1 May 13, 1940 Dinant, Belgium 1600 Hours General Erwin Rommel has had a very busy weekend. The Meuse River rages fast and cold. The loyal admirer of Adolf Hitler paddles a small rubber assault raft toward the west shore. Locals blew the bridges one day ago. This exposed crossing is the only way. Rommel and the young Wehrmacht soldiers spilling over the sides of the cramped black inflatable are not alone. All around them, German troops dig their paddles into the green current, desperate to reach the far shore, where heavily fortified French troops lay down thick rounds of fire. "On the steep west bank . . . the enemy had numerous carefully placed machine-gun and anti-tank nests as well as observation points, each one of which would have to be taken on in the fight," Rommel will report. "They also had both light and heavy artillery, accurate and mobile." Some French defenders are hidden in concrete bunkers on the high rocky bluffs, while others aim their M29 machine guns out the windows of abandoned homes on the water's edge. Still other French fighters launch heavy artillery from the ruins of the Crvecoeur Castle, near a mighty bend in the river where spotters have a clear view of the German attackers. For the first time in days, at a time when he needs it most, the wiry, forty-eight-year-old Rommel enjoys little air support. The only covering fire for the general and this band of young infantry soldiers from the 7th Rifle Regiment-almost all less than half his age-comes from the shore behind them, as tanks from his 7th Panzer Division unleash lethal rounds at French positions. Yet the Meuse must be crossed. Wehrmacht troops have been practicing this moment for months on the Mosel River in the secrecy of Germany's Black Forest, with Rommel in particular driving his men hard to perfect their crossing tactics. This is his first tank command after a highly decorated infantry career and he is desperate to succeed. The time has now come to put that training to use. One hundred yards wide at the Leffe crossing point, and fast enough that any man or vehicle attempting to ford its waters will be swept away, the meandering Meuse is a daunting geographical blockade between the rugged Ardennes Forest and open countryside leading straight into France's heart and soul: the capital city of Paris. The two-thousand-year-old city on the banks of the Seine River is the most sublime and resplendent city in Europe. The City of Lights, as Paris is known, is famous for its architecture and museums, thinkers and writers, ideals and poetry, cuisine and history. As King Francis I, former ruler of France, once stated: "Paris is not a city; it is a world." Such is the allure that Germany's despotic supreme leader, Adolf Hitler, once an aspiring painter of watercolors, has a long-standing fascination with Paris's beauty. Hitler has never set foot in the City of Lights, but despite his admiration he still seethes about the punitive terms of surrender France imposed on Germany at the end of World War I. The FYhrer is determined to conquer Paris and humiliate its citizens with a display of total Nazi power. "When at last," Hitler wrote in his manifesto, Mein Kampf, "the will-to-live of the German nation, instead of continuing to be wasted away in purely passive defence, can be summoned together for a final, active showdown with France, and thrown into this last decisive battle with the very highest objective for Germany; then, and only then, will it be possible to bring to a close the perpetual and so fruitless struggle between ourselves and France." Hitler dreams of oversized German flags bearing the swastika, symbol of his National Socialist-"Nazi"-Party, flying from the Eiffel Tower. In this fantasy, museums like the great Louvre will be looted and priceless works of art shipped to his own capital city of Berlin, which will be redesigned and reconstructed, completing his goal of humbling the French even further by ensuring that Berlin's wonders far outstrip those of Paris. Adolf Hitler is very close to realizing that goal. á á á The battle for France began on May 10, just three days ago. More than a million German soldiers poured across their border, determined to crush the French army and its British ally, which has sent nearly a half million troops to aid in the defense. Utilizing a technique known as blitzkrieg-"lightning war"-combining fast-moving divisions of Germany's ten panzer tank divisions accompanied by fighter planes and dive-bombers in the skies above, Hitler's unstoppable forces are attacking with a speed never before seen in warfare. It is the panzers at the forefront, punching through enemy defenses and using speed to expand the fluid battle lines. They do not wait for the infantry, as is the tactic of French tanks. Wehrmacht foot soldiers simply do their best to keep up. The German forces are split into tactical armies, with German Army Group B spearheading the attack in the north. Their mission is to slice through Luxembourg, Belgium, and the