The Occupation and Liberation of Paris

Podcast Transcript

Of all the cities that experienced the Second World War, one of the most interesting stories is that of Paris.

Paris was not the scene of major fighting like Warsaw, which was all but destroyed. It was occupied for over four years, during which time it saw acts of resistance and collaboration.

When the city was liberated after the invasion of Normandy, it was supposed to be destroyed, but it survived due to one man’s act of disobedience.

After liberation, the city witnessed incredible acts of reprisal and vengeance.

Learn more about the occupation and liberation of Paris on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.

The story of Paris during the Second World War is one that was different than that of any other city during the war. While it avoided the massive destruction of Warsaw and Leningrad, it suffered through years of Nazi occupation and was almost destroyed during its liberation.

After the start of the European war in September 1939 with the German invasion of Poland, Britain and France both declared war on Germany.

Despite having declared war, pretty much nothing happened between France and Germany for months. This period of inactivity on the western front became known as the “Phoney War.”

This state of affairs couldn’t last forever. The Phoney War became quite real in May of 1940 when Germany launched a Blitzkrieg invasion into Belgium and the Netherlands, before pivoting south into France, completely bypassing France’s Maginot line.

France at the time had the largest military in Europe after Germany, and everyone, including the Germans, assumed that the invasion of France would be a long, drawn-out affair.

It was not.

In just six weeks, France was conquered, which was a surprise to everyone, including the Germans. The German army almost destroyed the British Army at Dunkirk and would have if it were not for the dramatic rescue by a flotilla of civilian ships.

In June of 1940, the Germans approached the outskirts of Paris. Given the almost complete collapse of the French and British armies, the conquest of Paris seemed inevitable. It was just a matter of how much of the city would be destroyed and how many people would be killed.

Rather than fight, Paris was declared an open city.

The idea of an open city was developed in the 20th century with the advent of mechanized warfare. An open city is a city that has been declared demilitarized during wartime to avoid destruction and civilian casualties.

The declaration is typically made by the defending side, which agrees not to resist an advancing enemy force and removes all military presence or fortifications from the city. This status is meant to spare the city from bombing, shelling, or urban combat under the laws of war, as attacking an undefended city is considered a violation of international conventions.

Paris was declared an open city by the French government on June 12, 1940, in hopes of preserving its cultural heritage and civilian population from the devastation of battle as German forces approached.

The British had recommended that the Parisians fight the Germans street by street, but they rejected the idea.

The French government fled the city.

On June 14, 1940, German troops entered Paris through the northern and eastern suburbs. The Nazi flag was raised over iconic landmarks including the Arc de Triomphe and the Eiffel Tower. The images of German soldiers marching down the Champs-Élysées became one of the most potent symbols of European defeat in World War II. Remarkably, about 60% of Parisians had already fled the city, creating a massive exodus that clogged the roads leading south.

The Nazi occupation of Paris was designed to maintain a façade of normalcy while systematically exploiting the city and its inhabitants. The Germans established headquarters at the Hôtel Meurice on the Rue de Rivoli, and the swastika flew prominently from public buildings. Paris was governed by a German military administration led by General Otto von Stülpnagel, who worked alongside French collaborationist authorities.

Daily life changed dramatically for Parisians. Food rationing was imposed immediately, leading to severe shortages. By 1942, Parisians were limited to approximately 1,200 calories per day, less than half the pre-war average. Basic goods like coal, clothing, and coffee became scarce. A thriving black market emerged, with inflated prices that only the wealthy could afford.

The occupiers enforced a strict curfew from 9 PM to 5 AM. Public gatherings were restricted. German authorities tightly controlled newspapers, radio broadcasts, and cultural institutions. The press became a mouthpiece for Nazi ideology. Many French writers and artists, such as Jean-Paul Sartre, continued working in Paris, while others, including André Malraux and Pablo Picasso, became associated with resistance or withdrew from public life.

German propaganda films replaced many French productions in cinemas. Paris’s famous cultural life continued in a diminished form under German censorship and supervision. The occupiers attempted to create the illusion of a “normal” Paris, encouraging tourism from German soldiers and civilians.

For Jewish Parisians, the occupation brought systematic persecution. In October 1940, the first anti-Jewish laws were enacted, excluding Jews from public service and certain professions. In May 1942, Jews were required to wear the yellow star. The most infamous roundup occurred on July 16-17, 1942, known as the Vel d’Hiv Roundup, when French police, following German orders, arrested over 13,000 Jewish men, women, and children.

Most were held in appalling conditions at the Vélodrome d’Hiver sports arena before being sent to transit camps and eventually to Auschwitz. Of the approximately 76,000 Jews deported from France during the war, fewer than 3,000 ever returned.

Resistance to German occupation began gradually. Initially, it consisted primarily of small acts of defiance: distributing underground newspapers, painting V-for-Victory signs, or placing flowers at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. Charles de Gaulle’s famous call to resistance from London on June 18, 1940, inspired many, but organized resistance networks took time to develop.

By 1942, several major resistance movements operated in Paris. Groups like “Libération-Nord,” “Combat,” and the communist-led “Front National” established cells throughout the city. These groups gathered intelligence for the Allies, sabotaged German installations, helped downed Allied airmen escape, and assassinated German officers and French collaborators.

The resistance faced constant danger from the Gestapo and the French collaborationist police, particularly the Milice, which was a Vichy paramilitary force. Thousands of resisters were arrested, tortured at facilities like the Gestapo headquarters, and either executed or deported to concentration camps.

