French Army alternatives, 1935-40 (41?)

tomo pauk said:

French small arms anyone?
They were on forefront with the light machine gun idea and execution back in the Great war, and were also the only major country that developed and issued the self-loading rifles. They also fiddled a bit with the pre-intermediate cartridge with the 8mmx35, and with the pre-assault rifle for it.
In the interwar period, that level of innovation pretty much died out.
(see here the RSC models of 1917 and 1918 firing it out 100 years after the ww1)

So I'd suggest that they still have the RSC 1918 in some production, it will be using the left over 8mm Lebel cartridges anyway. Try and make the 7.5mm version of it in the meantime. A carbine made around perhaps the 7.5mmx35 round might've been usful.
The lack of a good, modern SMG also needs to be addressed. The light MG FM 1924 seems to be the only success story - so just make more of these?
Surprisingly enough, there was a lack of a modern repeating rifle in the interwar period - bar a the small number of MAS 36, it was the ww1 left overs and that's it? This also need to be rectified.
There is also no belt-fed MG for the Army.
Any worth in an ATR in 13.2mm calibre? It was not like the German tanks before 1941 were that well armored, after all.

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Of course, the only reasonable and logical choice would be to field the mighty and infallible Chauchat! Those weak Germans would never stand a chance!

TM06 said:

Of course, the only reasonable and logical choice would be to field the mighty and infallible Chauchat! Those weak Germans would never stand a chance!

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Over a quarter of a million Chautchats were made and put to use. Indeed they were still about in 1940 and some were used as captured weapons by second line German units afterwards. As an automatic rifle having a limited automatic fire ability, with a trained crew as part of an integrated trained assault team, it was quite useful and remained in use with the Belgians and Poles for many post war years. The Belgians rebuilding their 7mm Mauser versions post war to a higher durability standard. Long overtaken by later LMGs it was still a useful automatic rifle. One may note that WW1 Browning Automatic Rifles sent to the UK for Home Guard use were specifically doctrinally for use as semi automatic rifles with, initially, automatic fire only in an emergency and soon further limited to only semi automatic fire.

The standard Chauchat was not a fine weapon but it was a workable one and notable for being designed for stamped parts and production outside the arms industry ie the gun by bicycle manufacturers and magazines by tinplate toy makers*. That the Americans insisted on converting them to 30-06 ammunition gave a failure meme which only covered a tiny proportion of the vast Chauchat production has bedevilled anglophone views on the gun which are absent in the Francophone world. It became superseded by better weapons but was still better than bolt action rifles.


* in that sense it was a precursor to the Sten machine carbine. A sort of MP28 made by the Chauchat method.
**yes I do have a sense of humour and know the quote above was tongue in cheek.

French small arms were as chaotic and poorly planned as many other French armament paths.
Some of the guns were good but long term planning seems to have suffered from fits and starts and changes in direction.

The Hotchkiss 1914 may not have been as bad as some think as an infantry heavy machinegun but some export versions may have had trouble.
Most infantry heavy machine guns needed 3-4 man crews and with such a crew the 1914 could perform most of the duties missions required. However it was not a good gun for using in tanks or other confined spaces. That said many other countries machine guns used in tanks/AFV left a lot to be desired (Italy, Japan, Soviet Union) during WW II.
The French had come up with an armored vehicle gun that was better than some, but they never used it as a tripod mounted infantry gun. The FM 24/29 did not have the fast change barrel requires for such a role but may have been OK as a light Machine gun (Brens had quick change barrels for better sustained fire) but if the French had sufficient 1914s in the company or battalion that may not have been a big problem.
A better sub machine gun might have been nice but even in the German army MP-38s and MP-40s were not as common in 1939-40 as they became latter.

