France 1940: Blitzkrieg in the West (Praeger Illustrated Military History) |
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You Are Here: Home > History Books > France History > Item 184
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France 1940: Blitzkrieg in the West (Praeger Illustrated Military History)
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by Alan Shepperd
Sales Rank: 1884429
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$3.97
At Amazon
on 9-11-2008.
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Features
Cover Type: Hard Cover with 96 pages
Published by: Praeger Publishers February 28, 2004
Written in: English
ISBN 10 Number: 0275982793
ISBN 13 Number: 978-0275982799
Book Dimensions:
10 x 7.2 x 0.5 inches
Weighs: 15.8 ounces
Reader Reviews
This review is from: France 1940: Blitzkrieg in the West (Campaign) (Paperback)
Shepperd's book is yet another in Osprey's large collection of moderately useful publications. It shares the same characteristics of the others, as I have written elsewhere: it is a bland, uneven overview that contains several important mistakes and suffers from some strange interpretations and errors of omission. The first problem is with the assessments of German and French commanders. Rommell gets the bulk of the attention (some twenty lines out of 73) despite the fact that he was only a divisional commander at the time. Kleist and Guderian get comparative short shrift, even though they were much more influential. Shepperd dispenses with the French command very quickly, mentioning only army, army group, and political leaders. Shepperd's obvious disdain for the French is revealed in his assessment of the French prime minister, Reynaud, which points out the fact that he had an influential mistress (who cares?). In short, Shepperd's presentation of the German and French commanders is inept and trivial. When Shepperd discusses the opposing armies, he starts to make outright mistakes. He claims, on page 13, that the French 37mm gun mounted in many of their tanks was "useless against contemporary armor". Obviously, Shepperd did not bother to look up any (easily available) data on weaponry and armor of German and French tanks. Contrary to his claim, the French 37mm was more than adequate to deal with the vast bulk of German tanks in 1940 (which were Panzer I and II models). Instead, it was actually the German tanks that lacked the punch to deal with their foes: their 37mm gun could barely deal with the common H35 and R35 tanks, and were of only marginal use (against the sides) of the S35 and B1 tanks. Shepperd simply parrots most of the long-standing myths about the state of the French forces in 1940. This is revealed by hisabout the employment of French tanks. He implies that the French threw most of their tanks away by employing only four armored divisions (each with 160 tanks). He overlooks the fact that there were also three light mechanized divisions (each with 260 tanks) as well as five light cavalry divisions (each with 44 tanks). The French did distribute many tanks to independent tank battalions, but about a third of these tanks were FT17s, left over from World War I. Although over a thousand useful R35 and H35 models were distributed to these battalions as well, the French army was more mobile and concentrated its tanks far more than Shepperd admits. Effectively, the count is 7 French armored divisions against ten German. And yes, the German divisions had more tanks in each one, but 58% of their tanks in the field were Pz I and Pz II models, which can hardly be termed "tanks". Shepperd further disparages the French army by sniping at its perceived immobility; this is not done overtly, but the implication is there: he shows pictures of French troops by their horses, and notes that guns were horse-drawn and "moving slowly" (page 39), while ignoring the fact the vast bulk of the German army was in the exact same situation (in fact, this is what caused so much worry at higher levels of command during the campaign: the panzers were dramatically outrunning the entire horse-drawn and foot-marching German army). Shepperd is also way off on French morale: recent scholarship on the campaign reveals that the French were confident that they would win, given they had the superior army. Shepperd's German-centric book is also revealed in errors of omission: he does not present the structure of a French division despite providing one for a panzer division, and he ignores successful battles fought by the French (as in front of Gembloux, where Prioux's two light mechanized divisions beat the 3rd and 4th panzer divisions). Finally, the campaign itself is told in the fashion of a broad overview: not much detail and presented in a straightforward textbook-like fashion. Clearly, there is better, more detailed writing on the portion of the campaign Shepperd covers. In the end, these books are for modelers and wargamers, not those interested in getting an accurate history of a campaign. So, how useful is it in this regard? Again, one star. There are quite a few pictures, most of which are commonly seen. The color plates of men and vehicles are mostly badly drawn, with washed out coloring. The 3-D maps that form the central attraction for wargamers are interesting, as always. They will provide some inspiration for putting miniatures on the table top, but the maps are "zoomed out" so there is not much detail.
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France 1940: Blitzkrieg in the West (Praeger Illustrated Military History)
Available from Amazon
Price: $3.97
Updated on 9-11-2008.
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