[SIZE=3]
French Army - Army de Terre[/SIZE]
OOC Notes:
Historically, the French regarded Germany as their expected future enemy. Post-WWI, the French had suffered grave casualties which required over a generation to replenish, and the French nation did not wish to engage in yet another costly war. Additionally, capable generals from the Great War, promoted rapidly into positions of authority, stayed on in their roles postwar, leading to a stagnation of ideas within the French Army, and a doctrine that largely evolved around defense: “not losing” as opposed to winning. Although a number of individuals correctly analyzed the difficulty, the combination of unrealistic expectations about German plans and France’s own capabilities led to a poisonous situation that resulted in France’s rapid defeat in May 1940.
However, in Wesworld, a number of factors appear to be at variance with historical events. First, and most obviously, France did not entrust its defence to the construction of the Maginot Line, instead using those resources to develop other facets of the armed forces (and civil structure). Included in that is a more sound combined-arms doctrine than France historically developed. Second, France’s willingness to abolish Great War reparations in the late 1920s suggests that, unlike historically, the French people and government did not intend to “ensure the Hun never rose again”. Third, the faster Entente victory (Armistice in 11/11/1917) in the Great War removed a full year of bloody engagements - and both the French and the Germans thus benefit. Fourth, France has a number of potential enemies aside from Germany: the creation of AEGIS places France in the middle of three individually-smaller but formidable powers in the form of Italy, Iberia, and the Netherlands. [1] Fifth, and finally, France has the possibility of facing much more developed military opposition in their outremer holdings (Africa and Asia).
It is therefore my opinion that, based on Wesworld history as is currently canon, the French Army has a number of key places where, by intent or accident, it diverges from the historical. I wrote the events of the Rif-Atlas War, started by my illustrious predecessor, as a way of subtly demonstrating these changes and serving as the rationale for a further point-of-divergence.
Over the future, I intend to develop the Armee de Terre in much the same vein as Charles de Gaulle proposed in his 1934 book
Vers l’Armée de Métier (“The Army of the Future”), which proposed an professional army based on mobile armour and armoured infantry. [2] As de Gaulle argued, this sort of army favors the French demographics of the period; in Wesworld, though the French demographics are not
quite as bad, the need for a more fluid defense and offense against potential enemies (be it in Metropolitan France or abroad) makes this plan more realistic. Additionally, as an ally of two of the world's leading modern armies (Atlantis and Russia), France has substantial reasons to seek more modern tactics.
Recruitment and Composition of the Army
[SIZE=1]
Agent148 sent me this excellent write-up of how the French Army is recruited. At the present time, I have nothing I can add to it, and therefore post it here in its entirety.[/SIZE]
The Armee de Terre is divided into two distinct formations, although both function in tactically the same way, they are recruited differently, and operate under somewhat different conditions.
The Metropolitian Army of France, is recruited by conscription exclusively, only it's officers are generally long-term volunteers/professionals. Every french male of 20 years of age, is liable for three years service with the colours, five if assigned to a specialist branch. The majority of recruits - generally men from an agricultural background, although just as often they could be shop assistancts, small craftsmen and factory workers, or clerks and teachers depended on their area of recruitment - traditionally are assigned to the infantry branch, with certain size and weight restrictions limiting those who could serve in the cavalry branch. Service in the artillery and engineers was reserved for those who had worked in technical fields, such as railways or in public works projects.
Following their active service, a conscript passed into the Reserve for a period of 11 years. Each infantry regiment and light infantry battalion, maintained a reserve unit into which these reservists were assigned, if mobilized for war purposes, these reserse units were to be used for garrison and line-of-communications duties or to help form reserve infantry divisions. On completion of service within the Reserves, each conscript then passed into the Territorials for a further 7 years service. Following this the conscript, was then directed into the Territorial Reserves for a final 7 years, making for a total of 28 years service. Both the Territorials and Territorial Reserves were intended purely as local defence units, and only mobilized in war time in moments of extreme emergency. Typically both units would be deployed on line-of-communications and labour duties for making and maintaining trench systems, roads and railway lines.
By law, no conscipt soldier in the Metropolitian Army may serve outside continental France, in peacetime.
The second force within the Armee de Terre is the Colonial Army, which has answered to various departments over time. Originally considered part of the Ministry of the Marine & Colonies, when it was first formed, the Colonial Army has bounced administratively between the Ministry of he Marine, the later independent Ministry of Colonies, and the Ministry of War. It wasn't until 1900 that the Colonial Army was formally transferred to the control of the General Staff of the Army. Even then the Colonial Army maintained what amounted to an effective independent administrative structure.
The soldiers of the Colonial Army are recruited from two primary sources, volunteers from metropolitian France, French colonial conscripts and the indigenous peoples of the French Colonial Possessions. Colonial Army units are catagories, into several traditional types depending on where they were recruited and who they were recruited from. Regiments and battalions of infantry raised in North Africa, were for instance entitled tirailleurs if raised from the indigenous peoples. If they were raised from french volunteers or french colonist conscripts, they were termed zouaves. North Africa also produced two types of light cavalry for service within the Colonial Army, chasseurs d'Afrique and spahis. The former being recruited from Frenchmen, the later from native elements. Units recruited in other French colonial possessions followed the same format. A third type of formations was that of mixed combat regiments or battalions drawn from both french and native volunteers and colonial conscripts, and these units were generally dubbed Colonial in addition to their branch of service or area title.
