Gaston-Henri Billotte
Encyclopedia
Gaston-Henri Billotte was a French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 military officer, remembered chiefly for his central role in the failure of the French Army
French Army
The French Army, officially the Armée de Terre , is the land-based and largest component of the French Armed Forces.As of 2010, the army employs 123,100 regulars, 18,350 part-time reservists and 7,700 Legionnaires. All soldiers are professionals, following the suspension of conscription, voted in...

 to defeat the German invasion of France
Battle of France
In the Second World War, the Battle of France was the German invasion of France and the Low Countries, beginning on 10 May 1940, which ended the Phoney War. The battle consisted of two main operations. In the first, Fall Gelb , German armoured units pushed through the Ardennes, to cut off and...

 in May 1940. He was killed in a car accident at the height of the battle.

Billotte was born at Sommeval
Sommeval
Sommeval is a commune in the Aube department in north-central France.-Population:...

, in the Aube
Aube
Aube is a department in the northeastern part of France named after the Aube River. In 1995, its population was 293,100 inhabitants.- History :Aube is one of the original 83 departments created during the French Revolution on 4 March 1790...

. He graduated from the Saint-Cyr
École Spéciale Militaire de Saint-Cyr
The École Spéciale Militaire de Saint-Cyr is the foremost French military academy. Its official name is . It is often referred to as Saint-Cyr . Its motto is "Ils s'instruisent pour vaincre": literally "They study to vanquish" or "Training for victory"...

 military academy in 1896 and joined the infantry. In World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

 he served as a brigade commander and as an officer of the General Staff. In 1919-20 he was head of the French Military Mission in Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...

. He served the rest of the 1920s and 1930s in colonial posts, in Syria
Syria
Syria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest....

, Tunisia
Tunisia
Tunisia , officially the Tunisian RepublicThe long name of Tunisia in other languages used in the country is: , is the northernmost country in Africa. It is a Maghreb country and is bordered by Algeria to the west, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north and east. Its area...

, Morocco
Morocco
Morocco , officially the Kingdom of Morocco , is a country located in North Africa. It has a population of more than 32 million and an area of 710,850 km², and also primarily administers the disputed region of the Western Sahara...

 and French Indochina
French Indochina
French Indochina was part of the French colonial empire in southeast Asia. A federation of the three Vietnamese regions, Tonkin , Annam , and Cochinchina , as well as Cambodia, was formed in 1887....

, where he was Commander-in-Chief from 1930 to 1932. He was promoted to general in 1927. In 1933 Billotte returned to France, where he served as a Member of the Supreme War Council, President of the Consultative Committee for Colonial Defence and Military Governor of Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

.

The Battle of France

When World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 broke out in September 1939 Billotte was 64 and close to retirement, but he was appointed Commander in Chief of the 1st Army Group based in northern France adjacent to the Belgian
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...

 border. When the Germans attacked on 10 May, Billotte's forces advanced into Belgium under the agreed Allied plan, on the assumption that the Germans would repeat their manoeuvre of World War I, attacking through Belgium into northern France, and then advance on Paris. In fact, the German attack in Belgium was a feint designed to draw the Allied forces northwards, while the real German assault was aimed at the Ardennes
Ardennes
The Ardennes is a region of extensive forests, rolling hills and ridges formed within the Givetian Ardennes mountain range, primarily in Belgium and Luxembourg, but stretching into France , and geologically into the Eifel...

 sector further south (see Manstein Plan
Manstein Plan
The Manstein Plan was the primary war plan of the German Army during the Battle of France in 1940.-Overview of the Plan:Developed by German Generalleutnant Erich von Manstein, the plan greatly modified the original 1939 versions by Franz Halder of the invasion plan known as Fall Gelb...

). Like all the Allied commanders, Billotte failed to discern the German plan.

On 12 May Billotte was given the task of co-ordination the operations of the French, Belgian and British armies in Belgium. He lacked the staff and the experience for this task, and is reported to have burst into tears when informed of it. He failed to co-operate effectively with the British commander, General Lord Gort
John Vereker, 6th Viscount Gort
Field Marshal John Standish Surtees Prendergast Vereker, 6th Viscount Gort, VC, GCB, CBE, DSO & Two Bars, MVO, MC , was a British and Anglo-Irish soldier. As a young officer in World War I he won the Victoria Cross at the Battle of the Canal du Nord. During the 1930s he served as Chief of the...

, and the Belgian commander, King Leopold
Leopold III of Belgium
Leopold III reigned as King of the Belgians from 1934 until 1951, when he abdicated in favour of the Heir Apparent,...

. By 15 May Billotte's morale was "at rock bottom." After a meeting with Gort on 18 May, he remarked to a British officer: "I'm shattered and I can't do anything against these Panzers
Panzer Division
A panzer division was an armored division in the army and air force branches of the Wehrmacht as well as the Waffen-SS of Nazi Germany during World War II....

."

On 20 May the British government, alarmed at the situation, sent the Chief of the Imperial General Staff, General Edmund Ironside
Edmund Ironside, 1st Baron Ironside
Field Marshal William Edmund Ironside, 1st Baron Ironside GCB, CMG, CBE, DSO, was a British Army officer who served as Chief of the Imperial General Staff during the first year of the Second World War....

, to confer with Gort and Billotte. Ironside later wrote: "I found Billotte and Blanchard all in a state of complete depression. No plan, no thought of a plan. Ready to be slaughtered. Defeated at the head without casualties... I lost my temper and shook Billotte by the button of his tunic. The man is completely beaten." Ironside effectively took over the co-ordinating role from Billotte and organised an unsuccessful attack southwards towards Arras
Arras
Arras is the capital of the Pas-de-Calais department in northern France. The historic centre of the Artois region, its local speech is characterized as a Picard dialect...

 in the hope of checking the German advance.

Finally realising the threat posed by the rapid German advance from the Ardennes towards the sea, the French commander-in-chief, General Maxime Weygand
Maxime Weygand
Maxime Weygand was a French military commander in World War I and World War II.Weygand initially fought against the Germans during the invasion of France in 1940, but then surrendered to and collaborated with the Germans as part of the Vichy France regime.-Early years:Weygand was born in Brussels...

, ordered Billotte to withdraw his forces southwards. At a meeting in Ypres
Ypres
Ypres is a Belgian municipality located in the Flemish province of West Flanders. The municipality comprises the city of Ypres and the villages of Boezinge, Brielen, Dikkebus, Elverdinge, Hollebeke, Sint-Jan, Vlamertinge, Voormezele, Zillebeke, and Zuidschote...

 on 21 May, Weygand found Billotte depressed and pessimistic, "heavily marked by the fatigues and anxieties of the past two weeks." After leaving this conference, Billotte was severely injured when his staff car was involved in an accident, and died after two days in a coma. The British general Henry Pownall
Henry Royds Pownall
Lieutenant General Sir Henry Royds Pownall KCB, KBE, DSO was a British general, who held several important command and Staff appointments during World War II. In particular, he was Chief of Staff to the British Expeditionary Force in France and Belgium until the fall of France in May 1940...

 (Gort's Chief of Staff) said: "With all respect, he's no loss to us in this emergency."

Billotte's son Pierre Billotte
Pierre Billotte
Pierre Armand Gaston Billotte was a French Army officer and politician. He was the son of General Gaston Billotte, who commanded parts of the French Army at the start of World War II...

 joined the Free French movement and had a distinguished military and political career in postwar France.
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