Back in the years of World War II, 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 they began to call the Vichy regime.
Marshal Foch's car. 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 - there are such people in every war. During the Second World War, individual soldiers, military units, and sometimes entire states unexpectedly took the side of those who bombed and killed them yesterday. June 22, 1940 was the day of shame for France and the triumph of Germany.
After a month-long struggle, the French suffered a crushing defeat from the 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, in 1918, Germany signed the humiliating surrender in the First World War.
The Nazi leader enjoyed the victory. He entered the car, listened to the preamble of the text of the truce, and defiantly left the meeting. The French had to part with the idea of negotiations, the armistice was signed on the terms of Germany. 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 had concentrated in the south. The Russian émigré writer Roman Gul later recalled the atmosphere that prevailed in the summer of 1940 in the south of France:
“All the peasants, winegrowers, artisans, grocers, restaurateurs, cafe garcons and hairdressers and soldiers running like a rabble - they all wanted one thing - anything, just to end this fall into the bottomless abyss.”
Everyone had only one word in mind - "truce", which meant that the Germans would not go to the south of France, they would not come here, they would not quarter their troops here, they would not take cattle, bread, grapes, wine. And so it happened, the south of France remained free, though 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 uniting the country, and most importantly, that the Germans would now free almost two million French prisoners of war.
Marshal Henri Philippe Pétain (1856-1951), head of the French collaborationist government, welcomes French soldiers released from captivity in Germany at the train station in the French city of Rouen. All this was 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 withdraw to northern Africa and continue the war with Hitler. But Pétain offered to end the resistance. 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 in the history of France, not conquered but subjugated, has come.
A group of French prisoners of war follows the streets of the city to the gathering place. In the picture: on the left - French sailors, on the right - Senegalese arrows of the French colonial troops. What policy Pétain would pursue became clear from his speech on the radio. In his address to the nation, he called on the French to collaborate 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. It was not just a nod to Germany, 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, this is 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. How to adapt to the new government, everyone decided for himself. When the Red Army was rapidly retreating to the east, they tried to bring industrial enterprises to the Urals, and if they did not have time, they simply blew them up so that Hitler would not get a single conveyor belt. The French did it 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 big that by the beginning of the war with the USSR, that is, a year later, Germany had risen to the first place in the world in aluminum production.
Paradoxically, after the actual surrender of France, things were going well for French entrepreneurs, they began to supply Germany with aircraft, 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, exist today, immediately shifted their focus to the production of trucks. Recently, scientists have calculated and it turned out that about 20% of Germany's truck fleet during the war years were made in France.
German officers in a cafe on the streets of occupied Paris, reading newspapers, and the townspeople. German soldiers passing by greet seated officers. In fairness, it should be noted 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 coins of five francs, and this at a time when nickel was considered a strategic material, it was used only for the needs of the military industry, armor was made from it. During the Second World War, not one European country used nickel in minting coins. As soon as the German leadership found out about Pétain's order, almost all the coins were seized and taken out for melting down.
In other matters, Pétain's zeal exceeded even the Nazis' own 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 managed only with anti-Jewish propaganda.
Anti-Semitic cartoon from the period of the German occupation of France There was a photo exhibition in Paris, where the guides clearly explained why the Jews are the enemies of Germany and France. The Parisian press, in which articles were written by the French under the dictation of the Germans, seethed with hysterical calls for the extermination of the Jews. The propaganda quickly bore fruit, signs began to appear in the cafe stating that “dogs and Jews” were forbidden to enter the institution.
While in the north the Germans were teaching the French to hate the Jews, in the south the Vichy regime was already disenfranchising the Jews. Now, under the new laws, Jews did not have the right to hold public office, work as doctors, teachers, could not own real estate, in addition, Jews were forbidden to use telephones and ride bicycles. They could ride in the subway, only in the last car of the train, and in the store they did not have the right to stand in a general queue.
In fact, these laws did not reflect a desire to please the Germans, but 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 aliens, 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 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 Austerlitz station during 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 the jobs of the indigenous population, which did not cause much enthusiasm among them.
