In this thread Arturas wrote:
I wrote a post where I asked for a cite but it was the last post in the thread so he might not have seen it.
Has anyone seen this claim anywhere else? Does anyone have a cite? If other German forces than Rommel’s used this trick I would also be interested.
Rommel has a very good reputation for following the rules of war so it would be interesting if this really happened.
I’m not saying that it’s not true, but I’ve never heard that before. Individual nazis and gestapo were known to do it, but a tank division in full attack that greatly outnumbers the enemy? What would be the purpose? Rommel was known for his fake attacks to create a diversion and then sweep around with the main force, blindsiding the enemy. In 1940 the Germans were on full offensive in Belgium and Rommel caught the french with their pants down by going through the Ardennes, which France didn’t think was possible, so they weren’t even there, just some Belgians. When France got word of fighting in the area they sent the most of their armor units to the area. When Rommel’s couple of thousand tanks and support infantry greeting the arriving French with a pretty big can of whoop-ass, the French retreated and Rommel kept right on moving. Beyond that, there weren’t many French defenses to begin with, much less any that you would even have to think about trying something like a fake surrender, again, when you are attacking on their soil. Also at that time, nobody was using tanks like the Germans. Tanks were very spread out as support vehicles, not in units like the Germans, especially at such massive scale moving at such great speed. The only places where Rommel ran into trouble were at blown bridges that were being defended.
I’ve read an awful lot about Rommel from both sides and have never heard of that. When you have nearly twice the number of tanks as the combined number of the four countries you are fighting, and you have nearly all of them going hell bent for leather to Dunkirk, who are you going to run up a white flag for? Just doesn’t seem like something that one of the greatest military tacticians there ever was would do. He wouldn’t have to. I also think that he would have considered it an insult to his professionalism.
But I could be wrong.
I agree with Turbo Dog that I’ve never heard of Rommel using a false truce flag in 1940. There were reports of German soldiers using false surrenders to ambush American soldiers in the 1944 Ardennes offensive which occurred in the same area but had nothing to do with Rommel. Perhaps that might be a source of confusion.
No such thing about the German offensive in France was reported at the time as far as I know. And I do think that the news would have been full of it.
Nor did I ever hear of German’s using fake surrender during the Battle of the Bulge. Some German “special forces” who used US uniforms to infiltrate US rear area positions and were idiomatic speakers of English caused a lot of confusion at first. This turned out to be a lot more smoke than fire and was ineffective after the first couple of days. One simple reason might have been that the German armored forces and infantry moved so fast for the first few days that their “special forces” were quickly overrun by their own side. Wouldn’t that be a kick in the ass?
It’s the silliest thing I’ve ever heard, actually. As if the French defenders would allow columns of tanks to just speed by, white flags or so, hauling ass down the road.
“Where are dey going, Marcel?”
“Eh, j’en sais pas. Ah guess someone down da road will accept dere surrender.”
“Ah, bon. Plus de vin?”
RickJay, the Frech Forces DID allow Rommels tanks to “just speed by, hauling ass down the road”. No white flags. He blew by the main defenses and allowed the French surrender to the rear guard.
May, 1940. From here.
UncleBill, I have to admit I’m suspicious of any account that says Erwin Rommel breached the Maginot Line. He wasn’t anywhere near the Maginot Line in 1940. Rommel’s division, 7th Panzer (later in the campaign he also commanded 5th Panzer) crossed into Belgium and henceforth into France. The Maginot Line lay on the frontier of Germany and France, well south of where Rommel went through. I don’t think that account is very accurate if it can’t even pin down the country Rommel was in when he crossed the French border, or if it claims the Maginot Line was broken (it never was.) The rest of the account seems accurate, but that one paragraph looks fictional - in fact, it doesn’t even fit the tone of the rest of the essay.
Sorry, I did miss the question. I had to start working (and I still need to as I still have 200 pages left to edit (nasty technical text where I have to guess what technical word might have been meant-so time consuming). I read this in a book a very long time ago. So I am glad someone else found a source. What is worse is that I would have absolutely no access to it now.
I could have sworn it was Rommel but perhaps it was some other German commander, if you want to argue about location.
You are aware that history is not a reporting of facts but of only those facts (we hope they are facts, at least) that support the author’s view and political correctness. We needed to make up with the Germans quickly in order to fight the Communists, so very little is written about army atrocities. There was an article that appeared a few years ago, I think in Austria, that the Wehrmacht had participated in rounding up Jews or some of the atrocities, something the Wehrmacht had fought for years to keep quiet, trying to create the image of a professional army. After the intial publicity, the subject again disappeared. Sorry, can’t give any sites for this, maybe someone can help.
