After the Fall of France, the battle to retake France began in Africa in November 1940. By September 1944, after the
liberation of Paris and the
southern France campaign and taking of Mediterranean ports in Marseille and Toulon, the country was largely liberated. The Allied Forces were driving into Germany from the west and the south. The liberation of France didn't finally end till the elimination of
some pockets of German resistance along the Atlantic coast at the end of the war in May 1945. ] Militarily, the liberation of France was part of the Western Front of World War II. Other than scattered raids in 1942 and 1943, the reconquest began in earnest in the summer of 1944 in parallel campaigns in the north and south of France. On 6 June 1944, the Allies began
Operation Overlord, the largest seaborne invasion in history,
establishing a beachhead in Normandy, landing two million men in northern France and opening another front in western Europe against Germany.
American forces broke out from Normandy at the end of July. At the
Falaise Pocket the Allied armies destroyed German forces, opening the route to Paris. In the south, the Allies launched
Operation Dragoon on 15 August, opening a new military front on the Mediterranean. In four weeks, the Germans retreated from southern France to Germany. This left French ports in Allied hands, resolving earlier supply problems in the south. Under the onslaught from both directions, the French Resistance organized a
general uprising in Paris on 19 August. On 25 August 1944 Paris was liberated. The Allied forces began to
push towards the Rhine. Initial rapid advances in the North stretched lines of supply in the autumn, and the advance slowed. German counteroffensives in the winter of 1944–45 such as the
Battle of the Bulge slowed but did not stop the Allied armies, some crossing the Rhine in February, with heavy German losses. By late March several Allied armies had crossed and began
advancing rapidly into Germany, with the end of the war not far away. With France mostly liberated, a few
pockets of German resistance remained until the
end of the war in May 1945.
Gabon – November 1940 The
Battle of Gabon resulted in the Free French Forces taking the colony of French Gabon and its capital,
Libreville, from Vichy French forces. It was the only significant engagement in
Central Africa during the war.
North Africa – November 1942 Torch . The soldier at the dune line is carrying a flag because it was hoped the French would be less likely to fire on Americans.
Operation Torch, the invasion of
French North Africa, was carried out to trap Axis forces in North Africa between two Allied armies – an Anglo-American one in the west and a British and Commonwealth one in the east; this would also permit an invasion of Italy and free the Mediterranean for shipping. It would be the first ground combat operations for American troops in the west. In a three-pronged Allied assault against Vichy régime targets in French North Africa, the landing forces of Operation Torch came in at
Casablanca,
Oran and
Algiers. Following
Case Anton, French colonial governors had found themselves taking orders from the German military administration, and did so with varying degrees of enthusiasm. The American consul in Algiers believed that Vichy forces would welcome American soldiers. A Western Task Force (aimed at Casablanca) was composed of American units, with Major General George S. Patton in command and Rear Admiral
Henry Kent Hewitt heading naval operations. This Western Task Force consisted of the U.S.
3rd and
9th Infantry Divisions, and two battalions from the U.S.
2nd Armored Division — 35,000 troops in a convoy of over 100 ships. They were transported directly from the United States in the first of a new series of
UG convoys providing logistical support for the North African campaign. The Center Task Force, aimed at Oran, included the U.S. 2nd Battalion,
509th Parachute Infantry Regiment, the U.S.
1st Infantry Division and the U.S. 1st Armored Division—a total of 18,500 troops. The Eastern Task Force—aimed at Algiers—was commanded by Lieutenant-General
Kenneth Anderson and consisted of a brigade from the British
78th and the U.S.
34th Infantry Divisions, along with two British commando units (
No. 1 and
No. 6 Commandos), together with the
RAF Regiment providing five squadrons of infantry and five Light anti-aircraft flights, totalling 20,000 troops. During the landing, ground forces were commanded by U.S. Major General
Charles W. Ryder, of the 34th Division and naval forces were commanded by Royal Navy Vice-Admiral Sir
Harold Burrough. The plan to install
Henri Giraud as governor of the freed territories did not get local support but the Vichy commander in chief of French armed forces
François Darlan had been captured during the operation and was installed as High Commissioner, in return for which he ordered French forces in North Africa to cooperate with the Allies. Darlan was assassinated by an anti-Vichy monarchist and Giraud then took over. The Darlan deal triggered the invasion of Vichy France by Germany.