After Pétain signed the first anti-Jewish decrees, in a matter of days, thousands of Jews found themselves without work and without a livelihood. But even here everything was thought out, such people were immediately assigned to special detachments, in which the Jew had to work for the benefit of French society, clean and improve cities, and monitor roads. They were enrolled in such detachments forcibly, they were controlled by the military, and the Jews lived in camps.
Arrest of Jews in France, August 1941 Meanwhile, the situation in the north was getting tougher, which soon spilled over into supposedly free southern France. At first, the Germans made the Jews wear yellow stars. By the way, one textile company immediately allocated 5,000 meters of fabric for sewing these stars. Then the fascist leadership announced the 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 in favor of the physical extermination of the Jews, as soon as the Germans ordered the collection of the entire Jewish population in special points, the French authorities again obediently complied with 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. More precisely, the French police did not kill Jews, but they arrested and deported 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 Germany's collaborator in these processes.
As soon as the Germans moved on to the deportation of the Jewish population, ordinary Frenchmen suddenly ceased to be silent. Entire Jewish families, neighbors, acquaintances, friends disappeared before their eyes, and everyone knew that there was no turning back for these people. There were weak attempts to stop such actions, but when people realized that the German car could not be overcome, they themselves began to save their friends and acquaintances. A wave of so-called quiet mobilization has risen in the country. The French helped the Jews escape from under the escort, hide, hide.
An elderly Jewish woman on the streets of occupied Paris. By this time, Pétain's authority, both among ordinary Frenchmen and among German leaders, was seriously shaken, people no longer trusted him. And when in the 42nd 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 the allies in the anti-Hitler coalition. The German reaction was very tough, Veshi's regime was immediately reinforced by Hitler's proteges. The Germans introduced true fascists and ideological collaborators from among the French into the government of Pétain.
One of them was the Frenchman Joseph Darnan, 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.
Wehrmacht patrol prepares to search for Resistance fighters in the sewers of Paris. Now Jewish raids were taking place everywhere, the largest operation began in Paris in the summer of 42, the Nazis cynically called it "spring wind." It was scheduled for the night of July 13-14, but the 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 forces, the date had to be corrected. The operation was already carried out according to the well-known scenario - all the Jews were herded into one place, and then taken to the death camps, and the Nazis conveyed unambiguous instructions to each performer, all the townspeople should think that this is a purely French invention.
At four in the morning on July 16, a raid began, a patrol came to the home of the Jew and took the families to the Vel d'Yves winter velodrome. By noon, about seven thousand people had gathered there, including four thousand children. Among them was one Jewish the boy Walter Spitzer, who later recalled... we spent five days in this place, it was hell, the children were taken away from their mothers, there was no food, there was only one water tap for everyone and four outhouses. 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" Yves.
Laval (left) and Karl Oeberg (head 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 out of the city, this was not the demand of the German side, it was the proposal of the French, more precisely, Pierre Laval, another protege of Berlin. He suggested that all children under 16 be sent to concentration camps.
In parallel, the French leadership continued to actively support the Nazi regime. In 1942, Fritz Sauckel, Commissioner for Labor Reserves of the Third Reich, 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 Peten government established compulsory labor service, all Frenchmen of military age had to go to work in Germany. Railroad wagons with live goods were pulled from France, but few of the young people were eager to leave their homeland, many of them ran away, hid or went into resistance.
Many French believed that it was better to live by adapting than to resist and fight the occupation. In the 44th, 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 invaders. And then General Charles de Gaulle came to the rescue, he created and for many years in every way supported the myth that the French people during the years of occupation, as a whole, participated in the resistance. In France, trials began on those who served as a German, Peten was also brought to trial, because of 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, already in the summer of 1949 they completed their work. More than a thousand convicts were pardoned by President de Gaulle, the rest waited for an amnesty in 1953. If in Russia former collaborators still hide that they served with the Germans, then in France such people returned to normal life already in the 50s.
