On November 11, 1918, the German government representative Eltzberger and the Allied Commander-in-Chief Foch signed an armistice in a train car at the Reyndide station in the Compiègne Forest in northeastern France, Germany surrendered, and on June 21, 1940, Germany and France once again signed an agreement in the same carriage, but after 22 years, the status of the two sides was different. The signing ceremony was held on June 22, at 3:18 p.m., when the German Fuehrer Hitler arrived at the scene, and not far from the carriage there was a French memorial plaque engraved in French: November 11, 1918, where the evil glory of the German Empire finally succumbed. Hitler glanced back at the plaque before entering the carriage, his eyes filled with contempt, anger and hatred. At 6:50 p.m., French representative Huntsger and German representative Keitel signed their names on the armistice at the same time, and in the moment of signing, a news that people still dare not believe spread to every corner of the world: France surrendered to Germany.
A Monument to the First World War in France with a fallen German eagle on it
If there is anything that France will always remember after its defeat, it must be a ridiculous French honor, after France announced its surrender in 1940, the insulting passage began to be sung for 80 years, for example, "How did France resist the German invasion?" "France did not resist, it was the French road that resisted, and the reason why Germany fought for a month was because they were in a hurry", "When did the French army give the invaders the most headaches?" "When compiling the list of surrendered soldiers", "What was the most difficult thing about invading France?" "Capture Paris before France surrenders, or it rains."
France has been a generation of empires that swept through Europe in history, in the time of Charlemagne they washed blood, in the Middle Ages they were invincible, in the period of great navigation they were proud of the world, in the age of enlightenment they led the world, the book "The German Emperors" is described in this way: the French nation is the most famous fighting nation in Europe, before the Franco-Prussian War, the French were invincible. In addition, France is also the country with the highest winning rate in Europe, and in the more than 800 years of history before World War II, France has participated in 185 battles, of which 132 wins, 10 draws, and 43 defeats, ranking first in Europe.
However, in the period of World War II, the French only fought for 42 days before surrendering, which is too different from the french previous "bully" image, 23 Soviet Red Army soldiers in the Battle of Stalingrad in the absence of any foreign assistance still insisted on the Pavlov Building for 59 days, with 3 million "First European Army" France resistance time is not as long as the Soviet Union to hold a building, this is a bit unreasonable, in fact, when France surrendered, the Allied casualties were only 350,000, but the surrender of soldiers reached a terrible 1.9 million What caused these soldiers to lose their fighting spirit in an instant? It's man-made.
23 Red Army troops held the Pavlov Building for 59 days, and the Germans were unable to seize control
The immediate reason for France's surrender was simple: France's battle plan against Germany could not be carried out, and although the Anglo-French coalition was the main force that defeated the Germans in World War I, it was precisely because of this that French officers with "rich combat experience against Germany" still firmly believed that the German army would attack along the old path of The First World War. After the German army invaded Poland on September 1, 1939, Britain and France estimated that the Poles should be able to withstand the German army for a year, and the worst could also last for 6 months, so that france could give France enough time to mobilize for war, and when the French army could launch a large-scale attack in the summer of 1941, taking Berlin directly, objectively speaking, this idea was not entirely whimsical, because the number of Polish troops exceeded one million at that time, and Stalin also believed that it would take some time for the German army to capture Poland, at least a month was impossible. Based on the successful experience of the French army in the First World War against Germany, the Defense was more effective than the attack, and the French officers decided to unswervingly implement the defensive strategy this time.
During the invasion of Poland in 1939, soldiers of the SS Panzer Division rested in a ditch on the side of the road leading to the pabianice
The French plan was this, first relying on the Maginot Line to let the Germans set up the main force in the lowlands, which was a fortification line that mainly extended from the Swiss border, along the Franco-German border all the way to Belgium, the purpose of this line of defense was to force any invasion must pass through Belgium, so that when the war broke out, Britain, Belgium, and the Netherlands would participate at the first time, and then when the German army crossed the mountain river, the Coalition army would give a heavy blow, severely damage Germany in Belgium, and finally have "rich combat experience against Germany" The French officers revived everything in the First World War and finally completed the second destruction of Germany.
On 16 September 1939, on the outskirts of Warsaw, German infantry advanced cautiously
In fact, at that time, the French officers also thought that the German army would pass through the Ardennes, but the optimistic and positive French spirit made them firmly believe that the French army could move before the German army completely crossed, which was not a big problem, so during the time when the Poles resisted the German army, the French did so and waited for the arrival of the German army, but the French did not expect that Poland only insisted on 28 days in the hands of the Germans, in May 1940, Hitler boldly launched the "Manstein Plan", first launched a war in Belgium to attract the main force of the Anglo-French coalition army Then, behind the allied forces, they used motorized troops to infiltrate the weakest part of the French defense, which the French considered the most insurmountable Area of Ardennes, and with this move alone, the Germans firmly choked the throat of the French.
