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Beginning on May 12, 1940, Wehrmacht troops, without encountering any serious obstacles on their way, systematically captured French territories and without a fight took the northwestern part of the Maginot Line, which was the last redoubt of the Allies and was recognized by many military leaders as an ideal fortification. When German tanks began their victorious raid across Western Europe, the General Staff of the British Empire developed a plan for the evacuation of Allied troops from the continent to the British Isles, the so-called “Dynamo Plan”. This ten-day military operation, during which 340 thousand troops from the French, British and Belgian armies were transported from the continent to the islands, became the largest operation of its kind in history.
The Nazis continued to advance deeper into French territory and reached Paris on June 14. That same day, in the evening, a giant banner with a fascist swastika was erected on the Eiffel Tower. This victory was very significant for the Germans, who had a special dislike for France, and in particular for Paris, since throughout World War I the French, by the will of fate, avoided the German occupation. The swastika flying over the Champs Elysees was a kind of revenge of the Germans for the shame in the First World War.
Eight days after the capture of the French capital, Henri Pétain and other French political leaders signed a truce with the Nazis. According to this document, Germany annexed half of France, where an occupation regime was established. France's industrial, raw materials and food resources came under German control. In the remaining half (in the south of the country), power was transferred to the puppet government of Pétain. This truce was signed in the Compiegne Forest, which was also very symbolic, since twenty years ago, in 1919, the Germans were forced to sign an act of surrender there.
In July 1940, Marshal Pétain, at the head of the government meeting in Vichy, began to pursue a policy of national treason, expressing the interests of part of the French bourgeoisie, oriented toward fascist Germany. The Vichy regime, led by Pétain, and later led by Pierre Laval, actively collaborated with the Nazis and helped stifle the national liberation struggle of the French people. The French population experienced double pressure: on the one hand, from the occupiers, and on the other, from their own government.
The liberation of France began on July 6, 1944, when Allied troops landed in Normandy, and less than three months later, on August 25, 1944, French soldiers led by General Charles de Gaulle entered Paris triumphantly. Following them was the 4th US Infantry Division. Nazi resistance was quickly broken, despite Hitler's order to burn Paris to the ground.
On the day of change of government in Great Britain May 10, 1940 The German offensive began on the Western Front. Bypassing the French defensive Maginot Line, German divisions invaded the territory of Belgium, Holland and Luxembourg and launched an offensive against France. With approximately equal forces, the success of the Germans was ensured by a tactically competent distribution of divisions, the massive use of tank formations in the direction of the main attack, and a breakthrough of the front that was unexpected for the enemy.
Unlike the 1914 campaign, the German offensive turned not towards Paris, but towards the sea. On May 20, German troops reached the coast of Pas-de-Calais and turned to the rear of the Anglo-French forces, encircling 28 Allied divisions. Only an unexpected stop to the German offensive made it possible to evacuate Allied troops from the port city of Dunkirk to the British Isles (“the miracle of Dunkirk”). 338 thousand people were saved, but the losses of weapons were enormous.
Soon the Nazis sent their forces to Paris. From the south, French troops had to repel the attacks of the Italian army (On June 10, 1940, Italy declared war on France), and in the north and northeast they had to resist Wehrmacht units.
On June 14, German troops entered Paris without a fight, the government fled to Bordeaux, Prime Minister Paul Reynaud was replaced by a hero of the First World War Marshal Petain, who immediately began negotiations for a truce. June 22, 1940 In the famous headquarters carriage in Compiègne, an armistice was signed between Germany and France.
The new French government agreed to the German occupation of most of the country, the demobilization of almost the entire army and the transfer of the French navy and military aircraft to Germany and Italy. The seat of Petain’s government was the small southern French town of Vichy, so his regime, which took a course towards cooperation with the occupiers (collaborationism), was called the “Vichy regime.”
French General Charles de Gaulle, who found himself in England, condemned the actions of the Petain government and called on the French to continue resistance to Nazi Germany.
