expected that any of the German generals involved would after the war be only too glad to put himself in a favourable light with his captors by claiming that he had arranged this warning to the Allies. Yet, in fact, none did so — and all seemed convinced that the accident was quite genuine. But we know that Admiral Canaris, the head of the German Secret Service — who was later executed — took many hidden steps to thwart Hitler’s aims, and that just prior to the attacks in the spring on Norway, Holland, and Belgium, warnings were conveyed to the threatened countries — though they were not properly heeded. We know, too, that Canaris worked in mysterious ways, and was skilled in covering up his tracks. So the fateful accident of January 10 is bound to remain an open question.

No such doubt surrounds the origination of the new plan. It forms another strange episode — though strange in a different way.

The old plan, worked out by the General Staff under Halder, had been to make the main attack through central Belgium — as in 1914. It was to be carried out by Army Group ‘B’ under Bock, while Army Group ‘A’ under Rundstedt delivered a secondary attack, on the left, through the hilly and wooded Ardennes. No big results were expected here, and all the armoured divisions were allotted to Bock, as the General Staff regarded the Ardennes as far too difficult country for a tank drive.‡

‡ The French General Staff took exactly the same view. So had the British General Staff, When in November, 1933, I was consulted as to how our fast tank formations — which the War Office was just beginning to form — could best be used in a future war I had suggested that, in the event of a German invasion of France, we should deliver a tank counterstroke through the Ardennes. I was thereupon told that ‘the Ardennes were impassable to tanks’, to which I replied that, from personal study of the terrain, I regarded such a view as a delusion — as I had emphasised in several books between the wars.

The Chief of Staff of Rundstedt’s Army Group was Erich von Manstein — regarded by his fellows as the ablest strategist among the younger generals. He felt that the first plan was too obvious, and too much a repetition of the Schlieffen plan of 1914 — so that it was just the kind of stroke for which the Allied High Command would be prepared. Another drawback, Manstein argued, was that it would meet the British Army, which was likely to be a tougher opponent than the French. Moreover, it would not lead to a decisive result. To quote his own words:

We could perhaps defeat the Allied forces in Belgium. We could conquer the Channel coast. But it was probable that our offensive would be definitely stopped on the Somme. Then there would grow up a situation like 1914 . . . there would be no chance of reaching a peace.*

* Liddell Hart:
The Other Side of the Hill,
p. 152.

Reflecting on the problem, Manstein had already conceived the bold solution of shifting the main stroke to the Ardennes, feeling that this would be the line of least expectation. But there was one big question in his mind, about which he had consulted Guderian in November 1939.

Here is Guderian’s own account:

Manstein asked me if tank movements would be possible through the Ardennes in the direction of Sedan. He explained his plan of breaking through the extension of the Maginot Line near Sedan, in order to avoid the old-fashioned Schlieffen plan, familiar to the enemy and likely to be expected once more. I knew the terrain from World War I, and, after studying the map, confirmed his view. Manstein then convinced General von Rundstedt, and a memorandum was sent to O.K.H. [the Supreme Headquarters of the Army, headed by Brauchitsch and Halder]. O.K.H. refused to accept Manstein’s idea. But the latter succeeded in bringing his idea to Hitler’s knowledge.†

†
ibid,
pp. 153-4.

Warlimont brought Manstein’s idea to the notice of Hitler s headquarters, after a talk he had with Manstein in mid-December. He mentioned it to General Alfred Jodl, Chief of O.K.W. Operations Staff, who passed it on to Hitler. But it was only after the air accident of January 10, when Hitler was looking for a new plan, that Manstein’s proposal, thus brought back into his mind, began to get a hold. Even then a month passed before he swung definitely in favour of it.

The final decision was clinched in a curious way. Brauchitsch and Halder had not liked the manner in which Manstein had pressed his ‘brain-wave’ in opposition to their plan. So it was decided to remove him from his post, and send him to command an infantry corps — where he would be out of the main channel and not so well placed to push his ideas. But following this transfer he was summoned to see Hitler, and thus had an opportunity to explain his idea in full. This interview was arranged on the initiative of General Schmundt, Hitler’s chief aide-de-camp, who was a fervent admirer of Manstein and felt he had been badly treated.

After that, Hitler pressed the idea on Brauchitsch and Halder so hard that they gave way, and remodelled the plan on Manstein’s lines. While Halder was a reluctant convert, he was an extremely able staff officer and the detailed drafting of the plan was a remarkable piece of logistical planning.

A characteristic sequel was that Hitler, once he had swung in favour of the new key-idea, was quick to assume that he had himself conceived it. All he gave Manstein was the credit of having agreed with him: ‘Among all the generals I talked to about the new plan in the West, Manstein was the only one who understood me.’

If we analyse the course of events when the offensive was launched, in May, it becomes clear that the old plan would almost certainly have failed to produce the fall of France. Indeed, it might have done no more than push the Allied Armies back to the French frontier, even if it did that. For the main German advance would have run head-on into the strongest and best-equipped of the Franco-British forces, and would have had to fight its way forward through a stretch of country filled with obstacles — rivers, canals and large towns. The Ardennes might seem more difficult still, but if the Germans could race through that wooded hill-belt of southern Belgium before the French High Command awoke to the danger, the rolling plains of France would lie open to them — ideal country for a great tank drive.

Had the old plan been maintained, and come to an impasse as was probable, the whole outlook of the war would have been very different. While it is unlikely that France and Britain could ever have defeated Germany on their own, a definite check to the German offensive would have given them time to develop their armaments, particularly in aircraft and tanks, and thus establish a balance of power in these new arms. The unconcealable failure of Hitler’s bid for victory would in time also have undermined the confidence of his troops and people. Thus a stalemate in the West would have given Hitler’s strong group of opponents at home a good chance to gain increasing support and develop their plans for overthrowing him, as a preliminary to peace. However things had turned out after the check, it is likely that Europe would have been saved much of the ruin and misery that befell her peoples as the result of the chain of events that ensued from the collapse of France.

While Hitler benefited so much from the air accident that led him to change the plan, the Allies suffered much from it. One of the strangest features of the whole story is that they did so little to profit by the warning that had fallen into their lap. For the documents which the German staff officer was carrying were not badly burned, and copies of them were promptly passed on by the Belgians to the French and British Governments. But their military advisers were inclined to regard the documents as having been planted on them as a deception. That view hardly made sense, for it would have been a foolish kind of deception to risk putting the Belgians on their guard and driving them into closer collaboration with the French and British. They might easily have decided to open their frontier and let the Franco-British armies come in, to reinforce their defences, before the blow fell.

Even stranger was that the Allied High Command made no change in its own plans, nor took any precautions to meet the probability that if the captured plan were genuine the German High Command would almost certainly shift the weight of their attack elsewhere.