2) the French Ministry of War, is during 1937 considered raising the conscript service period from 3 years, to 5 years, for infantry, and from 5 years to 7 years for those serving in technical branches such as the engineers and artillery. The last time the army considered such a move to increase it's reserves of trained soldiery, the Chamber of Deputies nearly rioted, at the turn of the century. The fight to block an increase of 1 year to the previous 2 years conscript service for infantry, and 3 years for technical branches caused the socialist deputies to revolt! The extension was passed only by a narrow margin in both the Chamber and the Senate.
The Rif-Atlas War and Novel Developments
Following the Rif-Atlas War, the French Army analyzed their performance and identified a number of points they wished to improve on:
-
Motorized / Armoured Infantry: more vehicles, and less expensive and effective vehicles, are required.
-
Tanks and lightly-armoured vehicles: the universal application of radios to the gear of scout and armoured vehicles, permitting better reporting of enemy movements and swifter response to developing situations.
-
Paratroopers: Further development of suitable cargo aircraft and tactics; the expansion of training and capabilities.
Small Arms
France is generally well-situated for small arms as a result of the FAR Standardized Small Arms Program. The infantry is slowing converting over to the new MAS-36 semiautomatic rifle (in 6.5x51) and equipping with the modern FM-37 general-purpose machine gun in the same round. Although side arms are not standard issue for most solders, officers are equipping with the Fabrique Nationale GP35 Hi-Power pistol.
French mortars are well-enough known and close enough to historical that I don’t feel it’s necessary to go into them here.
Tanks
By 1937, the Armee de Terre has a plethora of tank designs in service, ranging from the ancient FT-17 tank to the light AMR-series and Hotchkiss H35 light tanks to the monstrous 69-ton FCM 2C-bis. Part of this is due to the lack of a centralized institution responsible for overseeing tank development, with each branch of the service submitting vague requirements and leaving it to the manufacturing committees to answer them. In December 1937, the French Army changed this situation with the creation of the
Direction des Études et Fabrications d'Armement or DEFA, which was charged with, among other things, all future tank design. DEFA incorporated the Army’s earlier
Les Armements et les Tactiques le Spéciales Corps, which had formed in February 1936 to serve as a testing and demonstration unit both for vehicles and tactics. ATSC retained most of its independence but reported to DEFA, which was responsible for offering strategic guidance and making final recommendations to the Army. DEFA’s tank design committee spent much of 1938 analyzing the performance of armoured vehicles in field exercises as well as the Rif-Atlas War. In late 1937, however, DEFA did approve the adoption of the internationally-developed Transall TT-37 as an interim response to tank developments elsewhere in Europe; the rapid proliferation of heavily-armed and protected Asian tanks even in remote backwaters such as Persia caused some concern, leading to significantly larger acquisitions of TT-37s than otherwise planned. The TT37 was the first French tank to receive an informal type name, becoming the Char 2E “Lefebvre”.
Development of the
D4 Char Coloniale pressed forward in mid-1937, and a number of units of this type saw service in the Rif-Atlas War in General Billotte’s
Batalillon de Chars de Combat de coloniale. This tank, armed with a 57mm gun and powered by a diesel engine, was an improvement on many of the older French tanks and provided a great deal of technical information for future French tank design. However, by 1939, no further orders of the D4 were placed; the Armee de Terre was concerned at the rapid distribution of very well-armed and armoured modern tanks even to countries such as Persia and Latvia. By February 1939, the Deuxième Bureau [3] determined the use of a high-velocity 90mm AA gun on the newest Indian tanks, and anticipated that other powers would shortly thereafter move to larger high-velocity guns. Renault, having already worked on the D4
Char Coloniale, had seen the developing trend and reported working on a new "D5" tank.
Another concern for DEFA was the selection of a better suspension system. Most French tanks of the 1930s used either leaf-and-spring, vertical coil, or horizontal helical suspension; only the TT-37 used Christie suspension, although that system was standard on most Atlantean and Russian tanks. The French tankers, when presented with opportunities to test allied tanks, universally approved of the superior suspension systems, as well as a number of other advances. In 1939, an engineer for Transall, François Auteuil, developed a new torsion-bar suspension system design. The new Auteuil Suspension was selected for future French tanks, and largely replaced older suspension designs.
By December 1939, DEFA, in collaboration with the Delacroix Committee (responsible for reviewing the events of the Rif-Atlas War and reports from other period conflicts) recommended that future French tank development be organized in only two overall categories. The first was a lightweight “destroyer” tank suitable for scouting, covering the flanks of an advancing infantry or armoured force, and engaging in the pursuit of defeated enemy forces. The second category, more radical, called for a “Char de croiser de bataille” or “battlecruiser tank” capable of serving both as an infantry tank and a cruiser tank. This would be supplemented, when necessary, by heavy breakthrough tanks, although the Delacroix Committee recommended this duty be given to assault guns such as the SAu-35 (OTL SAu-40).
