Boyot, Gaston

Born in Somvale , Department of Ob. He graduated from the Saint-Cyr Special Military School in 1896 and entered the military service in Tonkin, and then in China. Then he returned to his homeland and continued his studies at a military college during 1907-1909. After graduation, he returned to Tonkin, but already as a battalion commander in 1911-1913. Then he was transferred to Morocco, where he continued to serve in the occupation corps until 1915.

World War I 1914-1918

During World War I, the brigade commander and officer of the General Staff.

The interwar period 1918-1939

In 1919-20 was the head of the French Military Mission in Poland. In the 1920s and 1930s served in the colonial garrisons in Syria, Tunisia, Morocco and French Indochina , where he was commander in chief from 1930 to 1932. He was promoted to general in 1927. In 1933, Boyot returned to France, where he worked as a member of the Supreme Military Council, president of the Colonial Defense Advisory Council and the chiefs of the military administration of Paris.

World War II 1939-1940

When World War II began in September 1939, Biot was 64 years old, and he was about to resign, but was appointed commander of the 1st Army Group, based in northern France near the Belgian border. When the Germans attacked on May 10, Boyot’s forces began advancing towards Belgium according to the Allied plan, which suggested that the German army would repeat the maneuver of World War I and attack northern France, passing through the territory of Belgium, and then move to Paris. According to the Gelb plan , the German attack on the territory of Belgium was a distracting maneuver, the purpose of which was to pull the Allied forces to the north, while the object of the real offensive was the Arden sector. Like many commanders of the allied forces, Biyot was unable to unravel the real plans of the enemy. On May 12, Boyot was tasked with coordinating the actions of the French, Belgian and British armies in Belgium. To accomplish this mission, he lacked suitable staff assistants and relevant experience, and as reported in the report, “when he heard about his appointment to the assignment, he burst into tears.” He was unable to coordinate his actions with the British commander, General Lord Gort, and the Belgian commander, King Leopold . By May 15, Biyota’s fighting spirit was “at the bottom”. After meeting with Gort on May 18, he confessed to the British officer: "I am exhausted and could not do anything with these" punishment "." On May 20, the British government, worried about the situation, sent the chief of the Imperial General Staff, General Edmund Ironside, to negotiate with Gort and Boyot. As Ironside later noted: “I found Boyot and Blanchard in a state of utter depression. No plan, no attempt to make a plan. Ready to go to the slaughter. The defeat begins with the head, without military casualties ... I lost my temper and, seizing Boyot by the button of his uniform, shocked him. This person has long surrendered ” ^[3] . Ironside took command of the coordination of operations and organized an unsuccessful offensive southward in the Arras region in the hope of testing the strength of the German troops. In the end, realizing the threat posed by the rapid advance of the Germans from the Arden region towards the sea, the French commander-in-chief General Maxim Weygand ordered Biyot to withdraw troops to the south. At a meeting held in Ypres on May 21, Weigan found Biyota in a state of depression and pessimism, "he was marked by the heavy press of anxieties and worries of the last two weeks."

On May 21, Boyot was seriously injured in a car accident and died two days later, without leaving a coma. British General Henry Pounell (Chief of Staff of Gort) said in this connection: "With all due respect, but at the moment this is not the biggest loss for us."

The son of Billot - Pierre Billot joined the Free France movement and reached great heights in the political and military career in post-war France.

• 1915, lieutenant colonel
• 1916, Colonel
• March 15, 1919, Brigadier General of the Polish Army
• July 11, 1920, Brigadier General of the French Army
• March 9, 1927, Division General
• June 15, 1930, corps general
• November 4, 1933, Army General

• Cavalier of the Order of the Legion of Honor December 30, 1904, officer of the Legion of Honor October 15, 1918, commander of the Legion of Honor July 11, 1924, great officer of the Legion of Honor December 24, 1931, Grand Cross of the Legion of Honor December 23, 1937
• Military Cross 1914-1918 (France) January 21, 1915
• World War I Victory Allied Medal
• Commemorative Medal of War 1918-1918
• Commemorative Medal of Syria-Cilicia
• Colonial medal with the bar "Morocco"
• Belgium, Great Officer of the Order of the Crown , Officer of the Order of Leopold I, Big Cross
• Italy, commander of the Order of the Crown of Italy
• Morocco, Commander of the Order of the Alawite Throne
• British Empire, Knight of the Order of the Baths
• British Empire, Knight Commander of the Royal Victorian Order