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Radio-Intercepts, Reconnaissance and Raids: French Operational Intelligence and Communications in 1940

2013; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 28; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/02684527.2013.789636

1743-9019

Martin S. Alexander,

European history and politics

Abstract Mentioned in memoirs by a few former military intelligence officers, operational intelligence has had little attention in academic writing on the Second World War before Ultra's decisive contributions began in 1941–2. Especially neglected has been the fighting provoked by the German offensive in 1940 that cleaved through France, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg and drove Britain off the Continent. This article tackles this gap, analysing the military intelligence/military operations interface on the French side. It assesses the contributions and shortcomings of radio-intercept intelligence, along with intelligence-gathering by air and ground reconnaissance (demonstrating that German air superiority imposed a ‘battle blindness’ on Allied commanders wanting intelligence on approach marches and formation switches more than a dozen kilometres into the German rear). It reveals that frontline infantry raiding – redolent of intelligence-gathering techniques familiar to veterans of 1914–18 trench warfare – was again widely employed. This proved a highly effective recourse, particularly during the positional battles on the Somme, Aisne and Oise in June 1940, filling intelligence gaps left by more technologically sophisticated but more fragile sources. The factors that kept formations fighting so as to inflict significant delays and heavy losses on the German assaults were robust communications networks (to convey operational intelligence fast enough to permit counter-manoeuvres based on it), and the preservation of French chains of command and control. When these key nodes collapsed, preventing the hard-won operational intelligence being deployed to coordinate French military resistance, the latter declined into a series of disjointed, directionless and unavailing acts of courage that could not exploit the several instances during the campaign when the Germans, too, were afflicted by battle fatigue, re-supply bottlenecks and morale wobbles. Notes 1 See Peter Jackson, France and the Nazi Menace. Intelligence and Policy-Making, 1933–1939 (Oxford: OUP 2000); idem, ‘British Power and French Security, 1919–1939’, in Keith Neilson and Greg Kennedy (eds.) The British Way in Warfare: Power and the International System, 1856–1956. Essays in Honour of David French (Farnham: Ashgate 2010) pp.101–34; idem, ‘La Politicisation du Renseignement en France, 1933–1939’ and Olivier Forcade, ‘L'Exploitation du Renseignement stratégique français en 1936–1938, in Georges-Henri Soutou, Jacques Frémeaux and Olivier Forcade (eds.) L'Exploitation du Renseignement en Europe et aux Etats-Unis des années 1930 aux années 1960 (Paris: Economica 2001) pp.63–81, 83–98, respectively; Peter Jackson and Joseph Maiolo, ‘Strategic Intelligence, Counter-Intelligence and Alliance Diplomacy in Anglo-French Relations before the Second World War’, Militärgeschichtliche Zeitschrift 65 (2006), Heft 2, pp.417–61; Robert J. Young, ‘French Military Intelligence and the Franco-Italian Alliance, 1933–1939’, Historical Journal 28/1 (1985) pp.143–68; idem, ‘French Military Intelligence and Nazi Germany, 1938–1939’, in Ernest R. May (ed.) Knowing One's Enemies. Intelligence Assessment before the Two World Wars (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press 1986) pp.271–309; Anthony Adamthwaite, ‘French Military Intelligence and the Coming of War, 1935–1939’, in Christopher M. Andrew and Jeremy