ABSTRACT
The fall of France in June 1940 has been described as ‘one of the defining events in twentieth-century world politics’ (Adamthwaite, 1995, p. vi). It has also been claimed that ‘No event in contemporary history has caused greater shock and consternation than the fall of France in June 1940’, since it was so sudden, so unexpected and so complete (Boyce, 1998, p. 1). To the distinguished French historian Marc Bloch, ‘It was the most terrible collapse in all the long story of our national life’ (Shirer, 1970, p. 4). A nation state, which had been one of the Great Powers of Europe for centuries and controlled one of the most extensive European colonial empires, was overwhelmed in a military campaign that lasted forty-four days (10 May-22 June 1940); and the defeat was so devastating that, according to the terms of the armistice, France accepted the neutralization of her armed forces, the loss (once again) of AlsaceLorraine, German occupation of northern France and of a broad swathe of territory down her Atlantic coastline to the Spanish frontier, and the conversion of what remained of France into a vassal state of the Third Reich. Moreover, the fall of France in June 1940 was more than just a military defeat. To a considerable extent, national morale and confidence in the Third Republic collapsed: hence the millions of civilian refugees who joined a mass exodus in front of the advancing Germans, the unwillingness of civilians to resist in any way the German invasion, the widespread relief with which the news of the armistice was greeted, the large parliamentary majority in favour of transferring full constitutional powers to Marshal Pétain, and the initial official and popular acceptance of the Vichy regime.