Tunisian campaign French Tunisia had been a protectorate of France since 1881, when it became part of France's colonial empire. After the
Operation Torch landings in Morocco and Algiers the Allied forces moved eastwards into Tunisia as British forces moved west following the
Second Battle of El Alamein. The Axis forces in North Africa were reinforced but subsequently cut off from resupply and caught between the two armies. The Allies took
Bizerte and
Tunis in May 1943 and the remaining Italian and German forces in North Africa surrendered. The Allies now had all of North Africa as a base of operations against southern Europe.
Corsica – 1943 bomber at
Solenzara Air Base in Corsica in late 1944. Except for a brief period, Corsica had been under the control of France since the
Treaty of Versailles (1768). In World War II, Corsica was occupied by the
Kingdom of Italy from November 1942, through September 1943. Italy initially occupied the island (as well as parts of France) as part of Nazi Germany's Case Anton on 11 November 1942. At its peak, Italy had 85,000 troops on the island. There was some native support among
Corsican irredentists for the occupation.
Benito Mussolini postponed the annexation of Corsica by Italy until after an assumed Axis victory in World War II, mainly because of German opposition to the irredentist claims. Although there was mild support for the occupation among collaborationists and resistance was initially limited, it grew after the Italian invasion and by April 1943 became united, and was armed by airdrop and shipments by the Free French submarine
Casabianca and establish some territorial control. After Mussolini's imprisonment in July 1943, German troops took over the occupation of Corsica. The
Allied invasion of Italy began 3 September 1943, leading to
Italy's surrender to the Allies, with the main invasion force landing in Italy on 9 September. The local resistance signaled an uprising for the same day, beginning the liberation of Corsica (
Operation Vesuvius). The Allies did not initially want such a movement, preferring to focus their forces on the invasion of Italy. However, in light of the insurrection, the Allies acquiesced to
Free French troops landing on Corsica, starting with an elite detachment of the reconstituted
French I Corps landing (again by the submarine
Casabianca) at Arone near the village of Piana in northwest Corsica. This prompted the German troops to attack Italian troops in Corsica as well as the Resistance. The Resistance, and the Italian
44 Infantry Division Cremona and
20 Infantry Division Friuli engaged in heavy combat with the German
Sturmbrigade Reichsführer SS. The
Sturmbrigade was joined by the
90th Panzergrenadier Division and the Italian XII Paratroopers Battalion/ 184th Paratroopers Regiment
184th Infantry Division "Nembo", which were retreating from
Sardinia through Corsica, from
Bonifacio to the northern port of Bastia. There were now 30,000 German troops in Corsica withdrawing via Bastia. On 13 September elements of the
4th Moroccan Mountain Division landed in
Ajaccio to try to stop the Germans. During the night of 3 to 4 October, the last German units evacuated Bastia, leaving behind 700 dead and 350
POWs.
Battle of Normandy – June 1944 , France 6 June 1944
Operation Overlord was launched on 6 June 1944 with troops landing in Normandy. Attacks by 1,200 planes preceded an amphibious assault by more than 5,000 vessels. Nearly 160,000 troops crossed the English Channel on 6 June. The
Battle of Normandy was won due to what is still today the largest ever military landing logistical operation; it brought three million soldiers, mostly American, British, Canadian, and French, over the Channel from Britain. Some of the German Army units they met in this operation were
Ostlegionen, part of the German
243rd and
709th Static Infantry Divisions, near the
Utah,
Juno and
Sword invasion beaches. The British intelligence organization,
MI9, created
Operation Marathon to gather downed airmen into isolated forest camps where they would await their rescue by allied military forces advancing after the Normandy Invasion of 6 June 1944. The
Comet Line, a Belgian/French escape line, operated the forest camps with financial and logistical help from
MI9, which also provided support for Operation Bonaparte, another escape and evasion line for downed airmen in Normandy.
