Audie Murphy never publicly confirmed nor denied his true date of birth. Throughout his life, there were rumors and stories that suggested he had been born a little earlier or a little later than most people thought. What we do know is that his driver’s license displayed 1925 as the year he was born — a fact that has been accepted as part of his legacy ever since.
When you look at the numbers involved in the battles along the Maginot Line, they tell a stark story of imbalance.
A typical battalion consisted of around 800 men. On the German side alone, there were 27 battalions poised for action, while the French could muster only 8 battalions in this sector. This disparity would become a critical factor as the engagements unfolded.
When the French 104th Division was assigned to hold a 30-mile stretch of front, they faced an impossible mission. Made up of just eight battalions, they were vastly overextended. To put this into perspective: at the time, a properly defended fortified line would require nine battalions for every 13 miles. The math simply didn’t add up.
When American and French forces returned to the Colmar Pocket in late 1944, they faced a daunting task. It took two weeks of fierce fighting to secure the high ground on the French side of the Rhine Valley. Unfortunately, the persistent low clouds and mist robbed them of the visibility they so badly needed to make full use of their hard-won vantage point.
On the 28th of June, 1940, just days after signing the French surrender in Paris, Hitler himself visited one of the Maginot Line forts. Fresh with victory, he even mused about turning the fort into a museum — a monument to his triumph over France.