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@mikechrishill: What a fucking uneducated troll response to a really well made video. France was not remotely pro-Nazi, aside from Hitler’s puppet government. Sure there was an armistice, but it was forced on them. Churchill knew full well the puppets were planning an invasion, which is why he took drastic measures to keep the warships out of German hands! It’s not a bullshit narrative, if you’ve seen Historograph’s other videos, you’d know he’s very fucking thorough when it comes to research. If you consider the time and resources spent on the Maginot (to deter the Germans), the investment from Britain into the resistance movement, and the attacks on France in general, you’d have to be a complete retard to think France was pro-Nazi. The US got into some fights with Britain too, but at the end of the day we were still on the same side. Fighting with our allies was unfortunate...but fighting without them would have been catastrophic.
@mikechrishill Non sense and completely false. Darlan promised the Brits that the French fleet would never be used against them. What was in the armistice regarding the fleet was as likely to happen as, let say, that the German would pay the Versailles Treaty reparation. Still the Brits would open fire at their allies of yesterday and kill 1300 officers and sailors, just to show how reckless they were and impress the Yanks. A treacherous communication event. Unless you really think that the Americans and Roosevelt were assholes ready to let down the Brits, this action was pointless. Mers el Kebir was out of reach of the German. The French showed afterward with the scuttling of their fleet in Toulon that they would never let the German have their ships, and the enraged vichy French gave the Brits some payback in Dakar or in Syria. Darlan was a fool to think his word would mean something. Until that day, and set aside the fact that his wife was british and that he probably had to endure sub-standard cooking at home, he had no real reason to hate la perfide albion.
Hi Mr Historiograph, I'm trying to reach out to you to propose a business agreement: I would love to dub your videos to Italian and then re-upload them onto an italian Historiograph channel. I reckon there is a potential untapped market for italian-speaking wartime history videos. Your videos are shockingly well made and would face very little same-language competition. The revenue from those videos would then be split at some rate to be decided between the two of us. Let me know what you think, I belive this can be a profitable endevour.
Roosevelt to French ambassador in Washington "I would have done the same if I were Churchill." (this is not the exact quote, I have no idea what the exact quote is, though do feel free to tel me).
It's nothing more than the proverbial English perfidy. They fled to Dunkirk like cowards, but they still managed to sink the fleet of their (former) ally (!!)
@@benmurray8810 I remind you that it was the French and Belgian troops who defended Dunkerque during the British "evacuation" ... I also remind you that the French have continued the fight, thanks to the Forces Françaises Libres ("Free French Forces") led by Général de Gaulle: from the Battle of Britain to Hitler's Eagle's Nest, the French have been in every fight, including in North Africa, on June 6, 1944 in Normandie, but also in the Soviet Union (Régiment de Chasse Normandie-Niémen). Anglo-Saxon historiography may have deliberately "forgotten" their struggles but not us! And I remind you again that the French people have organized one of the most effective resistance movements in Europe and that the country has the third largest number of "Righteous among the Nations", behind Poland and the Netherlands.
@@gilbertdumotiermarquisdela3037 You are incredibly deluded. Britain sent an army to your country to fight two world wars. Millions of our people died for your country and you dare to call our retreat to Dunkirk cowardly? It was the French army that knew the threat from an Ardennes attack existed and placed old men with out dated guns in a thin line to hold it. That was not our failing. We did exactly what your high command told us to do and when you failed to defend your own country you call us cowards for withdrawing? Have you forgotten how many French and Belgian troops the Royal Navy and British civilians evacuated from Dunkirk? Did you also forget that we allowed De Gaulle to use our broadcasting capability to speak to France while your own government surrendered. You are possibly the worst person I've ever seen crawling over TH-cam. Britain is not perfect but the situation at Dunkirk was one of it's proudest moments and one of the greatest human achievements ever done. If your retarded admiral at Mers El Kebir had agreed to sail to the Carribean no French sailors would have died that day. It's a shame he was French. A German would almost certainly agreed to that generous offer.
@@gilbertdumotiermarquisdela3037 while saying that the French did nothing during or after the German invasion is wrong, I disagree that the retreat from Dunkirk was cowardly. First of all if they hadn't evacuated they had no chance of survival so all of the people there would be killed or taken prisoner, Secondly being a coward means running away from the fight but a good amount of the evacuated soldiers fought in North Africa, manned AA guns during the battle of Britain and then even returned to France for round 2 on the 6th of June 44. The French and Belgian soldiers protecting the evacuees, the British fighting after Dunkirk, the men and women fighting in the French resistance and all of the other soldiers that took part in the war against Germany were heroes and anybody calling them cowards should be ashamed of themselves.
Anonymous Person Britain and France (well really England and France but I’m counting them as the same) have been at war for centuries. The joke is that in these wars both navies have fired on each other multiple times at sea and from port.
Then HMS Ark Royal decides Aircraft carriers are more effective, Then U-81 decides submarines are more effective, Then B-17 Bombers of 15th AAF decide long range tactical bombers are more effective,
There was an alternative plan the English presented where the French ships could sail to a US port. However due to the strict interpretation of his orders, Gensoul determined he would have been going against orders had he done so. The last order he had received from Admiral Darlan was that he could sail to the US in the event the Germans or Italians (Frances enemies at the time of the orders) were trying to capture his ships. Now that the armistice had been signed and England was making the demands for capture (instead of Germany or Italy), it was his strict interpretation of his orders rather than following the spirit of the orders that led to his being fired upon.
Actually Darlan's order was Gensoul could sail to the U.S. if an enemy fleet tries to seize or attack them. Meaning that they are not limited to just Germany or Italy
@@bomschhofmann1644 eh, you never know. youtube works really differently sometimes, i know of few channels that i really love that was recommended to me on comment sections and not by youtube. and since i love the guy's work, why not publicize it so he can get more views? - oh, i don't think that part in paranthesis was there when i wrote the comment, if it was, my bad :)
Its a tragedy of war alright - but a necessary one. While Sommerville was concerned with the action, with honour and with the pride of the Navy, Churchill was thinking of the long game - the need to court Armerica's interest, the need to eliminate a potential threat early and the admission that, with France lost and the British Army historically being small (and scattered across the world) this would be a long war. They knew that the RAF and the Royal Navy could keep Britain safe and the were both more than a match for their German enemy - but there is only so much you can do as a island nation. In 1940 there was a very real likelihood that Europe would remain under the Nazi grip for years - maybe decades. You simply can't take shortsighted, hopeful actions early in a conflict, particularly when you are the last man for your team standing.
@@dynamo1796 All Churchill's unnecessary war crime did was encourage people in France to support the Vichy regime. Recruitment for the Free France movement plummeted.
@@MarkHarrison733 You're conflating matters here. The Free France movement was always doomed to be a a wisp of ideology and nothing more. Once the world saw Britain wouldn't give in, they knew it meant Europe would under German occupation for years. There would be no peace settlement, only the war between Britain and Germany until the US could bring her might to bear and support the retaking of Europe. Supporting the Vichy regime was what people did so they could survive until that day of freedom. The same happened in the Netherlands, Norway, Denmark and beyond. The French didn't simply go "oh well, the British sank three ships, we'd better join forces with the tyrannical dictator who just slaughtered tens of thousands of our countrymen" - you muppet.
@@MarkHarrison733 It was better to lose some recruits in the resistance than arm our enemy with a modern powerful fleet. The British were already out-numbered in the Mediterranean without adding this French fleet to their arsenal.
@regis bognor Regarding the 100 years war, my belief is both sides lost. The French crown should have, legally, gone to Edward III. The French kingdom was, by all means, divided and leaderless. One can dream of what may have happened if Edward had become king of England AND France. Maybe centuries of useless wars, resulting in millions of deaths, not mentioning Brexit.
@@artificialgravitas8954 Explicitly true for Australia. Cook was interacting with the locals all the way up the east coast on his first voyage. His men were working on a translation dictionary while the Endeavour was being repaired after running onto the Great Barrier Reef, so he knew that they had a language. Yet he declared the land "Nerra Nullius" - empty land! This has ramifications to the present day.
There is a mistake in the video about it not taking a scratch. It's 5 inch gun was actually damaged so it could no longer fire and forcing it to turn away.
@@amitm1993 firstly who the is “Britishers”? Also in ww2 uk had the strongest bavy in the world and contained germany with it. They also contributed the most technologically and single handedly saved europe. Tell me if the uk didnt get involved how would france get freed ?
The French betrayed the British by backing out of their agreement never to sign a separate peace. The French navy was the 4th largest in the world. If the Germans had managed to get their hands on it they could've (together with the Italians) reached naval parity with Britain and interrupted her trade enough to starve the British Isles. One of the agreements reached in the second armistice at Compiegne was that all French ships were to return to ports in mainland France, there's no reason to think the Germans wouldn't have tried to seize them. They eventually actually did try, but the French scuttled their ships.
@Hunter D the fact that the French were beaten on the mainland didn't mean they had to sign a seperate peace. They could've set up a government in their colonial holdings.
@Hunter D Vichy France was a puppet State of Germany but they could still make their own decision like, not fighting the war for Germany and not giving them their ships.
@@nicobruin8618The purpose of an army is to protect your people, how can you protect the people of France is you leave France? When you are beaten you have to admit defeat otherwise the wars would never end.
Before you enter the comments section, there are a few things I would like to make clear. For one thing, to all those who regard the shelling of Mers El Kebir as a British betrayal, may I remind you that the French and British had signed an agreement stating that neither country would sign a separate peace with Germany, an agreement which the French broke when they signed the Second Compiene Armistice. Secondly, Admiral Gensoul could have sailed to the Caribbean and still technically be in French territory. I hope that people do express their beliefs, and I myself will do my best to respect those beliefs, even if I do not believe in them myself, those who wish to challenge my views may do so, and I will do my best to either reply in my defense, or acknowledge my mistake (if I remember to, that is), I hope that we can all be respectful to each other. Good day.
@@alexgraham12345 Sorry I took so long to reply, Anyway. Yes, Britain and France did fail in their obligation to protect Poland (aside from the Saar offensive, but that was basically a failure), which was the faults of Britain and France, however, if you want to be more specific, it was the fault of the two governments, both of which were gone by this point. The shelling of Mer El Kebir was a tragedy, however, without the benefit of hindsight, it was a nesessary tragedy, the British feared that the germans or Italians would comandear the ships, and yes in the end, it was proven to be an unesessesary tragedy when the French scutteled their remaining fleet at Toulon, but that is with hindsight, and one cannot truly understand decisions with the benefit of hindsight, because with hindsight we know what will happen afterwards, so put yourself in Churchill's Shoes, Your country could be invaded by the Germans, your biggest ally has abandonned you, and now their navy is ripe for the taking by your enemies, what would you do, desparate times call for desparate measures, this was one of them, you can either accept that it happened and move on, or we can argue about it until we die, and let me tell you something, I am Greek-Canadian, since I'm Greek, I have tons of reasons that I could use as an excuse to hate all Turks and Germans, but I don't, I believe that just because someones ancestors did bad things, dosn't mean that those people are evil, their ancestors, yea, them, no. Also, so what if it had no enforcement mechanism, using that as an excuse to break it is like saying that since there are no police officers then I can break the law. I will leave you with this, to understand decisions made in the past, you must remove the benefit of hindsight from your understanding, I'm glad that we were able to remain civil in our little debate here, good day to you.
