INVASION of Holland, Belgium, Luxembourg and France.....
FALL GELB

 

Operation Fall Gelb : invasion of the low countries , meaning : Holland , Belgium , Luxembourg and France ....
During the first days of May 1940 , the French army under command of General Gamelin and a smaller British force (expeditionary force) under the command of Lord Gort took up their positions along the French border with Belgium . They knew that Germany would invade France and that the attack would be in that area , wether or not Belgium is neutral or otherwise .
The area along the Lorraine was protected by the Maginot line and the river Meuse from Verdun , Sedan and Charleville had the protection of the dense Ardennes ....

May 10 , 1940 , German paratroopers spotted , followed by airattacks in Holland , another wave of German paratrooperss sighted , tanks and motorised divisions cross border !
Holland was in a panic , although the soldiers put up a stiff fight , Germans overran their positions ...
May 14 , 1940 : Germans demand that the Dutch resistance stop their actions or else they will bomb the city of Rotterdam . At the same time 50 German bombers were on route to Rotterdam , bombong it and killing over 20.000 people according to the German propaganda machine .
Holland was overrun , German forces on it's way through Belgium not yet conquered completely .

Prior to paratrooper landings to get the important positions , Brussels and Antwerp was bombed .
Then paratroopers got in and secured important airfields and railroadjunctions , again the Blitzkrieg tactic prooved to be one of the best strategies ever .
The Belgian army didn't gave up without a fight .....
In the same time in France , they were guessing what entranceway the Germans would use to invade France .... Maginot line was impossible to see a German advance there , Swiss border is well secured , the 2nd French army guards the woods of the Ardennes ..... aging defendants of the 2nd army in the unlikely event of seeing Germans in the Ardennes .

One thing was for sure , they would invade France through Belgium as those were the plans found on a German pilot who crashed with his courierplane in Belgium , january 1940 ..... but on those plans the invasion would be in mid january 1940 ....
2 German generals , Guderian and von Manstein , didn't agree with the Schlieffen plan . This plan meant the invasion of France from central Belgium out .
So the Germans used Sichelschnitt (Sickle cut) ..... attack and advance through Holland , then cross the Belgian border luring General Gamelin and the French , aswell as the B.E.F. (British Expiditionary Force) into central Belgium . While this was happening , Guderian would advance with his panzers through the Ardennes , push towards the Channel and squeeze the Allies in a pocket near Calais so that they were trapped .....

12th May 1940 ,the French 7th army was send to Breda to assist with what was left of the Dutch army , B.E.F. crossed the border with Belgium and got as far as Wavre . The 1st French army headed towars Namur . Sichelschnitt was working well , 13 May 1940 , von Manstein gave the order to the panzerdivsions , motorized and mechanical units aswell as infantry to make the surprise entry in France through the Belgian Ardennes ...
The French second class troops were no match for the elite German forces , the invasion of France began .....

The Blitzkrieg in France started , 1.500 Luftwaffe planes bombed Sedan and the surrounding areas together with heavy artillery . La Marfeé hights , one of the best defence positions the French had near Sedan , was soon overrun by the Germans . Pillboxes were blown up by Sturmpionieren while Flakguns attacked other pillboxes and canons , killing ever French troop inside or next to it .
Meanwhile the B.E.F. and the French 1st army had orders to retreat from their positions , no stopping the well oiled German warmachine .
On the 17th of May 1940 , Brussels was taken .
Everywhere allied troops were pushed back , the remains of the Belgian , French and B.E.F. army retreated all the way to Dunkirk , where they would be picked up by the British in fishingboats and transport ships to get them safe in England , this operation by the Allies was operation Dynamo .
Soon the lowcountries were in German hands ......
 

next