Governmental Policy and Combat Effectiveness: France 1920-1940

French governmental policy and legislation between the world wars had unintended effects on the morale and efficiency of military officers. The second-order effects were progression of officers' morale from psychological autonomy toward dependency. These effects can be discerned from an analysis of articles in military journals between 1920 and 1940. The third-order effects were on efficiency. They included the officers' growing inability to cooperate across branches, unwillingness to attend to technological developments, and unquestioning acceptance of an obsolete military doctrine -behavior that contributed to their defeat in 1940. The French experience illustrates processes through which unexamined governmental action can degrade the combat effectiveness of an armed force.