By the time of the capture of France, the Versailles decisions hated by Hitler had been annulled, and the Fuhrer found himself at the zenith of his own glory. Material from the site
German success in France was based not on superior numbers of troops and weapons, but on the skillful distribution of German divisions when they appeared in a numerical majority at a weak point on the Allied front. The massive and well-coordinated use of German tank formations ensured a breakthrough of the front, and this success was then consistently developed. The failure of the Allies, first of all, turned out to be strategic - the French troops were in complete confusion, their generals lost control over communications and the movements of entire armies. No soldier in such a situation can fight successfully.
On May 10, 1940, German troops launched an attack on France, which declared war on Germany on September 3, 1939, in connection with the latter’s attack on Poland. As a result of the rapid advance of German troops using the tactics of lightning war - blitzkrieg, the allied forces were completely defeated, and on June 22 France was forced to sign an armistice. By this time, most of its territory was occupied, and practically nothing remained of the army.
The path of German troops to France ran through the lands of Belgium and the Netherlands, which were the first victims of aggression. German troops quickly captured them, defeating the French troops and the British Expeditionary Force that came to the rescue.
On May 25, the commander-in-chief of the French armed forces, General Weygand, said at a government meeting that it was necessary to ask the Germans to accept surrender.
On June 8, German troops reached the Seine River. On June 10, the French government moved from Paris to the Orleans area. Paris was officially declared an open city. On the morning of June 14, German troops entered Paris. The French government fled to Bordeaux.
On June 17, the French government turned to Germany with a request for an armistice. On June 22, 1940, France capitulated to Germany, and the Second Compiegne Truce was concluded in the Compiegne Forest. The result of the armistice was the division of France into an occupation zone by German troops and a puppet state controlled by the Vichy regime.
A Panther tank drives past the Arc de Triomphe in Paris.
German soldiers rest on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea near Toulon. A destroyed French destroyer is visible in the background.
The head of the collaborationist government of France, Marshal Henri-Philippe Petain, welcomes French soldiers released from captivity in Germany at the train station in the French city of Rouen.
The ruins of a workshop at the Renault plant in Paris, completely destroyed by British aircraft.
Portrait of Gestapo officer SS Obersturmführer Nikolaus Barbie. Head of the Gestapo in Lyon, where he received the nickname "Executioner of Lyon".
German 88-mm anti-tank gun PaK 43 in occupied Normandy.
German officers near a Horch-901 car in occupied France.
German mounted patrol on one of the streets of Paris.
German troops march through captured Paris.
German soldiers at a street stall in occupied Paris.
Belleville quarter of occupied Paris.
Tank Pz.Kpfw. IV of the 7th Wehrmacht Division on the Toulon embankment near the French battleship Strasbourg.
Place de la Concorde in Paris.
An elderly Jewish woman on the street of Paris.
On the Rue des Rosiers in occupied Paris.
Rue de Rivoli in occupied Paris.
Parisians are snapping up food.
On the streets of occupied Paris. German officers near a street cafe.
On the streets of occupied Paris.
French civilian cars running on coal and gas in Paris. In occupied France, all gasoline went to the needs of the German army.
Weighing of jockeys at the Longchamp racecourse. Occupied Paris, August 1943
In the Luxembourg Gardens in occupied Paris.
Famous milliners Rose Valois, Madame Le Monnier and Madame Agnes during the races at the Longchamp racecourse, August 1943.
Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at the Arc de Triomphe in Paris.
Les Halles market in occupied Paris.
Bicycle taxi at the famous Parisian restaurant “Maxim’s”.
Parisian fashionistas in the Luxembourg Gardens. Occupied Paris, May 1942.
A Parisian woman on the embankment applies lipstick to her lips.
A showcase with a portrait of the French Marshal-collaborator Pétain in occupied Paris.
German soldiers at a checkpoint at a crossroads near Dieppe.
German officers explore the Normandy coast.
A German BMW 320 car after a collision with a Ford BB truck on the street of a French town.
A column of self-propelled guns Panzerjäger I of the 716th Wehrmacht Infantry Division on the march in occupied France.
Two German soldiers on the street of the occupied French town of Granville.
Two German soldiers in a broken Sd.Kfz.231 armored car on the road in occupied Normandy.
Column of German troops in Paris.