The further the Second World War went down in history, the more heroic their military past seemed to the French, no one remembered not about supplying Germany with raw materials and equipment, not about the events at the Paris velodrome. From Charles de Gaulle and all subsequent presidents of France down 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 President of France, Jacques Chirac, at a rally in the memorial to the victims of the Vel d'Yves, for the first time apologized for the deportation of Jews and called on the French to repent.
In that war, each state had to decide which side to be on and whom to serve. Even neutral countries could not stand aside. By signing multimillion-dollar contracts with Germany, they made their choice. But perhaps the most eloquent was the position of the United States on June 24, 1941, the future President Harry Truman said: “If we see that Germany is winning the war, we should help Russia, if Russia is winning, we should help Germany, and let them kill each other more, all for the good of America!”
On the day of the change of government in the UK 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 went on the offensive against France. With an approximate equality of forces, the success of the Germans was ensured by the tactically competent distribution of divisions, the massive use of tank formations in the direction of the main attack, and a front breakthrough unexpected for the enemy.
In contrast to the 1914 campaign, the German offensive was not directed 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 troops, surrounding 28 Allied divisions. Only an unexpected stop of the German offensive made possible the evacuation of the Allied forces from the port city of Dunkirk to the British Isles (“the miracle of Dunkirk”). 338 thousand people were saved, but the loss of weapons was enormous.
Soon the Nazis sent their forces to Paris. From the south, the French troops had to repel the attacks of the Italian army (June 10, 1940 Italy declared war on France), and in the north and northeast to resist the Wehrmacht units.
On June 14, German troops entered Paris without a fight, the government fled to Bordeaux, Prime Minister Paul Reynaud was replaced by the hero of the First World War Marshal Petain, who immediately began negotiations for a truce. June 22, 1940 in the famous staff car 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 invaders (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 were annulled, and the Fuhrer found himself at the zenith of his own glory. material from the site
The success of the Germans in France was based not on superior numbers of troops and weapons, but on the skillful distribution of German divisions when they appeared in the majority in the weak point of the Allied front. The massive and well-coordinated use of German tank formations ensured a breakthrough of the front, and this success then developed consistently. The failure of the allies was primarily strategic - the French troops were completely confused, their generals lost control of communications and movements of entire armies. No soldier in such a situation can fight successfully.
An interesting historical project by Sergei Larenkov.
Paris, 1940. Hitler with the leadership of the Reich at Trocadero | Paris, 2010.
History of this project. In November 2010, Rossiyskaya Gazeta organized an exhibition of works by Sergei Larenkov dedicated to the siege of Leningrad in the French city of Honfleur, where a Russian film festival was held. He made a number of works in Paris, dedicated to the occupation of this city in 1940, as well as the Parisian uprising and the liberation of Paris in 1944.
By the beginning of June 1940, the main forces of the French army were defeated or cut off to the north. The road to Paris from the German troops that had broken through was open. On July 14, 1940, the German army entered Paris. The years of occupation began.
The military governor, General Henri Fernand Dentz, declared Paris an "open city", the German troops entered the empty three-quarters of the capital a month after Germany began active military operations against France, without a fight.
Paris, 1940. German soldiers march at the Arc de Triomphe | Paris, 2010:
The residents who remained in Paris were awakened by loudspeakers in French with a strong German accent about a curfew from eight o'clock in the evening to five in the morning. It also said: “Parisians! Over the next two days, the troops of the Reich will march through Paris in a solemn march, everyone stay at home! The new authorities ordered that all clocks be moved forward one hour. Paris lived according to Nazi laws and Berlin time.
Paris, 1940. German cavalry on the streets of the occupied city | Paris, 2010:
Paris, 1940. Montmartre | Paris, 2010:
It just so happened that the photo shows exactly the restaurant that in 1814 was the first to be called "Bistro". As the legend says, this name came from the Russian Cossacks, who wanted to eat quickly.
There is a story according to which Hitler could not climb the Eiffel Tower, as the elevators were disabled by the French, who did not want to obey the new authorities. He could only take pictures against the backdrop of the tower.