Then again, the French wouldn't have signed a separate peace with the Germans if the French far right hadn't seized power in what amount to a coup d'état. Which wouldn't have happened if the French government hadn't panicked and voted to give emergency powers to some old guy who happened to not like the Republic's politicians very much. Which wouldn't have happened if the Battle of Belgium hadn't been lost. Which wouldn't have happened if _the British army hadn't run away to Dunkerque in the middle of the French counter-attack_ (and let's be clair, it's not the British that are to blame, it's specifically John Gort, who acted against the general British consensus of wanting to actually win) ... Which wouldn't have happened if the idiot in charge of the defence of the Ardennes hadn't stubbornly refused to listen to the detailed reports from air scouts and told the French Air Force to bomb the giant armored German traffic jams in the forest to oblivion Which wouldn't have happened if Belgium hadn't pulled off of the alliance, somehow believing that neutrality would work this time Which wouldn't have happened if France had lent the required money to Belgium for turning the Meuse-Argonne line into another impassable Maginot line Well, we can continue for a long time, actually...
@@eth3549 Total nonsense...Gort moved 'some' troops back to plug a gap left by the Belgians which threatened the channel ports. The only escape route for all allied armies. The Weygand Plan never looked likely to succeed any way, he hardly believed in it himself. When he took command of the French army in late May he said himself, 'I'm several weeks too late' French, British and Belgians ALL made to Dunkirk to escape a POW camp. The 125,000 French, majority of the French army in the northern pocket were not cowards for leaving France. Besides, there were still over 100,000 British troops fighting further south, who had to be evacuated later as France continued to collapse. They didn't even defend their own capitol. There was no spirit of the Marne, no real belief in victory in France from the get go. France has many option to continue fight, from exile, or in poliltical union with Britain...sadly Petain was chosen and turned his back on France's only true ally in this period Britain. Now we know what we know about Vichy, the British should have been even more distrustful.
The French commander couldn't just sail off and join the British fleet. He had to see a much bigger picture than the British. He had to consider the political side-effects and recriminations such an action might have on occupied France, and possibly even Vichy France as well. The Germans might have retaliated against the French citizenry (if you think that unlikely, just take a look at what they did to the inhabitants of Oradour-Sur-Glane), or the Germans might have proceeded to occupy Vichy France (which they ultimately did anyway). By the same token, although I'm sure the French were sincere when they promised that they would never voluntarily turn their vessels over to the Germans, the British couldn't be sure that the Germans wouldn't just show up one morning, order the crews off the ships and take them over themselves (something the Brits had done in the First World War), which would have shifted the Mediterranean's balance of naval power irrevocably in favor of the Axis powers. In the end, it was a terrible, perhaps even treacherous, thing to do to an ally, but when your nation's very existence is at stake and you're fighting an enemy as formidable and ruthless as Nazi Germany, you haven't the luxury of being nice.
The French had the opportunity to scuttle them at that moment and solve the problem on all sides, but no he had to get his own sailors killed. If he was going to do it anyway then i fail to the see the problem in doing it sooner rather than later
Two of the three options wernt that though. 1st Option ally with the Royal Navy and fight to free occupied France, 2nd Option scuttle your ships, 3rd option sail to the French colonies in the Pacific and agree to sit out the war.
only the old battleships Bretagne was destroyed and very minor ships, all the destroyers, the submarines, the carrier and the others battleships survived the attack
@@volcanares9620the destroyer Mogador was hit by a 15" shell while leading the way out of the harbour, her depth charges detonated and she sank. The battleship Provence was damaged by several hits, and because she was quite old she was never repaired. The Dunkerque battle cruiser (or whatever her class is called in english) was damaged by shells and three days later, her side was blown up when an aerial attack hit and expoded a torpedo boat next to her. She was hastily repaired (using concrete to fill the holes in her hull), sent back to Toulon just in time to be stuttled there. Even if most of the human casualty are from the Bretagne's crew, she was not the only ship damaged there. (And also, there are claims of british aircrafts downed by french fighters but not confirmed for what I know. Anyway, several contradicting reports have been made of this event and Historograph's video is the best I have seen on it)
Hindsight is always a thing but it still gives us two alternate possibilities as to what the fleet could have done, they could have scuttled like they did in French ports, or they could have done the same as the Vichy army in North Africa and sided with Germany, fighting the US army that was expecting them not to resist as they had pledged not to during operation Torch.
Shaque Johnson it was a logical decision. The French admiral could have easily just sailed away with the brits or joined the other French ships with the brits but they were adamant. Plus, the alliance between the 2 stated that they were not to negotiate a separate peace but the French did so any way, betraying the british
This is one of those situations with no easy solutions. France had just surrendered so any action viewed by the germans as breaking the armistice could lead to an even worse outcome. Don't forget no one had the benefit of hindsight so all decisions were based on the realities of the moment not what might be the case 4 or 5 years later.
@@F40PH-2CATdid we sunk our battleship ourself or was it our fault because we didn't want to obey to the UK ? In both case that sound like an incredibly retarded take, I'm surprised someone that can come up with this can also actually write
@@MrGuana141 The French should have surrendered their fleet. The British were correct to assume that Germany would attempt to seize the French fleet as shown in 1942 when ultimately, all the flagships at Mers El Kebir were scuttled by the French themselves anyway. The Germans never did obtain the French fleet but they very well could have, in fact they came very close. Not to mention the utility the British would have gotten from the French ships in fighting the axis, a cause which would have benefitted France. France could have contributed it's navy to the liberation of France but chose to keep them in port until 1942 for no good reason, wasting some incredible ships.
Everything in hindsight is terrifying but knowing your nation could be enslaved by Nazis? Wouldn't you do anything you can to survive? I sure as hell would.
That idiot who commanded the fleet in Oran was more interested in etiquette than in averting a tragedy. Sinking fleet was okay but what really got him worked up that the British did send a captain to haggle with him instead of an admiral like he was one himself. The rest is known
There is a slight translation issue here, where the word 'contrôle' in french, and 'controllo' in Italian was mistakenly translated as 'control', where they really meant 'supervision' or 'check' as in 'passport control'. According to John Keegan, this might have played a factor in the British admiralty decision ...
@@vitoravila9908 true, although we do have the hindsight. The Admiralty didn't have a magic crystal ball to see into the future, so they made a decision based on the information they had. Regrettable, but tragically necessary.
Tetragon 213 well, there is a lot of controversy if the action in Oran was really necessary. Suffice to say that they were out of the Axis reach, as this particular action took place in Algeria Politically tho, in the great scheme of things, this action, again according to Keegan, galvanized the nation around Churchill, due to his firm decision to keep fighting no matter what. We often forget how fragile UK's position was during the summer of 40, and with the surrender of France and no clear commitment from the Americans, the British were on their own, and surrender, or even invasion and defeat, were considered by many( including the American ambassador Kennedy) the most likely outcome. Even Hitler got surprised by the British determination. In short, even if militarily this action was questionable, politically was a very effective and successful move
@@vitoravila9908 effective and successful move... yes and no... We all know that was a doubtful move military, it was even Lucky to not put at war France against UK... which was meaning, that germany could have freed millions of french prisoners, give back all tanks and guns to french and more of all, french fleet would have joined italian fleet in mediterranean sea, and both of them there would have been a great threat for english... Suez canal would have felt etc... but to be less specular, there was true negociations, secret ones, between De gaulle and all of the french colonies in africa and in french middle east protectorate... it was working actually, Mers el Kebir destroy almost all the negociation... let's wait 2 weeks in july, and AOF, AEF and Syria lebanon join free french... then automatically, french fleet + 150k good soldiers in algeria join back the fight, combined with british 8th army, they can take Lybia and thrashed the unprepared and under equipped italian army there... Churchill was knowing french would never give their fleet to axis... He told it, but he was truly needed to give a new "souffle" to Britain in schock and total disarray... British media have always presented Mers el Kebir as a victory over Axis... Despite this sort of betrayal (as french have the right to considere it and so has the right the english to not considere it), de gaulle has shown a true leader skill : he went to the BBC to defend the British for the indefendable act of Mers el Kebir... and it wasn't easy. We were lucky that at those time, We had so charismatic leaders, Churchill, Roosevelt, Stalin, and De gaulle... I don't say Stalin was a good one, but you can't deny him his tenacity and his leadership... Place Chamberlain instead of Churchil and the war is over... place De gaulle instead of petain and things would have gone either way... For Rossevelt, it's different... I would say he wanted to enter in war before but wasn't able to convince his own people and he needed their approbation, he pushed Japanese to make pearl harbour, he wished it, but didn't expected to be that efficient against his own navy... then he was preferring petain to De Gaulle, which is harsh to accept here, especially he had prepared a money and many american servants to take the lead of the french administration after DDay... stunning and poor idea but logic... but he leads perfectly USA.
This event was never taught to us in school (I live in Australia) and we were only really taught about positives of the Australian army and to a lesser extent the British army during the war. We learned so little about events such as this or the positives of the Axis forces and it really disappoints me that I’m having to learn all of this years later. I’m really glad this channel exists and spends time showing both sides of the war with lesser known parts of the war. So keep up the good work, i only found your channel fairly recently and have been watching all your videos. 😀
@@valentinlageot4101, The fact that they were all human and some of them openly embraced the positive aspects of that humanity whenever they got the opportunity. I'm not talking Rommel or Schindler or other ""good Nazis"" I'm talking the majority or more likely large minority of enlisted soldiers and other low-ranking military personnel who had little in common ideologically with fascism and maintained some level of a conscience and "civility" while fighting for the "defense" of their country or because they were forced to.
@@fluffly3606 what positives did teh German accomplished at the east, what were they defending, bnothing they were attacking mostly, they invaded teh whole of Europe and yes maybe not for the all Nazi thing but still, until the very end they stayed loyal even if the war and its motivs was never beneficial for their nations. here a question what did the Whermacht accomplished to protect its motherland or even teh Waffen SS, nothing they just ruined the reputation of a culturally rich country of Europe as the Warmongering (even tho it wa smeant to be France that had this bad reputation fo invading its neighbor) what good did those men accomplished for tehir country, yes tehy were braves but again had japan surrendered would their cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki be in RUin, would have germany surrender in 1944, would the Red army have commited mass rpe in eastern and central Europe.
I don't see any reason why they'd need to teach this in the national curriculum. It's interesting but it has no real relevance to educating Australian kids.
How have I never learned of this? It's such a tragic story from the war and such a dramatic one. Even in this relatively matter-of-fact retelling I can imagine and empathize with the captains of both sides...
