Karl Rudolf Gerd von Rundstedt had already completed an exemplary military career, retiring at 62 years of age as a Generaloberst commanding Gruppenkommando 1 (‘Army Group Command’ – the precursor to the Heeresgruppe) in Berlin on 31 October 1930. Born (12 December 1875) into the military aristocracy, he was a captain commanding an infantry company in Alsace at the opening of World War I and an army corps chief of staff on the Russian Front by its end. When Hitler came to power he was a General der Infanterie commanding the Berlin Military District. Within a year of retirement he was recalled to help plan – and lead one of the two army groups in – the Polish Campaign.
Despite his age, Rundstedt was known for his resourcefulness and flexibility and was universally respected as a ‘brilliant exponent of grand tactics … who grasped the essentials of any problem in an instant’. Indifferent to both minor (tactical level) details and strategic issues (national level), he focused on what today is termed ‘the operational art of campaigning’, taking advantage of his subordinates’ talents and allowing them great latitude in achieving his operational objectives. As a Clausewitzian purist, he excelled in mass and manoeuvre and was a strong adherent to the ‘principles of war’ – consequently he viewed the advent of Panzers and ‘blitzkrieg tactics’ with great caution.
Commander of Heeresgruppe A: Generaloberst Gerd von Rundstedt (Bundesarchiv Bild 146-1987-047-20)
For this reason, when Halder grouped five Panzer and three motorized infantry divisions into one powerful armoured phalanx within his command, Rundstedt and the staunchly conservative OKH hierarchy searched for a more traditional commander who could ‘rein in’ the aggressive young Panzer generals. This they found in General der Kavallerie Paul Ludwig Ewald von Kleist, a 58-year-old veteran who had retired in 1938. The scion of a famous Junker military family, he graduated from a military school in 1900 and was a captain in the ‘Totenkopf Hussars’ at the start of World War I, rising to command a cavalry regiment by its end. Recalled to duty for the Polish Campaign, he commanded XXII AK, which eventually included one Panzer and one light mechanized division. Experienced in handling armour but considered ‘old school’ on tactical matters, he had the balance that the OKH leadership thought necessary to control a notoriously ‘difficult subordinate’ such as Heinz ‘Brausewetter’ (‘stormy weather’) Guderian.
Commander of what is frequently called Panzergruppe Kleist: cavalry General Ewald von Kleist. (Bundesarchiv Bild 183-1986-0210-17)
Aggressive, impetuous and temperamental, General der Panzertruppen Heinz Wilhelm Guderian was commissioned in his father’s Hanoverian Jäger-Bataillon Nr. 10 in 1908. A short, serious officer of exceptional courage and dedication, during World War I Guderian initially commanded a cavalry signals company, eventually rising to become an army-level (AOK C) operations officer. Such were his recognized talents that he was appointed to the elite Großer Generalstab. Four years later, he joined its Weimar successor, the Reichwehr’s Truppenamt (‘Army Troop Bureau’), as a general staff officer to the Inspekteur der Verkehrstruppen (‘Inspector of Transportation Troops’).
There Guderian ‘approached motorization with inventive zeal’ and began studying, lecturing and writing on mobile tactics in military history. In 1931 he was rewarded with command of the 3. (Preußen) Kraftfahrwesens Bataillon (3rd (Prussian) Motor-Transport Battalion), the Reichwehr’s trial motorized unit, where he started experimenting using ‘dummy tanks’. Promoting his developing theories of deep penetrating armoured thrusts, his treatises were published in his book, Achtung – Panzer! six years later. By then he and others had developed tactics for decisive armoured attacks: massed tank assaults penetrating deep into the enemy’s rear areas to paralyze their command and control, using air attacks as ‘flying artillery’ and accompanied by infantry in motorized vehicles.
From October 1935 Guderian commanded the 2. Panzer-Division and three years later was appointed Chef der Schnellen Truppen (‘Chief of Mobile Troops’), being granted direct access to Hitler. Leading XIX AK (mot.) – one Panzer and two motorized infantry divisions – in Poland, he broke through fortified defences along the Narew River near Wizna (8–10 September) and executed a deep, wide envelopment of the enemy’s Northern Front, driving all the way to Brest (Brześć) and almost capturing the Polish High Command.
General Heinz Guderian. As this image portrays, Guderian was obviously greatly admired by his men. (Bundesarchiv Bild 101I-139-1112-17)
After Guderian the single most impressive Panzer leader would be an infantry officer who had benefited both from being a Great War hero and his proximity to Hitler. Generalmajor Erwin Johannes Eugen Rommel’s aggressive leadership and creative tactics as a company commander on the Italian Front won him the Pour le Mérite at Caporetto in World War I. Not talented as a staff officer, he languished in the Weimar’s Reichswehr, finally finding his niche teaching tactics at the Potsdam Infanterieschule (‘infantry school’), and later commanded the (former Austrian Army) Wiener-Neustadt War Academy.