For a long time it was believed that this photo depicted the execution of a member of the Resistance movement, but the name of the person in the photo was not known, and there was no documentary evidence that executions were carried out in the Belfort fortress (in particular, not a single cartridge case was found on the territory). Many years after the war, Georges Blind's son, Jean, saw this photograph for the first time and recognized his father in it. He said that his father was not shot in Belfort. He was arrested and kept in a fortress, and later transferred to a concentration camp in Blechhamer (Upper Silesia) where he died. In prison, the Germans subjected Georges Blind to a mock execution, but did not obtain any information from him, and sent him to a camp.
German convoy and half-track tractors Sd.Kfz. 10 near the houses of the French village of Suip.
Five Kriegsmarine sailors see off the submarine U-198 at a bunker in La Pallise, France, on the day the boat went out on its last combat patrol.
Adolf Hitler and Francisco Franco at negotiations in the French town of Hendaye.
Nazi flag over a Paris street, 1940.
Adolf Hitler poses with his entourage in front of the Eiffel Tower in Paris in 1940. On the left is Albert Speer, Hitler's personal architect, future Reich Minister of Defense Industry and Armament. On the right is sculptor Arno Becker.
Germans eat on the streets of a French city.
Luftwaffe soldiers with a young French woman at the hippodrome in occupied Paris.
A German soldier stands at a book stall on the street of occupied Paris.
A section of the street near the Parisiana cinema in occupied Paris.
German units and a military band are preparing for a review in occupied Paris.
Citizens of occupied France greet the head of the collaborationist Vichy government, Marshal Henri Philippe Pétain.
German officers in a cafe on the street of occupied Paris, reading newspapers, and townspeople. German soldiers passing by greet the seated officers.
Field Marshal E. Rommel with officers watches the work of a plow during an inspection of the Atlantic Wall.
Adolf Hitler at a meeting with Francisco Franco in the French town of Hendaye. 
A German soldier plows the land with French peasants on a captured Renault UE wedge.
A German post on the demarcation line dividing occupied and unoccupied France.
German soldiers ride a motorcycle through a destroyed French city.
Even during the Second World War, when the north of France was under the occupation forces of Germany, the residence of the collaborationist government of free southern France was stationed in Vichy, which came to be called the Vichy regime.
Marshal Foch's carriage. Wilhelm Keitel and Charles Huntziger during the signing of the armistice, June 22, 1940A traitor, an accomplice of the enemy, or in the language of historians - a collaborator - such people exist in every war. During the Second World War, individual soldiers went over to the enemy's side, military units, and sometimes entire states unexpectedly took the side of those who had bombed and killed them only yesterday. June 22, 1940 became a day of shame for France and triumph for Germany.
After a month-long struggle, the French suffered a crushing defeat from German troops and agreed to a truce. In fact, it was a real surrender. Hitler insisted that the signing of the armistice take place in the Forest of Compiègne, in the same carriage in which Germany signed the humiliating surrender in the First World War in 1918.
The Nazi leader enjoyed his victory. He entered the carriage, listened to the preamble to the text of the truce and defiantly left the meeting. The French had to give up the idea of negotiations; the armistice was signed on German terms. France was divided into two parts, the north, together with Paris, was occupied by Germany, and in the south, from the centers in the town of Vichy. The Germans allowed the French to form their new government.
photo: Philippe Pétain at a meeting with Adolf Hitler, October 24, 1940 By the way, by this time the majority of French citizens were concentrated in the south. Russian emigrant writer Roman Gul later recalled the atmosphere that reigned in the summer of 1940 in the south of France:
“All the peasants, winegrowers, artisans, grocers, restaurateurs, cafe garçons and hairdressers and soldiers running like rabble - they all wanted one thing - anything, just to end this fall into a bottomless abyss.”
On everyone’s mind there was only one word, “truce,” which meant that the Germans would not go to the south of France, would not march here, would not station their troops here, would not take away cattle, bread, grapes, wine. And so it happened, the south of France remained free, although not for long, very soon it would be in the hands of the Germans. But while the French were full of hope, they believed that the Third Reich would respect the sovereignty of southern France, that sooner or later the Vichy regime would succeed in unifying the country, and most importantly, that the Germans would now release almost two million French prisoners of war.