It always seemed to me that the naval stories of WW2 were the most dramatic - Mers el Kebir, Bismarck and Hood, Operation Pedestal, the sinking of HMS Glorious, Pearl Harbor...
This might be because i'm British and maybe we are programmed in a particular way, but am i the only one who thinks the ultimatum issued was entirely reasonable.. ? basically either continue to fight, sail to Gibraltar and disarm or sail to another French territory and disarm? The French Admiral can make all the guarantees that he wants but he could easily be replaced or otherwise unable to disarm the French fleet in the event the Germans tried to take over and if Britain hadn't sunk this French squadron the French, Italian and German fleets combined could have overwhelmed Britain and forced it into an armistice
Nope, he was literally given 3 good options and 1 neutral option (scuttle). Instead he chose option 5, which was to waste his sailors lives and then cry about how it was all the brits faults. Talking about how he'll never surrender to germany all while refusing to join the fleet to fight against them? Bullshit. SS officer finds out the crews families, tells them they either fight the british or their families suffer, all of a sudden malta is gone and the north africa campaign may very well have had a different outcome. Every life lost that day was 100% on the french admirals head.
Actually you are wrong it was an insane risk for the british to do this. The vichy government could have easily chosen to take this betrayal as justification to side with the germans actively and declare war on the UK. It was nowhere near the full force of the french navy. This also caused many french forces to refuse helping the british when they could have. It is a shameful disgrace on the Uk navy.
@@feanedhell The French where scattered after the fall of France in 1940 including their navy. From a British perspective Vichy France was little more than a German puppet state, French collaborators with Pétain at the helm of the Vichy government. So "actively working with the Germans" was to be expected.
It was a complexe decision as the french had just signed the armistice so technically they shouldn't fight anymore. The order received by the french admiral were to sail to the US or Britain in case of Axis attack, but Britain tried to disarm them first. With no reel threat, the admiral didn't see a reason to choose these option that, if reveiled, could have endangered Free France.
If Gensoul didn’t put his pride above his country, then they might have reached a peaceful resolution by not wasting the hours Holland spent relaying messages via intermediaries.
This incident is still bitterly remembered in the French navy. When you talk to French sailors about working with the British, they usually tell you "remember Mers El Kebir".
@@coolstorybrooooo7643 And they would answer : "Sure, after we had no other choice since you had scurried back to your island". The French navy did not fight for Germany anyway. They either left France and joined the French free forces, scuttled or disarmed. Some sailed to the UK to join the fight, but Mers El Kebir seriously eroded their trust in the British, understandably so. Don't act like the British were winning at that point. They were just lucky they did not share a land border with Germany and Germany did not have sufficient forces to invade Britain after the battle of France.
@Caratacus Nearly all of the French forces who went to England (once the British had decided to reembark, they could not hold the pocket anymore) were almost immediately shipped back to France (Brittany) to keep the fight going, until Pétain said otherwise. And after Mers El Kébir, not too many French soldiers were inclined to trust the British, which is why so few ultimately went to Britain. But anyways, my point is not to stir controversy about complex historical events none of us know enough about. I was just saying that Mers El Kebir is still bitterly remembered in the French navy. That's it.
@Caratacus Yeah, as I told you, the majority of the French troops evacuated to Britain were almost immediately redeployed to France to keep fighting, until the armistice was signed. There were not 100 000 French troops in England by that time. I'm also not trying to defend the French collaborators of the time. What they did was horrible. But also not that antisemitism was widespread in Europe, and not just in Germany, although it was not weaponized by the other governments. Heck, the Brits had a Nazi party in the 1930s. If the UK had fallen, there's no doubt that Hitler would also have found good friends in Britain. And please, leave the "shed tears" and other angry ad hominem rhetoric for the schoolyard. If you're a true Brit, keep calm and carry on. Although I must say, I lost interest in this conversation, so as a true Frenchman, I surrender. I wish you a pleasant day good Sir
It's nothing more than the proverbial English perfidy. They fled to Dunkirk like cowards, but they still managed to sink the fleet of their (former) ally (!!)
@@xenotypos not really, the ships could have joined vichy France. They were given a reasonable ultimatum that would have benefited them and had no consequences (all they had to do was sail to a British port) and they refused. If they didn't to go to an allied port that seems rather suspicious even if the French later proved their honesty to Britain
@@justinbeath5169 Literally no power in the world would have agreed to any of those deamnds and Churchill knew that when he gave the order, similar deamnds are exactly what started WW1 and ofcourse the british would ahve said no if the situation was turned on its head. Letting your millitary be commanded by anyone else Is jsut the biggest NO GO you can have, when you are letting someone else command your forces then you are already beyond the point of surrendring to them and there is no point in your further existence. The consequence of accepting any of the demands would clearly be that nobody would ever take the french navy seriously. There is nothing suspicious about a sovereign nations millitary not taking orders from a different nations governement , if they did take orders from that other nation then that would truly be suspicious.
@@freedomfighter22222 there are many instances of armies being commanded by other nations, it even happened at Alexandria at the same time and early in the war with the polish navy. It would have been better to continue the fight than to capitulate like the rest of France
Britain: Can you maybe, like, move your fleet to friendly ports? France: ...No. Britain: Please? France: No. Britain: I will be forced to open fire on you France: Still no. Britain: (Opens fire) France: (Surprised Pikachu Face)
@@jeanhunter3538 Benefit of hindsight, how can the British be sure that the French fleet is actually gonna scuttle their own fleet? Its not like that has ever happened before.
How would Germans even reach French fleet in Africa?... Only reason it was moved to Toulon was exactly due to British attack... With Mers El Kebir British only proved theirs' paranoia which was enough for them to justify attacking theirs' former allies. That attack is to this day arguably the biggest stain on British account.
This has recently been featured in Azur Lane, in a special event, in all its tragic splendour. Royal Navy ships unwilling and remorseful, French ships determined to stand their ground whether against German or British guns, and a new hope arising with Richelieu organizing the Free French Fleet.
French Navy: Damn, we just lost the war. We have no use for our ships really. British Navy: *Attacks Mers El Kebir* French Navy: *a h s h i t h e r e w e g o a g a i n*
@@EstonianShark Shame on you! If you are really Estonian it like I did a joke on the brave people who resisted Germany and the URSS occupation of your country.
Lol you have to have the French Navy in your port to destroy it, remember the battle of Cheasepeake where the French Navy shot you in the ass because yes they did that more than once.
@@archivesoffantasy5560 Je vais te la faire plus court moi, L'invasion de Normandie en (1202-1204), en (1213-1214), Saintonge, Anglo VS Français (1294-1303), 1557-1559, French religion (1562-1628), Bataille au Québec de 1627-1628, Guerre de Cent Ans 1337 - 1453, Guerre de succession d'Autriche 1743, Guerre d'indépendance Américaine, je pourrais continuer longtemps comme ça. Vous avez le don de tout remettre à vos batailles les plus connu, je n'ai pas fait les conquêtes napoléoniennes où il a fallut des coalition de votre armée avec l'Europe pour nous arrêter. Et ce coup de le dos a été le coup de grâce, Dunkerque quand pourtant on vous a sauvé le cul parce que à l'heure actuelle tu serais entrain de pleurer sur ton sort de ne pas avoir d'armée. Arrêtez de vous référez aux batailles "Les plus connus" parce qu'elles ne veulent rien dire tout simplement, parce que à l'heure actuelle notamment en niveau maritime permet moi de douter de la supériorité britannique. Avec les salutations Françaises !
@@sayzen4588 I don’t speak French but I know France has a powerful military history. Britain has names like Nelson, Cochrane, Wellington, Marlborough, Henry V, Edward III, Richard O Connor etc France has named like Napoleon, Turrene, Villars, Grand Conde, Saxe, Davout, La Hire etc Like I say, got no problem admitting France has powerful and important history because it’s the truth. I feel that Franco Prussian and WW2 is what damaged the reputation, but people forget the eras of dominance of bourbon France.
I can see the British side of this but I can also understand the French side you can never tell what's going to happen in the future or how people truly react British did what they had to do remember hindsight is always 20/20 you have to look at things from the lens of today and what has happened in the past because you can never see the future and it is certainly a sad thing with a British had no choice and their opinions Sapphire was it the right thing sadly I think it was considering the nature of Germany at that time
Germany nature doesn't change whatsoever that French still could just as much simply scuttle theirs' warships in situation in which Axis actually tried to seize them. If Germans managed to do that in Scapa Flow 20 years earlier, it's only ignorant to say that far better manned French warships couldn't.
Ignoring the fact that Vichy France was THE France in 1940, 1941 and 1942 without any doubt, it's delusional to expect that one's military will be more loyal to other state than it's own.
@@ReichLife and it is not delusional to think than they would join the side in favor of liberating their country rather than the puppet state of the country that invaded France
I've heard from some naval historians that the French Admiral transmitted to his superiors that the only options were scuttle themselves or surrender themselves to the British so they responded with basically piss off instead of choosing another option that they were unaware of.
Though that's often pointed out the 3rd possibility of the french Caribbean was impossible. There was no base there able to receive a fleet that size, nor the ressources to sustent them. And the proposition was not only that but also disarm them under us control. Gensoul did not mention it because he knew it was not an option.
Thinking the Battle of Trafalgar was the last naval battle between Britain and France, I found this. As I tell friends, the more I learn of history, the more I realize how little I know.
@@madman10340 He can't give a fleet like that to the first one threatening him. France was now at peace, helping the british could have meant war with germany again. That's funny how people are joking about the french saying they surrendered, but they don't understand why Gensoul didn't surrender his ships.
@@brothergrimaldus3836 Yeah... A foreign country ask kindly to leave his ship and he say no, yeah he sure was an idiot... Everyone would have agree to this term, for sure...
As a Brit I’m saddened that we had to do it But if Britain was ever knocked out in a war I’d expect our allies to do the same to our navy Never let the ship fall into enemy hands
Josh lower although they didn’t swing the sword, French leadership is just as responsible for the deaths of those men- additionally their arrogance prevented the war itself from Being over in a matter of weeks.
Is this incident the reason why vichy-french soldiers kept fighting the Allies in Madagascar, syria and on the landing of the American and British troops in North-Africa?
@@ozzmanzz thanks for the reply. I was searching for that for a long time. Weirdly, they must have known, that Germany would occupy them anyhow and -on the long run- they would be better off fighting with the Allies, not against them.
MrUnseen The French tried to maintain some pride by thinking they were still in control, albeit in just the Vichy south. Sadly the Allies paid a heavy price for this. An Australian soldier who later became the Governor of New South Wales, Sir Roden Cutler, was awarded a Victoria Cross and lost a leg fighting not the Germans but the French in Syria during ww2. What a mad time it was.
@@generalzyklon3913 Defending their colonies my ass...the allied troops were not fighting to take france's colonies, they were fighting for France to be FREE!
