Panzer Thrust - The Matrix Games version of West Front

Abbeville, 40km NW of Amiens, France: [Best played as Axis] Again and again as the fighting continued across Belgium and northern France, German armored columns were thrust to the west causing panic in the Allied defensive lines. Late on 19 May Guderian was granted complete freedom of movement and he wasted no time ordering his panzer corps to strike. By mid-day on the 20th the British battalion defending Amiens had been destroyed and the swastika was flying over the city. Considering the ease with which his panzers had captured Amiens, Guderian believed that the path to the channel was now undefended. The 2nd Panzer Division was instructed to push on to Abbeville, only 20 kilometers from the coast, and seize the bridges across the Somme River for use in the second phase of the conquest of France. But Abbeville had not been left undefended, as the 5th Recon Battalion discovered when it approached the objective late in the afternoon and was cut off by elements of the British 35th Infantry Brigade.