1940 General Weygand in Egypt

British Newsreel. February 19, 1940. Maxime Weygand was a French military commander in World War I and World War II. Though not as infamous as Philippe Petain, Weygand is remembered for initially fighting the German invasion of France in 1940, then surrendering to and collaborating with the Germans as part of the Vichy France regime.Weygand passed the war of 1914-18 as a Staff Officer. At the outbreak, he satisfied his taste for contact with the troops while spending 26 days with the 5ème Hussards. On 28 August, he became a Lieutenant-Colonel on the staff of Marshal Ferdinand Foch. He was promoted to Brigadier General in 1916 and Major General in 1918, serving in the Supreme War Council from 1917. He remained on Foch's staff when the marshal was appointed Supreme Allied Commander. In 1918 he served on the armistice negotiations, and it was Weygand who read out the armistice conditions to the Germans at Compiègne, in the twice infamous railway carriage.Weygand was briefly sent to Poland as head of the French military mission in 1920 during the Polish-Soviet War. The mission also included French diplomat Jean Jules Jusserand and the British diplomat Lord Edgar Vincent D'Abernon. It achieved little; indeed, the crucial Battle of Warsaw was fought and won by the Poles before the mission could return and make its report. Subsequently, for many years, the myth that the timely arrival of Allied forces saved Poland was begun, a myth in which Weygand occupies the central role.Weygand returned to France in 1925, when he became director of the Center for Higher Military Studies, a position he had for five years. In 1931 he was appointed Chief of Staff of the French Army, Vice President of the Supreme War Council and Inspector of the Army. He remained in the positions, except Inspector of the Army, until his retirement in 1935 at 68.By late May 1940 the military disaster in France after the German invasion was such that the Supreme Commander, Maurice Gamelin, was dismissed, and Weygand recalled from Syria to replace him. Weygand arrived on May 17 and started by cancelling the side counter-offensive ordered by Gamelin, to cut off the enemy armoured columns which had punched through the French front at the Ardennes. Thus he lost 2 crucial days before finally adopting the solution, however obvious, of his predecessor. But it was by then a failed manoeuvre, because during the 48 lost hours, the German infantry had caught up behind their tanks in the breakthrough and had consolidated their gains. Weygand then oversaw the creation of the Weygand line, an early application of the Hedgehog tactic; however, by this point the situation was untenable, with most of the Allied forces trapped in Belgium. Weygand complained that he had been summoned two weeks too late to halt the invasion.After some further vain attempts to contain the enemy offensive, he then joined in seeking an armistice and cooperation with the German occupiers.