Noakes (eds.) Intelligence and International Relations, 1900–1945 (Exeter: Exeter University Press 1987) pp.191–208; M.S. Alexander and W.J. Philpott, ‘The Entente Cordiale and the Next War: Anglo-French views on Future Military Cooperation, 1928–39’, in M.S. Alexander (ed.) Knowing Your Friends. Intelligence inside Alliances and Coalitions from 1914 to the Cold War (London: Frank Cass 1998) pp.53–84; William Philpott and Martin S. Alexander, ‘The French and the British Field Force: Material Contribution or Moral Support ?’, The Journal of Military History 71/3 (2007) pp.743–72. 2 Only one major book treats this, Ernest R. May's Strange Victory (New York: Hill and Wang 2000), and even this relies heavily on secondary works. 3 Description and assessment of Gauché in Maj.-Gen. Sir Kenneth Strong, Men of Intelligence. A Study of the Roles and Decisions of Chiefs of Intelligence from World War I to the present day (London: Cassell 1970) pp.36–7. 4 M.-H. Gauché, Le Deuxième Bureau au Travail (1935–1940) (Paris: Amiot-Dumont 1953) p. 215 (emphasis in original); albeit heavily derivative, cf. Philip John Stead, Second Bureau (London: Evans Brothers Limited 1959), esp. pp.16–17, 27–35; trans. into French as Le Deuxième Bureau sous L'Occupation (Paris: Fayard 1966); Martin S. Alexander, ‘Did the 2e Bureau Work ? The Role of Intelligence in French Defence Policy and Strategy, 1919–39’, Intelligence and National Security 6/2 (1991) pp.293–333. 5 See K.-H. Frieser (with John T. Greenwood), The Blitzkrieg Legend. The 1940 Campaign in the West (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press 2005); R.A. Doughty, The Breaking Point. Sedan and the Fall of France, 1940 (Hamden, CT: Archon 1990); Olivier Forcade, ‘Le renseignement face à l'Allemagne au printemps 1940 et au début de la campagne de France’, in Christine Levisse-Touzé (ed.) La Campagne de 1940. Actes du colloque: 16 au 18 novembre 2000 (Paris: Tallandier 2001) pp.126–55; idem, La République Secrète. Histoire des services spéciaux français de 1918 à 1939 (Paris: Nouveau Monde 2008); Sébastien Laurent, ‘Le renseignement de 1860 à nos jours: État des sources militaires’, Revue Historique des Armées 4 (2000) pp.97–110; ibid., Politiques de l'Ombre: Etat, renseignement et surveillance en France (Paris: Fayard 2009); Frédéric Guelton and Abdil Bicer, Naissance et evolution du renseignement dans l'espace européen (1870–1940). Entre démocratie et totalitarisme. 14 études de cas (Paris: Publications du Service Historique de la Défense 2007); Pierre Lacoste (ed.), Le Renseignement â la française (Paris: Economica 1998). 6 Cf. essays in May, Knowing One's Enemies, passim; Alexander, Knowing Your Friends, passim. 7 R.H.S. Stolfi, ‘Equipment for Victory in France in 1940’, History 55/183 (1970) pp.1–20 (p.20). 8 J.P. Harris with Niall Barr, Amiens to the Armistice. The BEF in the Hundred Days Campaign, 8 August—11 November 1918 (London and Washington, DC: Brassey's 1998) pp.50–1, 99–107, 137, 176, 184–8. 9 See Charles Christienne and Pierre Lissarague, A History of French Military Aviation, trans. Francis Kianka (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press 1986) pp.181–5. I am grateful to Colin Bryan, a former student of mine at Aberystwyth University, for this reference. 10 Jean Stengers, ‘ENIGMA, the French, the Poles and the British, 1931–1940’, in Christopher M. Andrew and David Dilks (eds.) The Missing Dimension. Governments and Intelligence Communities in the 20 th Century (Basingstoke and London: Macmillan 1981) pp.126–37; Wladyslaw Kozaczuk, Enigma. How the German Machine Cipher was Broken, and How it was Read by the Allies in World War Two, ed. and trans. Christopher Kasparek (Frederick, MD: University Publications of America 1984); F.H. Hinsley, E.E. Thomas, C.F.G. Ransom and R.C. Knight, British Intelligence in the Second World War, 5 vols. (London: HMSO 1979–90), vol. I (Its Influence on Strategy and Operations) pp.108–9, 138–9; Christopher M. Andrew, Secret Service. The Making of the British Intelligence Community (London: Heinemann 1985) pp.448–51. 