Comment by stochastimus | Hacker News Reader

Comment by stochastimus | Hacker News Reader

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Too bad the Maginot line is mentioned only in passing in the blog - the Maginot line really is a testament to the failure of central planning and bureaucracy to produce and execute on ideas that stand the tests of time and battle. A drastic (but mostly true) oversimplification is this: France, seeing Hitler’s military buildup, created an impenetrable fortress along the border and sucked the life out of the French economy to build, supply, and man it. One failure was the inability to see that German light armor could navigate the Ardennes forest and circumvent it. Another failure was that the massive gun turrets periodically embedded in the fortification were designed so that they couldn’t be rotated to point back toward France; as a result, they couldn’t be used to defend against an army which had circumvented the wall. So, in the end, the French had simply provided the Germans with a massive cache of ammunition, food, guns, and other supplies which were all stocked within the Maginot fortification. Here’s the wikipedia entry for anyone interested: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maginot_Line

> created an impenetrable fortress along the border

Absolutely not. No-one ever expected the Maginot line to hold more than a few weeks.

It's goal was two-fold:

  - Delay the invasion by a few weeks to give time for mobilization.
  - Force Germany to go through Belgium again to ensure the involvement of the United Kingdom which was guaranteeing Belguim.

And both goals were achieved.

> Another failure was that the massive gun turrets periodically embedded in the fortification were designed so that they couldn’t be rotated to point back toward France

That's absolutely not a failure, it's a lesson learned from WWI: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Douaumont

The "Maginot Line didn't work" meme is up there with the "The Chevy Nova didn't sell because No Va means Don't Go in Spanish" meme. Stuff I was taught in school by well-meaning teachers who never really verified anything.

> testament to the failure of central planning and bureaucracy

Central planning is the only way inter-nation wars make sense; bellum omnium contra omnes is just chaos. Bureaucracy (aka division of power, aka decision by consensus/committee) is the real problem. It becomes a turf war or a “not my responsibility” issue.

Great summary, but worth mentioning the Line was not a single fortress but many many over hundreds of kilometers.

And it was never breached directly, instead it was the failure of France (a certain General Huntziger stabds out), the UK, Belgium and the Netherlands to halt the German invasion through the low countries. For all intended purposes, the Marginot line worked as intended and didn't fail. A lot of other stuff did. By now you can basically use the Maginot line as a litmus test whether or not people properly analyzed a topic or if they work based on memes.

Edit: The push through the Ardennes was a gamble even the German army, and its Generals, were surprised to actually work.

Living near a stretch of the Maginot line it amazes me to no end how much concrete is still around and will be for long time.

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