I have only heard from my father that they generally did not take SS and Gestapo prisoner. I have never seen that written. Another thing is that he was never taught German phrases. Interesting thing. I bought a copy of a 1944 DoD booklet with all sorts of vital translations like ‘hands up’, ‘stop’ ‘come forward’ etc. He said he never saw it. He was never told where he was fighting, other than the country. This would be a serious handicap in taking prisoners. He was manning a machine gun, so close enough to sometimes need to use such phrases. (To explain that phrase, he was back 100 yards from the men carrying rifles, providing covering fire. One reason probably being that it took 2-3 men to lug it around with the ammunition, so it was not mobile enough to be the point.) But he also participated in searching buildings, since that was when he found the concealed lugar he had.
Help any?
From this site:
http://www.ibiscom.com/blitzkrieg.htm
We are again getting into the pernicious mythology about WWII.
The Maginot Line was never taken by direct assault and this was widely reported at the time. There is no need to rewrite history, just take the time to go to the archives of any newspaper and you’ll find the stories. The German battle plan was for a quick armored attack through Belgium preceisely because there was no Maginot Line to fight through.
Shooting of prisoners is a bad idea, and rarely done, because of the retaliation factor. When it happens it is in the heat of the moment or a misunderstanding and not as a result of command policy. Historian John Toland (Battle: Story of the Bulge) writes of such a shooting of German prisoners by a US unit. A garbled field phone command from headquarters was read as “Take no prisoners.” The order really was to take prisoners who were desparately needed in the early days of the Bulge in order to try to find out what the hell was going on.
The main and strongest part of the Maginot line was on Germany’s border, but the line actually extended all the way up the border.
So although what is generally regarded as the Maginot was skirted, the line itself was in fact broken. By crossing the border, the Germans breached the Maginot. A month later, when most of the French were on the run or rushing north, the Germans did in fact breach the main part of the Maginot at the Saar gap. Physically, the line held, but in an area that required more men than physical barriers, it was broken.
I was unable to access your geocities.com sites.
The Maginot line extented from Sedan to Wissenberg according to the Smithsonian in this url=“http://www.smithsonianmag.si.edu/smithsonian/issues97/jun97/maginot.html”] Maginot Line site.
There was a line for fortifications from the Swiss border to Sedan in NE France but except for the Maginot Line itself, it was a series of more or less isolated strong points that was to be connected by mobile defences in case of actual attack.
The final German breakthrough in 1940 was from Sedan on to the north and did not breach the Maginot line according to the best information I can find.
Noone found a cite supporting your point.
Seriously? Atrocities by Germans are well known. In the east they are too many to be counted but even in a country like Norway where there was little fighting I know several.
Executed soldiers(British commandos in uniform)
Sailing without flag.
Prison camps for russians and Serbs.
And this is just off the top of my head!
And believe me speaking well of the Germans weren’t popular in Norway (or any other occupied country) after the war. But the point is that what you describe sounds unlikely and Rommel is known for following the rules of war. And even if it was another German commander I think we would know like we know about the bombing of Rotterdam.
Gestapo(Geheime Statspolizei =Secret Police) wasn’t a fighting force so I doubt your father would have been in a position to capture any. SS often fought to the death(at least until late in the war when conscripts were used in SS divisions also).
FWIW. The Times Atlas of the Second World War (Times Books, 1989, p44) has Rommel leading the westernmost part of the assault, passing the Somme between Amiens and the sea, to take Rouen and the Seine basin downriver from Paris. Somewhat distant from the Maginot Line, as usually understood.
Ok. First, the use of the term ‘Maginot Line’ would be my mistake since I am not that careful in distinguishing the Maginot Line proper from the French border defences in general.
Second, I have been trying to remember something about the source. While I have a read a couple of books about Rommel, it seems this information was together with other tricks of warfare, not his life history. Were I looking anywhere, I would start with the Ballentine series on WWII. In any case, the source was not primary documents and unlikely to be a scholarly secondary source such as a doctoral dissertation. It was most likely something from popular literature and not a gripping read either. So I am sure even if found, someone would be able to discredit it as a less than perfect source. That was only one of two such incidents I read about, the other involving a small band of German soldiers who used the trick to occupy positions closer to the enemy but got the worst of the deal. So it sticks out in my mind. But I can concede the point if it will bring peace, it is not that important to me.
Third. Post-war policy about speaking favourably about the Germans I should think is a little easier to find. As to what was done in Norway, I can’t say. I grew up in the US in the 70’s when even little that was nasty was being published about the Soviets.
Fourth. I doubt my father ran into many of either SS or Gestapo since the former, I thought, fought in their own units, and the latter were usually behind the lines. However, as far as we could figure out, he was in Patton’s army (Said Patton never visited his unit at the front line) and fought in France, so would have been likely to have overrun various surprised Germans. He is now dead and had seen too much death and terror, so was not interested in recalling that part of his life. We only got an incident here and there. Most likely the story about SS and gestapo was in response to some statement I made about how honourable everyone was in the war. He tried to show me that war was not a storybook and people did what they had to in order to survive, not follow some code of honour.
