The surrender of France

It was only a matter of time before the rest of the French army collapsed under the stunning force of the German blitzkrieg. Some important French politicians, like Marshal Pétain, hated their own government more than they hated the Nazis and so France was a divided nation. Paris was occupied on 14 June. On 22 June the French surrendered to the Germans in the same railway carriage in which the Germans had surrendered to the French in 1918. Hitler had his revenge for that shame and the carriage, preserved by the French since 1918 as a memorial to their First World War victory, was now blown up on Hitler's orders.

Vichy France

Reynaud, the French Prime Minister, resigned rather than surrender. The new Prime Minister, Pétain, was willing to co-operate with the Nazis. The Germans took control of northern France but allowed the bulk of southern and south-eastern France to be governed by Pétain from the town of Vichy. Vichy France, as this area was known, was despised by the British and some French because of its willingness to work with the Nazis. The Vichy government in its turn believed the British had deliberately abandoned the 40,000 French troops at Dunkirk. What happened next would stun the world and enrage supporters of Vichy France.

Neil Demarco: The era of the Second World War; Oxford University Press, 1993/2000, page 31