Rank and File
A Clerk’s War
20th September to 23rd September 1939
The Royal Air Force is back in action, perhaps because the Allied leaders suspect that the crucial period of the Battle for France is near. 6th Taktischeluftflotte was caught just after it took off from the newly repaired Lille airbase. Steele’s three interceptor groups were too much for Dorstling’s single “Gustav” geschwader, and Dorstling ordered both his Heinkels and Messerschmitts to abort their mission and return to base. Most of the damage was suffered by the fighters, but some bombers were also lost. According to the report from the commander of the airbase, our planes didn’t have a chance. The report states that if the Luftwaffe cannot provide air cover, he cannot ensure that the round-the-clock bombing schedule can be maintained. I am not sure whether it was caused by this attack, but it was noticeable that the Luftwaffe carried out few bombing missions on the 20th, despite the wave of attacks on the ground.
And there was a surge along the whole front. No less than four separate battles started simultaneously (right on 4PM) as from Amiens to Dorman our divisions moved forward, pushing towards Paris.
In Amiens, von Amann’s 17.Infanterie clashed with de Boussu-Walcourt’s 3eme Division. The 3eme has taken severe losses and is down to less than 5.500 men, and more importantly its integrity has been critically reduced, to the point that von Amman doubts that it will last a day of combat. One province to the south-east, in Noyon, Curtze has a Panzer division (4th Leichte) and a motorised (20.Infanterie) with which to handle General Slim’s 55th and 56th Brigades. Although the 56th Brigade is in a chaotic condition, it has only lost a few men, and the 55th is in good condition. Slim’s reputation alone would give most generals pause, but Curtze believes he has a better than average chance of victory. In fact, his initial report promises victory, but doesn’t give a date.
Battle of Amiens
Battle of Noyon
His neighbour, General Engelbrecht, had no such hesitation. With his Gebirgsjagers back to nearly full strength, he anticipates no problems in clearing Hutton’s 14th Mountain Brigade out of Soissons. To be honest, nobody here gives General Hutton a chance of holding on. Although he has nearly 6,000 men and the area has heavy forest cover, his men are tired after several forced marches and Engelbrecht is an experienced campaigner who will take advantage of any weakness.
The final battle in the series should be a walkover for von Kressenstein. The only soldiers in Dormans are headquarters troops from 1ere Armee, commanded by the French General Georges. Georges is held to be an expert in defensive battles, but he still needs decent troops to fight, and he has only makeshift infantrymen. 30.Infanterie is a veteran fighting unit, and should soon have the clerks and staff officers on the run.
I assume the action continued through the night, but I went home. I must be getting blasé, but the thought of sitting in my office waiting to hear the snippets of information from the radio and telegraph room was not as attractive as it was three months ago. It is extremely unlikely that our attacks will achieve a stunning success at night: not when we can’t see what we are fighting. The battle will continue, but not much will happen until dawn.
As expected, the next day I had nothing significant on my desk, though I did notice a report that the Armee de l’Air had sent Valin back to bomb Neufchateau. He is back to just one Groupe de Bombardement, but our analysts are unsure whether this reflects a change of tactics by the French, or if his other two units were badly damaged by our fighters several days ago.
At 10AM von Amman’s prediction came true: the 3eme Division lasted less than a day, in fact only 16 hours, and that included all the hours of darkness. We lost only 37 men, de Boussu-Walcourt lost 118.
Shortly afterwards we were taken by surprise. We had been concentrating so much on Fall Zentrum and watching the blocks fall into place that we had forgotten that our enemy was real and had its own plans. Though this particular action could not have been expected, and perhaps reflects the last hopes of the Belgian Army. Van Voorst tot Voorst is leading his 7e Division to try and recapture a piece of Belgium, the province of Arlon. Given that General Blaskowitz has a panzer division and three infantry divisions, all in good condition, this must be seen as a final fling. No French or British units are involved, which may be an indication that they see Belgium as lost for good.
On the 21st Valin again hit Neufchateau, but on the 22nd he switched targets to Cambrai. His attacks were not too damaging, mainly due to the small number of bombers, each of which appear to be far less effective than ours. We don’t know if this is due to the bomber design or bombing techniques, but everyone is grateful nevertheless. Despite the lack of significant damage, he was able to carry out his missions unchallenged for three days now, and tension between the Heer and the Luftwaffe started to rise to uncomfortable levels.
A Bruguet 695 bomber over Cambrai: these light bombers have a bombload of less than 500kg which reduces their effectiveness.
Two other battles that started on 20th September all came to a conclusion on 22nd. First was Dormans, and the result once again showed the futility of unsupported headquarters troops attempting to resist a combat division. Von Kressenstein’s report mentioned only three men dead or missing, and he claimed to have inflicted at least 195 on the 1ere Armee headquarters contingent.
Several hours later Soissons was ours, Hutton’s unfortunate mountain troops continuing their forced flight south. They fought well, considering the poor condition they were in, but after losing 235 men they had had enough. Engelbrecht admitted to losing 154 men, and acknowledged that the British were a far tougher foe than he had expected.
The final win for the day was a crushing defeat for the remnants of the Belgian Army. 7e Division lost 855 men in its brief and pointless assault, while our units lost a total of 35 men. Is this the last we will see of the Belgians?
A now familiar sight as the Belgian Army disintegrates: our officers accept the surrender of another group of defeated soldiers.
General Eicke must have caught the advancing habit from Ruoff. He had barely secured Calais when his men were on the march again, into Berck. The French General Gain must wonder what is happening –he is never gets a moment to try and re-organise his 19eme Division. Eicke confidently predicts that Gain will be retreating within 48 hours. With his track record to date, I can quite believe it.
