The Maginot Line

Haunted by the losses of 1914–18, France spent the 1930s building a chain of concrete forts along its border with Germany, linked by deep tunnels and underground railways and named after the war minister André Maginot. In May 1940 the German army went round it through the Ardennes. Most forts held out until after the armistice, but the line became shorthand for preparing to fight the last war.