Shortround6 said:

A problem for the French is a large numbers of the S.35 never got radios despite plans/intentions.
This severely limited their ability to co-ordinate/co-operate.
The B I bis was given priority and even here the fitting not complete and there were 3 different radios (?) maybe four.
Early radios were short range and key (Morse code?) only. Then there was a voice radio. Platoon commanders got a different radio and higher command (company commander and above?) got a different set. Now if the company commanders tank breaks down there is no vehicle he can grab and maintain radio contact with higher formations.

Many of the 2 man tanks got no radios even on the platoon commander lever.

French lack of artillery creates repercussions. You can't steal 75mm guns from the Field artillery to make anti-tank guns when the field artillery is already understrength.
Now you have some better AT guns but you have hurt your general artillery support which was none to good to begin with.

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One of the least known issue of French armored units was that the refueling assets were by far not as close as the Germans dis.
Ditto for the bridge laying equipment.

It seems it would be easier for the French to create an atomic bomb from Congolese uranium than to change anything in the army structures and the thinking of the generals.

bf109xxl said:

It seems it would be easier for the French to create an atomic bomb from Congolese uranium than to change anything in the army structures and the thinking of the generals.

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The good generals were there : they proofed it in North Africa, Italy and ETO.The Army was then mainly equipped with US material and cloting.
As to the uranium, it came fom the Congo Belge - Belgisch-Kongo (presently Zaire), not from the French Congo (now Democratic Republic of Congo).

Frog said:

The good generals were there

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I know - and not only Doumenc. Unfortunately they had insufficient influence to change many of the wrong decisions.

Frog said:

As to the uranium, it came fom the Congo Belge - Belgisch-Kongo (presently Zaire), not from the French Congo (now Democratic Republic of Congo).

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I'm well aware of that, too. Buying uranium from the Belgians was not a big problem. But in general it was just sarcasm on my part.
I do not believe that any measure could save France from disaster. The failed reform of the army in the late 1920s, the diplomatic fiasco in 1932, the lethargic sleep until about 1936, demographic problems, internal political disputes all severely limited the possibilities. To overtake the Wehrmacht France needed national solidarity, full concentration of all resources on military construction and a sober assessment of the enemy in the top generals no later than 1932. But the probability of such a development was no higher than the invention of the atomic bomb in France at that time.

Eugenia Kiesling's Arming Against Hitler is essential reading. If you don't like Perun's YT channel or you couldn't get through Wages of Destruction, it is not thr book for you. Otherwise, it's hard to have a meaningful discussion without reference to it.

Shortround6 said:

Send the generals to classes on radios.
Like what they are.
Things at allow communication without dispatch riders. Or semaphore flags. Or carrier pigeons.
A class or two on promptness might not be out of place.
Like not waiting overnight to issue orders.

Tomo is correct. Changing hardware is not going to have much effect unless the software is changed. Doctrine/tactics, COMMUNICATIONS.

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"§81.Inconvénients- the capital disadvantage of the radio telegraphy is its indiscretion."

"- The enemy can listen, far with the back"

"The whole of the information collected by enemy listenings can provide to the adversary of the important data on the battle order and, to a certain extent, the intentions of the command. Also, in certain circumstances, the command it is led to prohibit partially or completely the use of the radio telegraphy."

"Radiotelefony"

"§85. Generally, the radiotelefony has the same above mention characteristics of employment as those for the radio telegraphy."

"- the reception can be more easily scrambled;
- the risks of indiscretions are even greater, especially if the stations are used for conversations.
The discipline of exploitation must thus be very strict. It is very difficult to ensure. It must be carefully controlled by the obligatory organization of a system of listening of the friendly transmissions. The conversation should in theory be practiced only in station-with-station."


There was also a saying along the lines of "To transmit is treason."

The French were very aware of how much they and the British exploited communication intercepts during the Great War.

What's not appreciated is that the French were proved correct! Ultra, MAGIC, and intermittent German successes against British codes showed just how vulnerable communication could be, and how devastating its effects.

elbmc1969 said:

What's not appreciated is that the French were proved correct! Ultra, MAGIC, and intermittent German successes against British codes showed just how vulnerable communication could be, and how devastating its effects.

