olid account of the war with Vichy France

Ask most people when Britain was last at war with France, they’d say Waterloo. This well researched account provides the casual reader with great insight into a relatively little known aspect of World War 2.

Smith writes well creating a rare read that works for the non-military historian whilst making it detailed enough for readers wanting a more detailed view point.

A good balanced account of a little know part of World War 2.

Thanks to netgalley for the review copy.

It is odd to reflect that in Britain’s ‘Finest Hour’ - the year between the armistice signed between France and Germany on 22 June 1940 and the German invasion of Soviet Russia on 22 June 1941 when Britain ‘stood alone’ in Europe - British servicemen stood less risk of being killed by the Nazis than British housewives braving the Blitz, whilst at the start of that period the British killed more Frenchmen than Germans. 

This last fact is attributable to the Royal Navy’s action at Mers-el-Kébir in the Vichy French colony of Algeria on 3 July 1940. Following the Fall of France, Britain was concerned that the French fleet might fall into the hands of the Nazis. Churchill therefore offered the French three choices: to scuttle their ships, join the Royal Navy or be sunk. The message was mishandled, the British opened fire and 1,297 French lives were lost.

One can argue that Churchill needed to show appeasers like Halifax and neutrals like the United States, that Britain was determined to fight, even if that meant killing Frenchmen but militarily the action is very difficult to justify, especially given that in 1943, when Hitler occupied Vichy France, the remainder of the French fleet was scuttled without overt pressure from Britain. There’s thus every reason to suppose that the French would have done the same in 1940, if the Germans had looked like they were going to gain control over the fleet at Mers-el-Kébir.

This incident is central to Colin Smith’s book ‘England’s Last War Against France’, which is subtitled ‘Fighting Vichy 1940-1942’. Smith seeks to place this event and these years in the broader context of Anglo-French relations since the Entente Cordiale of 1904 but his account makes no mention of Anglo-French tensions arising from issues such as the Franco-Belgian occupation of the Ruhr (1923-25) or the 1935 Anglo-German Naval Agreement. 

Even more surprising is the fact that the book makes no mention of the 1941 Free French coup against the tiny, Vichy-controlled islands of St Pierre and Miquelon, which lie just off the coast of Newfoundland, which did so much to sour Roosevelt’s attitude towards de Gaulle, resulting in de Gaulle’s exclusion from Operation Torch: the Anglo-American landings in Vichy-controlled Morocco and Algeria in 1942.

Thus whilst Smith has a very nice turn of phrase, a strong narrative drive and a good understanding of military affairs, his neglect of the diplomatic sphere severely restricts the usefulness of his otherwise very readable book.