Despite these dangers, the Parisian resistance grew stronger, particularly after the German occupation of Vichy France in November 1942 and the implementation of forced labor service in February 1943.

Following the Allied landings in Normandy on June 6, 1944, the liberation of Paris became increasingly possible. The initial Allied plan was to bypass Paris to avoid urban combat and potential destruction, focusing instead on pursuing retreating German forces.

On August 7, General Dietrich von Choltitz was appointed the German military governor of Paris. He received instructions directly from Hitler to prevent Paris from falling into Allied hands……at all costs.

Events forced a change in the Allied plans to bypass Paris.

On August 15, 1944, a strike by Paris police was followed by an uprising of railway workers. By August 19, the resistance had seized control of police headquarters and other municipal buildings. Barricades appeared throughout the city, reminiscent of previous

As fighting intensified, General Dwight D. Eisenhower, the Supreme Allied Commander, reconsidered the decision to bypass Paris. French General Philippe Leclerc’s 2nd Armored Division was ordered to liberate the capital, supported by the U.S. 4th Infantry Division.

On August 23, Hitler gave the order to Von Choltitz to destroy Paris. This included demolishing key infrastructure such as bridges, monuments, and cultural landmarks. However, Von Choltitz, a seasoned Wehrmacht officer, ultimately chose to defy these orders.

Hitler’s exact words to Von Choltitz were “Paris must not pass into the enemy’s hands, except as a field of ruins.”

Recognizing both the military futility of defending the city and the immense cultural and human cost of its destruction, Von Choltitz instead opened communications with the French Resistance through the Swedish embassy and delayed aggressive responses to the uprising. On August 25, 1944, he formally surrendered Paris to General Leclerc and American forces.

His decision is widely credited with sparing Paris from devastation, though historians continue to debate whether his actions were motivated by moral conviction, military pragmatism, or a desire to distance himself from Hitler’s increasingly irrational directives.

When Hitler found out that Von Choltitz had disobeyed his orders, he went ballistic. The next day, he launched V2 rockets at Paris, but the damage was minimal compared to what could have happened.

The liberation culminated on August 26 with a victory parade down the Champs-Élysées led by General Charles de Gaulle. In a famous speech at the Hôtel de Ville, aka the city hall, de Gaulle declared: “Paris! Paris outraged! Paris broken! Paris martyred! But Paris liberated! Liberated by itself, liberated by its people with the help of the armies of France, with the support and the help of all France, of the France that fights, of the only France, of the real France, of the eternal France!”

….He did not mention the small role that the United States, Britain, and Canada played in its liberation.

The celebration was tempered by the reality that snipers still threatened from rooftops, leading to firefights during the victory parade itself. Approximately 1,000 resistance fighters and 3,200 civilians were killed during the week-long last gasp battle for Paris.

This, however, was not the end of the story.

Thousands of Parisians had collaborated with the Nazis both officially and unofficially, and now the people of Paris wanted payback.

A wave of retribution swept through the city as the French people and the provisional government sought to punish those who had collaborated with the German occupiers. This period, known as the épuration, or “purification,” took two main forms: the épuration sauvage, or wild purge, and the épuration légale, or the legal purge.

The wild purge occurred immediately and often violently, involving spontaneous acts of vengeance. Collaborators—ranging from those who worked with the Gestapo to those accused of profiting from the occupation—were beaten, executed without trial, or publicly humiliated. One of the most infamous acts was the public head-shaving of women accused of “horizontal collaboration” with German soldiers, often paraded through the streets as a spectacle of shame.

In the months that followed, the provisional government under Charles de Gaulle established legal proceedings to restore order and ensure due process. Special courts tried tens of thousands of suspects; sentences ranged from imprisonment and forced labor to execution. High-profile collaborators, such as Vichy officials and pro-Nazi journalists, were among those prosecuted.

Today, visitors to Paris can find numerous memorials commemorating both the victims of Nazi persecution and the heroes of the resistance. The Shoah Memorial honors Holocaust victims, while the Memorial to the Martyrs of the Deportation remembers those sent to concentration camps. The Mont-Valérien fortress, where over 1,000 resistance members were executed, serves as a national memorial.

The story of occupied Paris reveals both the darkest and most inspiring aspects of humanity: collaboration and resistance, betrayal and heroism, despair and hope. Perhaps most importantly, it demonstrates how ordinary citizens, and a single person in a position of power, when faced with extraordinary circumstances, can make profound moral choices that echo through history.

The Executive Producer of Everything Everywhere Daily is Charles Daniel. The Associate Producers are Austin Oetken and Cameron Kieffer.

Today’s review comes from listener gc1003 over on Apple Podcasts in the United States. They write.

Synchronicity

I recently listened to your podcast on the Schlitz mistake. That very afternoon, I saw a headline online: “Is Molson Coors repeating the Schlittz mistake?”

Have you ever experienced similar synchronicity, having just created or published a podcast only to find it in the news that day?

Greg C

Thanks, Greg! These things happen all the time. If you have enough data points, it would be strange if at least two of them didn’t have something in common. Part of it is just luck, but another part of it is that you are now aware of what to look for.

Had you not just heard the episode on the Schlitz Mistake, for example, you might not have taken notice of the headline. You would have read it and thought nothing of it.

I’ve had many listeners who have had such things happen, including the guy who heard he was having triplets the same day he heard my episode on multiple births.

With enough listeners and enough episodes, these things are going to happen.

Remember, if you leave a review or send me a boostagram, you, too, can have it read on the show.