Vichy France

Podcast Transcript

After the Nazi invasion of France in 1940, the French were forced to sign a lopsided armistice that gave control over most of the country to Germany.

However, about 40% of Frace was not occupied by the Germans. It was controlled by a French government that came to power after the invasion and collaborated with Germany.

The government ruled much of France for four years until the Allied invasion of France, and after liberation, the collaborators paid the price.

Learn more about Vichy France and the governing of France during the Second World War on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.

Before the events of this episode, the regime in France was known as the Third Republic.

The Third Republic was established in the wake of the 1870 Franco-Prussian War.

Napoleon III was removed from power and was replaced by a parliamentary system with a very weak president.

Despite being the longest-lasting regime since the French Revolution, the period of the Third Republic was noted for its frequent change in governments.

The Third Republic was a highly unstable institution depsite having existed through the First World War and a host of social and technical changes that took place in the early 20th century, including the rise of socialist and nationalist movements.

From 1935 to 1940, Frace had been led by a series of left-wing prime ministers from several socialist parties.

In March 1940, the parliament selected a more centrist leader, Paul Reynaud, who was a member of the Democratic Republican Alliance.

Reynaud had been against the appeasement of Nazi Germany and was militantly anti-Nazi.

He was the prime minister in power when Germany invaded France in May 1940.

As I recounted in my episode on the Maginot Line, the German invasion of France shocked everyone, including the French and the Germans. The entire operation was over in just six weeks, which was far faster than even the Germans anticipated.

France had one of the largest armies in Europe, and Germany assumed that it would be the most difficult fight they would have in Europe. However, France put too much emphasis on its static defense line, which the Germans just went around. The end result was a route for the French army as well as the British Expeditionary Force on continental Europe.

Once Paris fell on June 10, the government relocated, and there was a movement to sign an armistice with the Germans to try and save something from the disaster.

Reynaud refused to sign an armistice with Germany, which most ministers wanted, so he resigned as prime minister on June 16.

The government was then put into the hands of Deputy Prime Minister Philippe Pétain, who supported an armistice.

Here, I should mention who Philippe Pétain was. He wasn’t just another French politician. Pétain was one of the heroes of the First World War. He was the Army Chief of Staff during the war, and he was awarded the title of Marshall of France, the highest military honor that can be bestowed on French generals. He was one of only three men to have been made a Marshall of France during the war.

So Pétain, at least at this point in the war, was considered a real French hero. I should also note that he was 84 years old when he became Prime Minister.

Hitler demanded that the armistice be signed at the same spot, in the same railcar as the armistice that ended the First World War. In fact, Hitler sat in the same chair as Marshal Ferdinand Foch had done in 1918 and left early the same way Foch did as well.

The armistice was extremely lopsided in favor of Germany. There was no negotiation. The French were told to take it or leave it.

The terms of the agreement included a ceasefire and the establishment of a demarcation line. The Germans would occupy the north and west of Frace along the Atlantic, which consisted of about 60% of French territory.

The French government would control the remaining 40%, plus France’s overseas territories. On paper, France would retain its status as a sovereign country, but the reality was quite different.

The French army would be limited to 100,000 men, all current French prisoners of war would remain in captivity until Britain had been removed from the war, which never happened, and the French fleet was to be disarmed and confined to its ports under German and Italian control.

Both the French and the Germans thought that Britain would come to terms quickly. Instead, all of the French prisoners remained as such until 1945.

Also, the entire German occupation would be paid for by the French.

The reason why Hitler allowed this is because they didn’t want to control France completely. If they occupied all of France, it would tie up an enormous number of men and it would give the French populace more reason to rebel and fight back.

The new French government under Philippe Pétain moved its administrative seat to the city of Vichy in what was known as the Zone libre, or free zone of France, as opposed to the zone occupée that the Germans occupied.

There was also a small part of southeastern France that was occupied by Italy.

The new government in Vichy began to change things almost immediately. On July 10, the parliament officially dissolved the Third Republic, and on July 11, Pétain assumed the new position of Chief of State, which was formerly the equivalent position of President.

Pétain has basically assumed dictatorial control over France, at least the parts that the Germans didn’t directly occupy.

The regime’s motto was “Work, Family, Homeland,” emphasizing traditional values as a counterbalance to the perceived disorder of the republican period.

Vichy France was characterized by an ideology that included elements of nationalism, authoritarianism, and in some cases, alignment with Nazi racial policies. The government restructured itself to consolidate power around Pétain, who wielded significant personal authority.

The Vichy government’s policies were very collaborationist, although they resisted openly joining Italy and Germany as part of the Axis Alliance. Technically, France was neutral for the rest of the war, which meant that French troops wouldn’t be fighting outside of France on behalf of Germany.

When the government was formed, most people in France were supportive, if only because it halted the German advance.