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All very true.
But the effects of poor tactical communications are also devastating. Tank platoon leaders that cannot either give orders to their subordinate tanks nor receive information from them.
and further up the line in the change of command. Company commanders that cannot communicate with platoon leaders.
Tank and infantry commanders that cannot call for artillery support (or call it off if needed) on even battalion scale (or higher?) in a timely fashion?

Blundering around blind not knowing where your own supporting (or flanking) units are in the hopes of keeping your enemy also ignorant of what is going on seems a poor way to fight a war. Turns out the Germans could use aircraft and radios from forward observers to keep their commanders at least somewhat up to date on where both their own units and where the French units were. Not always be more often than the French knew what was going on.

Not to defend the French period of use of motorised Napoleonic communications but the fear of enemy monitoring your transmissions is a very real one.

Not just the decoding of them but simply identifying transmissions gives a discernible map of the past and present movements of units and lets you assess their future plans. What was learned in the course of the war was the importance of strict radio discipline and the possibility of using signals as a weapon of deception.

Signal Intelligence becomes a vital theatre of war of it's own.

elbmc1969 said:

What's not appreciated is that the French were proved correct! Ultra, MAGIC, and intermittent German successes against British codes showed just how vulnerable communication could be, and how devastating its effects.

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French were proved wrong, too. One of perhaps least ... sexy procedures used not just by WAllies involved a man with a radio and binoculars to call, if not order, the artillery to fire at enemy positions, that were taken by the enemy perhaps 20 or 30 minutes ago. Without the radios there is no meaningful and timely coordination between the Army and friendly aircraft.

Having a good thousand of radios in the tanks, artillery, AA and AT batteries, infantry units would've made the task of listening and deciphering for the enemy nigh impossible in a high intensity combat, and any feedback the Germans might've radioed back to their own tactical units would've been too late. Germans hearing over the radio the French saying something like 'tulip is at Corsica' instead of 'enemy tanks in the WXY village' would've took a lot of time for the Germans to figure what the heck these French are saying. There was also nothing preventing the French to make fake radio calls, copying the German Navy ideas from ww1.

ULTRA & Magic took advantage of the Axis (mostly German and Japanese) habit to talk about the things of strategic importance over the radio.

I'm going to the archives next week to have a look at a large number of documents about French vehicles (fighting or otherwise), namely related to improvements and the more obscure 1936-40 developments. I will refrain from further comments on the matter until then as what I find may shape my answer differently.

I myself prefer to make facts up as I go and present them with firm determination and conviction.

tomo pauk said:

French were proved wrong, too. One of perhaps least ... sexy procedures used not just by WAllies involved a man with a radio and binoculars to call, if not order, the artillery to fire at enemy positions, that were taken by the enemy perhaps 20 or 30 minutes ago. Without the radios there is no meaningful and timely coordination between the Army and friendly aircraft.

Having a good thousand of radios in the tanks, artillery, AA and AT batteries, infantry units would've made the task of listening and deciphering for the enemy nigh impossible in a high intensity combat, and any feedback the Germans might've radioed back to their own tactical units would've been too late. Germans hearing over the radio the French saying something like 'tulip is at Corsica' instead of 'enemy tanks in the WXY village' would've took a lot of time for the Germans to figure what the heck these French are saying. There was also nothing preventing the French to make fake radio calls, copying the German Navy ideas from ww1.

ULTRA & Magic took advantage of the Axis (mostly German and Japanese) habit to talk about the things of strategic importance over the radio.

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However lax radio procedures in the Western Desert did allow the Axis to draw up a picture of units and events from sloppy plain language transmissions and direction finding which played possibly as much of a role in their successes as did their breaking of the USA diplomatic codes which were sending updates given to their military attaché by Commonwealth HQ in Egypt. One thing Montgomery did was to rigorously tighten up radio procedure practices at all levels and that, plus the capture of the Afrika Korps signals intelligence unit, put a stop to most of the leakage.

