MAGINOT LINE

Waikato Times, Volume 127, Issue 21248, 19 October 1940, Page 12 (Supplement)

MAGINOT LINE

SEVERAL WEAKNESSES SHOWN OVER-PUBLICISED BEFORE WAR (Times Air Mail Service) LONDON, July 31 The reason German armies marched through the Netherlands and Belgium is clear when one has seen the Maginot Line, states the Berlin corlin correspondent of the Christian Science Monitor. As a military defence system it has some weaknesses which stand out in retrospect. But I after spending three days travelling 700 miles over the length and breadth - of the line I am satisfied that the Low Countries owe their misfortune to the strength of the main French defence system. The actual breaching of the line in the final days of the battle for France was primarily a gesture of prestige for German World War veterans as compensation for the defeat they suffered in 1918. And what defence there was by the French garrison was equally a gesture, since by the time the attack came the German armies behind them had nearly reached Switzerland, their covering combat troops were fighting in the rear, and the war was virtually over. There is little evidence of fighting in the Maginot area. For the most part the concrete works stand unscratched, nev; partly finished ones are guarded by ide concrete mixers, the countryside shows only unused trenches, miles of barbed wire and steel tank obstacles. Why Line Failed

Where the German attack came through at Brisach, the French bunkers were heavily damaged by frontal artillery fire. Farther back in the main defence areas some others have been put out of action by fire from the rear. But mostly it is a story of a military concept which failed because it was based on a defensive political concept which never contemplated the German advance around the flank through the Netherlands and Belgium. The attack did show up some weaknesses. The steel turrets stand out sharply on the horizon and advertise the presence of underground works. German 88-millimeter antiaircraft shells were able to pierce these turrets and also, like a spike being driven by swift hammer blows, to eat holes through the concrete walls. The high muzzle velocity of these guns made them more useful for this purpose than heavy i artillery which strikes a harder blow but fails to penetrate. I The Maginot Line proves to be 1a three-zone defence system. The first zone consists of small concrete outposts directly on the bank of the river mounting only machine I guns, and supported about a mile in the rear by larger concrete works | mounting machine guns and 37i millimetre anti-tank guns covering j the roads back from the river. I The second zone on higher ground I farther in the rear is the main de~ j tensive line where the underground

connecting tunnels, barracks, maga- 1 zines, and machinery so publicised before the war are located. In one such works we saw there were three casemates, each mounting three turrets. Of the nine turrets two were revolving and the other seven fixed, thus only two were available for use .against an attack from the rear. These main works of the line mounted light and heavy machine guns, anti-tank guns, and occasionally 75 millimetre guns, but these last were the rargest rfguns which were actually used inside the big works of the line. Well behind this fighting line was the heavy artillery zone where surface was used to conceal the gun emplacements but no heavy defence works. The second zone was expected to hold the attacks. Vulnerable From Rear The line was over-publicised before the war. The number of underground works for railways was very few and none of the main forts mounted heavy artillery. They were vulnerable from the rear where the concrete was only a yard and a half thick instead of three as in front and where only a few movable turrets could be brought to bear. But it was a powerful line. The French mechanics who still tend the engines deep underground do so with a wistful tenderness. They had faith in their line which was imshaken because it was broken in the last days of the war. It never had a chance to prove what it was intended to do. Its heavy forts were only the anchors of a line to be defended nv surface combat. That army had gone to the rear before the attacks came, and the attacks poured around the anchors like watti around boulders in a stream.