The head of the collaborationist government of France, Marshal Henri Philippe Pétain (1856-1951), welcomes French soldiers released from captivity in Germany at the train station in the French city of Rouen. All this had to be implemented by the new head of France, who was endowed with unlimited powers. He became a very respected person in the country, the hero of the First World War, Marshal Henri Philippe Pétain. At that time he was already 84 years old.
It was Pétain who insisted on the surrender of France, although the French leadership, after the fall of Paris, wanted to retreat to north Africa and continue the war with Hitler. But Pétain proposed to stop resisting. The French saw an attempt to save the country from destruction, but finding such a solution turned out not to be a salvation, but a disaster. The most controversial period has come in the history of France, not conquered but subjugated.
A group of French prisoners of war follows along a city street to a meeting place. In the photo: on the left are French sailors, on the right are Senegalese riflemen of the French colonial troops. What policy Pétain would pursue became clear from his radio speech. In his address to the nation, he called on the French to cooperate with the Nazis. It was in this speech that Pétain first uttered the word “collaborationism”; today it is in all languages and means one thing - cooperation with the enemy. This was not just a bow towards Germany, with this step Pétain predetermined the fate of the still free southern France.
French soldiers with raised hands surrender to German troops Before the Battle of Stalingrad, all Europeans believed that Hitler would rule for a long time and everyone had to more or less adapt to the new system. There were only two exceptions, Great Britain and, of course, the Soviet Union, which believed that it would definitely win and defeat Nazi Germany, and all the rest were either occupied by the Germans or were in an alliance.
The French read Charles de Gaulle's appeal of June 18, 1940 on the wall of a house in London. Everyone decided for themselves how to adapt to the new government. When the Red Army was rapidly retreating to the east, they tried to move industrial enterprises to the Urals, and if they didn’t have time, they simply blew them up so that Hitler wouldn’t get a single conveyor belt. The French acted differently. A month after the surrender, French businessmen signed the first contract with the Nazis for the supply of bauxite (aluminum ore). The deal was so large that by the beginning of the war with the USSR, that is, a year later, Germany had risen to first place in the world in aluminum production.
It is not paradoxical, but after the actual surrender of France, things were going well for French entrepreneurs, they began to supply Germany with aircraft and aircraft engines for them, almost the entire locomotive and machine tool industry worked exclusively for the Third Reich. The three largest French automobile companies, which by the way still exist today, immediately refocused on producing trucks. Recently, scientists calculated and it turned out that about 20% of Germany's truck fleet during the war years were manufactured in France.
German officers in a cafe on the street of occupied Paris, reading newspapers, and townspeople. German soldiers passing by greet the seated officers. In fairness, it is worth noting that sometimes Pétain allowed himself to openly sabotage the orders of the fascist leadership. So in 1941, the head of the Vichy government ordered the minting of 200 million copper-nickel five-franc coins, and this at a time when nickel was considered a strategic material, it was used only for the needs of the military industry, and armor was made from it. During World War II, more than one European country did not use nickel in coinage. As soon as the German leadership learned about Pétain's order, almost all the coins were confiscated and taken away for melting down.
In other matters, Pétain's zeal exceeded even the Nazis' expectations. So the first anti-Jewish laws in the south of France appeared even before the Germans demanded such measures. Even in northern France, which was under the rule of the Third Reich, the fascist leadership so far made do with only anti-Jewish propaganda.
Anti-Semitic caricature from the period of the German occupation of France There was a photo exhibition in Paris, where the guides clearly explained why Jews are enemies of Germany and France. The Parisian press, in which articles were written by the French under the dictation of the Germans, was seething with hysterical calls for the extermination of the Jews. The propaganda quickly bore fruit; signs began to appear in cafes stating that “dogs and Jews” were prohibited from entering the establishment.
While in the north the Germans were teaching the French to hate Jews, in the south the Vichy regime was already depriving Jews of civil rights. Now, according to the new laws, Jews did not have the right to hold government positions, work as doctors, teachers, could not own real estate, in addition, Jews were forbidden to use telephones and ride bicycles. They could only ride the subway in the last car of the train, and in the store they did not have the right to join the general queue.