Netherlands, not only capturing those nations but also luring British and French troops into battle. Unbeknownst to the Allies, this is a fatal trap. Meanwhile, German Army Group A silently approaches from the east, using the dense Ardennes Forest to conceal what will become known as one of history's greatest surprise attacks. Their job is to dash all the way from the German border to the English Channel, then link up with Army Group B to completely surround and annihilate the Allied forces. Known as a "double envelopment," this tactic is among the oldest in military history, used by Hannibal to defeat the Romans at Cannae in 216 BC. On paper, it looks like two sides of a vise pressing together, squeezing the conquered army in between. If successful, Hitler will accept the French surrender in due course, then have Paris and all of France to call his own. But the bold plan will fail if German Army Group A cannot cross the impregnable Meuse. Flowing 575 miles from northeast France all the way to the North Sea, this serpentine river twists through valleys lined with high cliffs. "Mosa," its Latin name, roughly translates as "maze," for the many abrupt bends and U-turns on the waterway's journey to the sea. And it is not just the Meuse that serves as a natural barrier between Germany and France but also the mountainous terrain on both banks, making for impregnable natural defensive positions. France's top military leader, the intellectual General Maurice-Gustave Gamelin, has every confidence the Meuse will stop the German invasion. He is the architect of "stand-and-take-it warfare," as some in the press label his strategic mindset. The white haired Parisian calls the river "Europe's best tank obstacle" and has planned his battle strategy accordingly. "La Meuse est infranchissable"-"The Meuse cannot be crossed"-the general is fond of stating. In 1939, Time magazine named Gamelin "the world's foremost soldier," almost ensuring that those words are treated as gospel. But just ten days before Germany attacked, a French military attachZ in Switzerland passed along intelligence to General Gamelin in Paris stating that the Germans would invade through the Ardennes Forest, then attempt to cross the Meuse. The attachZ was ignored. Gamelin's belief in the invulnerability of the Ardennes is so profound that he also rejected a 1938 study by his own commanders stating that not only will an attack through the forest succeed but German troops will race to the Meuse River within sixty hours. In fact, Rommel's panzers need just fifty-seven. 2 May 13, 1940 Leffe, France 1605 Hours General Erwin Rommel is determined to prove Monsieur Gamelin a fool. Rommel's woolen battle uniform is drenched in sweat and river water as he paddles with all his might. His knee-high black leather riding boots are soaked. The general is exhausted, having slept little since the invasion began. Yet he ignores the near misses of gunfire and geysers of artillery rounds landing in the water all around him. Instead, Rommel shouts encouragement to the brave boys paddling alongside him. "I now took over personal command of 2nd Battalion of 7th Rifle Regiment and for some time directed operations by myself," the general will report of his temporary return to infantry command. "I crossed the Meuse in one of the first boats and at once joined the company." The assault raft reaches the shore near a ruined waterfront ch%teau. Rommel orders the riflemen into position, shouting for them to keep their heads low. French artillery zeroes in, launching a withering series of rounds. Nevertheless, the general commands a handful of young soldiers to paddle the assault rafts back to load infantry still waiting to cross. Rommel desperately needs artillery of his own to pin down the French. But the big guns are stuck in traffic somewhere on the narrow roads of the Ardennes, as materials for constructing pontoon bridges having been deemed more important. The general is hoarse from shouting orders. There are still five hours before sunset. The air sings with small-arms fire. Rommel's men take heavy casualties. Death comes as a surprise, whether from a machine-gun bullet hundreds of yards away or a shell fired from a mile distant; few of these teenagers catch a glimpse of the man who pulls the trigger and have even less chance to shoot back. After months of training, four exhausting days on the move, and the adrenaline surge of advancing on an enemy position in broad daylight, these young warriors perish. More than eighty German soldiers are killed, while still others are turned into mist by direct artillery hits, forever to be listed as "missing" in the official casualty report. Yet Erwin Rommel defies death. He does not wear a helmet, preferring a high-peaked officer's cap, which not only alerts French sharpshooters to his commanding rank but also leaves him vulnerable to the slightest high-velocity metal shell fragment. Despite the heavy fire, he strides back and forth along the waterfront, finally