ABSTRACT
Britain and France were reluctant to go to war with Germany, and Britain refused to pull its weight in continental land warfare, committing only ten divisions. So unexpectedly decisive was the Allied defeat that many commentators blamed British and French defeatism a consequence of memories of the slaughter of World War I and, in the case of France, interwar political turmoil. The Allies were behind the Germans in 1940, both in terms of the numbers of armoured divisions and the requirement that these should be all-arms formations. Allied operational planning was driven by Belgium's decision in 1936 to abandon its military alliance with France and declare its neutrality. To the south French forces did better and temporarily halt German Army Group Bs thrust into central Belgium. As German Army Group B invaded the Low Countries, Army Group A was moving through the Ardennes. Two Belgian divisions in the area moved away to the northeast, providing no serious opposition.