In fact, these laws did not reflect a desire to please the Germans, but rather the French's own views. Anti-Semitic sentiments existed in France long before the Second World War; the French considered the Jews of the peoples to be outsiders, not indigenous, and therefore they could not become good citizens, hence the desire to remove them from society. However, this did not apply to those Jews who had lived in France for a long time and had French citizenship; it was only about refugees who came from Poland or Spain during the civil war.
French Jews at the Austerlitz station during the deportation from occupied Paris. After the end of World War I, during the 1920s, many Polish Jews migrated to France due to the economic crisis and unemployment. In France, they began to take jobs of the indigenous population, which did not cause much delight among them.
After Pétain signed the first anti-Jewish regulations, in a matter of days thousands of Jews found themselves without work and without means of subsistence. But even here everything was thought out, such people were immediately assigned to special detachments in which the Jew was supposed to work for the benefit of French society, clean and improve cities, and monitor roads. They were forced into such detachments; they were controlled by the military, and Jews lived in camps.
Arrest of Jews in France, August 1941 Meanwhile, the situation in the north was getting tougher, and soon it spread to the supposedly free southern France. First, the Germans forced Jews to wear yellow stars. By the way, one textile company immediately allocated 5 thousand meters of fabric to sew these stars. Then the fascist leadership announced mandatory registration of all Jews. Later, when the raids began, this helped the authorities quickly find and identify the Jews they needed. And although the French were never supporters of the physical extermination of Jews, as soon as the Germans ordered the collection of the entire Jewish population in special points, the French authorities again obediently carried out the order.
It is worth noting that the Vichy government helped the German side and did all the dirty work. In particular, Jews were registered by the French administration, and the French gendarmerie helped deport them. To be more precise, the French police did not kill Jews, but they did arrest and deport them to the Auschwitz concentration camp. Of course, this does not mean that the Vichy government was entirely responsible for the Holocaust, but it was an accomplice of Germany in these processes.
As soon as the Germans moved to deport the Jewish population, ordinary French people suddenly stopped remaining silent. Before their eyes, entire Jewish families, neighbors, acquaintances, friends disappeared, and everyone knew that there was no way back for these people. There were weak attempts to stop such actions, but when people realized that the German machine could not be overcome, they began to save their friends and acquaintances themselves. A wave of so-called quiet mobilization arose in the country. The French helped the Jews escape from the convoy, hide, and lie low.
An elderly Jewish woman on the street of occupied Paris. By this time, Pétain's authority, both among ordinary French and among German leaders, had seriously weakened, people stopped trusting him. And when in 1942 Hitler decided to occupy all of France, and the Vichy regime turned into a puppet state, the French realized that Pétain could not protect them from the Germans, the Third Reich still came to the south of France. Later, in 1943, when it became clear to everyone that Germany was losing the war, Pétain tried to contact his allies in the anti-Hitler coalition. The German reaction was very harsh, the Vesha regime was immediately strengthened by Hitler’s proteges. The Germans introduced true fascists and ideological collaborators from among the French into the Pétain government.
One of them was the Frenchman Joseph Darnand, an ardent follower of Nazism. It was he who was responsible for establishing a new order, for tightening the regime. At one time he managed the prison system, the police and was responsible for punitive operations against Jews, resistance and simply opponents of the German regime.
A Wehrmacht patrol prepares to search for Resistance fighters in the sewers of Paris. Now Jewish roundups took place everywhere, the largest operation began in Paris in the summer of 1942, the Nazis cynically called it “spring wind.” It was scheduled for the night of July 13-14, but plans had to be adjusted; July 14 is a big holiday in France, “Bastille Day.” It is difficult to find at least one sober Frenchman on this day, and the operation was carried out by French police, the date had to be adjusted. The operation took place according to a well-known scenario - all the Jews were herded to one place, and then taken to death camps, and the fascists conveyed unambiguous instructions to each performer, all townspeople should think that this was a purely French invention.
At four in the morning on July 16, the raid began, a patrol came to the home of the Jews and took their families to the Vel d'Hiv winter velodrome. By noon, about seven thousand people had gathered there, including four thousand children. Among them was one Jewish boy Walter Spitzer, who later recalled... we spent five days in this place, it was hell, children were torn from their mothers, there was no food, there was only one water tap and four toilets for everyone. Then Walter, along with a dozen other kids, was miraculously saved by the Russian nun “Mother Mary,” and when the boy grew up, he became a sculptor and created a memorial to the victims of “Vel d’Hves.”
