ABSTRACT
The military problem was solved fairly expeditiously, for it was mainly physical and manageable. Actually in North Africa the people military and civilian agents dealt with both de Gaullists and Vichy officers to prepare for the Allied landing, de Gaullist youths having led die way along the beaches and an arch-Vichy official, Admiral Darlan, having induced the French forces to cease firing. The shock might have been less sharp had General Clark made an armistice with some obscure Vichy commander instead of with the notorious leader in "collaboration". Though the President explained that it was an act of pure military expediency without broader implications, some feared that Darlan s position might make him the chief of a provisional government for France and give him power over the French Army. It was into an oddly exotic atmosphere that the Allied forces stepped when they entered Nortli Africa.
