In the face of uncertainty Part II
Part I
So when the Germans invaded where did they come? They moved north through the Ardennes forest completely bypassing the Maginot Line. Some people had pointed out this problem earlier, Winston Churchill, for one, but it was dismissed as a non-issue because the French had an army at the northern point that they said could move to intercept any thrust coming from the Ardennes. "But we don't think it will be necessary. The Ardennes are impassable. No army can come through it."
But the Germans went right through it and it took them only a few days to do. And they did it with 3 armies, the northern and southern of which moved to engage the armies of Belgium on the north and the French army stationed north of the Maginot Line, to their south. The center army struck through to France and would have wrapped up the British Expeditionary Force if Hitler hadn't lost his nerve and slowed the offensive down. That probably saved Europe in the end. That was the only thing that day that slowed the Germans down.
The Maginot Line was an impressive thing and would have prevented a war like WWI. The problem was that WWII was a completely different war fought using different tactics. It was a mobile war where armies maneuvered around fixed positions and focused power on points along static fronts. That made the Maginot Line irrelevant. What France was to prepare to fight the last war.
This is often true of business, they fight the last war. Put another way, we engage based on what we know. That is human and understandable and we can be charitable about it. But we must realize things are not so static as this, even if the original "war" has been understood and prepared for adequately. (The issue in Europe moved from impregnability to mobility.) Markets change, attitudes change and technologies change to make the future uncertain to a great extent. Companies who cannot or, worse, will not, continually reevaluate what they are doing might make money and be successful but that is so long as the original rules apply that were set down before or the troops on the front line are flexible enough to make things work. But when those rules change, and they will, the company could be left with the equivalent of the Maginot Line, something we look at now and wonder how anyone could ever have been so stupid.
So when the Germans invaded where did they come? They moved north through the Ardennes forest completely bypassing the Maginot Line. Some people had pointed out this problem earlier, Winston Churchill, for one, but it was dismissed as a non-issue because the French had an army at the northern point that they said could move to intercept any thrust coming from the Ardennes. "But we don't think it will be necessary. The Ardennes are impassable. No army can come through it."
But the Germans went right through it and it took them only a few days to do. And they did it with 3 armies, the northern and southern of which moved to engage the armies of Belgium on the north and the French army stationed north of the Maginot Line, to their south. The center army struck through to France and would have wrapped up the British Expeditionary Force if Hitler hadn't lost his nerve and slowed the offensive down. That probably saved Europe in the end. That was the only thing that day that slowed the Germans down.
The Maginot Line was an impressive thing and would have prevented a war like WWI. The problem was that WWII was a completely different war fought using different tactics. It was a mobile war where armies maneuvered around fixed positions and focused power on points along static fronts. That made the Maginot Line irrelevant. What France was to prepare to fight the last war.
This is often true of business, they fight the last war. Put another way, we engage based on what we know. That is human and understandable and we can be charitable about it. But we must realize things are not so static as this, even if the original "war" has been understood and prepared for adequately. (The issue in Europe moved from impregnability to mobility.) Markets change, attitudes change and technologies change to make the future uncertain to a great extent. Companies who cannot or, worse, will not, continually reevaluate what they are doing might make money and be successful but that is so long as the original rules apply that were set down before or the troops on the front line are flexible enough to make things work. But when those rules change, and they will, the company could be left with the equivalent of the Maginot Line, something we look at now and wonder how anyone could ever have been so stupid.
posted by Scott W. Clark at 9:57 PM
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