However, this honeymoon didn’t last long. Vichy officials cooperated with German authorities in the deportation of Jews and other persecuted groups to concentration camps, implemented anti-Semitic laws, and recruited labor for German factories.

The regime abolished many republican institutions, replacing elected positions with appointments made by Pétain. The regime also sought to reshape French culture and society through propaganda and controlled media, promoting its values and justifying collaboration with Germany.

Pétain, the former hero of France, had become a dictator and a collaborator at the highest level.

While the Vichy regime was officially in charge of the government, it faced internal opposition from the French Resistance, which comprised various groups across the political spectrum that fought against both the German occupation and Vichy’s authority. The Resistance conducted espionage, sabotage, and guerrilla warfare, and it also worked with Allied forces to prepare for the liberation of France.

In addition to the Occupied Zone and the Free Zone, there was a third France: Free France. Free Frace was the government in exile that was led by General Charles de Gaulle.

The Free French government was headquartered in London. Initially, most French colonies sided with the Vichy government. Cameroon was the only colony in Africa that initially sided with Free France, along with various territories in the Pacific and South Asia.

A referendum held in French Polynesia was 5564 to 18 against the Vichy Government.

A fundamental moment in the Vichy Government took place in April 1942 when Pierre Laval was appointed Prime Minister. He had previously been removed from government when Pétain came to power.

In a radio address to the nation, he said the quiet part out loud when he said he hoped for a German victory to stop the spread of Bolishivsm. The facade of the Vichy government being independent melted away as the French public saw that they were just a puppet of Germany.

The division between the Occupied and Free Zones in France ended in November 1942 when the Allies conducted Operation Torch, the invasion of North Africa.

By this time, two years after the German invasion of France, most of the overseas French soldiers became disillusioned with the Vichy government and shifted their support to the Free French government.

After limited resistance to the Allied landing, French troops eventually arrested the Vichy French leaders and threw their support to the Allies.

One of the reasons Germany allowed a non-occupied zone is France is because they didn’t want North Africa to serve as a base to continue the fight against Germany.

Now that North Africa was under Allied control, and all the overseas French territories were under the control of the Free French government in exile, the reason for the Free Zone no longer existed.

On November 8, Hitler ordered Case Anton, the operation, to occupy the Free Zone and the island of Corsica. Italy also dramatically expanded its zone of occupation in France.

In June 1943, De Gaul and other Free French leaders established the French Committee of National Liberation. Based in Algeria, this was recgonized as the legitimate French government by the Allies and they represented France to the alliance.

The end of the Vichy Government came with the Allied invasion of Europe on D-Day, June 6, 1944. As the Allies moved across France, the Vichy government continued to lose power until everything collapsed on August 25 with the liberation of Paris.

A small group of Vichy officials fled to Germany and, with the approval of Hitler, set up a government in exile at Castle Sigmaringen located in the German state of Baden-Württemberg.

Known as the Sigmaringen Enclave, it became a haven for Vichy officials and French collaborators. From September 1944 until the end of the war, they basically played pretend government. There, they did things like issue postage stamps and meet with officials from other Axis powers, but fundamentally, they ruled no territory and no people.

In April 1945, as the Third Reich collapsed, the enclave was disbanded. Its members were captured by French forces or fled further into Germany.

In the aftermath of the war, there were widespread public acts of revenge on collaborators as well as legal consequences.

Approximately 120,000 people were investigated for their collaboration with the Nazi regime and the Vichy government.

Of those investigated, around 50,000 cases went to trial. The outcomes ranged widely, from acquittals to sentences that included imprisonment and, in some cases, the death penalty.

Pierre Laval, the Prime Minister of the Vichy government who openly supported a German victory in the war, was found guilty of treason and was executed on October 15, 1945.

Philippe Pétain, who retained the position of Chief of the French State throughout the entirety of the war, was also put on trial and found guilty of treason and the special crime of indignité nationale, or national indignity, which was created to close a legal loophole as defendants could claim they didn’t commit treason as they were technically working for the French state.

Pétain was sentenced to death and was stripped of all his property and honors.

De Gaul, who was the head of the Provisional Government of the French Republic, commuted Pétain’s sentence to life in prison because of his advanced age. He was 89 at the time of sentencing.

Soon after his prison sentence began, he started showing signs of dementia. By 1949, he was barely lucid and required full-time care.

He died in 1951 at the age of 95.

In the years since, France has struggled with the legacy of Philippe Pétain, one of France’s greatest heroes of the First World War and one of the greatest villains of the Second.

Vichy France was unlike any other government during the Second World War. Most conquered countries were directly occupied, or the local government was directly appointed by the conquerors.

Vichy France was different. It had the veneer of being independent, and its leaders were, in fact, selected, at least initially, by the French parliament. However, in the end it was nothing more than a puppet government for the Germans, and many of those in the Vichy government ended up paying for that with their lives.