From London, General Charles de Gaulle urged French soldiers and civilians to continue fighting alongside the Allies rather than accept defeat. The speech helped launch what became known as “Free France,” an external resistance movement claiming to represent France’s continued war effort. Although few heard it live, it became a powerful symbol and rallying point over time.
After France’s rapid defeat in the Battle of France, French leaders sought an armistice with Germany. The agreement, signed near Compiègne, set the terms for a German occupation zone in the north and west and left a southern “unoccupied” zone under a new French government. This decision reshaped French politics and created the conditions for both collaboration and resistance.
Fearing that French warships might be seized by Germany, Britain attacked French naval forces at Mers-el-Kébir in French Algeria. The action killed more than a thousand French sailors and badly damaged or sank several ships. It deepened anger and mistrust between Britain and the Vichy authorities, while underscoring how isolated Free France initially was.
Meeting in Vichy, the combined Senate and Chamber of Deputies voted to give Marshal Philippe Pétain full constitutional authority. This vote effectively ended the French Third Republic and opened the way for the authoritarian “French State,” commonly called Vichy France. The new regime claimed it could protect French interests by cooperating with Germany.
Vichy adopted a major anti-Jewish law that excluded Jews from many professions and public roles. It marked the start of official, state-led antisemitic policy in France that went beyond German demands in important ways. These measures helped make later arrests, internments, and deportations easier to carry out.
Over two days in Paris, French police arrested roughly 13,000 Jews, including many women and children, in the largest roundup of Jews in France. Many were held under harsh conditions, then deported—most ultimately to Auschwitz. The event became a central example of how French authorities participated in persecution during the Occupation.
After Allied landings in North Africa, Germany launched Operation Case Anton and occupied the previously “unoccupied” zone in southern France. This ended the remaining territorial autonomy of the Vichy regime inside metropolitan France. In response, Vichy’s collaboration intensified, while resistance activity expanded under growing German control.
The Vichy regime created the Milice to fight internal enemies, especially resistance networks, with German support. The Milice became known for arrests, torture, and cooperation with German security forces. Its rise showed how collaboration shifted from administration and policing into organized political violence.
Vichy introduced the Service du travail obligatoire (STO), requiring many young French men to work in Germany’s war economy. The policy provoked strong opposition and pushed many to evade registration by going into hiding or joining resistance groups (often called the maquis). It helped transform resistance from scattered networks into a larger social movement.
Jean Moulin helped bring together major resistance movements, political parties, and unions in a single coordinating body: the Conseil national de la Résistance (CNR). The CNR improved cooperation inside occupied France and strengthened de Gaulle’s claim that he represented a unified national resistance. This unification also laid groundwork for planning France’s political future after liberation.
In Algiers, Charles de Gaulle and Henri Giraud created the French Committee of National Liberation (CFLN) to unify Free French leadership. The CFLN acted as a provisional government for territories outside German control and coordinated military and political efforts with the Allies. It was an important step toward restoring a French republican state after liberation.
The CNR unanimously adopted a program that combined immediate plans for sabotage and support of liberation with proposals for postwar reforms. It outlined aims such as restoring republican legality and expanding social protections after the war. This helped connect the wartime resistance to a clear political project for rebuilding France.
Allied forces landed in Normandy to open a major western front against Germany. The invasion, known as D-Day, began the military campaign that would push German forces out of France. It also increased the urgency of resistance operations and accelerated the collapse of German control in western Europe.
The Provisional Government issued the Ordinance of 9 August 1944 to re-establish republican rule of law as France was being liberated. It declared Vichy’s constitutional acts void from the start and reaffirmed that “the Republic” had legally never ceased to exist. This created a legal foundation for rebuilding state institutions and dismantling collaborationist organizations.
Allied forces landed on the Mediterranean coast of France to open a second major front and support a rapid advance north. The operation helped liberate key ports and stretched German defenses as they retreated. Combined with the Normandy campaign, it sped up the liberation of much of France in late summer 1944.
After an uprising in Paris and the arrival of Allied and Free French forces, German troops surrendered in the capital. The liberation was a major political turning point: it allowed de Gaulle and the Provisional Government to reassert authority on French soil. In the same period, German forces removed Pétain and leading Vichy officials from France, signaling the practical end of the Vichy regime in metropolitan territory.
Vichy France, Occupation, and the Free French (1940–1944)