Paris, 1940. Against the backdrop of the Eiffel Tower | Paris, 2010:
Paris, 1940. The parade of the invaders on the Champs Elysees. | Paris, 2010:
Paris, 1940. Rue Rivoli. | Paris, 2010:
Paris, 1940. Parade of the invaders | Paris, 2010:
Paris 1940. Wehrmacht at Place de la Concorde | Paris, 2010:
Paris, 1940. The parade of the invaders at the Arc de Triomphe | Paris, 2010:
Paris, 1940. German cavalry on Avenue Foch | Paris, 2010:
Summer 1944. The Red Army, having liberated Belarus, is fighting in Poland. Landed in Normandy on June 6, the allies are moving east. The plans of the American command do not include the immediate liberation of Paris, they are rushing to Germany.
Without waiting for the Americans, on August 18, 1944, the French Resistance fighters raise an uprising in Paris. Having rich experience in uprisings and revolutions, the inhabitants of Paris take to the barricades.
Paris, 1944. Parisian uprising. Barricade on Quay Grand Augustin | Paris, 2010:
To the credit of the Parisian police, from the very beginning of the uprising, she actively went over to the side of the people and, together with the Resistance fighters, went into battle with the Nazis.
Paris, 1944. Paris uprising. Concord Square | Paris, 2010:
The uprising swept the whole city, the Nazis, who settled in the strongholds, offered increased resistance, which they finally managed to break with the approach of the tank corps of General Leclerc from the troops of the Fighting France, led by De Gaulle. Thus, on August 24, Paris was completely liberated by the forces of the French themselves. Crowds of enthusiastic citizens took to the streets of Paris to meet the liberators.
Paris, August 29, 1944. Victory Parade | Paris, 2010:
The protagonist of the liberated Paris, the future President of France, General Charles de Gaulle, walked at the head of the column at the Victory Parade.
Paris, 1944. De Gaulle at the head of the parade in honor of the liberation of the city | Paris, 2010:
With a solemn step, the American infantrymen, who had no direct relation to the liberation of Paris, walked along the Champs Elysees, but shed their blood on French soil.
Paris, 1944. Parade in Liberated Paris | Paris, 2010:
Paris, 1944. American infantry on the Champs Elysees | Paris, 2010:
Paris 1944. A wrecked Panther at the Arc de Triomphe | Paris, 2010:
And Paris was also helped to liberate by our compatriots from among the former prisoners of war who participated in the Resistance, who also took part in this parade.
Starting from May 12, 1940, the Wehrmacht troops, without encountering any serious obstacles on their way, systematically seized French territories and without a fight took the northwestern part of the Maginot Line, which was the last Allied redoubt 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 forces from the continent to the British Isles, the so-called "Dynamo plan". This ten-day military operation, during which 340,000 soldiers of the French, British and Belgian armies were transported from the continent to the islands, was the largest operation of its kind in history.
The Nazis continued to move deep into French territory and on June 14 they reached Paris. On the same day, in the evening, a giant banner with a Nazi 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 the entire World War I, the French, by the will of fate, avoided the German occupation. The swastika hovering over the Champs Elysees was a kind of German revenge 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 an armistice with the Nazis. According to this document, Germany annexed half of France, where an occupation regime was established. Industrial, raw materials, food resources of France were under the control of Germany. In the remaining half (in the south of the country), power was transferred to the puppet government of Pétain. This armistice was signed in the Compiègne forest, which was also very symbolic, since twenty years ago, in 1919, the Germans were forced to sign the act of surrender there.
In July 1940, Marshal Pétain, at the head of the government, which met in Vichy, began to pursue a policy of national treason, expressing the interests of a part of the French bourgeoisie that was oriented towards Nazi Germany. The Vichy regime, headed by Pétain, and later by Pierre Laval, actively collaborated with the Nazis and helped to stifle the national liberation struggle of the French people. The French population experienced double pressure: on the one hand - the invaders, on the other - their own government.
The liberation of France began on July 6, 1944, when the 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 in triumph. They were followed by the 4th US Infantry. Nazi resistance was quickly broken, despite Hitler's order to burn Paris to the ground.