spotting a location where his combat engineers can build a ferry. Work begins immediately. Rommel orders local houses set on fire to provide a smoke screen protecting his engineers from snipers. When construction bogs down, the general personally leaps into water up to his hips to assist. The ferry is built within hours. As French artillery runs out of ammunition and ceases firing, Rommel's personal panzer command tank becomes the first armored vehicle to float across. By morning, thirty more panzers will be over the Meuse. But one laborious crossing at a time is too slow. The general hastens the German advance by ordering the construction of a pontoon bridge at a crossing between Leffe and Bouvignes. Thirty miles to the south, near the city of Sedan, fellow panzer generals Heinz Guderian and Georg-Hans Reinhardt have also successfully fought their way over the Meuse and are constructing their own temporary bridges. By May 14, just four days after the invasion of France, the myth of the uncrossable Meuse is no more. French officers desert their commands. Those caught in the act by their superiors are executed with a shot to the head. This reminder for others to stand fast does little good. Lacking leadership and facing certain death in the path of the unrelenting German advance, entire French units raise the white flag of surrender. One major is captured attempting to escape dressed like a woman, his uniform pants beneath the dress giving him away. So many French give up that the Germans do not have time to imprison the defeated men, simply ordering them to throw down their weapons and march east into Germany, their rifles then hurled under tank treads and crushed. Amazingly, most French do as they are told. When a lone lieutenant colonel indignantly refuses three direct orders to surrender, Rommel orders him shot. Yet there is no celebration for General Erwin Rommel. Not yet. The general and his fellow panzer commanders know the blitzkrieg must roll on. The men are exhausted and coated in dust, still fueled by adrenaline and now euphoria. One by one, the seven tank divisions fan out over a twenty-mile front and advance west across France. The air vibrates with the rumble of panzers. Rather than wait for supplies to catch up, these tanks refuel at abandoned roadside gas stations. The roads are clogged with refugees and still more French soldiers eager to throw down their arms. There is little resistance. French throats choke from terror at the sight of the German onslaught, but Erwin Rommel is stirred: "In a light morning mist, with the rising sun behind us, the tank column rolled on towards the west," he will confidently write. Paris is just 150 miles in the distance. And nothing now stands in the way of Adolf Hitler's army. It's all happening so fast. 3 May 16, 1940 Paris, France 5:30 p.m. Winston Churchill has come to save France. It is six days since the German onslaught. Two days ago, as General Erwin Rommel was crossing the Meuse, the Netherlands harbor city of Rotterdam was leveled by the Luftwaffe. Nearly nine hundred civilians were killed and eighty thousand made homeless. The German officer accepting the Dutch surrender, a small, corpulent Prussian named Dietrich von Choltitz, was unrepentant about the devastation. Knowing the German mindset toward such all-out war, Churchill shudders to think that a similar fate awaits Paris. Britain's newly elected prime minister strides into the French foreign minister's office here at number 37 Quai d'Orsay, followed closely by three of his top military commanders. The bonfires of burning government documents remain lit, smoky sweet smell of burning paper wafting in through the open windows. An oversized battlefield map balances on an easel. The mood among the assembled French dignitaries is grim. Yesterday morning, Churchill awoke to a frantic phone call from his French counterpart, Paul Reynaud. "He spoke in English, and evidently under stress: 'We have been defeated,'" Churchill will later quote Reynaud. "As I did not immediately respond he said again: 'We are beaten; we have lost the battle.' I said: 'Surely, it can't have happened so soon?' But he replied: 'The front is broken near Sedan: they are pouring through in great numbers with tanks and armored cars.'" So it is that Winston Churchill has flown to Paris to meet with the Anglo-French Supreme War Council. He wears a bow tie and waistcoat. His breath is Romeo y Julieta cigar and luncheon champagne, wreathed in Penhaligon's Blenheim Bouquet aftershave. Churchill's ambition is to find ways Britain can help stop the German advance. He is upbeat, certain there is a way to reverse France's stunning battlefield fiascos. The sixty-five-year-old prime minister remains standing as the French commander in chief, General Maurice-Gustave Gamelin, steps forward to brief the group on the war status. Excerpted from Taking Paris: The Epic Battle for the City of Lights by Martin Dugard All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.