@@walterkronkitesleftshoe6684 Abrial Commanded the French navy and land forces, the land forces sacrificed themselves to allow as many allies as possible to flee, the British navy refused (during a good half of the evacuation) the evacuation of the French forces, the French navy who was sunk participated in the evacuation, I worded it badly I should have said, "who participated in" or "who saved English soldiers". In any case, the French land forces not only saved the English at Dunkirk but this evacuation should not have taken place.
@@Bracus.Reghusk The numbers evacuated from the Dunkirk pocket were. 205,000 British troops, 110,000 French troops 23,000 Belgian troops. The BEF suffered 66,426 casualties, that was 11,014 killed or died of wounds, 14,074 wounded and 41,338 men missing or taken prisoner The BEF lost one seventh of its personnel killed and captured, because the TEN BEF divisions on the Belgian border were left isolated by the unannounced withdrawal of the French first army on their right flank, and collapse of the Belgian forces on their left. The Perimeter of the Dunkirk pocket was manned by British, French and Belgian troops, which fought to allow British French and Belgian troops be evacuated MOSTLY by the RN and British "little ships". Don't try to blame the DREADFUL performance of the >140 divisions of the French home army on the 10 BEF divisions. They were seconded to the PISS POOR French high Command, and it was THEY who lost the battle. Luckily We Brits fought on and saved you from the 1000 year nazi reich, while the majority of the French population quietly acquiesced and collaborated with nazi rule.
I guess it would depend on the terms of surrender between france and germany . I could see how it could violate these terms , especially considering that the u.s is about to get involved
The entire French fleet should have sailed out to continue the fight after the surrender. This is why I respect De Gaulle, Petain and the rest of the leadership betrayed France.
This ^ Seems rediculous that the French Navy at Mers El Kebir didn't see the writing on the wall with the fascists. They were not going to stop at France or Britain.
@@404Dannyboy Look at what happened to Poland and Warsaw. Do you blame the French for not wanting Paris to be annihilated and millions of people dying?
My Dad was a Royal marine during Ww2. And was Nauseatd at this Action. But he knew only to well, if those French ships were taken by Germany or even Italy at that time. England would have been in 'Do Do' up to their Necks. And the 'Do Do' was already waist Deep, after Dunkirk. It was a Sadly Needed Action..! He was always bothered by the Fact that, on the Ships coming back from Dunkirk were a lot of French fighting men. To Fire on them in Port felt Wrong. After the War he Never Voted for Churchill in any Election..! Such were his feelings over that Action..! Sad but Required..! Not every Frenchman was Against Germany. "Lest we Forget..!" Great Video. Thanks. Cheers All. 😎
@@MarkHarrison733 But we DID win..... As you well know, when you cry yourself to sleep every night because there are NO nazi death camps on British soil for you to stand guard at.
french navy : France have lost, so our ship will stay neutral . And if the german try to take them, we will scuttle them . Are we good ? England : Well yes, but actually no
@Cpl. Rook just because, the fleet at Toulon scuttled their ships, doesn't mean the one at mers el kebir would have. Also the british werent exactly in a trusting mood at the time, as the french had recently betrayed them by surrendering to the germans, even though a previous agreement made it so they could not surrender without british consent. Which would make the british eye french promises with suspicion. It was also far more likely for the fleet at mers el kebir to turn over to the germans for the following reasons. 2 years had passed after the surrender and vichy france was becoming more hostile to the germans, as to why they would have been eager for a chance to resist. The fleet at toulon was also a fair bit smaller as to why the germans had not thought to sieze those ships earlier. The vichy france at mers el kebir was more eager to please as they had just recently surrendered. And the germans would have been far more interested in these ships than the ones at toulon as they were planning to invade britain at this time and the fleet at mers el kebir was more powerful.
Britain were left with no choice had Italy or Germany taken control of the French fleet which they definitely would’ve we likely would’ve lost the war in the Mediterranean
And yet, in 1942, when the Germans invaded Vichy France, they tried to get their hands on the French fleet at Toulon, but the French managed to scuttle their fleet before they arrived. They didn't just let the Germans get it.
For all of those that are saying that UK had no choice well...it was a shitty Idea, the British shot themselves in the foot and Churchill later on declared that this operation was a bad idea and a tragedy. The British did way more harm than good to both France and UK. Vichy gained legibility and power following the attack, UK lost thousands and thousands of volunteers for the FFF as well as giving a motive for the African army to resist. "France negotiated a peace with the Germans thus betraying the British" do you want to talk about the times previous to the armistice where UK betrayed France. Before Dunkirk the French were planning a counter attack with the British. Prior to the said attack the British felt like not doing so and they left without telling the French. At Dunkirk the BEF was supposed to hold the city with the French and Belgians but a counter order was given and the BEF sat back on the beach without, again, telling the French that had to desperately fill the holes in the defence by launching furious counter attacks to repel the Germans. The British left France alone and now France is the traitor for wanting the good of their citizens? You people thinking that this attack was deserved are really dipshit just wanting to protect the British treason and blaming the French yet again
You’re missing the big picture. This attack cemented belief that Britain wasn’t defeated, and she would carry on with the war. At a time when it looked like Britain would be defeated, Churchill needed to show the world (and the US in particular) that Britain meant to carry on no matter what. Yes it was a tragedy, but it’s not like it was a sneak attack. The British gave the French plenty of choices and time.
@@muttley8818 Pleased that someone wants to disagree with me so I can correct you. You say they had plenty of choices and that It wasn't a sneak attack ? Well the French couldn't comply to ANY of the options the British gave them so it was basically a death sentence for the fleet or for the French at home. Secondly, while this attack was not sneaky, the British choose to open fire when they heard French vessels were heading their way. It means they attacked with both ships and planes, a fleet of French vessels almost unable to move and to deemed themselves in a Harbour. If this attack was a surprise attack (Like pearl harbour) then it would have been a total massacre and the few ships that fled would have been sunk too. Thirdly, "this attack showed that UK would still fight" well it showed that they were more than eager to attack their former ally less than a month after their armistice while leaving the Germans alone. A great act of heroism and bravery. It would have been better if they didn't TARGET THEIR FUCKING ALLY THAT WAS NOW NEUTRAL. Fourthly I don't know why you mention Dunkirk saying "Not only French were evacuated" well of course otherwise the brits would have been pretty horrific allies. But you know what happened to these french soldiers that got evacuated ? They were all sent back to France. They all returned to desperately fight for France. They lived to fight another day, without the brits this time.
@@parodyclip36 1- The French Navy knew how to scuttle their fleet. It’s not rocket science. Darlan refused to sail to a neutral port. And Vichy France could not be trusted. 2 -As above. Vichy France could not be trusted. British couldn’t take the risk of the Navy falling into German hands. They gave plenty of warning to Darlan. 3 - You imply the British escaped Dunkirk to leave the French fend for themselves. I just corrected you by saying French troops also evacuated. And I won’t even bother telling you how many British troops were left behind in France and became POW’s. Do your own research. 4 - French soldiers were NOT sent back. They became part of the Free French, led by De Gaulle. Some went to fight in Africa, some took part in SOE ops to support French resistance. Most remained in the UK until they took part in D-Day (along with British and other Allied forces, making your last sentence false).
This video makes the French look way more innocent than they really were in this matter! Drachnifel's video on this is much more detailed and outlines how Gensoul was in complete dereliction of duty.
Attacking neutral ships anchored in their port, tipically british. As a british said to surcouf, a french navy captain: "Us british we fight for honour whereas you french fight for money" And Surcouf to answer: "Well, we all fight for what we lack of"
Total war is like that, necessity becomes everything. Though yeah not the first time GB destroyed a fleet preemptively, the Dutch and Danish for example.
There needs to be a little more information on the French perspective of these events. This battle had an important effect on French morale and subsequent dealings between free France and Vichy colonies. It’s important to remember that this battle is (one of) the reasons why France was unable and unwilling to participate in more actions during WW2
Nahh, the new French government was fairly pro-Nazi. They wouldn't have been completely independent in defeat anyways. French soldiers and citizens might have been, but alas, organizing a revolution was not in the British power/possibilities....
i know this is 3 years old but no??? it's not? most of these ships were repaired, multiple of them defected after case anton, and those that didn't were scuttled the very fact that they didn't immediately defect en masse to the uk or a neutral port was what made them incapable of doing more, even had this not happened, they still would have gone to toulon and been scuttled because germany would never have not tried to take them, we have all the hindsight in the world, and we know for an absolute fact that the literal only possible way they could have done more was if the french, either just before armistice, or during the parlay at mers, had defected, remaining loyal to the occupation government was an unavoidable, naive death sentence. it was delusional, even at the time, to presume hitler, known oathbreaker, was going to be nice to his new chia pet in vichy and not throw it away when he needed the desk space. there is no circumstance, barring what many ships did, i.e. defect, where the bulk of the navy doesn't get scuttled, they were always going to attempt seizure, because they were always going to invade vichy. this means france was always going to be irreparably crippled and lack most of the military bulk to be more active, that navy was the last remnant of capability, and the french naval brass, and collaboration government, squandered most of it and only showed an iota of awareness of what they had done by bringing the fleet right to the hungry hungry hitler's doorstep, when they chose to blow it up, and i can only imagine how angry many of the crews were at the brass for absolutely dropping the ball and allowing themselves to be forced to sink their last surviving force by cornering themselves. those that defected became active, voracious participants, and the battleships that defected quite literally became some of the highest performing ships of the war. mers was basically only symbolically successful, i mean, it meant a lot of the ships at toulon were under repairs, but that scarcely matters, even fully competent and undamaged ships were scuttled. it was, at the time, effectively the only option, and it's tragic how in hindsight, it was probably not something that was really, materially, necessary, since in the end, the french really were serious that they would rather annihilate their own navy than let the germans have it, but at the time, the british had no way of knowing that, or that even if france resisted, they would be able to scuttle the ships, it might literally even be said that if the ships at toulon that were under repairs were better served by being damaged, as it made them easier to scuttle, helping to deprive germany of making nascent plan z more tangible.
@@MrNicoJac not necessarily pro nazi but anti 3rd republic unlike germany at that point catholic conservatism was more the mainstream culture of the vichy ppl.
@@MrNicoJac No, that's false, it was only days old and didn't even have any constitution, it was neutral. Probably most of French people wanted to stay with the Allies, why do you think resistance was at such a large scale in France? But no, the British shot entirely disarmed ships, basically saying "Hey guys you either come with us or we kill you, but dont worry we're the good guys!"
it was british arrogance as well.........what nation is going to accept terms like that unless there ships come under an active threat of actually being seized.
They wouldn't have done that to the Irish Navy. Hood would've opened one supersized can of whoopass! 🇮🇪 Great post btw. I always love these little-known side-operations, (Minced Meat, Paperclip Etc). I'm on board. 👊☘
@@michaelwang1524 yes battleships Dunkerque, Strasbourd and Provence along most of the ships from Mers el Kébir where brought to Toulon to be safe from british attacks but as the germans tried to take the ships the french scuttled them. But the most powerful battleship of the french navy : Richelieu joined the allies after operation Torch as she was still in Africa.
