Quote:
Originally Posted by Apollonian
There is also the problem that French industry and transportation was heavily centered around Paris. Once Paris was lost, French victory became far more difficult. You could get around this via an attack during the Phoney War, or prewar by having France shift its center of industry away from the border, or at least distributing things more defensively. Another possibility is the extension of the Maginot line along the Belgian border, but that leads to quite a few diplomatic complications.
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Another good option might be for the French commitment to Czechoslovakia (which appears to have been taken more seriously than the British) to actually hold up in 1938. Hitler seems to have been angling for an actual war with the Czechs (alone) in 1938, if the Munich agreement had fallen out a different way, and he was sure Britain and Russia would stay out, but France wouldn't he might have taken a chance. With a year less German preparation (and they needed it), and the defenses in Sudatenland still in the hands of a Czechoslovak army that was considered pretty good in 1938 too - well if come winter there French armies in the Rhineland, Czech armies in Silesia, and Hitler is facing domestic rumblings for getting us into a war we apparently are not winning, maybe Germany could fold up. I suppose the big question here is what does Stalin do in 1939 if it looks like France and Czechoslovakia will shortly be partitioning Germany between them. He's not going to feel bad about a German defeat, but a rising French (or Czech!) superpower isn't good news either.