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Comment by kujhytrtyu | Hacker News Reader

The maginot line failed because they only built it along the border with their enemy (germany) and didn't continue it along the border with their friend (belgium) - so the enemy simply drove around it.

In newspaper terms it's like having a paywall but allowing the full text of the story to appear via Google's cache.

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> The maginot line failed because they ... didn't continue it along the border with their friend (belgium) - so the enemy simply drove around it.

Wikipedia says this is a myth:

> It is a myth however that the Maginot Line ended at the Belgian border and was easy to circumvent.[2] The fortifications were connected to the Belgian fortification system, of which the strongest point was Fort Eben-Emael.

[2] Mosier, J. The Blitzkrieg Myth: How Hitler and the Allies Misread the Strategic Realities of World War II, HarperCollins, 2004, pp. 2, 38.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maginot_Line

Still happened though

Still something else happened --not the original argument (that they bypassed it because it wasn't extended to Belgium).

The moral of the story is that, while the Maginot Line would have been a perfect defense in World War I, it was ineffective in World War II. People are always preparing to fight the last war. Very common mistake. A failure of imagination.

item 2000000!

Also, the maginot line was a system of heavy (i.e. immovable) fortifications and France's only defensive plan. Once germany found a way around it (duh), France could not quickly change strategy (it didn't have a Plan B) or mobilize the resources sunk into the Line (they were concrete). Oops.

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