One thing is often forgotten about the aftermatch of this attack : it was a complete failure. The french fleet at Mers el Kebir was : - 2 modern Battlecruisers (Dunkerque and Strasbourg) which were the main targets being real threats - 2 old battleships (Bretagne and Provence) - 1 seaplane carrier (Commandant Teste) - 6 large destroyers (Mogador, Volta, Le Terrible, Kersaint, Tigre and Lynx) - 10 light destroyers (Casque, Corsaire, Bordelais, Boulonnais, Brestois, Tornade, Tramontane, Trombe, Typhon and La Poursuivante) - 4 submarines (Ariane, Danae, Diane and Euridyce) - 7 other smaller ships (Rigault de Genouilly, Chamois, Séoise, Toulonnaise, Terre Neuve, Armen and Estérel) Athough ships like Dunkerque and Magador were damaged only the old Bretagne and small ships like Rigault de Genouilly were sunk. In africa those ships were far from Germany but because of this attack the french choose to place most of them in a safer place : Toulon. Which could easily be taken by germany there. Plus after an attack like this, the logical reaction of France would have been to declare war on the UK, giving that fleet to the AXIS, at least Pétain choose not to declare war on Britain. But as now those ships were in Toulon Germany tried to take them and the french scuttled most of them (Dunkerque, Strasbourg, Provence, Commandant Teste, Mogador, Volta, Kersaint, Lynx, Casque, Corsaire, Bordelais, Trombe, Typhon, La Poursuivante and Euridyce) Tigre wasn't scuttled and was taken by the italians, they also started to repair some of the ships. Le Terrible had more luck she came back to Africa (Dakar) after escorting Strasbourg to Toulon. She joined the allies after operation Torch like most of the french ships in Africa including the most powerful ship of the french navy : battleship Richelieu. If the fleet had stayed at Mers el Kebir more ships would have joined the ally after operation Torch. Some would have been destroyed like Boulonnais, Brestois, Tornade, Tramontane, Ariane, Danae and Diane were.
It was far from a failure. It negated the threat of the French capital ships in the space of ten minutes. The point was not to destroy the Marine Nationale in Mers El Kebir, it was to neutralise its capital ships so they did not tie down British capital ships from the British battle-line and hand the Italians the strategic initiative as well as the material initiative. Naval power is a balance and the tipping point at in the Med in June 1940 came when time ran out and Gensoul refused to act logically- Mers El Kebir was a tragedy and a failure by both sides to co-operate, but the RN achieved their objectives; Dunkerque and Provence as well as many of the Destroyers were only superficially saved by their shallow harbour, they would never be a threat to the RN again thanks to serious damage, Bretagne was totally destroyed, Strasbourg was routed and displaced also becoming useless. I understand your sentiments, but the rest of the French fleet was simply not a threat worth betraying an ally over, that's why Somerville ceased firing so soon. *The attack on the capital ships at Mers El Kebir was a disgusting betrayal, but characterised by its necessity and effectiveness.*
@@oliver8928 Strasbourg was the most powerful french ship at Mers el Kebir and was not even seriously damaged => it was a failure After an attack like this France could have joined the war on germany's side and all those ships would have fallen in axis hands. Dunkerque was damaged yes but with the support of Germany the ship would be back in action quickly. And the most powerful french battleship was Richelieu which wasn't even at Mers el Kebir.
The difference between Mers-el-Kébir and Alexandria was Gensoul. While he may not have been outright nazi sympathizer, he was certainly a diehard anglophobe. Churchill knew Gensoul and didn't trust his loyalty to the allied cause against Germany. If Sommerville had the good sense to send another admiral to handle negotiations rather than a captain, Gensoul would probably have shown him the secret orders from Darlan to scuttle the remaining ships of the fleet if Germany moved against them. That may have changed the outcome of the operation. However, the persistent rumour is Churchill wanted the "battle" as a way to show Roosevelt Britain was serious about doing whatever it took to stay in the war and defeat nazi Germany. Whatever the real story, Roosevelt was impressed enough to conclude the ships for bases negotiations less than two weeks later, giving Britain 50 overage but still useful destroyers to the British for bases it turned out we'd need once the US got into the war with Germany.
Exactly. Gensoul was the problem here. He decided not to take the decision himself but to pass the ultimatum up the chain of command to Admiral Darlan in France. Darlan was " at home on 3 July and could not be contacted" according to French records (dubious in my opinion) so Gensoul's request for orders went to the new, barely formed ,Vichy Government. But Gensoul *deliberately* omitted the key phrase in option 3} of the British ultimatum " or perhaps be entrusted to the United States and remain safe until the end of the war, the crews being repatriated. ". Which was *exactly* the secret order that Admiral Darlan (convieniently not contactable) had already given to the French Navy in the event of such an ultimatum.
@@WgCdrLuddite it's my opinion that the French fleet should have sailed against Germany like the Greeks, Dutch, Poles, etc. but they didn't. I would point out to say what if they didn't scuttle in time and there ships were seized then it would disastrous and we would be saying that the British should have tried to stop it
Gensoul did share the order of Darlan to scuttle ships with Holland. At Alexandria french and british admirals knew each other very well (I think they were brother in law). So they decided to make an agreement, the french could keep their ships but they had to stay in alexandria.
@@volcanares9620 I've never read of any family relationship between Cunningham and Godfroy. I've also never seen anything that said Gensoul actually showed a copy of Darlan's order to Holland. All the negotiations were carried out by his lieutenant, Bernard Dufay, and there's no evidence he even had access to the original order. Gensoul deliberately left out the option of his ships sailing to the French West Indies for interment by the US Navy in his cables to the French government, only saying the terms were surrender or fight. Darlan's order even included sailing the fleet to US waters for interment if a foreign power attempted to seize the ships, an option the British would have taken if they had seen the original order. Gensoul was spoiling for a fight, and he got one. Godfroy had heard of the results at Mers-el-Kébir before negotiations began at Alexandria. He had a much weaker squadron than the one at Mers-el-Kébir and wisely decided that neutralizing the ships was the wisest course.
Cullen Moseley They were offered a choice to join the British or alternatively move to a British port or be fired upon. So their Admiral betrayed them with his decision.
People harp on the admiral a bit too much. He said he would scuttle the ships if it came to it. But he wasn’t simply going to sink them in a safe port to the request of an ally.
Cullen Moseley Murderous treachery yet they were made aware hours before said ‘treachery’ took place of what would happen if the terms were rejected. The British are not proud of this hence why they offered terms to avoid it in the first place, but they should not have to rely on an Admirals word that the ships would be scuttled especially considering the threat said ships would pose to Britain if the Admiral failed to scuttle the ships and the Germans/Italians captured them.
Amazing how complicated history and the people who live it are when we see facts. Great history especially after the publishing of Eric Larson’s “THE SPLENDID AND THE VILE”. Thank you!
They should have sent someone with the same rank as the french admiral at the port because sending a captain was a disrespect. Also sending an ultimatum means no negotiations, you either pick one option or get war. Doing these mistakes and then expecting french to cooperate in a very short time period is just stupid. Whole this mess could have been avoided imo.
I think they sent the captain, because he was a fluent french speaker, and had a lot of experience interacting with French commanders, from his previous posting in Paris. Of course, the captain could have been accompanied by admiral Sommerville.
It could have been avoided if the fire had chosen to sail with the allied fleet or to be repatriated but they chose not to. It was the French admiral's fault and no one else's
@@justinbeath5169 you're like John snow you know nothing. French fleet sailing under british command ? British would have done the same. They knew it, everybody knew it. They came with their guns out, proposing shitty ideas knowing damn well no Man in their right sense would accept. Yeah Gensoul was probably an asshole but he wasn't there by accident. He did as much as he could the right thing. Much more, he was unable to contact the Grand admiral Darlan to be backed up and that's something that could have made a difference. Then again, knowing that Darlan's great grandfather was killed in Trafalgar by brits i doubt he would have surrendered his pride to them. You just don't know what you're talking about so stop talking
Britain betrayed so many of their allies during WW2. There's also the Polish in 1939 and postwar, the Chinese in Burma campaign, the Egyptians and Indians whom they had made various promises to and then trampled all over, etc.
@@micahistory crappy allies who fought 2, no 3 wars to keep mainland Europe free from domination by any central power, and won them all, yeah, really crappy allies
Royal Navy: "Hey buddy, how about you come fight the war with us? We'll avenge the German invasion together, it'll be fun!" French Navy: "Non." Royal Navy: "Okay... well, how about you just sail back with us and we'll keep your ships safe for the rest of the war? You won't have to do any fighting so you won't get in trouble with the Germans." French Navy: "Non!" Royal Navy: Look, France, buddy, we're really worried about the Germans taking your ships, if you don't want us to look after your ships, then just take them to one of your ports on the other side of the Atlantic where they'll be safe." French Navy: "NON!" Royal Navy: "SERIOUSLY? Dude, I gotta' be honest, we can't risk just leaving your ships here for the Germans or Italians to try to take. If you don't want to move them, then you'll have to scuttle them. French Navy: "Non, now go away!" Royal Navy: "Please buddy... We're not leaving till though ships are out of of the way, sorry to have to do this but you're leaving us no option, scuttle them now or get off because at 3pm, we'll sink them for you..." French Navy: "Don't let the door hit you on the way out!" Royal Navy: "We're back... It's 3pm already... And your still floating... We really don't want to do this but you're kind of leaving us no option... Leave the Med, scuttle, or get the hell off... We'll give you till 5:30 but no more, Churchill is texting me every 5 mins, he says we have to sort this now!" French Navy: Not listening... Royal navy: "It's 5:30 already and we don't see any fireworks... Time's up! You've got 24 mins to evacuate before we start shooting. We don't want to hurt anyone so make sure you get everyone get off your ships NOW!" French Navy: "Everyone stay right where you are! The English are bluffing, they would never... What's that noise? Sounds like thunder in the distance..." BOOM! French Navy: "Traitors!" Royal Navy: "We warned you... many times... What exactly did you think was going to happen? Why on earth did you choose this ONE time to NOT surrender?"
They didn’t fight for your support they. They couldn’t care less about the American people, they just wanted to get one over the British because we had beet them in war a few years earlier and they were still mad
@@nathancorfield2609 I can understand the worries of the British authorities of this time. But can you tell me what had been the good results of such an action? These events had been well exploited by the Vichy's and German's propaganda. I would remember to you that, when the Germans invaded the so-called Free-Zone in 1942 , the French Navy present in Toulon preferred to scuttle or join the Allies instead of falling into the hands of the nazies. So the French sailors kept their word , proving, a posteriori, that the worries of the British authorities were out of purpose.