Laval (left) and Karl Oberg (chief of the German police and SS in France) in Paris When the great exodus of Jews from Paris took place in 1942, children were also taken from the city, this was not a demand of the German side, it was a proposal of the French, more precisely of Pierre Laval, another protege of Berlin. He proposed sending all children under 16 to concentration camps.
At the same time, the French leadership continued to actively support the Nazi regime. In 1942, the Commissioner of the Third Reich for labor reserves, Fritz Sauckel, turned to the French government with a request for workers. Germany was in dire need of free labor. The French immediately signed an agreement and provided the Third Reich with 350 workers, and soon the Vichy regime went even further, the Pétain government established compulsory labor service, all Frenchmen of military age had to go to work in Germany. Railroad cars with live goods poured in from France, but few of the young people were eager to leave their homeland; many of them ran away, hid, or joined the resistance.
Many French people believed that it was better to live by adapting than to resist and fight the occupation. In 1944, they were already ashamed of such a position. After the liberation of the country, none of the French wanted to remember the shamefully lost war and cooperation with the occupiers. And then General Charles de Gaulle came to the rescue; he created and for many years strongly supported the myth that during the years of occupation the French people, as one whole, participated in the resistance. In France, trials began against those who served as Germans, and Pétain was brought to trial; due to his age, he was spared and instead of the death penalty, he got off with life imprisonment.
Tunisia. General de Gaulle (left) and General Mast. June 1943 The trials of the collaborators did not last long; they completed their work in the summer of 1949. President de Gaulle pardoned more than a thousand convicts; the rest received amnesty in 1953. If in Russia former collaborators still hide the fact that they served with the Germans, then in France such people returned to ordinary life already in the 50s.
The further the Second World War went into history, the more heroic their military past seemed to the French; no one remembered the supply of raw materials and equipment to Germany, or the events at the Paris velodrome. From Charles de Gaulle and all subsequent French presidents up to François Mitterrand, they did not believe that the French Republic was responsible for the crimes committed by the Vechy regime. Only in 1995, the new French President Jacques Chirac, at a rally at the memorial to the victims of Vel d'Hiv, first apologized for the deportation of Jews and called the French to repentance.
In that war, each state had to decide which side to be on and whom to serve. Even neutral countries could not stay away. By signing multimillion-dollar contracts with Germany, they made their choice. But perhaps the most eloquent position was the position of the United States. On June 24, 1941, future President Harry Truman said: “If we see that Germany is winning the war, we should help Russia, if Russia wins, we should help Germany, and let them do as much as possible.” killing each other more, all for the good of America!”
On the eve of World War II, the French army was considered one of the most powerful in the world. But in a direct clash with Germany in May 1940, the French only had enough resistance for a few weeks.
Useless superiority
By the beginning of World War II, France had the 3rd largest army in the world in terms of the number of tanks and aircraft, second only to the USSR and Germany, as well as the 4th largest navy after Britain, the USA and Japan. The total number of French troops numbered more than 2 million people.
The superiority of the French army in manpower and equipment over the Wehrmacht forces on the Western Front was undeniable. For example, the French Air Force included about 3,300 aircraft, half of which were the latest combat vehicles. The Luftwaffe could only count on 1,186 aircraft.
With the arrival of reinforcements from the British Isles - an expeditionary force of 9 divisions, as well as air units, including 1,500 combat vehicles - the advantage over the German troops became more than obvious. However, in a matter of months, not a trace remained of the former superiority of the allied forces - the well-trained and tactically superior Wehrmacht army ultimately forced France to capitulate.
The line that didn't protect
The French command assumed that the German army would act as during the First World War - that is, it would launch an attack on France from the northeast from Belgium. The entire load in this case was supposed to fall on the defensive redoubts of the Maginot Line, which France began building in 1929 and improved until 1940.
The French spent a fabulous sum on the construction of the Maginot Line, which stretches 400 km - about 3 billion francs (or 1 billion dollars). Massive fortifications included multi-level underground forts with living quarters, ventilation units and elevators, electrical and telephone exchanges, hospitals and narrow-gauge railways. The gun casemates were supposed to be protected from aerial bombs by a 4-meter thick concrete wall.