My comment the other day of nothing ever happening at night was soon proved wrong. The morning of the 23rd there was a detectable quietness over the Reichskanzlei. It didn’t take me long to ferret out the reason – our string of victories has been broken. Geyr von Schweppenburgs’s valiant effort to take Montmedy has been called off. From what I heard, he managed to disengage his men in the middle of the night and silently withdraw back across the Belgain border to Neufchateau. I realise that to successfully withdraw from a lost battle is a tremendously skilful manoeuvre, and that the General has saved 2nd Leichte Panzer Division from a mauling, but he has lost more than 10% of his force (1202 from 9996). The French losses were heavy but manageable: 610. No wonder there were sombre faces around that morning – could this be the end of a promising career? Von Schweppenburg has been mentioned as a rising star, but casualties of that order (and a defeat) usually spell demotion at the best. Later that day, however, I saw a high level telegram from the Army of the Ardennes to von Schweppenburg’s headquarters. It congratulated him on carrying out his orders and pinning 45,000 French troops while we launched the drive on Paris. So perhaps the General is still being fast-tracked to the top: he obviously knew exactly what he was supposed to do and carried out his orders perfectly. The successful night withdrawal was just the cream on the cake.
A Luftwaffe deployment order on 23rd caught my eye for two reasons: the first was that it mentioned my brother’s unit: 2nd Fliegerkorps. The second was the unprecedented honour that it gave to General Ruoff. Normally units are rarely named after living officers – you have to die to get honoured that way. A few rare exceptions are made, however, and this is one of them. A new Messerschmitt 109E interceptor geschwader has been named JG 70 “Ruoff”! The accompanying explanation talks of the outstanding example he has set in pushing his unit to the front etc etc. He has obviously impressed several people high up in the government. (Though I suspect Goebbels and Frick had a hand in this – looking for ways to keep civilian morale up. One way is to create a popular hero. But they must have twisted Goering’s arm to get him to name a Luftwaffe unit after a Heer officer!). Whatever the reason and the background politics, JG 70 “Ruoff” has joined 2nd Fliegerkorps at the captured airbase in Bruxelles.
Part of the official naming ceremony of the new geschwader: honouring a new hero.
To defeat General Gain took Eicke just over half the time he had thought likely. A short firefight and 19eme abandoned Berck and headed west along the coast. For a non-motorised unit, Eicke and his 28.Infanterie are making good time as they clear the Channel provinces.
The last of the battles that began on the 20th wound down towards the end of the day. Probably the hardest fought battle of the past few days, Curtze finally forced General Slim to reluctantly pull his men back. We lost 444 men to Slim’s 839, but considering the advantages we had in numbers and equipment, the British did very well to not only hold on for three days, but to do so with no reinforcements (Curtze had another division join him in the assault).
Curtze’s Aufklarung units move through a ruined town in Noyon. Fighting was particularly fierce here, with the British stubbornly refusing to retreat.
The pain was not over for the Allies. Von Bock decided his men would advance to keep up the momentum. He had no concerns of ambushes or running into prepared positions, as aerial and land reconnaissance showed that the British in front of him were totally disorganised. He has sent 16.Infanterie from Lille and 8.Infanterie from St Omer into Abbeville, where the hapless General Lawsom will be faced with the choice of either squandering the lives of his men or joining the retreat (which is beginning to look suspiciously like a rout) towards Paris.
Battle of Abbeville
Bock’s men move their artillery (10.5cm howitzers) across a tributary ofthe Somme near Abbeville. As can be seen, they do not expect to come under enemy fire.
Bombing summary
20th September
Montmedy: Udet with 2 x Ju 87G, 2 x He 111:
147, 126
21st September
Luftwaffe
Dormans: Grauert with 2 x He 111:
63, 126, 123
Amiens: Kitzinger with 2 x He 111:
68, 106
Noyon: Udet with 2 x Ju 87G:
42, 90, 81
Soisson: Sperrle with 1 x Bf 109G, 2 x He 111:
59, 98, 134
Armee de l’Air
Neufchateau: Valin with 1 x TAC:
32, 46, 20
22nd September
Luftwaffe
Longuyon: Grauert with 2 x He 111:
84, 115, 114
Montmedy: Kitzinger with 2 x He 111:
84, 96, 116
Noyon: Udet with 2 x Ju 87G:
33, 86, 92
Dormans: Dorstling with 1 x Bf 109G, 2 x He 111:
77, 115
Soissons: Sperrle with 1 x Bf 109G, 2 x He 111:
75, 160, 128
Armee de l’Air
Cambrai: Valin with 1 x TAC:
55, 52, 50
23rd September
Noyon: Udet with 2 x Ju 87G:
34
Berck: Sperrle with 1 x Bf 109G, 2 x He 111:
52
Abbeville: Dorstling with 1 x Bf 109G, 2 x He 111:
97, 129, 113
Berck: Grauert with 2 x He 111:
91
Noyon: Kitzinger with 2 x He 111:
117, 144
Fall Zentrum at end of 23rd September: only one battle continues, as the Allies seem unable to mount a coherent defence. The hundreds of thousands of Allied troops to the west are effectively cut off from the battle for Paris. Unternehmen Gummiknuppel is reaching completion, with only the final blow to be delivered.
Westwall at end of 23rd September: all is quiet on the Westwall front
Egypt at the end of 23rd September: in an alarming development, the RAF has started bombing Italian units. We have some observers with the Italian infantry, and they report the Regia Aeronautica has not been sighted. If control of the air is conceded to the British, the Italian army will face an uphill battle to take Egypt.