11 Paul Paillole, Notre Espion chez Hitler (Paris: Laffont 1985); Gustave Bertrand, Enigma, ou la plus grande énigme de la guerre (Paris: Plon 1973) pp.78–9; Stead, Second Bureau, pp.9–10, 22–3. 12 This fragmentation of French headquarters and intelligence support staff reflected deep rivalries between Gamelin and Georges (each general having patrons on different points of the political spectrum), as well as a more laudable desire to disperse higher headquarters to reduce the risk of catastrophic attack by the Luftwaffe, which had aerial superiority. 13 Strong, Men of Intelligence, p.37; cf. idem, Intelligence at the Top: Recollections of an Intelligence Officer (London: Cassell 1968). 14 Louis Rivet, Carnets du Chef des Services Secrets, 1936–1944, ed. Olivier Forcade and Sébastien Laurent (Paris: Nouveau Monde 2010) p.300. 15 Hinsley et al., British Intelligence in the Second World War, vol. I, pp.110–15, 118–19, 127–38, 143–9; Richard J. Aldrich, GCHQ. The Uncensored Story of Britain's Most Secret Intelligence Agency (London: Harper 2010) pp.20–6; Martin Thomas, ‘France in British Signals Intelligence, 1939–1945’, French History 14/1 (2000) pp.41–66. 16 Rivet, Carnets, pp.301–2. 18 Paillole, Notre Espion, p. 184; Aldrich, GCHQ, pp.25–6. 17 L. Ribadeau-Dumas, ‘Essai historique du chiffre de l'Armée de terre. 4e partie (1919–39)’, Bulletin de l'Association des Réservistes du Chiffre [hereafter: BARC] 3 (1975) pp.19–33; idem, ‘Essai historique du chiffre de l'Armée de terre. 5e partie (1939–45)’ 4 (1976) pp.33–47. 19 Dean Juniper, ‘The First World War and Radio Development’, RUSI Journal 148/1 (2003) pp.84–9 (p.86). 20 Basil Collier, Hidden Weapons. Allied Secret or Undercover Services in World War II (London: Hamish Hamilton 1982) p.92; Ralph Bennett, Behind the Battle. Intelligence in the War with Germany, 1939–45 (London: Sinclair-Stevenson 1994) pp.46–8. 21 Rivet, Carnets, p.302. 22 Ibid., p.303. 23 Douglas Porch, The March to the Marne. The French Army 1871–1914 (Cambridge: CUP 1981); David B. Ralston, The Army of the Republic. The Place of the Military in the Political Evolution of France, 1871–1914 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP 1967). 24 Chef de Bataillon Paquet, Etude sur le fonctionnement interne d'un 2 e Bureau en campagne (Paris: Berger-Levrault 1923). 25 Rivet, Carnets, p.304. Cf. statement by a staff captain at GQG (supreme headquarters), who rose to be French chief of defence staff in the 1960s, that much of the broader apparatus of the 2e Bureau worked well, in André Beaufre, 1940. The Fall of France (New York: Alfred A. Knopf 1968) p.196; French original, Le Drame de 1940 (Paris: Plon 1965) p.248. 26 On early World War II radio communications, see Martin van Creveld, Command in War (Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP 1985) pp.191–4. 27 Ministère de la Guerre, Notice sommaire sur la Télégraphie sans fil et les appareils de communication electrique sans fil en service dans l'Aviation et l'Infanterie, 2nd ed. (Paris: Imprimerie Nationale 1918). 28 Noting, however, that Germany's armed forces suffered from similar branch-of-service compartmentalization, one historian who examined such issues in the Luftwaffe concluding that: ‘Alternate assignments were possible only in between the operational, training and intelligence sectors. The quartermaster sector was already somewhat too special[ised], and even more so signal communications’. Horst H. Boog, ‘The Luftwaffe and Technology’, Aerospace Historian 30/3 (1983) pp.200–6 (p.205). 