André-Gaston Prételat

After the Armistice, he became chief of staff of the Army of Alsace (1918), the troops occupying Alsace-Lorraine (annexed by France from Germany).

[1] He pointed out security weaknesses in the defensive fortifications of the north-east border of France in December 1938 and attempted to address these with improvements he planned in April 1939 but efforts had scarcely been undertaken when the war began in September 1939.

Prételat openly opposed entering the war with Germany along with one other member of the War Council, but nevertheless did send the French Second Army Group on what he feared would be an underpowered offensive against the German Siegfried Line in the Saar on 8 September.

The offensive was halted only four days after it had begun on order of French chief of staff Maurice Gamelin, and Prételat withdrew the Second Army Group to behind the Maginot Line, in the north-eastern sector of the French northern front, to where they would remain until the outbreak of the Battle of France on 10 May 1940.

On 26 May, in fear that German forces would overwhelm exhausted groups to his west, Prételat sought and was refused permission to retreat.