A bit of history discovered.  Fighting Vichy 1940-42 .

 

1. Ah yes, the final Anglo-French war, one of the more fascinating and lesser-understood episodes of WWII. I’m familiar with most of the campaigns (indeed, I’ve even managed to find some good scenarios of them), but there are few that tie the overall story together.

   However, I must note a few things many miss. In many ways, the 1940-43 “Shadow War” is viewed as the only and somewhat ultimate Anglo-French war in the modern era, and it is tempting to overlook parts of the issue that seem to contradict that view. However, there were several important factors involved.

   For one (though few know this), the main enemy in the Levant was not French but Syrian, as the Germans exerted their influence to turn the colony into what can best be described as the relatively independent Syrian protectorate of Germany with nominal Vichy control. Most of the enemy forces that were engaged carried the Syrian banner, and relatively few were actually directly French units. Indeed, by the time of the conflict, Dentz was pretty much acting as the military commander of the Syrian government rather than as a French colonial officer. However, given fears of Arab nationalism (the reason Syria was finally invaded was, after all, because Britain connected the dots to where German aircraft supporting a separate Iraqi mutiny were based) led to them being called “Vichy French”, even when they were only nominally so.

   Secondly, many fail to recognize (as they also fail to recognize with the Italians), that many Vichy units were “French” only in name, even aside from the colonials. It is not a secret that the Germans funneled a few hundred thousand men into Vichy and Italian payrolls during these years, occasionally not even being taught the language of their new “unit” before being sent off to fight under their colors. Needless to say, the presence of a very large German contingent in the Vichy forces (not counting “official” German forces and advisors that- sixty plus years afterwards- we STILL haven’t fully accounted for) would certainly do much to explain why the Vichy forces favored the Germans over the Western Allies (and why the “French” often fought with more determination than a large fraction of them did in 1940:chances are, many of them were wearing Grey at the time).

   Thirdly, many do not realize that, often times, Vichy forces fought each other during the main campaigns: for instance, during Torch, one of the more modern Vichy formations (and one of the few that had escaped widespread Germanization) bolted for the Atlas Mountains rather than confront the Western Allies, taking time to come down only to strike at their supposed countrymen (often cooperating with the Allies) before finally coming down and rallying following the Vichy capitulation.

   However, even when this is considered, it is fascinating. I will definitively have to check this out.

   Posted by Turtler       08/16/2009  at  01:10 PM  



2. Also, By the way, I do not believe Ironclad (Battle for Madagascar) was the roughest fighting of the War against Vichy. That would have been Exporter (Syria).

   Posted by Turtler       08/16/2009  at  01:27 PM  



3. I REALLY need to stop doing this, but I found another error: for the American casualties in Torch, he grouped all the Western Allied casualties and called them American. This is ignoring the fact that British Commonwealth and even Free French units also fought and suffered through the campaign. Even with that, however, he still shoots over: Allied casualties were roughly 1,200, not 1,500.

   And finally, I must point out that much of the reputation gained by the French colonials in Italy was the result of a lot of the racial propaganda by the Fascists both before and during (and to an extent after) the war. Certainly, there were rapes, some even gang-rapes, and several officers did turn a blind eye to the atrocities of their men, but the same can be said of the other Allied units, and the Western Allies were relatively good at disciplining their own. The image of the “Negroid French rapist” is largely because the RSI and the Germans hammered it in over and over.

   Posted by Turtler       08/16/2009  at  01:38 PM  



4. the French story is intractably complex and inescapably ugly.
   Sums it up really. They always described us as “perfidious Albion” but you would have to go a long way to outdo the Fwench when it comes to underhand dealings.
   There is a lot the French have in their past that they would prefer remained buried. They like to play the “gallant resistance” card at every opportunity, but they had plenty of people willing to do the Germans dirty work.

   Posted by LyndonB       08/16/2009  at  03:11 PM  



5. My French teacher explained it to me thusly.  In Paris the locals still dislike Americans because they all would rather still be speaking German.  In the outlying Provances the locals LIKE Americans because they remember why THEY aren’t speaking German.

   Posted by emdfl       08/17/2009  at  05:33 AM  



6. Yes outside Paris they hate paris! in slight fairness the fwench army, and government were heavily communist (source:- Mr W Churchill) the communists undermined all aspects of French defence, including manufacture, especially aircraft, turtler might want to look at that!

   Posted by Chris Edwards       08/17/2009  at  09:38 PM  



7. Meh…
   Surrender-monkeys, except when fighting those who are trying to bail them out.

   Sounds like frog-eaters to me…

   DD

   Posted by Dedicated_dad       08/17/2009  at  11:11 PM  

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