29 College Park, MD: US National Archives and Record Administration [hereafter US-NARA]: Record Group 165 [hereafter: RG165] Military Intelligence Division Correspondence (1917–1941), Box 1139, File 2280-C-96: France – Armament and Equipment: Radio Communication. Report by Maj. Louis J. Fortier, US Army (20 October 1937), encl. in Lt. Col Sumner Waite, asst. military attaché (Paris) to War Dept., Washington, DC (27 October 1937). 30 Ibid. For technical and production aspects of French military communications gear see Pascal Griset, ‘Les industries d'armement: l'exemple des transmissions’, in Levisse-Touzé, La Campagne de 1940, pp.330–45. 31 An exception is Robert A. Doughty, ‘The French Armed Forces, 1918–1940’ in Allan R. Millett and Williamson Murray (eds.) Military Effectiveness, 3 vols. (London: Unwin Hyman 1988) vol. II, pp.39–69 (esp. pp.50–2). 32 Particularly the holdings on communications in the French army engineer archives (sous-série: Génie), in France: Château de Vincennes, Service Historique de la Défense – Département de Terre [hereafter: SHD-T]: 34N786-839 (Bataillons de Génie: Compagnies de sapeurs-mineurs, Compagnies télégraphiques, Compagnies radio et divers); 34N873-4 (Bataillons télégraphiques); 34N875 (Parc de Transmissions); 34N876-877 (Sections télégraphiques); 34N878-879 (Compagnies radio). 33 G. Sadoul, Journal de guerre (2 septembre 1939–20 juillet 1940) (Paris: Les Editeurs Français Réunis 1977) pp.240–1, 271–2; a Communist, Sadoul was by the beginning of World War II a prominent French historian of the cinema. 34 Ibid., p.240. 35 Ibid. 36 Juniper, ‘The First World War’, p.87. 37 Sadoul, Journal de guerre, pp.271–2; quaint though the French methods appear, much German air–ground liaison in 1940 relied on equally low technology, a French 8th Inf. Divn Intelligence bulletin reporting how Wehrmacht motorized columns were accompanied by an aircraft, whilst one of the column's lorries displayed a large white arrow-shaped panel pointing skyward to show the direction of advance of the ground troops who fired flares in various colours to signal the aircraft. SHD-T: 32N37 (8e DI), Dossier [hereafter: Dr.] 7 – Annexe au compte-rendu de renseignements (30 mai 1940). 38 Ibid., pp.272–3. 39 Ribadeau-Dumas, ‘Essai historique du chiffre de l'Armée de terre. 5e Partie’, p.45. 40 Anon., The Diary of a Staff Officer (Air Intelligence Liaison Officer) at Advanced Headquarters North BAFF 1940 (London: Methuen 1941) pp.29–30. 41 SHD-T: 32N14, Dr. 1: 5e DIM Etat-Major – ‘Etude des Opérations de la 5e DIM par le Général Boucher’ (10–28 mai 1940) p.20. 42 Eliot A. Cohen and John Gooch, Military Misfortunes. The Anatomy of Failure in War (New York: The Free Press 1991) pp.223–4; Martin S. Alexander, The Republic in Danger. General Maurice Gamelin and the Politics of French Defence, 1933–1940 (Cambridge: CUP 1992) pp.323–6, 334–6. 43 Anon., The Diary of a Staff Officer, p.36. 44 Ribadeau-Dumas, ‘Essai d'historique du chiffre de l'Armée de terre: 5e Partie’, p.46. 45 SHD-T: 32N37, Dr. 1: 8e Division d'Infanterie [hereafter: DI] – Journal des Marches et Opérations 1940, 1 April–25 June, p.14. 46 SHD-T: 30N52 (VIIIe Corps d'Armée), Dr. 3 (Etat-Major. 3e Bureau), ‘Opérations du VIIIe Corps d'Armée. Journée du 14 Juin’, p.2. 47 Rivet, Carnets, pp.399–400. 48 See Nicole Dombrowski Risser, France under Fire. German Invasion, Civilian Flight and Family Survival during World War II (Cambridge: CUP 2012); Hanna Diamond, Fleeing Hitler. France 1940 (Oxford: OUP 2007); Jean Vidalenc, L'Exode de mai–juin 1940 (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France 1957); Nicole Ollier, L'Exode: sur les routes de l'An 40 (Paris: Laffont 1969); Pierre Miquel, L'Exode, 10 mai–20 juin 1940 (Paris: Plon 2003). 