Generalmajor Erwin Rommel, in his usual element – leading from the front. (NARA)
When mobilized the faculties of these schools provided security details for various staffs and headquarters. Rommel commanded the Führerhauptquartier battalion protecting Hitler’s mobile military HQ during the Sudetenland crisis, the Munich crisis, and the Polish Campaign. When Hitler asked him what command he wanted, Rommel unhesitatingly requested a Panzer division. He was given the newly formed 7. Panzer-Division in Kluge’s AOK 4 and Hoth’s XV AK.
Général d’Armée Maurice Gustave Gamelin was the Chief of the General Staff of National Defence for France and Supreme Commander of all Allied land forces. Graduating first in his class from Saint-Cyr military academy in 1891, at the outset of World War I he was Joffre’s operations chief and, in 1916, at the age of 44 he became one of France’s youngest and most capable divisional commanders (9e Division). Steeped in the successful – though atrociously costly – defensive tactics of the Great War he was disinterested in technology and thus incapable of assimilating mobile warfare concepts that emerged during the next two decades.
A small, compact man approaching 70, Gamelin was politically adroit, intellectually superior and professionally detached. Not a leader of men, he preferred to be thought of as a ‘philosopher general’ who managed resources and composed detailed plans to do so. He and his 15-officer staff were ensconced at Château de Vincennes on the eastern outskirts of Paris so he could be near the political power centres. Eschewing radios for fear that the Germans could locate his HQ by homing in on their transmissions, he relied on the national telephone/telegraph network and motorcycle dispatch riders for communications with his Grand Quartier Général (GQG) headquarters at Montry, which prepared, elaborated, and distributed his guidance – resulting in a ‘decision cycle’ time of nearly 48 hours.
Général Maurice Gustave Gamelin, Commandant Suprême des Armée Alliées. (Corbis)
In charge of actually ‘running the war’ was Général d’Armée Alphonse-Joseph Georges, an officer who had risen entirely through professional merit and was considered by many to be France’s finest soldier. The polar opposite of Gamelin in temperament and character, Georges had joined Foch’s staff during World War I and afterwards became Pétain’s chief of staff. Passed over in 1935 for Gamelin’s position largely because of his right-wing political associations, as the former’s star waned (and he approached mandatory retirement age), their relationship deteriorated to where ‘they could hardly exchange civilities’.
Général Alphonse Joseph Georges as the Chief of Army Personnel Bureau in the mid-1930s. (Max Schiavon)
From his HQ at La Ferté-sous-Jouarre, Georges’s role was to coordinate the operations of three army groups stretching from the Channel coast to the Swiss border, apportion the air force effort supporting them, and direct the assignment of army reserves. The most critical part of the front was Groupe d’Armées 1 under Général d’Armée Gaston-Henri Gustave Billotte. Commanding four French armies and the British Expeditionary Force (BEF), he naturally paid more attention to the two French armies and BEF advancing into Belgium and southern Holland, largely ignoring the 2e and 9e Armées holding the line along the Meuse River.
Commanding 2e Armée – at the hinge of the French line swinging into Belgium – was Général d’Armée Charles Léon Clément Huntziger. Graduating from Saint-Cyr in 1901, Huntziger had significant combat experience fighting in the pre-World War I colonial wars in Madagascar and Indochina and commanding a battalion in the Great War. Considered another brilliant intellect, Huntziger was promoted rapidly, becoming the youngest commander on record as the chief of French forces in Syria. Viewed as Gamelin’s most likely successor, he was also arrogant and complacent – a dangerous combination – and consequently lacked any interest in considering any alternatives to the ‘proven’ concept of the unbroken linear defence.
Général Charles Huntziger, Guderian’s adversary. (Corbis)
Commanding 9e Armée – which was to move into southern Belgium and hold along the Meuse from Charleville-Mézières to Namur – was Général d’Armée André Georges Corap, a 62-year-old Norman who had spent most of his career in North Africa. Beginning with great promise, he graduated first in his class from Saint-Cyr in 1898 and, after passing through World War I as a staff officer, became famous for his capture of the Moroccan rebel Abd el-Krim in 1926. However, in spite of being promoted thereafter, Morocco remained the high point of his career.
Living on past glory, Corap became overweight and slovenly but was well liked by his troops and ‘held in high esteem by his superiors’. In the late 1930s he headed the somnolent 2e Région Militaire (Amiens) and once war was declared was assigned the equally ‘quiet’ Ardennes sector where he could do little harm. Once actively engaged, he proved surprisingly energetic, but being totally ignorant of modern mechanized warfare he could not anticipate the speed or the violence that two Panzer corps would unleash upon his sluggish, largely reservist, infantry formations.