A slight digression but there were national characteristics on naming methods used by different nations for things like operations and stop lines etc. The Germans tended to use names which reflected the activity, the Americans tended to use similar theme names for actions and locations within a particular overall operation. Who would have guessed that the D Day beaches named Utah and Omaha were the American ones? The British compiled random lists of operation etc. names to be chosen in order of request whatever the level or activity. The Soviets also used mostly random titles but just ones chosen at the planning level and not from an approved list. These are all part of the signals intelligence war. I know nothing of the French practice but I suspect a tendency to use dramatic and historical ones. These are all things that can define the joint between forces of different armies for example. If you have a British unit next to an American one, and such joints are a known weak point then, if one is using random names and the other names of baseball teams, the join is clear whatever else is known. Certain operators have habitual characteristics. This links the transmission with known units. However, in a signals deception plan you can swap entire signals staff between units to cover up a move or pretend a moves is being made.

What the French in 1936 could have done is establish, monitor and enforce a radio procedure that limited the discernibly information from the Germans and gone wholeheartedly into signals intelligence as a form of radio reconnaissance to establish and track German units. This needs no clever code breaking nor actual message reading. Equally raise the quality and status of intelligence within the army. With nothing else they would at least have command and control of a known army and its opposition. The German traffic jam into the Ardennes must have been a glowing strip of light in the radio world and the Air Force reports confirming same causing a maximum air effort to destroy that traffic jam.

TM06 said:

From what little I could find, FCM and ARL were in the process of designing turrets to fit the 75 mm mle 39 TAZ with a 57 calibre barrel. There's not much on the gun itself - being two prototypes that were destroyed during the German invasion - but Brandt designed an APDS shell for it. From what I can glean about the gun, it was created after it was realized that the 25 mm SA 34 and the 47 mm SA 37 would be inadequate for dealing with heavier tanks, and they based the gun on either the Schneider CA 75 or the Canon de 75 mm modèle 1924 - the latter being the most likely. Nothing is known about the gun's performance other than that the crew could fire at a rate of one shot per 2 seconds and that it had a range of 12,500 m.

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What I have found in the past

The 75 TAZ39 had a penetration capability of 80mm/35deg @1000m with the 1910 75mm shell @700m/s and a of 90mm/35deg @1000m with the 75/57mm shell (velocity 900m/s). The TAZ39 was actually produced and has commonality with another french gun, the 75mm mle 32 AA (it's basically the AA gun on an AT chassis). This tube is different from the Mle 97. The cartridge from TAZ-39, the APDS reached 1095 m/sec and punctured 130 mm of armor at 1,000 m @ 35 ° in the Mle 97

With the same 75/57mm shell, the 75 mle 97 has a penetration of 90mm/35deg@1000m 900m/s

Canon de 75mm TAZ mle 1939
Caliber : 75x518R mm
Barrel length : 4000 mm (3250 mm rifling) L/53
Battle-ready weight : 2090 kg
Rate of fire : 20 rpm
Muzzle velocity : 700 m/s (more with the planned sub-caliber 75/57mm APDS and HEAT shells)
Traverse : 360°
Elevation : 40°
Maximum range : 13000 m
The 75mm Mle1939 had a new 3-trails carriage for all around firing and should have replaced all the 75mm AT guns (75mm Mle1897 and Mle1897/33 used in AT role, 75x350R mm) (and part of the 47mm AT guns) at the divisional level but it did not enter in service before the armistice.


This was from a French Website that now seems gone, and no archive.org for the moment

tomo pauk said:

There was also nothing preventing the French to make fake radio calls, copying the German Navy ideas from ww1.