49 Beaufre, 1940. The Fall of France, p.209 50 Paillole, Notre Espion, p.183. 51 Group Captain G.J. Oxlee, OBE, BA, MRAeS, Aerospace Reconnaissance (London and Washington, DC: Brassey's 1997) p.4. 52 The GRDIs and GRCAs in 1940 merit greater attention; on their actions see Martin S. Alexander, ‘After Dunkirk: The French Army's Performance against “Case Red”, 25 May to 25 June 1940’, War in History 14/2 (2007) pp.219–63 (esp. pp.231, 251). 53 Lee Sharp, The French Army, 1939–1940. Organisation. Order of Battle. Operational History, 2 vols. (Milton Keynes and Sterling, VA: The Military Press 2002) vol. I, p.138; DLM stood for Division Légère Mécanique, and France's 4th DCR, led by Charles de Gaulle, was constituted ad hoc after fighting began in May 1940, never receiving its organic aviation component. 54 Oxlee, Aerospace Reconnaissance, p.4; SHD-T: 1K224/9, Cabinet du Général Gamelin: Journal de marche (6 September 1939). 55 SHD-T: 1K224/9, Gamelin: Journal de marche (12 September 1939). 56 Ibid. (1 October 1939). 57 Christienne and Lissarague, A History of French Military Aviation, pp.267–321; Herrick Chapman, State Capitalism and Working-Class Radicalism in the French Aircraft Industry (Berkeley, CA and London: University of California Press 1991) pp.32–49, 103–10, 153–73, 214–17, 221–5. 58 See A.D. Harvey, ‘The French Armée de l'Air in May–June 1940: A Failure of Conception’, Journal of Contemporary History, 25/4 (1990) pp.447–65; Patrick Facon, L'Armée de l'Air dans la tourmente. La bataille de France, 1939–1940 (Paris: Economica 1997) pp.18–24, 75–92; Pascal Venesson, ‘Institution and Airpower: The Making of the French Air Force’, Journal of Strategic Studies 18/1 (1995) pp.36–67; Robert J. Young, ‘The Strategic Dream: French Air Doctrine in the Interwar Period, 1919–1939’, Journal of Contemporary History, 9/4 (1974) pp.57–76; Alexander, Republic in Danger, pp.150–71. 59 Lt-Colonel Faris R. Kirkland, USAF (Ret.), ‘The French Air Force in 1940. Was it Defeated by the Luftwaffe or by Politics?’, Air University Review (September–October 1985) < http://www.airpower.maxwell.af.mil/airchronicles/aureview/1985/sep-oct/kirkland.html> (accessed 19 December 2007). 60 Colonel A. Grasset, ‘La Défense Nationale et l'effort nécessaire’, Revue des Deux Mondes, CVIIIe année (8e Pér.), vol. 45 (15 June 1938), pp.820–45 (p.839). 61 France: Archives Nationales: Papiers Edouard Daladier 496 AP/32, 4 DA 5 Dr. 7, sdr.b (Notes du général Vuillemin). ‘Organisation générale de l'Armée de l'Air. Le Général Chef d'État-Major Général de l'Armée de l'Air à Monsieur le Ministre de l'Air’ (n.d. – ? September 1938). I am grateful to Dr Daniel J. Hucker for alerting me to this material. 62 France: Palais du Luxembourg (Paris): Archives du Sénat [hereafter: AS]. Senate Army Commission [hereafter: SAC]. ‘Séance du 7 juin 1939. Présidence de M. Daniel Vincent’, p.64; Anthony Christopher Cain, ‘L'Armée de l'Air, 1933–1940: Drifting toward Defeat’ in Robin Higham and Stephen J. Harris (eds.) Why Air Forces Fail. The Anatomy of Defeat (Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky 2006) pp.41–70. 63 By the last week of May 1940, 25 per cent of crews had been lost ‘since the German invasion of France a fortnight before’, according to one eye-witness who joined missions flown by FAF units. Gordon Waterfield, What Happened to France (London: John Murray 1940) p.80. 64 Christienne and Lissarague, A History of French Military Aviation, pp.323–44. 65 Sharp, The French Army, 1939–1940, vol. I, p.140. 