Word: frenches
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Dates: during 1930-1939
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...Gamelin said he feels free now for a war of maneuver-somewhere. His High Command made further show of this free feeling by sending home 3,000 of 27,000 civilian doctors who were mobilized for service in the West. Perhaps spring will find some of these doctors in French Syria with Weygand's Army, ready to stem a Russian march into Bessarabia, or to drive at Germany through the postern gate of erstwhile Poland...
...Furthermore, the completion of all this work places the French High Command in a position to attempt maneuvering operations, going beyond the defensive phase on the day and at the hour it may suit it eventually...
Only to laymen do the French military use the phrase "Maginot Line." In official parlance, their system of forts and ramparts is called "The Permanent Fortified Positions." In physical terms, the commentary meant that these positions have now been lengthened at both ends, and also increased in depth, on the same principle as the Siegfried Position-a network of strong points capable of being extended backward indefinitely should they be cracked in front. In psychological terms, the mention of "maneuvering" and "beyond the defensive phase" seemed to mean: "Germans, not only can you neither crack nor flank...
...coincidence or not, the French forecast of a war of maneuver was preceded and followed by greatly increased activity of German patrols, all the way from the Moselle to the Rhine. Starting with dozens, the Nazi raids increased to as many as 80 in a single night, in such strength that even the tough Moroccans in the Wissembourg sector had to call for artillery support to blow the raiders back. The Germans tried a new system, approaching each French outpost in separate columns or files, to bomb it with grenades from three sides simultaneously. These raids, by seasoned troops, were...
News correspondents were "temporarily" withdrawn from the French front Jines last week, but not before Correspondent Kenneth T. Downs of International News Service managed, with a comrade, to spend three days and two nights at outposts held by Moroccans in the Vosges foothills near Wissembourg. His account of this trip was one of the first notable pieces of reporting in World War II. Excerpts...