124Close Combat
Field Marshal Rundstedt’s Army Group A roars across the French border on May 10 against light resistance. General Heinz Guderian, a leading proponent of German tank tactics, leads one of the Panzer corps driving into France. Bock’s Army Group B races across Holland and Denmark.
On May 12, the French Seventh Army clashes with the Germans near Tilburg, but the French wither before a rain of German attacks. French troops are demoralized by the Germans’
Both Guderian and the commander of the Seventh Panzer Division, Erwin Rommel, show the world how the tank has changed the modern battlefield. Many in the German High Command believe rapid advances by armored units will leave exposed flanks that invite counterattack. In fact, the Panzer units are often ordered to halt so the rest of the army can catch up. In Western Europe, the rapidly moving armored columns do indeed expose their flanks, but these columns breed so much confusion and panic that counterattacks are impossible to organize.
On May 15, the Dutch surrender. Churchill, visiting Paris to meet with French leaders, asks where the reserves are. He is appalled at the answer: There are no reserves. On May 17, the Germans enter Brussels, the next day Antwerp. Three days later, Guderian’s Panzers reach the coast.
The Germans have mowed a swath 20 miles wide from the Ardennes to the Atlantic. The French and British try to slice through the swath before it can be strengthened and widened. Rommel’s division is attacked by British Matilda heavy tanks near Arras. These tanks make good progress because they can with- stand most of the Germans’ conventional antitank weapons. When the Germans are on the verge of defeat, some of their antiaircraft gun crews depress the barrels of their
By May 26, it is clear the Belgian army is finished, and British units begin to fall back on the town of Dunkirk on the French coast. Belgium surrenders on May 28; British and French units race to cover the approaches to Dunkirk.
Confusion and misunderstanding among the German commanders prevent a coordinated assault on the Dunkirk perimeter. Ultimately the Panzer divisions are shifted from Dunkirk south to continue the attack toward Paris. The final push at Dunkirk falls to the infantry and the German air force the Luftwaffe.
British and French units at Dunkirk put up a heroic fight while every available ship and boat is put to use evacuating troops to England. Over 220,000 British and 112,000 French soldiers are evacuated; but when the Germans reach Dunkirk early