@@eryximaque6310 it was done based on the knowledge of the German track record of keeping promises not to mention that if you remember our two countries for hundreds of years were sworn enemies. There was still a distrust between the two. Especially towards the French, whether it was justified or not. Surely that played a factor. I regret that it resulted in the deaths of so many of your countrymen but it was a difficult decision that had to be made
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@mikechrishill: What a fucking uneducated troll response to a really well made video. France was not remotely pro-Nazi, aside from Hitler’s puppet government. Sure there was an armistice, but it was forced on them. Churchill knew full well the puppets were planning an invasion, which is why he took drastic measures to keep the warships out of German hands! It’s not a bullshit narrative, if you’ve seen Historograph’s other videos, you’d know he’s very fucking thorough when it comes to research. If you consider the time and resources spent on the Maginot (to deter the Germans), the investment from Britain into the resistance movement, and the attacks on France in general, you’d have to be a complete retard to think France was pro-Nazi. The US got into some fights with Britain too, but at the end of the day we were still on the same side. Fighting with our allies was unfortunate...but fighting without them would have been catastrophic.
@mikechrishill Non sense and completely false. Darlan promised the Brits that the French fleet would never be used against them. What was in the armistice regarding the fleet was as likely to happen as, let say, that the German would pay the Versailles Treaty reparation. Still the Brits would open fire at their allies of yesterday and kill 1300 officers and sailors, just to show how reckless they were and impress the Yanks. A treacherous communication event. Unless you really think that the Americans and Roosevelt were assholes ready to let down the Brits, this action was pointless. Mers el Kebir was out of reach of the German. The French showed afterward with the scuttling of their fleet in Toulon that they would never let the German have their ships, and the enraged vichy French gave the Brits some payback in Dakar or in Syria. Darlan was a fool to think his word would mean something. Until that day, and set aside the fact that his wife was british and that he probably had to endure sub-standard cooking at home, he had no real reason to hate la perfide albion.
You should link drachinfel's video to this. He goes into depth about the negligence of the french admiral.
Hi Mr Historiograph, I'm trying to reach out to you to propose a business agreement: I would love to dub your videos to Italian and then re-upload them onto an italian Historiograph channel. I reckon there is a potential untapped market for italian-speaking wartime history videos. Your videos are shockingly well made and would face very little same-language competition. The revenue from those videos would then be split at some rate to be decided between the two of us. Let me know what you think, I belive this can be a profitable endevour.
Historigraph, Your Photo at minute 9:16 of Admiral Marcel-Bruno Gensoul Looks more Like a Photo of Admiral Darlan, I think you ought to check it
British admirals: "please surrender your ships :)"
French admirals: "your father was a hamster and your mother smelled of elderberries"
Damn hamsters
Only this time, the Brits farted in their general direction and two battleships were sunk.
in 1940 , t British were more effective aginst the French than against the German
@@dellawrence4323 you know guys los their life , that's not funny ?
Gensoul: You are a mere captain and not worthy of an audience with me.
15in shell: Guess I'm worthy then.
"you know we had to do it to em" - King George VI
@@ng3898 *British Navy
@@MK-rr7cg *Royal Navy
Churchill: "It do be like that sometimes"
Roosevelt to French ambassador in Washington "I would have done the same if I were Churchill." (this is not the exact quote, I have no idea what the exact quote is, though do feel free to tel me).
@@keithwatson1384 *Afghanistan Navy
"Sees British shelling French ports"
*Oh! Brits and their habits!*
It's nothing more than the proverbial English perfidy. They fled to Dunkirk like cowards, but they still managed to sink the fleet of their (former) ally (!!)
Gilbert du Motier, marquis de La Fayette if the retreat to Dunkirk was cowardly, then we're going to need a new word to describe the French.
@@benmurray8810 I remind you that it was the French and Belgian troops who defended Dunkerque during the British "evacuation" ...
I also remind you that the French have continued the fight, thanks to the Forces Françaises Libres ("Free French Forces") led by Général de Gaulle: from the Battle of Britain to Hitler's Eagle's Nest, the French have been in every fight, including in North Africa, on June 6, 1944 in Normandie, but also in the Soviet Union (Régiment de Chasse Normandie-Niémen). Anglo-Saxon historiography may have deliberately "forgotten" their struggles but not us!
And I remind you again that the French people have organized one of the most effective resistance movements in Europe and that the country has the third largest number of "Righteous among the Nations", behind Poland and the Netherlands.
@@gilbertdumotiermarquisdela3037 You are incredibly deluded. Britain sent an army to your country to fight two world wars. Millions of our people died for your country and you dare to call our retreat to Dunkirk cowardly?
It was the French army that knew the threat from an Ardennes attack existed and placed old men with out dated guns in a thin line to hold it. That was not our failing. We did exactly what your high command told us to do and when you failed to defend your own country you call us cowards for withdrawing?
Have you forgotten how many French and Belgian troops the Royal Navy and British civilians evacuated from Dunkirk? Did you also forget that we allowed De Gaulle to use our broadcasting capability to speak to France while your own government surrendered.
You are possibly the worst person I've ever seen crawling over TH-cam. Britain is not perfect but the situation at Dunkirk was one of it's proudest moments and one of the greatest human achievements ever done.
If your retarded admiral at Mers El Kebir had agreed to sail to the Carribean no French sailors would have died that day. It's a shame he was French. A German would almost certainly agreed to that generous offer.
@@gilbertdumotiermarquisdela3037 while saying that the French did nothing during or after the German invasion is wrong, I disagree that the retreat from Dunkirk was cowardly. First of all if they hadn't evacuated they had no chance of survival so all of the people there would be killed or taken prisoner, Secondly being a coward means running away from the fight but a good amount of the evacuated soldiers fought in North Africa, manned AA guns during the battle of Britain and then even returned to France for round 2 on the 6th of June 44. The French and Belgian soldiers protecting the evacuees, the British fighting after Dunkirk, the men and women fighting in the French resistance and all of the other soldiers that took part in the war against Germany were heroes and anybody calling them cowards should be ashamed of themselves.
British shelling French ports and ships?
*see nothing wrong with that, they’ve been doing that for centuries*
?
I don't understand your point
@@luxembourgishempire2826 it's a joke
Anonymous Person Britain and France (well really England and France but I’m counting them as the same) have been at war for centuries. The joke is that in these wars both navies have fired on each other multiple times at sea and from port.
Some thing never change
Dunkirk- “I’m one of the greatest ships afloat”
Hood- “I’m about to end this guys whole career”
Bismarck- “Say what?”
hood joke...just sayin
Then HMS Ark Royal decides Aircraft carriers are more effective,
Then U-81 decides submarines are more effective,
Then B-17 Bombers of 15th AAF decide long range tactical bombers are more effective,
Hms rodney - what u say Bismarck?
Ohio class gets finished, did sumbudy say enemies ship
@@ukleonidas300 if only Rodney was anyhow crucial to bismarck sinking.... oh wait. ;)
There was an alternative plan the English presented where the French ships could sail to a US port. However due to the strict interpretation of his orders, Gensoul determined he would have been going against orders had he done so. The last order he had received from Admiral Darlan was that he could sail to the US in the event the Germans or Italians (Frances enemies at the time of the orders) were trying to capture his ships. Now that the armistice had been signed and England was making the demands for capture (instead of Germany or Italy), it was his strict interpretation of his orders rather than following the spirit of the orders that led to his being fired upon.
Actually Darlan's order was Gensoul could sail to the U.S. if an enemy fleet tries to seize or attack them. Meaning that they are not limited to just Germany or Italy
Sail to the US whive "magical fuel " .
Can you do a video on the WW1 campaigns in Africa? No one (except for like potential history that one time) talks about them
Well the great war talked about it
tbh yes
potential history just did a bit about german east africa, check him out!
@@TheKurtkapan34 ehh, i think he saw it already
@@bomschhofmann1644 eh, you never know. youtube works really differently sometimes, i know of few channels that i really love that was recommended to me on comment sections and not by youtube.
and since i love the guy's work, why not publicize it so he can get more views?
-
oh, i don't think that part in paranthesis was there when i wrote the comment, if it was, my bad :)
It broke my father's heart. He was in the Navy and at the time with the Free French in North Africa. For him the Mers el-Kebir was a tragedy.
Its a tragedy of war alright - but a necessary one. While Sommerville was concerned with the action, with honour and with the pride of the Navy, Churchill was thinking of the long game - the need to court Armerica's interest, the need to eliminate a potential threat early and the admission that, with France lost and the British Army historically being small (and scattered across the world) this would be a long war. They knew that the RAF and the Royal Navy could keep Britain safe and the were both more than a match for their German enemy - but there is only so much you can do as a island nation. In 1940 there was a very real likelihood that Europe would remain under the Nazi grip for years - maybe decades. You simply can't take shortsighted, hopeful actions early in a conflict, particularly when you are the last man for your team standing.
@@dynamo1796 All Churchill's unnecessary war crime did was encourage people in France to support the Vichy regime.
Recruitment for the Free France movement plummeted.
@@MarkHarrison733 You're conflating matters here. The Free France movement was always doomed to be a a wisp of ideology and nothing more. Once the world saw Britain wouldn't give in, they knew it meant Europe would under German occupation for years. There would be no peace settlement, only the war between Britain and Germany until the US could bring her might to bear and support the retaking of Europe. Supporting the Vichy regime was what people did so they could survive until that day of freedom. The same happened in the Netherlands, Norway, Denmark and beyond. The French didn't simply go "oh well, the British sank three ships, we'd better join forces with the tyrannical dictator who just slaughtered tens of thousands of our countrymen" - you muppet.
@@MarkHarrison733
It was better to lose some recruits in the resistance than arm our enemy with a modern powerful fleet.
The British were already out-numbered in the Mediterranean without adding this French fleet to their arsenal.
@@BikersDoItSittingDown The French would have scuttled their fleet, as they did in November 1942.
*Some guy jokes about the French always surrendering*
Brits: Surrender now
French: No
Brits: Nani
Britain: "Dude, why did you think now was a good time to break with tradition?"
france: retaliates by bombing gibraltar
the brits: :0
@@rallestein because Britain, making fun of the French since 1337.
@@sergarlantyrell7847 But they loose the one hundred years war
@regis bognor Regarding the 100 years war, my belief is both sides lost. The French crown should have, legally, gone to Edward III. The French kingdom was, by all means, divided and leaderless.
One can dream of what may have happened if Edward had become king of England AND France. Maybe centuries of useless wars, resulting in millions of deaths, not mentioning Brexit.
thank you for producing such quality content
Pierre Sihite your last name is quite the minefield
@@vulgarpotato indeed it is and ironically im not even french
@@vulgarpotato its pronounced si-he-te. te like the te in tell
Omlette du fromage
Fallen ally remains: *exist*
U.K:It's free real estate
Anything: exists
UK: It's free real estate
@@artificialgravitas8954 well that's more accurate
I think the whole of western Europe is free real estate
Artificial Gravitas *RULE BRITANNIA EARRAPE*
@@artificialgravitas8954 Explicitly true for Australia.
