World War: Boast & Threat

The French High Command, normally taciturn, last week authorized an extended commentary which contained both a major boast and a major threat. It said:

"Our work of fortification, carried out from the start [of war] at an accelerated pace, is now virtually complete. The essential purpose of this work was, in a sense, to double the Maginot Line. Thus, in the north of France and in the Jura [Swiss border] there has been constructed a line of defense that may well be described as formidable.

"From the first of this month our new line of fortifications seems to have removed any hope the enemy may have entertained either of crossing or flanking the Maginot Line.

"Furthermore, the completion of all this work places the French High Command in a position to attempt maneuvering operations, going beyond the defensive phase on the day and at the hour it may suit it eventually to fix."

Only to laymen do the French military use the phrase "Maginot Line." In official parlance, their system of forts and ramparts is called "The Permanent Fortified Positions." In physical terms, the commentary meant that these positions have now been lengthened at both ends, and also increased in depth, on the same principle as the Siegfried Position—a network of strong points capable of being extended backward indefinitely should they be cracked in front. In psychological terms, the mention of "maneuvering" and "beyond the defensive phase" seemed to mean: "Germans, not only can you neither crack nor flank us, but we are now so strong we can move out to meet you in Belgium or The Netherlands or Switzerland, or anywhere else that you may strike—even in the Balkans—and indeed we might move there against you without waiting for you to strike."

The return to Paris last week from the Near East of General Maxime Weygand, to report on his preparations for an Allied Army there, added interest to the commentary. With Finland getting hers from Russia, and with Rumania apparently earmarked next, it was newsworthy bluff, if not noteworthy fact, when Generalissimo Gamelin said he feels free now for a war of maneuver—somewhere. His High Command made further show of this free feeling by sending home 3,000 of 27,000 civilian doctors who were mobilized for service in the West. Perhaps spring will find some of these doctors in French Syria with Weygand's Army, ready to stem a Russian march into Bessarabia, or to drive at Germany through the postern gate of erstwhile Poland.