66 Robin Higham, Unflinching Zeal. The Air Battles over France and Britain, May–October 1940 (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press 2012) pp.149–234. I am grateful to Dr Gaynor Johnson of the University of Salford for bringing this book to my attention. Cf. Facon, L'Armée de l'Air, pp.96–101, 123–30; Kirkland, ‘The French Air Force in 1940’, pp.10–11; Pierre-Marie Gallois, ‘1939 – Doctrine française de guerre aérienne’, in Colloque International AIR 84. Adaptation de l'Arme aérienne aux conflits contemporains et processus d'indépendance des armées de l'Air des origins a la fin de la Seconde Guerre mondiale (Paris: Fondation pour les Etudes de Défense Nationale 1985) pp.47–63. 67 SHD-T: 1K224/9 – Cabinet du Général Gamelin. Journal de marche (9 October 1939). 68 Evidence and tributes, after flying several missions in May 1940 with a French night bomber squadron based at Nangis, east of Paris, in Waterfield, What Happened, pp.76–90; cf. Higham, Unflinching Zeal, pp.172–7, 182–3, 186–9, 194–7. 69 SHD-T: 1K224/9 – Gamelin. Journal de marche (20 September, 8 October 1939); on the dislocation of the French high command (the administrative rear-services under Gen. Aime-Joseph Doumenc being separately located at the Château de Montry) one notes that Gamelin was no genuine generalissimo, having merely ‘power of coordination’ with the air force and navy by the terms of the January 1938 decree that had named him Chief of Staff for National Defence). See SHD-T: 1K224/7, Gamelin: ‘Note sur le général Georges’ (9 December 1943); Marshal Henri-Philippe Pétain, ‘Défense nationale et commandement unique’, Revue des Deux Mondes CVIe année (8e Pér.), vol. 33 (1 May 1936) pp.5–17; Jean Vial, ‘La Défense Nationale. Son organisation entre les deux guerres’, Revue d'histoire de la deuxième guerre mondiale 5/18 (1955) pp.11–32; Higham, Unflinching Zeal, pp.157, 198–9. 70 Christienne and Lissarague, A History of French Military Aviation, p.181. 71 Ibid., p.183 (emphasis in original); cf. Commandant Mickael Marion, ‘La guerre aérienne en 1918: Comparaison des doctrines française et anglaise’ < http://www.cesa.air.defense.gouv.fr/IMH/pdf/PLAF_No17_Cdt_Marion.pdf> (accessed 19 March 2012) pp.4–15. 72 Collier, Hidden Weapons, p.80; cf. Christienne and Lissarague, A History of French Military Aviation, pp.323–44. 73 Waterfield, What Happened, p.85. 74 Hinsley et al., British Intelligence in the Second World War, vol. I, p.148; for the development of photo-reconnaissance since 1914–18 see Col. Terence J. Finnegan, Shooting the Front. Allied Aerial Reconnaissance and Photographic Interpretation on the Western Front – World War I (Bolling AFB, Washington, DC: National Defense Intelligence College Press 2006). 75 Hinsley et al., British Intelligence in the Second World War, vol. I, quoting Air Ministry file AIR 41/21, p.27, The National Archives (Public Record Office) Kew, London. 76 Frieser, Blitzkrieg Legend, pp.44–54, 342–5; Doughty, Breaking Point, pp.132–7; James S. Corum, The Luftwaffe. Creating the Operational Air War, 1918–1940 (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas 1997) p.277. Cf. sights witnessed by German follow-up infantry in Henri de Wailly, De Gaulle sous la casque. Abbeville 1940 (Paris: Perrin 1990) pp.34–5. 77 Waterfield, What Happened, pp.67–9; cf. Higham, Unflinching Zeal, pp.170–2, 239–41; Corum, The Luftwaffe, pp.278–80. 78 Oxlee, Aerospace Reconnaissance, p.13 (n.2). 79 Taken from tables in Klaus A. Maier, Horst Rohde, Bernd Stegemann and Hans Umbreit, Germany in the Second World War, vol. II, Germany's Initial Conquests in Europe, trans. from the German by Dean S. McMurry and Ewald Osers (Oxford: Clarendon Press 1991) pp.86–7, 101, 106, 117–18, 121, 124–5. For the 1 September 1939 Luftwaffe order-of-battle see Hooton, Phoenix Triumphant, pp.281–8; on the air war in Poland see Corum, The Luftwaffe, pp.272–7; also Klaus A. Maier, ‘The Luftwaffe’ in Paul Addison and Jeremy A. Crang (eds.) The Burning Blue. A New History of the Battle of Britain (London: Pimlico 2000) pp.15–21. 