The personnel of the French troops on the Maginot Line reached 300 thousand people.
According to military historians, the Maginot Line, in principle, coped with its task. There were no breakthroughs by German troops in its most fortified areas. But the German Army Group B, having bypassed the line of fortifications from the north, threw its main forces into its new sections, which were built in swampy areas, and where the construction of underground structures was difficult. There, the French were unable to hold back the onslaught of German troops.
Surrender in 10 minutes
On June 17, 1940, the first meeting of the collaborationist government of France, headed by Marshal Henri Petain, took place. It lasted only 10 minutes. During this time, the ministers unanimously voted for the decision to appeal to the German command and ask them to end the war on French territory.
For these purposes, the services of an intermediary were used. The new Minister of Foreign Affairs, P. Baudouin, through the Spanish Ambassador Lequeric, conveyed a note in which the French government asked Spain to appeal to the German leadership with a request to end hostilities in France, and also to find out the terms of the truce. At the same time, a proposal for a truce was sent to Italy through the papal nuncio. On the same day, Pétain addressed the people and the army on the radio, calling on them to “stop the fight.”
Last stronghold
When signing the armistice agreement (act of surrender) between Germany and France, Hitler looked warily at the latter's vast colonies, many of which were ready to continue resistance. This explains some of the relaxations in the treaty, in particular, the preservation of part of the French navy to maintain “order” in its colonies.
England was also vitally interested in the fate of the French colonies, since the threat of their capture by German forces was highly assessed. Churchill hatched plans to create an émigré government of France, which would give actual control over the French overseas possessions to Britain.
General Charles de Gaulle, who created a government in opposition to the Vichy regime, directed all his efforts towards taking possession of the colonies.
However, the North African administration rejected the offer to join the Free French. A completely different mood reigned in the colonies of Equatorial Africa - already in August 1940, Chad, Gabon and Cameroon joined de Gaulle, which created the conditions for the general to form a state apparatus.
Mussolini's Fury
Realizing that France's defeat by Germany was inevitable, Mussolini declared war on her on June 10, 1940. The Italian Army Group "West" of Prince Umberto of Savoy, with a force of over 300 thousand people, supported by 3 thousand guns, began an offensive in the Alps region. However, the opposing army of General Oldry successfully repelled these attacks.
By June 20, the offensive of the Italian divisions became more fierce, but they only managed to advance slightly in the Menton area. Mussolini was furious - his plans to seize a large piece of its territory by the time France surrendered failed. The Italian dictator had already begun preparing an airborne assault, but did not receive approval for this operation from the German command.
On June 22, an armistice was signed between France and Germany, and two days later France and Italy entered into the same agreement. Thus, with a “victorious embarrassment,” Italy entered the Second World War.
Victims
During the active phase of the war, which lasted from May 10 to June 21, 1940, the French army lost about 300 thousand people killed and wounded. One and a half million were captured. The French tank corps and air force were partially destroyed, the other part went to the German armed forces. At the same time, Britain liquidates the French fleet to avoid it falling into the hands of the Wehrmacht.
Despite the fact that the capture of France occurred in a short time, its armed forces gave a worthy rebuff to German and Italian troops. During the month and a half of the war, the Wehrmacht lost more than 45 thousand people killed and missing, and about 11 thousand were wounded.
The French victims of German aggression could not have been in vain if the French government had accepted a number of concessions put forward by Britain in exchange for the entry of the royal armed forces into the war. But France chose to capitulate.
Paris – a place of convergence 
According to the armistice agreement, Germany occupied only the western coast of France and the northern regions of the country, where Paris was located. The capital was a kind of place for “French-German” rapprochement. German soldiers and Parisians lived peacefully here: they went to the movies together, visited museums, or just sat in a cafe. After the occupation, theaters also revived - their box office revenue tripled compared to the pre-war years.
Paris very quickly became the cultural center of occupied Europe. France lived as before, as if there had been no months of desperate resistance and unfulfilled hopes. German propaganda managed to convince many French that capitulation was not a shame for the country, but the road to a “bright future” for a renewed Europe.
