Customer Reviews

The Battle of France, 1940 (Cassell Military Paperbacks)

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I thought this book was terrible. I never did figure out what Warner's intent was in writing this book. It's "The Battle of France" without the French, and yet it is not a book explicitly about the BEF either. If the book was actually about the BEF, then it would be very interesting. But to try to relate the history of the entire battle of France without more than passing references to French forces, command, politics, or inteligence/espionage (esp. prior to summer of 1940) is rediculous. To believe Warner, you'd think that it was the BEF that had the predominant number of troops and the French were just along for the ride.

This is a silly book. To believe Warner, the placement of the 10th Panzer division on the flank/reserve for a little while before driving to Calais and Dunkirk actually caused the eventual Allied victory in the war! Errors of fact abound (e.g. the Gross-Deutschland regiment is designated as an SS unit, or the assertion that German tanks were in large part superior to Allied tanks). Errors of interpretation abound as well: the contribution of the entire French Air force is dismissed in one sentence.

This is the worst book on a WWII subject I have read in a long time. Instead, read May's "Strange Victory" for a good look at military intelligence and strategy, Powaski's "Lightning War" for how that intelligence and strategy played out on the battlefield, and Jackson's "The Fall of France" for a good assessment of military and political decisions.

A survey of the appendix says it all. 14 pages are devoted to a detailed listing of the British order of battle down to the battalion. The Germans get less than a page (including comical statements such as "Army Group B were all infantry corps"), the French get less than half a page, and the Belgians and Dutch share a single sentence.

Typical Warner who likes to think that all campaigns and battles revolve around the British, that they alone are the masters of the battlefield.

Poorly written, scantily researched (if at all), this book will be a delight to read for the British, but rubbish to the rest of the world.

This book covers the Battle of France 1940. It was an interesting book. It was hard to believe that the Germans had defeated the British Expeditionary Force so bad however, Hitler decided that the German Army was moving too fast and ordered a halt which prevented the complete capture of the BEF. Also, interesting was that Britian was not able to properly suport France through use of fighter planes since Britian needed them to help protect for the invasion of Britian! It is a interesting book and I would buy it again!