80 On this phase of air operations and losses see Hooton, Phoenix Triumphant, pp.257–62; [Paul Richey] Fighter Pilot. A Personal Record of the Campaign in France. September 8 th 1939 to June 13 th 1940 (London: Batsford 1941) pp.85–119. 81 In an extensive literature see especially Charles Christienne, ‘L'Armée de l'Air dans la bataille de France’ in Institut d'histoire des conflits contemporains (ed.) Les Armées françaises pendant la Seconde Guerre mondiale, 1939–1945. Actes du colloque de Paris, mai 1985 (Paris: Fondation nationale des études de défense 1986); Paul Martin, Invisibles Vainqueurs. Exploits et sacrifices de l'Armée de l'Air en 1940 (Paris: Yves Michelet 1990); Jeffery A. Gunsburg, ‘L'Armée de l'Air vs. the Luftwaffe, 1940’, Defence Update International 45 (1984) pp.44–53; Patrice Buffotot and Jacques Ogier, ‘L'Armée de l'Air française dans la campagne de France, 10 mai–25 juin 1940. Essai de bilan numérique d'une bataille’, Revue Historique de l'Armée (1975) pp.88–117; Facon, L'Armée de l'Air dans la tourmente, passim. A much more sceptical view of FAF performance – and claims by historians sympathetic to it – occurs in Higham, Unflinching Zeal, pp.193–200, 203–7, 209–10. See also David Griffin, ‘The Role of the French Air Force: The Battle of France, 1940’, Aerospace Historian Autumn (1974) pp.144–53. Cf. André Ausems, ‘The Luftwaffe's Airborne Losses in May 1940: An Interpretation’, Aerospace Historian September (1985) pp.184–8; Williamson Murray, Luftwaffe (Baltimore, MD: Nautical and Aviation Publishing Co. 1985) pp.39–46; Hooton, Phoenix Triumphant, pp.239–71; Frieser, Blitzkrieg Legend, pp.44–54. 82 Jean-Louis Crémieux-Brilhac, Les Français de l'An 40, 2 vols. (Paris: Gallimard 1990), vol. II (Ouvriers et Soldats) pp.563–5, 574–89; but cf. Higham, Unflinching Zeal, p.209. 83 See Frieser, Blitzkrieg Legend, pp.157–61, 174–83; Julian Jackson, The Fall of France. The Nazi Invasion of 1940 (Oxford: OUP 2003) pp.163–7; for another case of mass flight or surrender by troops shattered by concentrated air-armour attack in mid-May see Jacques Minart, P.C. Vincennes. Secteur 4, 2 vols. (Paris: Berger-Levrault 1945) vol. II, pp.221–2. 84 F. d'Astier de la Vigerie, Le Ciel n'était pas vide, 1940 (Paris: Julliard 1952); Crémieux-Brilhac, Les Français de l'An 40, vol. II, pp.652–6, 665–7. 85 Hooton, Phoenix Triumphant, p.247; also Malcolm Smith, ‘The RAF’, in Addison and Crang, The Burning Blue, pp.22–36 (esp. pp.31–6). 86 Figures from tables and bar charts in Murray, Luftwaffe, pp.44–5; cf. Higham, Unflinching Zeal, pp.168, 202. 87 Ibid. Horst Boog, ‘The Luftwaffe's Assault’, in Addison and Crang, The Burning Blue, pp.39–54 (p.40). Boog, Luftwaffe, pp.48–9, corroborates Murray. Cf. Crémieux-Brilhac, Les Français de l'An 40, vol. II, pp.659, 666–9. Luftwaffe availability rates are from Maier et al., Germany in the Second World War, vol. II, pp.252–3, 278–9; Hans-Adolf Jacobsen and Jürgen Rohwer, Entscheidungsschlachten des Zweitens Weltkrieges (Frankfurt: Bernard and Greife 1960), in AN-496AP, Papiers Edouard Daladier 4DA8/Dossier 1/sub-dr.a, list airworthy Luftwaffe strength in the West on 10 May 1940 as: 1120 level-bombers; 342 Ju.87 Stuka dive-bombers; 42 fighter-bombers; 248 Me.110 twin-seat Zerstorers; 1016 Me.109 single-seat fighters; 401 transport aircraft (chiefly Ju.52s); 501 reconnaissance aircraft; 154 various, for a grand total of 3824 aircraft. 88 Sadoul, Journal de guerre, p.228 (26 May 1940); cf. Hooton, Phoenix Triumphant, pp.257–8, 262; Facon, L'Armée de l'Air dans la tourmente, pp.220–7; Crémieux-Brilhac, Les Français de l'An 40, vol. II, pp.652–4, 657–8. Cf. Frieser, Blitzkrieg Legend, p.343. 