22-Oct-39: 22-Oct-39: Dr. Goebbels Claims Churchill Lies; Allies Leave Ankara After Successful Pact Inked; Soviets Conduct Elections in Formerly Polish Territories; Western Front Artillery Duels Continue in Rain
Today is 22-Oct-1939, the 52nd day of World War II; there are 2,141 days left in the conflict.
War news is mostly quiet today. German Minister of Propaganda and Enlightenment Dr. Josef Goebbels uses a radio broadcast to attack British First Lord of the Admiralty Winston Churchill. Churchill is a liar, he claims.
After the conclusion of successful talks and a pact with the Turks, British General Archibald Wavell and French General Maxime Weygand depart in triumph from Ankara.
In India, which is still a part of the British Empire, the independence-minded Congress Party declares that it will not support the war effort and condemns the imperialism of the Empire.
The Soviet Union conducts elections in the newly won territories of the western Ukraine and western Belorussia, which had formerly belonged to Poland.
The Germans and French continue to conduct sporadic artillery duels along their common border; due to heavy recent rains, the no-man’s land along the front has been turned into a sea of mud.
21-Oct-39: Four of Nine Heinkel He-115 Seaplanes Downed; Ethnic Germans Repatriated from Italy; General Gamelin Won’t Attack Germans, He Says
Today is 21-Oct-1939, the 51st day of World War II; there are 2,142 days left in the conflict.
Over the North Sea, the British Royal Air Force and German Luftwaffe engage during an attack by the latter on a British ship convoy. The British ships and planes escape unscathed, but the Germans are not as fortunate; four out of nine of the Heinkel He-115 seaplanes are downed by the RAF.
Further out in the North Atlantic, a French Force de Raide, which includes the then-fastest destroyers on the oceans, spends over a week escorting a large convoy of ships during the crossing. It also intercepts a hostile German Kriegsmarine ship.
In yet another in a series of such arrangements, the Germans and Italians ink an agreement which provides for the transfer of more ethnic Germans back into the Third Reich, this time in the South Tyrol (which formerly belonged to Austria.
Along the Western Front on the continent, French and German artillery units exchange sporadic fire during a heavy downpour, while in Paris, Allied Commander-in-Chief General Maurice Gamelin indicates that he does not intend to attack the Germans across the Siegfried Line. Instead, he will wait until the Wehrmacht attacks in force, then withdraw France’s troops to behind the “impregnable” Maginot Line, thus halting the attack.
19-Oct-39: German OKH Presents Plan for Fall Gelb, the Invasion of France; Turks Ink Treaty With Allies; Brits Note Increase in Road Fatalities Due to Blackout
Today is 19-Oct-1939, the 49th day of World War II; there are 2,144 days left in the conflict.
German Reichskanzler Adolf Hitler’s Führer-Anweisung N°6, Directive No. 6, was issued on 9-Oct, directing the Army to prepare for an invasion of France through the Low Countries as soon as possible. Today, General Franz Halder, Chief of Staff of Oberkommado des Heeres, the High Command of the Army, hands Hitler OKH’s plan for the execution of the Führer’s order. Called Aufmarschanweisung N°1, Fall Gelb, or “Deployment Instruction No. 1, Case Yellow,” the main features of the plan call for the German left wing to fight a holding action on the French border facing the Maginot Line, while the main attack will be thrust through the middle of Belgium towards the French border. The plan also calls for a simultaneous invasion of Holland.
The plan seems, at first glance, to mirror the World War I Schlieffen Plan, which called for a sweeping envelopment action through Belgium and down the coast of the English Channel, wrapping around Paris and destroying the French Army. The German Army’s failure to execute the plan fully in 1914 (its right wing swung to the north of Paris instead of south) ended ultimately in stalemate and defeat on the Western Front in 1918.
Fall Gelb actually differs from the Schlieffen Plan, however. Gelb is based on an unimpressive, conventional frontal attack which would sacrifice an estimated 500,000 German soldiers in order to push the Allies back only as far as the Somme River. Gelb estimates that the Heer’s strength would thus be exhausted and would only be recovered in 1942, at which time the main attack against France could begin. Hitler is reportedly “disappointed and unimpressed” by the initial plan, to say the least. He will act immediately and decisively to change Gelb.
In Ankara, Turkey, after a day of talks between the British General Archibald Wavell, commander of British troops in the Middle East, and French General Maxime Weygand, former chief of staff, the “Ango-French-Turkish Treaty of Mutual Assistance” is inked by all parties. During the term of the 15-year treaty, the Turks undertake to aid the Allies if war begins in the Mediterranean as long as said aid does not bring Turkey into conflict with the Soviet Union. In exchange, the French give Ankara control of the disputed Sanjak of Alexandretta (the province of Hatay) in French Syria. The Syrians protest that the cession is illegal and the dispute over the province will continue even into the 21st Century.
Back in England, near the town of Whitby, North Yorkshire, two German Luftwaffe airmen are discovered after they drift ashore in a collapsible dinghy. They had been shot down over the North Sea two days previously.
The British Ministry of Transport notes that the wartime blackout, not enemy action, accounts for the most casualties so far; fatalities in road accidents increased from 617 in August, the last month of peace, to 1130 in September, the first full wartime month when the blackout was imposed, a 55% increase.