Paris – August 1944 , 26 August 1944 after Liberation The Liberation of Paris was an urban military battle that took place over the period of a week from 19 August 1944 until the German garrison surrendered the French capital on 25 August 1944. Paris had been ruled by Nazi Germany since the signing of the
Armistice on 22 June 1940, after which the
Wehrmacht occupied northern and western France. As the final phase of Operation Overlord was still going on in August 1944, Eisenhower was not considering the liberation of Paris to be a primary objective. The goal of the U.S. and Anglo-Canadian armed forces was to destroy the German forces, and end World War II in Europe, to allow the Allies to concentrate their efforts on the Pacific war.
Uprising – 15 August As the French Resistance began to rise in Paris against the Germans on 15 August, Eisenhower stated that it was too early for an assault on Paris. He was also aware that
Hitler had ordered the German military to completely destroy the city in the event of an Allied attack, and Paris was considered to have too great a value, culturally and historically, to risk its destruction. On 15 August employees of the
Paris Métro, the
Gendarmerie, and
National Police went on strike; postal workers followed the next day. They were soon joined by workers across the city, causing a
general strike to break out on 18 August. Barricades began to appear on 20 August, with Resistance fighters organizing themselves to sustain a siege. Trucks were positioned, trees cut down, and trenches were dug in the pavement to free paving stones for consolidating the barricades. Skirmishes reached their peak on 22 August, when some German units tried to leave their fortifications. At 09:00 on 23 August, under the orders of
Dietrich von Choltitz, commander of the German garrison and military governor of Paris, the Germans opened fire on the
Grand Palais, an FFI stronghold, and German tanks fired at the barricades in the streets. Adolf Hitler gave the order to inflict maximum damage on the city.
Allied arrival – 24–25 August The liberation began when the FFI staged an uprising against the German garrison upon the approach of General Patton's
US Third Army. On the night of 24 August, elements of General
Philippe Leclerc's
2nd Armored Division made their way into Paris and arrived at the
Hôtel de Ville shortly before midnight. The next morning, 25 August, the bulk of the 2nd Armored Division and the
US 4th Infantry Division and other allied units entered the city. von Choltitz surrendered to the French at the
Hôtel Meurice, the newly established French headquarters. de Gaulle arrived to assume control of the city. It is estimated that between 800 and 1,000 Resistance fighters were killed during the Battle for Paris, and another 1,500 were wounded.
German surrender – 25 August Despite repeated orders from Adolf Hitler that the French capital be destroyed before being given up, Choltitz surrendered on 25 August at the Hôtel Meurice. He then signed the official surrender at the
Paris Police Prefecture. Choltitz later described himself in
Is Paris Burning? (
Brennt Paris?) as the saviour of Paris, for not blowing it up before surrendering. The same day, Charles , President of the Provisional Government of the French Republic moved back into the War Ministry and made a rousing speech to the crowd from the Hôtel de Ville. The day after 's speech, General Leclerc's 2nd Armored Division paraded down the
Champs-Élysées, while marched down the boulevard and entered the
Place de la Concorde. On 29 August, the U.S. Army's
28th Infantry Division paraded 24-abreast up the
Avenue Hoche to the
Arc de Triomphe, then down the Champs Élysées, greeted by joyous crowds. The uprising in Paris gave the newly established Free French government and , enough prestige and authority to establish a provisional French Republic, replacing the fallen Vichy regime, which had
fled into exile.
