RTS Portion of game?

[VonMudra]

I might be wrong but didn't the french mainly loose because of a pacifist politic under the socialist Unions Government and a lack of amored divisions which werr instead used to Support the infantry.

The French tanks were indeed spread out heavily, but they did have armoured divisions that were, though weaker in size than German Panzer Divisions, generally had equal or superior tanks to the Germans. The problem generally stemmed from the French General Staff refusing to offer reinforcement and support during key French counter attacks, and losing their nerve. There were points where the French were close to cutting off the entire German spearhead and making it ripe for destruction, but the General Staff, inevitably, would refuse to support the attacks, preferring to shepard their resources. The funny thing is, the Allies outnumbered the Germans 2-1 in tank numbers, and most German tanks were of much inferior armour and armament, being Panzer 1 and 2s.

 

[Colonel__Klink]

I might be wrong but didn't the french mainly loose because of a pacifist politic under the socialist Unions Government and a lack of amored divisions which werr instead used to Support the infantry.

Nope. They lost because they hedged all their bets against the Maginot line holding and set their armies in Belgium. The Germans countered by pushing at Belgium while slicing through the Maginot at Sedan with motorized and tank units that were very swift. In one fell stroke the German army encircled the vast bulk of French and British forces. Though as VonMudra pointed out France wasted chances to cut off this German spearhead or initiate a breakout. In the aftermath France would have very little to fight back with.

 

[VonMudra]

Essentially the entire point of the Maginot line was to force the Germans to invade through Belgium. The french idea was there would be a meeting engagement in Belgium seeing heavy use of armoured forces, the Allies would be victorious due to their massive tank and air force advantages, and the front would settle in Belgium, thus keeping the war out of France proper. After that, the British blockade would go into effect and Germany would be starved to submission, thus avoiding the mass casulties of WW1.

The problem was, the French didn't bet on the Germans being able to pass armour through the Ardennes, and were much too slow to react to it when they did. By that point, the only thing that would have saved the Allies would have been quick action to break the German spearhead's neck and wipe out the forward units, but as I pointed out, they failed to act on that.

The funny thing is, the original German plan for invasion of France was exactly what the French had planned for. The Germans ended up changing plans in early 1940, but had they gone through with the original invasion plans, they probably would have been defeated.