Cook was interacting with the locals all the way up the east coast on his first voyage. His men were working on a translation dictionary while the Endeavour was being repaired after running onto the Great Barrier Reef, so he knew that they had a language. Yet he declared the land "Nerra Nullius" - empty land! This has ramifications to the present day.
8:30 That Gun Boat is one of the badass naval ship in history
Do you even USS Johnston?
@@therealwildboar1007 Ok then, Second Badass
There is a mistake in the video about it not taking a scratch. It's 5 inch gun was actually damaged so it could no longer fire and forcing it to turn away.
Try HMS Glowworm.
As a French. Im glad that you covered this event for the english speaking viewers. And as always, wonderfull work !
So do u think the british were justified in attacking the french navy?
Do you really think they do not know about this?)
@@amitm1993 my guy without the UK helping france the whole of France would still be under german control also who is "Britishers"?
@@amitm1993 firstly who the is “Britishers”? Also in ww2 uk had the strongest bavy in the world and contained germany with it. They also contributed the most technologically and single handedly saved europe. Tell me if the uk didnt get involved how would france get freed ?
@@amitm1993 "😂"
With friends like these, who needs enemies?
Hunter D not really
The French betrayed the British by backing out of their agreement never to sign a separate peace. The French navy was the 4th largest in the world. If the Germans had managed to get their hands on it they could've (together with the Italians) reached naval parity with Britain and interrupted her trade enough to starve the British Isles. One of the agreements reached in the second armistice at Compiegne was that all French ships were to return to ports in mainland France, there's no reason to think the Germans wouldn't have tried to seize them. They eventually actually did try, but the French scuttled their ships.
@Hunter D the fact that the French were beaten on the mainland didn't mean they had to sign a seperate peace.
They could've set up a government in their colonial holdings.
@Hunter D Vichy France was a puppet State of Germany but they could still make their own decision like, not fighting the war for Germany and not giving them their ships.
@@nicobruin8618The purpose of an army is to protect your people, how can you protect the people of France is you leave France? When you are beaten you have to admit defeat otherwise the wars would never end.
Germany : invades France partying like its 1914
Britain : destroys the french Navy partying like it’s 1814
1940 is the French 2020
@@Csetnikke fortunately, UK no longer has navy in 2020...
@@hangar1873 Rip
@@hangar1873 Britain had a large navy
@@hangar1873 if we built another 2 Queen Elizabeth class Carriers and 10 Type 45 or Type 83 Destroyers, we would be quite the naval power
Before you enter the comments section, there are a few things I would like to make clear. For one thing, to all those who regard the shelling of Mers El Kebir as a British betrayal, may I remind you that the French and British had signed an agreement stating that neither country would sign a separate peace with Germany, an agreement which the French broke when they signed the Second Compiene Armistice. Secondly, Admiral Gensoul could have sailed to the Caribbean and still technically be in French territory. I hope that people do express their beliefs, and I myself will do my best to respect those beliefs, even if I do not believe in them myself, those who wish to challenge my views may do so, and I will do my best to either reply in my defense, or acknowledge my mistake (if I remember to, that is), I hope that we can all be respectful to each other. Good day.
@@alexgraham12345 Sorry I took so long to reply, Anyway. Yes, Britain and France did fail in their obligation to protect Poland (aside from the Saar offensive, but that was basically a failure), which was the faults of Britain and France, however, if you want to be more specific, it was the fault of the two governments, both of which were gone by this point. The shelling of Mer El Kebir was a tragedy, however, without the benefit of hindsight, it was a nesessary tragedy, the British feared that the germans or Italians would comandear the ships, and yes in the end, it was proven to be an unesessesary tragedy when the French scutteled their remaining fleet at Toulon, but that is with hindsight, and one cannot truly understand decisions with the benefit of hindsight, because with hindsight we know what will happen afterwards, so put yourself in Churchill's Shoes, Your country could be invaded by the Germans, your biggest ally has abandonned you, and now their navy is ripe for the taking by your enemies, what would you do, desparate times call for desparate measures, this was one of them, you can either accept that it happened and move on, or we can argue about it until we die, and let me tell you something, I am Greek-Canadian, since I'm Greek, I have tons of reasons that I could use as an excuse to hate all Turks and Germans, but I don't, I believe that just because someones ancestors did bad things, dosn't mean that those people are evil, their ancestors, yea, them, no. Also, so what if it had no enforcement mechanism, using that as an excuse to break it is like saying that since there are no police officers then I can break the law. I will leave you with this, to understand decisions made in the past, you must remove the benefit of hindsight from your understanding, I'm glad that we were able to remain civil in our little debate here, good day to you.
Then again, the French wouldn't have signed a separate peace with the Germans if the French far right hadn't seized power in what amount to a coup d'état. Which wouldn't have happened if the French government hadn't panicked and voted to give emergency powers to some old guy who happened to not like the Republic's politicians very much. Which wouldn't have happened if the Battle of Belgium hadn't been lost.
Which wouldn't have happened if _the British army hadn't run away to Dunkerque in the middle of the French counter-attack_ (and let's be clair, it's not the British that are to blame, it's specifically John Gort, who acted against the general British consensus of wanting to actually win)
... Which wouldn't have happened if the idiot in charge of the defence of the Ardennes hadn't stubbornly refused to listen to the detailed reports from air scouts and told the French Air Force to bomb the giant armored German traffic jams in the forest to oblivion
Which wouldn't have happened if Belgium hadn't pulled off of the alliance, somehow believing that neutrality would work this time
Which wouldn't have happened if France had lent the required money to Belgium for turning the Meuse-Argonne line into another impassable Maginot line
Well, we can continue for a long time, actually...
@@eth3549 Total nonsense...Gort moved 'some' troops back to plug a gap left by the Belgians which threatened the channel ports. The only escape route for all allied armies.
The Weygand Plan never looked likely to succeed any way, he hardly believed in it himself. When he took command of the French army in late May he said himself, 'I'm several weeks too late'
French, British and Belgians ALL made to Dunkirk to escape a POW camp. The 125,000 French, majority of the French army in the northern pocket were not cowards for leaving France.
Besides, there were still over 100,000 British troops fighting further south, who had to be evacuated later as France continued to collapse. They didn't even defend their own capitol. There was no spirit of the Marne, no real belief in victory in France from the get go.
France has many option to continue fight, from exile, or in poliltical union with Britain...sadly Petain was chosen and turned his back on France's only true ally in this period Britain. Now we know what we know about Vichy, the
British should have been even more distrustful.
That didn't justify the war-crime !
The French commander couldn't just sail off and join the British fleet. He had to see a much bigger picture than the British. He had to consider the political side-effects and recriminations such an action might have on occupied France, and possibly even Vichy France as well. The Germans might have retaliated against the French citizenry (if you think that unlikely, just take a look at what they did to the inhabitants of Oradour-Sur-Glane), or the Germans might have proceeded to occupy Vichy France (which they ultimately did anyway). By the same token, although I'm sure the French were sincere when they promised that they would never voluntarily turn their vessels over to the Germans, the British couldn't be sure that the Germans wouldn't just show up one morning, order the crews off the ships and take them over themselves (something the Brits had done in the First World War), which would have shifted the Mediterranean's balance of naval power irrevocably in favor of the Axis powers. In the end, it was a terrible, perhaps even treacherous, thing to do to an ally, but when your nation's very existence is at stake and you're fighting an enemy as formidable and ruthless as Nazi Germany, you haven't the luxury of being nice.
The French had the opportunity to scuttle them at that moment and solve the problem on all sides, but no he had to get his own sailors killed. If he was going to do it anyway then i fail to the see the problem in doing it sooner rather than later
Considering many vichy soldiers actually fought against the allies in north africa, i'd say the paranoia of the British was well founded
@@TheTeremaster He didn't have to get his sailors killed, he just couldn't believe an ally would bomb his ships.
Could’ve just fucked off the the Caribbean too. It’s not like Germany can cry foul if you did that, because what good would they be in the Caribbean?
Two of the three options wernt that though. 1st Option ally with the Royal Navy and fight to free occupied France, 2nd Option scuttle your ships, 3rd option sail to the French colonies in the Pacific and agree to sit out the war.
Y’all better be praying to the copy right gods that this video doesn’t get copy righted again.
Another brilliantly researched video. I didn’t know that any French ships had actually managed to escape. So again, I’ve learnt something, thank you.
only the old battleships Bretagne was destroyed and very minor ships, all the destroyers, the submarines, the carrier and the others battleships survived the attack
@@volcanares9620 but not the 1500 sailors sadly
@@zainkhan69420 yes I know, they died as brave men refusing to surrender their ships
@@volcanares9620the destroyer Mogador was hit by a 15" shell while leading the way out of the harbour, her depth charges detonated and she sank.
The battleship Provence was damaged by several hits, and because she was quite old she was never repaired.
The Dunkerque battle cruiser (or whatever her class is called in english) was damaged by shells and three days later, her side was blown up when an aerial attack hit and expoded a torpedo boat next to her. She was hastily repaired (using concrete to fill the holes in her hull), sent back to Toulon just in time to be stuttled there.
Even if most of the human casualty are from the Bretagne's crew, she was not the only ship damaged there.
(And also, there are claims of british aircrafts downed by french fighters but not confirmed for what I know. Anyway, several contradicting reports have been made of this event and Historograph's video is the best I have seen on it)
Get out the British propagand ! The attack was a complete failure and just a bloodbath !
Hindsight is always a thing but it still gives us two alternate possibilities as to what the fleet could have done, they could have scuttled like they did in French ports, or they could have done the same as the Vichy army in North Africa and sided with Germany, fighting the US army that was expecting them not to resist as they had pledged not to during operation Torch.
Educate yourself
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scuttling_of_the_French_fleet_at_Toulon
"The crews were no about to abandon their ships and allow Les anglais to finish them up " . God, I love this line
The royal navy told the to get off the ships they refused they in fact started there engines and prepared to fight
@@jakesmith-bw1yc war crimes are war crimes
@@pokefreak480 except it was not a war crime it was the sinking of a fleet of war ships that would be used to attack us.
@@jakesmith-bw1yc but they scuttled their ships, so it was unnecessary 11:30
@@jakesmith-bw1yc It's a war crime !
Although it shouldn't have happened, I completely understand why the British did it, it was the most logical thing to do
Ikr, the French admiral should have just thrown in with them against the Nazis. He had that choice, and several others
exactly@@KBV1497
Shaque Johnson it was a logical decision. The French admiral could have easily just sailed away with the brits or joined the other French ships with the brits but they were adamant. Plus, the alliance between the 2 stated that they were not to negotiate a separate peace but the French did so any way, betraying the british
true@@pergys6991
not true@@ArmyRangerSJ
Bonne vidéo bien documentée et objective, merci
This is one of those situations with no easy solutions. France had just surrendered so any action viewed by the germans as breaking the armistice could lead to an even worse outcome. Don't forget no one had the benefit of hindsight so all decisions were based on the realities of the moment not what might be the case 4 or 5 years later.