Southern France – August 1944 Planning and goals When first planned, the
campaign in southern France and the landings in Normandy were to take place simultaneously—Operation Overlord in Normandy, and "Anvil" (as the southern campaign was originally called) in the south of France. A dual landing was soon recognized to be impossible; the southern campaign was postponed. The ports in Normandy had insufficient capacity to handle Allied military supply needs and French generals under pressed for a direct attack on southern France with the participation of French troops. Despite objections by Churchill, the operation was authorized by the Allied
Combined Chiefs of Staff on 14July and scheduled for 15August. The goal of the southern France campaign, now known as Operation Dragoon was to secure the vital ports on the French Mediterranean coast (of Marseille and Toulon.) and pressure German forces with another front. The US
VI Corps landed on the beaches of the
French Riviera () on 15 August 1944 shielded by a large naval task force, followed by several divisions of French Army B (commanded by
Jean de Lattre de Tassigny.). They were opposed by the scattered forces of the German
Army Group G, (
HeeresgruppeG) which had been weakened by the relocation of its divisions to other fronts and the replacement of its soldiers with third-rate men outfitted with obsolete equipment. The Army was understrength, most of the units having been sent north earlier. The units that were present were spread thinly, made up of second rate units from eastern Europe (
Ostlegionen) with low morale and poor equipment. The coastal defenses had been improved by the Vichy regime and later improved by the Germans after they took over in November 1942. The FFI played a major role in the fighting. The Allied ground and naval forces were supported by a fleet of 3470 planes, mostly stationed on Corsica and Sardinia. On 14 August, preliminary landings took place in the
Hyères Islands by the
First Special Service Force, a joint U.S.-Canadian special-forces unit, to secure a staging area and for amphibious landing training. After sporadic resistance, driving the German garrison to the western part of the island, the Germans surrendered on 17 August. The Force transferred to the mainland, becoming part of the
First Airborne Task Force. Meanwhile, French commandos were active to the west in
Operation Romeo and
Operation Span. walking through the liberated city of Marseille Hindered by Allied
air supremacy and a large-scale uprising by the FFI, the weak German forces were swiftly defeated. The Germans withdrew to the north through the
Rhône valley, to establish a stable defense line at Dijon. Allied mobile units were able to overtake the Germans and partially block their route at the town of
Montélimar. The ensuing battle led to a stalemate, with neither side able to achieve a decisive breakthrough, until the Germans were finally able to complete their withdrawal and retreat from the town. While the Germans were retreating, the French managed to capture the important ports of
Marseille and
Toulon, putting them into operation soon after. The Germans were not able to hold Dijon and ordered a complete withdrawal from Southern France. Army GroupG retreated further north, pursued by Allied forces. The fighting ultimately came to a stop at the
Vosges mountains, where Army GroupG was finally able to establish a stable defense line. After meeting with the Allied units from Operation Overlord, the Allied forces were in need of reorganizing and, facing stiffened German resistance, the offensive was halted on 14September. Operation Dragoon was considered a success by the Allies. It enabled them to liberate most of Southern France in just four weeks while inflicting heavy casualties on the German forces, although a substantial part of the best German units were able to escape. The captured French ports were put into operation, allowing the Allies to solve their supply problems soon after.
Eastern France – Autumn 1944 crossing the Seine at
Vernon, 28 August 1944. The
First Canadian Army liberated the French coast from Normandy to the Low Countries. Hitler had ordered the troops occupying them to
hold them at all costs but using isolation and coordinated bombardment, the ports were reduced. Fighting on the Western front seemed to stabilize, and the Allied advance stalled in front of the
Siegfried Line (
Westwall) and the southern reaches of the Rhine. Starting in early September, the Americans began slow and bloody fighting through the
Hurtgen Forest (described by
Ernest Hemingway as "
Passchendaele with tree bursts"—) to breach the Line. American forces fought from September until mid-December to push the Germans out of Lorraine and from behind the Siegfried Line. The crossing of the
Moselle River and the capture of the fortress of
Metz proved difficult for the American troops in the face of German reinforcements, supply shortages, and unfavorable weather. During September and October, the Allied
6th Army Group (
U.S. Seventh Army and
French First Army) fought a difficult campaign through the
Vosges Mountains that was marked by dogged German resistance and slow advances. In November, however, the German front snapped under the pressure, resulting in sudden Allied advances that liberated
Belfort,
Mulhouse, and
Strasbourg, and placed Allied forces along the
Rhine River. The Germans managed to hold a large bridgehead (the
Colmar Pocket), on the western bank of the Rhine and centered around the city of
Colmar. On 16 November the Allies started a large scale autumn offensive called
Operation Queen. With its main thrust again through the
Hürtgen Forest, the offensive drove the Allies to the
Rur River, but failed in its core objectives to capture the Rur dams and pave the way towards the Rhine. The Allied operations were then succeeded by the German Ardennes offensive.
Pockets of German resistance – to May 1945 armoured car which participated in the liberation of
La Rochelle in 1945.
Musée d'Orbigny-Bernon in
La Rochelle, France The pocket of La Rochelle was a zone of German resistance at the end of the Second World War. It was made up of the city of La Rochelle, the submarine base at
La Pallice, of the
Île de Ré and of most of the
Ile d'Oléron (the southern part of the island was part of the
Royan pocket). ==Victory – 7 May 1945==