Status Updates From The Collapse of the Third R...

This is proving to be more timely and relevant in many ways I hadn't anticipated. And damn, can Shirer write history. 1,000 pages let's go!

Everyone in Vichy had come to terms with the fact that the Third Republic was over, and that a dictatorship with Pétain at the helm was better in the current situation. But he was only a figurehead, and this was recognized by the 80 deputies of the assembly who voted against the proposal to grant expanded powers and agree on a new Constitution. History has crowned their courageous gesture with eternal glory.

The attack on the French fleet at Mers-el-Kébir was a logical sequence for Churchill because nobody is interested in keeping one's word when national interests are at stake, it is pure pragmatism. However, this also had negative consequences because society in France showed solidarity with the government in Vichy. Pierre Laval refused all attempts to maintain the third republic and began to dismantle it with ease.

The government moved to Vichy and it quickly became clear that it would be an authoritarian creation that would lean completely on Nazi Germany. Pétain, Darlan and others expressed absolute contempt for democracy, the politicians of the Republic, almost all of whom were immediately arrested. The sentiment that the British had betrayed them reached its peak with the events of Operation Catapult.

The members of the government only formally discussed certain clauses of the armistice in order to ostensibly preserve the honor of France for history. Everyone had had enough of the war and the public welcomed the armistice. Only de Gaulle and some generals in North Africa wanted to continue the fight, but they were pacified. More shameful for the French was the signing of the armistice with Italy.

Pétain's government was ready to accept all the conditions that the Germans gave it in order to end the war. The surrender of Jews and political prisoners to Germany, the stay of French prisoners, etc. They were also quick to accuse all supporters of continuing the fight of treason for pushing France into the war. The only positive thing about the Compiègne diktat was that fleet stayed in French hands.

The outlines of what the new France would look like under Pétain's leadership were soon visible. An attempt to transfer part of the government to North Africa was thwarted, and all who resisted were arrested or retired. De Gaulle's call for resistance fell on deaf ears, as most people had given up. A delegation was sent to the negotiations, knowing that they were going to a funeral of liberty, but fleet was the key.

Paul Reynaud had the opportunity to save France from the humiliation of Vichy, but at the moment when he could clean up all the defeatists, he decided to resign. It simply cracked under the pressure. All the later reminiscences of the parties involved was an attempt to repair the damage because they knew what would follow the moment Pétain became prime minister. So de Gaulle fled to London and decided to resist.

Telegrams were exchanged between London and Bordeaux offering various solutions. Britain initially allowed the acceptance of the terms of a separate armistice between France and Germany to be explored. The other option was a Union of the two Allies. All this was ad hoc and unconvincing to the defeatists, and the Prime Minister himself did not help matters by losing his confidence, which ultimately brought him down.

The government had to flee a second time, to Bordeaux. The pressure on Reynaud was unbearable, he was being wiretapped, his mistress was urging him on, the army was out of control, but he still held out hope of going to North Africa and continuing the fight. How much longer he would hold out was hard to say, but the question of the moment was not whether it would happen, but when.

Reynaud had one last chance to keep hope that his government would continue to resist the German attacks, if only he called on Churchill to address the ministers and reassure them in person that all was not lost. He avoided it and thus made the victory of the defeatists inevitable. Weygand began to disobey, and Pétain to assemble future traitors.

With the entry of the Germans into Paris and the subsequent collapse of the last possibility of a strategic retreat, Maxime Weygand's will to resist evaporated. All alternative solutions, Brittany and North Africa were rejected. Even Churchill saw that the French would surrender. They, on the other hand, were looking for a way to get out of the obligation that France should not sign the accompanying peace.

The desire and the question of the defense of France as well as Paris became the main stumbling block between the government and the army. Reynaud had fewer and fewer allies, and the only true supporter of the struggle to the very end was de Gaulle, who after the changes found himself in the government. This infuriated the defeatists, but Paris was declared an open city and the year 1871 repeated itself.

However the retreat from Dunkirk unfolded, relations between the Allies became almost irreversibly poisoned. In the end, the English had to think of themselves first, although they did not abandon the French and Churchill gave them equal treatment. The events in the north meant a new beginning for the British, and the beginning of the end for the French, because the prime minister was in a growing minority.

Pretty great so far. This authoritarian twit in France in the 1880s, Georges Boulanger, had so many Trump-like parallels I had to look him up online and yes, he was called "General Revenge" and has been compared to Don the con. Humans keep repeating the same mistakes.

Whoever first mentioned the word "Armistice", it was on the minds of French politicians and generals when they were deciding what and how to proceed with the demoralized army. A donkey was also wanted to help the besieged in Flanders to evacuate via Dunkirk. They found him in the Belgian army, but they were all overtaken by Leopold III, who signed the capitulation, which would later cost him the throne.

The counterattack plans agreed upon between Churchill and the French quickly fell apart because the generals were simply daydreaming. The British quickly realized this and discreetly sought a golden strategy from the encirclement in Flanders and began to retreat towards the sea. This further roused the defeatists who wanted to conclude a separate peace as soon as possible, in order to save the "honor of the army".

The Allies had many opportunities to make a counterattack prevent a wave of German tanks that cut off the main army in Flanders. However, the attitude "we will do it easily" and mutual quarrels prevented the decisive steps that the supreme commanders had to take. Even the change at the very top didn't change anything because no matter how much Weygand beat his chest like the new Foch, he wasn't even up to his knees.