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Vietnamese Code Talkers. French should have noticed that the USA started that with the Great War with Native American Choctaws, and continued in WWII

marathag said:

Vietnamese Code Talkers. French should have noticed that the USA started that with the Great War with Native American Choctaws, and continued in WWII

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Possibly they had enough trouble getting the troops to speak and write in standard French and not their local patois. The lack of standard French speakers was identified as a serious problem in the 1870 War and led to the national education system trying to instil 'standard' (ie Isle de France) French across the nation.

In WW2 one sign of a British agent in rural France was speaking standard French and not the local patois and agents needed a built in cover story of why they were not speaking like the locals.

A neighbor years back was from deep south Louisiana, Cajun country. In the early 1900s most spoke Cajun French and little English. The man was drafted for WW1 and told me the first large city he saw was Raceland Louisiana. In France, he could understand the French but they could not understand him. He apparently did well enough the U.S. general staff kept him until 1920. Interestingly, he had no birth certificate, only Church baptismal record, so the Army in it's wisdom spelled his name Campo rather than Campeaux.

tomo pauk said:

Seems like we don't have a what-if topic for all teh things French Army, so here it goes.

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We're of similar minds this month. I woke up this morning and asked myself, what could the French Air Force have done differently in the years leading up to WW2 to defeat the German invasion. Perhaps we can join this idea with French Army reform, so that they work in coordination with the Air Force. How much of France's army and air force was obsolete in 1939? It seems that nearly all their bomber aircraft were not competitive.

Did the French army suffer the same levels of duplication of effort as the air force? For example, France had six entirely distinct single-seat, single-engine, monoplane fighter programs in production between 1936 to 1940.

• Bloch MB.150. Specified 1934. First flight 1937. Introduced 1939.
• Morane-Saulnier M.S.406. Specified 1934. (same as the MB.150). First flight 1938. Introduced 1938.
• Arsenal VG-33. Specified 1936. First flight 1939. Introduced 1940.
• Dewoitine D.520. Specified 1936 (same as the VG-33). First flight 1938. Introduced 1940.
• Caudron C.714. Specified 1936 (same as VG-33). First flight 1936. Introduced 1940.
• Koolhoven F.K.58. Specified 1937. Ordered from Dutch firm. First flight 1938. Introduced 1940.

Meanwhile of this type Britain was producing only two (Spitfire and Hurricane) and Germany, less 25 He 100s, only one (Bf 109).

Was the French Army equally inefficient? Did France really need twelve tank types, including eight different models from one manufacturer alone, Renault? Meanwhile, excluding captured Czech tanks (designated Panzer 35 and 38), the Germans invaded France with only four domestically produced tank types: 523 Panzer Is, 955 Panzer IIs, 349 Panzer IIIs and 278 Panzer IVs.



Germany had three man turrets in their latest tanks, meanwhile many French tanks had one man turrets, with the poor TC expected to also load and fire the gun. I appreciate that France had lower manpower available for large tank crews, but a set limit for at least two man turrets would have been reasonable.

As for France's war strategy, the need for Germany to divert around the Maginot Line presented a great opportunity to predict where the Germans must come through, and move French armour, artillery and air force to meet at those places. I think sometimes war planners forget that fortresses more divert than deter invasion - like at Singapore - if enemy attack is assured, and you've made it impossible for that attack to succeed in one place, then the enemy must and will attack elsewhere. Your fortress has thus limited the enemy's choices and enabled you as the defender to concentrate your mobile forces elsewhere to seize the advantage when the enemy inevitably comes. That's what the Maginot Line was to to - to force the Germans to divert to the Ardennes, where France could have concentrated their forces to strike.

Instead the French trusted in geography.....

"French and British officers had anticipated the geographical limits of the Maginot Line; when Germany invaded the Netherlands and Belgium, they carried out plans to form an aggressive front that cut across Belgium and connected to the Maginot Line. The French line was weak near the Ardennes. General Maurice Gamelin, when drafting the Dyle Plan, believed this region, with its rough terrain, would be an unlikely invasion route of German forces; if it were traversed, it would be done at a slow rate that would allow the French time to bring up reserves and counterattacks."