Infantry Carriers
The founding of DEFA was less immediately obvious in the development of infantry carriers. During the Rif-Atlas War, numerous infantry commanders requested more
Voiture blindée de chasseurs portée 38L vehicles for carrying infantry in a protected vehicle. Infantry units assigned with these carriers demonstrated more effective performance than infantry units moving solely on foot, or even in trucks. However, the Armee de Terre was concerned about the high cost of the fully-tracked Lorraine 37L, and requested that interested companies propose a less-expensive alternative design for infantry carriers. One of the other faults identified with the VBCP-38L was the need for a trailer to carry most of the troops, which further increased cost over comparable half-tracks.
Of the resulting responses, including an improved Citroen-Kregesse halftrack, the Armee de Terre showed the greatest interest in Transall’s all-wheeled “Transporter blindée Type-42”. The eight-wheeled TB42 offered a top speed of 80 kilometers per hour and carried twelve soldiers and two crewmen, with. While a number of other designs provided similar performance, Transall’s entry set itself above the crowd by it’s amphibious capability, with two propellers on the aft end of the vehicle. This capability was advertised “for rapid river crossings”, but additionally gained the interest of the
Fusiliers Marins, the infantry arm of the French Navy. In February and March of 1941, a convoy of TB42 infantry carriers was assigned to undertake “The Black Cruise”, being transported by ship to Abidjan in Ghana, and then driving overland to Algiers. Although the journey was difficult and the vehicles suffered a number of breakdowns, all six of the TB42s successfully arrived in Algiers for transport back to France, where the vehicles were then driven from the Cote d’Azur to Dunkerque on the English Channel.
Artillery
One of the French Army’s highest priorities in the late 1930s - and one of the most contentious areas - was in the updating of field artillery. The famous “French 75” (
Matériel de 75mm Mle 1897) had a long and illustrious service life, endearing itself to the minds of both the French public and the generals themselves. Unfortunately, this legacy also made the gun somewhat difficult to replace, as many officers, even junior ones, thought that “what was good enough for 1915 is good enough for 1935”. Others, more far-seeing, disagreed, and pushed for the development of a new field gun, which eventually occurred with the acquisition of the Canon de 105 court mle 1935B.
However, the sheer number of French 75s in service offered a number of opportunities for other uses. Large numbers of the best-maintained French 75s were mounted on new split-tail carriages permitting a wider angle of traverse and lower stance. Once equipped with muzzle-brakes, these guns were widely adopted as antitank guns, a job made easier through the introduction of Swiss engineer Henry Mohaupt’s special antitank shells in early 1940. [4] A number of these improvised AT guns were also installed on the chassis of the Lorraine 37L tracked carrier for better battlefield maneuverability. The Lorraine 37L was additionally used as the base vehicle for a self-propelled gun modification of the French 75. [5]
Although large numbers of Mle 1897s were converted into antitank guns at a significantly reduced cost per unit, a more permanent solution still was sought, with conversions of both 75mm and 90mm antiaircraft guns, suitably placed on a more appropriate carriage, being considered. As of 1940, however, no firm decision was made. The French Army additionally investigated the design of a 155mm field howitzer, and regularly evaluated equipment from Russia and Atlantis.
Notes
- Note [1]: For various OOC reasons, I do not believe this is a likely conflict at the present time, and since 1935, France and Iberia have sought a sort of peaceful detente. This has been largely mimicked be detente between France’s ally Atlantis and Iberia. Additionally, the Belgians stand between the Netherlands and France, so this scenario would be a three-front war only if someone invaded Belgium first (which wouldn’t be me).
- Note [2]: This is a historical book which substantially affected - by their own admission - blitzkrieg proponents like Guderian.
- Note [3]: The Deuxième Bureau is France’s foreign intelligence organization, charged with determining the capabilities of enemy (or potential enemy) equipment, units, and plans. The Deuxième Bureau, from the 1910s to 1940, was acknowledged as one of the world’s best cryptanalysis organizations; for instance, in 1914 they broke the German diplomatic codes and decyphered the German declaration of war on France before the German ambassador’s office in Paris did.
- Note [4]: Historical introduction of HEAT shells. Mohaupt worked closely with the French and British in OTL, and the French historically shared the HEAT principal to the US in 1940 (the US promptly recruited him). In WWTL, he was recruited in 1937 by Yugoslavia.
- Note [5]: These developments of the “French 75” are based on the developments the French made in the pre-1939 days, and which the Germans made in 1941 to turn captured French guns into emergency AT guns. The French conversions were called
Canon de 75 mm mle 1897 modifié 1933. The self-propelled gun is based off of historical German conversions - although they used 155mm and 105mm guns, whereas I just used a 75mm gun. (Maybe later.)