The Germans captured the fortress of Sevastopol in 8 months, and Manstein was promoted to marshal
At dawn on June 5, 1940, thousands of German bombers appeared over France, an earth-shaking explosion announced the destruction of many important French targets, and more than 2,000 German tanks on the ground were rampage in French cities and cities, with the Northern Paris Basin occupied by the German army, France's most important industrial areas all fell, France wanted to continue to maintain the mainland industrial war is basically impossible, defeat is a foregone conclusion, Although de Gaulle's panzer division was later invincible on the front line and struck at all the enemy forces they encountered, a partial victory could not save France as a whole, so a few days later the French Deputy Prime Minister Pétain announced the surrender of France.
De gaulle
From a military point of view, the French surrender was a tactical and strategic mistake that led to a total loss, the main force was crushed, the capital was not safe to defend, and the total loss of industrial areas made it impossible for the French army to maintain the attrition of continuing to fight, but what we cannot understand is that France still had an army structure of millions of people at the time of surrender, and there were colonies larger than Chinese territory overseas, such conditions can be completely sustained, even if it can not defeat Germany in the end, it can also drag down Hitler's pace and greatly slow down its advance. So when France lost the war against Germany, Churchill immediately suggested that France go to guerrilla warfare and continue to fight with the German army, but the French top brass said that if they continued to fight, every inch of French land would be ravaged by the German iron hoof, and the French people would be slaughtered, and if they gave up resisting the retention of the government, the fearless courage of the French elite would eventually frighten the ruthless German invaders, and when the Vichy government announced its surrender, the French local government and the overseas governors also calmly accepted this decision. The whole country unanimously submitted to Hitler.
A large number of surrendered French troops
The French will have such a negative fighting mentality is not without reason, although they were the main force against the German army in world war, but also because of this war, the French soldiers killed more than 1.3 million, seriously wounded more than 4 million soldiers, economic consumption is even more uncountable, after the war in France has a large-scale famine, hunger is not just four words in the book for France at that time, but the real status quo, in order to win this war, France even owed Britain and the United States 7 billion US dollars in arrears, But what the French did not expect was that France poured its national strength to destroy the German offensive, and in the end it was an extremely disappointing ending.
After learning of France's surrender, a French man could not believe it
On January 18, 1919, when the victorious powers were discussing the aftermath of the defeat of Germany at the Palace of Versailles in Paris, France, because of the heavy damage caused by the war and considering the several german invasions against France in history, advocated severe punishment or even complete destruction of Germany, but Britain wanted to retain a relatively strong and economically self-reliant Germany to maintain the balance of power on the European continent, the United States expressed its support for Britain, and the anger of the French against the Germans was suppressed by Britain and the United States.
The victorious powers of World War I signed the Treaty of Versailles, which Germany retained
Not long after the end of World War I, the United States began to provide large-scale assistance to Germany in order to obtain more benefits from the Versailles system, Germany's infrastructure, tanks, aircraft and other technologies were quickly restored with the help of the United States, and various rare ore, oil and other strategic resources were also continuously transported to Germany, and soon Germany returned to the pre-war level, and the strength of all aspects has surpassed France, and the betrayal of the United States and Britain has made the French gradually lose confidence in the war. Some of them even began to question whether the desperate battle of the First World War was worth it, they did not want to fight, they did not want to fight again, which led to the Arrival of World War II, the French generally wanted to ignore it.
U.S. weapons destined for Germany are being commissioned
In addition, in 1930 France experienced a great depression, the social indicators fell directly to the bottom, which made France chaotic for a time, and compared to the chaotic social situation, the French Third Republic, which managed France, was even more panicked, in just a few years, the cabinet of the Third Republic changed more than a dozen times, the average life of each cabinet was less than 8 months, and when France fell into chaos from the inside out, various parties began to stand, the largest of which was the French Communist Party.
When the country's economy withered, the french communist power became stronger and stronger, after France was broken through by the German army in World War II, the French ruling party was very worried that if the war continued, the economic collapse of France would be overthrown by the French communist party, once this happened, the ruling party was likely to have nothing, even life may not be saved, and if it surrenders to Hitler, at least it can retain the position of power, and the surrender conditions given by Hitler at that time are extremely "rich", after all, they are descendants of the Frankish Empire. Hitler promised that the status and power of the French ruling class would remain essentially unchanged, and that the land already occupied by Germany could be returned after the war, so after considering various factors, the French top level finally reached a consensus: France surrendered to Germany.
French parties campaign
Although the Vichy government surrendered quickly after fighting with Germany, but it was extremely "heroic" when fighting with its own family, when de Gaulle led the Free French to fight around trying to liberate France, the French army led by the Vichy government fought with de Gaulle many times to prevent de Gaulle from entering Paris, however, even if France surrendered, it did not change the fate of the French to become slaves, when they laid down their weapons, it meant that they were humiliated by fascism, and countless French men were sent to Germany as laborers. Countless French women had to commit themselves to German soldiers in order to support their families, and Coco Chanel was one of them.
Coco Chanel
Therefore, although there are legitimate reasons for France's surrender, it still cannot hide the fact that this is a shameful act, no matter what the reason, committing to the evil fascists is never the work of a righteous teacher, no matter how many years have passed, it will always be nailed to the column of shame of history.