ABSTRACT
On 10 May 1940, the day Winston S. Churchill became Prime Minister, the war in western Europe at last began, with a German invasion of Holland, Belgium and Luxembourg. The German professional view was that the efforts made in Germany since 1933 had produced an army capable of defeating Poland but not France. To breach the Allied line in this Blitzkrieg required that the greatest German pressure be directed across the Meuse between Namur and Sedan. He disposed his forces accordingly, leaving the weakest of his armies guarding the precise area, between Namur and Sedan, on which the Germans were to concentrate their main thrusts. The withdrawal from Dunkirk and the fall of France, though not destroying the capacity of the United Kingdom to defend itself, did therefore destroy its capacity to wage offensive war against Germany on the ground.