89 Waterfield, What Happened, p.88; but cf. the strictures against French fighter-arm personnel's levels of professionalism and aircraft quality in Higham, Unflinching Zeal, pp.157–8. 90 République française: Journal Officiel. Chambre des Députés: Séance du 26 janvier 1937, Discours de M. Paul Reynaud, pp.168–9. 91 Collier, Hidden Weapons, p.92. 92 SHD-T: 34N527 - 29e DI Alpine (34e GRDI): Capt. de Lussan, Carnets de route, 12 (30–31 May, 2–3 June 1940); on the ‘hedgehogs’, so nicknamed on account of their prickly defensive characteristics, see Beaufre, 1940. The Fall of France, pp.199–200, 202–3. 93 SHD-T: 32N37, Dr. 7 – 8e DI Etat-Major (2e Bureau), Bulletin de Renseignements no. 395/2S (20 mai 12 h à 21 mai 12 h). 94 Denis Richards, The Hardest Victory. RAF Bomber Command in the Second World War (London: Hodder & Stoughton 1994) p.50. 95 Crémieux-Brilhac, Les Français de l'An 40, vol. II, pp.665–6; also Hooton, Phoenix Triumphant, pp.262, 264–6; Frieser, Blitzkrieg Legend, pp.309–10, 343; not really persuaded as to French aviation's performance over the Somme/Aisne in June 1940 is Higham, Unflinching Zeal, pp.187, 190–1. 96 France (Archives du Sénat): Senate Army Commission – Registre des procès-verbaux, 1939 (2). ‘Séance du 15 novembre 1939’, pp.84–9. 97 Ibid., pp.89–90; Christienne and Lissarague, A History of French Military Aviation, pp.345–64. On aircraft supply from the USA see John McVickar Haight Jr, American Aid to France, 1938–1940 (New York: Atheneum 1970); idem, ‘Jean Monnet and the American Arsenal after the Beginning of the War’ in Evelyn M. Acomb and Marvin L. Brown (eds.) French Society and Culture since the Old Regime (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston 1966) pp.269–83. 98 Douglas Porch, ‘Why did France Fall?’, Military History Quarterly 2 (1990) pp.30–41 (quotation: p.39). Heavily engaged on 8 June while seeking to deny the Germans the roads through the Forêt de Retz immediately north-east of Villers-Cotterêts, the 42nd GRDI (8th Infantry Division reconnaissance battalion) complained that: ‘We had enemy aircraft over our heads throughout this day; they did not machinegun us, but bombed us towards evening. Not a French aircraft in the sky. For lack of ammunition, our artillery retired from the battlefield’. SHD-T: 34N529 8e DI: 42e GRDI – Journal des Marches et Opérations pendant la campagne du 2 septembre 1939 au 25 juin 1940 contre l'Allemagne’, p.11 (emphasis added). 99 Higham, Unflinching Zeal, pp.189–90; contemporary account and figures for numbers of Parisians killed and wounded in Alexander Werth, The Last Days of Paris. A Journalist's Diary (London: Hamish Hamilton 1940) pp.122–5, 127–8. 100 Collier, Hidden Weapons, pp.92–3. 101 SHD-T: 32N14 (5e DIM), Dr. 1 – ‘Etude des opérations de la 5e DIM par le Général Boucher, 10–28 mai 1940’, pp.10, 25. 102 Anon., The Diary of a Staff Officer, pp.35, 61, 69, 76; Higham, Unflinching Zeal, pp.170–1, performs a great service by exploding the myth that the Battle of France was fought in six weeks of near-unbroken sunny days and blue skies. 103 US-NARA microfilmed US military attaché reports (1917–41), no. 2081-1407 (criticism of multi-seat combat planes, 8 April 1935); no. 2081-1415 (Farman-420 multi-seat combat plane, 14 May 1935), 2081-1407/2 (Critique of multi-seat combat plane, 16 May 1935). 105 France: Archives du Sénat. SAC – Procès-verbaux, 1939 (2), ‘Séance du 15 novembre 1939’, p.89. 107 Lt-Gen. Sir P. Neame, VC, Playing with Strife. The Autobiography of a Soldier (London: Harrap 1947) pp.253–4. 104 Gauché, Le Deuxième Bureau, p.232. 106 Ibid. 108 Ibid.; for similar shortcomings facing British aerial photo-reconnaissance and photo-image interpretation in the late 1930s and first part of WWII, see Hinsley et al., British Intelligence in the Second World War, I, pp.26–32; also