All memes aside, this was a great tragedy.
Albert Wesker most couldn’t care less about Algerians or Subsaharans
Created entirely by the French.
@@F40PH-2CAT How do you figure?
@@F40PH-2CATdid we sunk our battleship ourself or was it our fault because we didn't want to obey to the UK ? In both case that sound like an incredibly retarded take, I'm surprised someone that can come up with this can also actually write
@@MrGuana141 The French should have surrendered their fleet. The British were correct to assume that Germany would attempt to seize the French fleet as shown in 1942 when ultimately, all the flagships at Mers El Kebir were scuttled by the French themselves anyway. The Germans never did obtain the French fleet but they very well could have, in fact they came very close. Not to mention the utility the British would have gotten from the French ships in fighting the axis, a cause which would have benefitted France. France could have contributed it's navy to the liberation of France but chose to keep them in port until 1942 for no good reason, wasting some incredible ships.
so the french version of pearl harbour where the brits asked in a gentlemenly way by asking them to kindly surrender then fight haha
It wasnt even surrender since they were allies they just told they to go somewhere else
@@vallas8345 They couldnt wait just think of the consequences if the Germans got those ships
@@vallas8345 What as you French were sending your own ships to fire on the British ships, nice work genius.
The visualization on the map really helps to imagine the conflict a little better
Naval combat is so brutal, so so scary. Watching your last several videos, including the Scandinavian campaign, terrifying.
@Jacob Zondag
Wow, that's sick mate! Where was that at?
Terrifying isnt it!
Everything in hindsight is terrifying but knowing your nation could be enslaved by Nazis? Wouldn't you do anything you can to survive? I sure as hell would.
That idiot who commanded the fleet in Oran was more interested in etiquette than in averting a tragedy. Sinking fleet was okay but what really got him worked up that the British did send a captain to haggle with him instead of an admiral like he was one himself. The rest is known
Old breed mentality
There is a slight translation issue here, where the word 'contrôle' in french, and 'controllo' in Italian was mistakenly translated as 'control', where they really meant 'supervision' or 'check' as in 'passport control'. According to John Keegan, this might have played a factor in the British admiralty decision ...
On the other hand, could you *really* trust the axis to not use the French ships? Hitler *promised* not to invade Czechoslovakia, and yet...
Tetragon 213 well, they tried to cease French ships a couple years after that incident... Then the french sailors sank they own ships
@@vitoravila9908 true, although we do have the hindsight. The Admiralty didn't have a magic crystal ball to see into the future, so they made a decision based on the information they had. Regrettable, but tragically necessary.
Tetragon 213 well, there is a lot of controversy if the action in Oran was really necessary. Suffice to say that they were out of the Axis reach, as this particular action took place in Algeria
Politically tho, in the great scheme of things, this action, again according to Keegan, galvanized the nation around Churchill, due to his firm decision to keep fighting no matter what. We often forget how fragile UK's position was during the summer of 40, and with the surrender of France and no clear commitment from the Americans, the British were on their own, and surrender, or even invasion and defeat, were considered by many( including the American ambassador Kennedy) the most likely outcome. Even Hitler got surprised by the British determination.
In short, even if militarily this action was questionable, politically was a very effective and successful move
@@vitoravila9908 effective and successful move... yes and no... We all know that was a doubtful move military, it was even Lucky to not put at war France against UK... which was meaning, that germany could have freed millions of french prisoners, give back all tanks and guns to french and more of all, french fleet would have joined italian fleet in mediterranean sea, and both of them there would have been a great threat for english... Suez canal would have felt etc... but to be less specular, there was true negociations, secret ones, between De gaulle and all of the french colonies in africa and in french middle east protectorate... it was working actually, Mers el Kebir destroy almost all the negociation... let's wait 2 weeks in july, and AOF, AEF and Syria lebanon join free french... then automatically, french fleet + 150k good soldiers in algeria join back the fight, combined with british 8th army, they can take Lybia and thrashed the unprepared and under equipped italian army there... Churchill was knowing french would never give their fleet to axis... He told it, but he was truly needed to give a new "souffle" to Britain in schock and total disarray... British media have always presented Mers el Kebir as a victory over Axis... Despite this sort of betrayal (as french have the right to considere it and so has the right the english to not considere it), de gaulle has shown a true leader skill : he went to the BBC to defend the British for the indefendable act of Mers el Kebir... and it wasn't easy. We were lucky that at those time, We had so charismatic leaders, Churchill, Roosevelt, Stalin, and De gaulle... I don't say Stalin was a good one, but you can't deny him his tenacity and his leadership... Place Chamberlain instead of Churchil and the war is over... place De gaulle instead of petain and things would have gone either way... For Rossevelt, it's different... I would say he wanted to enter in war before but wasn't able to convince his own people and he needed their approbation, he pushed Japanese to make pearl harbour, he wished it, but didn't expected to be that efficient against his own navy... then he was preferring petain to De Gaulle, which is harsh to accept here, especially he had prepared a money and many american servants to take the lead of the french administration after DDay... stunning and poor idea but logic... but he leads perfectly USA.
Captivating video and extremely well edited.
This event was never taught to us in school (I live in Australia) and we were only really taught about positives of the Australian army and to a lesser extent the British army during the war. We learned so little about events such as this or the positives of the Axis forces and it really disappoints me that I’m having to learn all of this years later. I’m really glad this channel exists and spends time showing both sides of the war with lesser known parts of the war. So keep up the good work, i only found your channel fairly recently and have been watching all your videos. 😀
Why on earth would they teach u in school?
the positives in the Axis forces: tell me what positive you see in the Axis forces?
@@valentinlageot4101,
The fact that they were all human and some of them openly embraced the positive aspects of that humanity whenever they got the opportunity. I'm not talking Rommel or Schindler or other ""good Nazis"" I'm talking the majority or more likely large minority of enlisted soldiers and other low-ranking military personnel who had little in common ideologically with fascism and maintained some level of a conscience and "civility" while fighting for the "defense" of their country or because they were forced to.
@@fluffly3606 what positives did teh German accomplished at the east, what were they defending, bnothing they were attacking mostly, they invaded teh whole of Europe and yes maybe not for the all Nazi thing but still, until the very end they stayed loyal even if the war and its motivs was never beneficial for their nations. here a question what did the Whermacht accomplished to protect its motherland or even teh Waffen SS, nothing they just ruined the reputation of a culturally rich country of Europe as the Warmongering (even tho it wa smeant to be France that had this bad reputation fo invading its neighbor) what good did those men accomplished for tehir country, yes tehy were braves but again had japan surrendered would their cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki be in RUin, would have germany surrender in 1944, would the Red army have commited mass rpe in eastern and central Europe.
I don't see any reason why they'd need to teach this in the national curriculum. It's interesting but it has no real relevance to educating Australian kids.
How have I never learned of this? It's such a tragic story from the war and such a dramatic one. Even in this relatively matter-of-fact retelling I can imagine and empathize with the captains of both sides...
It always seemed to me that the naval stories of WW2 were the most dramatic - Mers el Kebir, Bismarck and Hood, Operation Pedestal, the sinking of HMS Glorious, Pearl Harbor...
This might be because i'm British and maybe we are programmed in a particular way, but am i the only one who thinks the ultimatum issued was entirely reasonable.. ? basically either continue to fight, sail to Gibraltar and disarm or sail to another French territory and disarm?
The French Admiral can make all the guarantees that he wants but he could easily be replaced or otherwise unable to disarm the French fleet in the event the Germans tried to take over and if Britain hadn't sunk this French squadron the French, Italian and German fleets combined could have overwhelmed Britain and forced it into an armistice
Nope, he was literally given 3 good options and 1 neutral option (scuttle). Instead he chose option 5, which was to waste his sailors lives and then cry about how it was all the brits faults. Talking about how he'll never surrender to germany all while refusing to join the fleet to fight against them? Bullshit.
SS officer finds out the crews families, tells them they either fight the british or their families suffer, all of a sudden malta is gone and the north africa campaign may very well have had a different outcome.
Every life lost that day was 100% on the french admirals head.
Actually you are wrong it was an insane risk for the british to do this. The vichy government could have easily chosen to take this betrayal as justification to side with the germans actively and declare war on the UK. It was nowhere near the full force of the french navy. This also caused many french forces to refuse helping the british when they could have. It is a shameful disgrace on the Uk navy.
@@feanedhell The French where scattered after the fall of France in 1940 including their navy. From a British perspective Vichy France was little more than a German puppet state, French collaborators with Pétain at the helm of the Vichy government. So "actively working with the Germans" was to be expected.
@@JohnMacbeth except that petain wasn't even in power at that time, and the armistice had barely been signed
It was a complexe decision as the french had just signed the armistice so technically they shouldn't fight anymore. The order received by the french admiral were to sail to the US or Britain in case of Axis attack, but Britain tried to disarm them first. With no reel threat, the admiral didn't see a reason to choose these option that, if reveiled, could have endangered Free France.
If Gensoul didn’t put his pride above his country, then they might have reached a peaceful resolution by not wasting the hours Holland spent relaying messages via intermediaries.
Actually Gensoul tryed to own time for move .
He suceeded ....
This incident is still bitterly remembered in the French navy. When you talk to French sailors about working with the British, they usually tell you "remember Mers El Kebir".
and we remind them "Remember when you made friends with Hitler'
@@coolstorybrooooo7643 And they would answer : "Sure, after we had no other choice since you had scurried back to your island". The French navy did not fight for Germany anyway. They either left France and joined the French free forces, scuttled or disarmed. Some sailed to the UK to join the fight, but Mers El Kebir seriously eroded their trust in the British, understandably so.
Don't act like the British were winning at that point. They were just lucky they did not share a land border with Germany and Germany did not have sufficient forces to invade Britain after the battle of France.
@Caratacus Nearly all of the French forces who went to England (once the British had decided to reembark, they could not hold the pocket anymore) were almost immediately shipped back to France (Brittany) to keep the fight going, until Pétain said otherwise. And after Mers El Kébir, not too many French soldiers were inclined to trust the British, which is why so few ultimately went to Britain.
But anyways, my point is not to stir controversy about complex historical events none of us know enough about. I was just saying that Mers El Kebir is still bitterly remembered in the French navy. That's it.
@Caratacus Yeah, as I told you, the majority of the French troops evacuated to Britain were almost immediately redeployed to France to keep fighting, until the armistice was signed. There were not 100 000 French troops in England by that time.
I'm also not trying to defend the French collaborators of the time. What they did was horrible. But also not that antisemitism was widespread in Europe, and not just in Germany, although it was not weaponized by the other governments. Heck, the Brits had a Nazi party in the 1930s. If the UK had fallen, there's no doubt that Hitler would also have found good friends in Britain.
And please, leave the "shed tears" and other angry ad hominem rhetoric for the schoolyard. If you're a true Brit, keep calm and carry on. Although I must say, I lost interest in this conversation, so as a true Frenchman, I surrender.
I wish you a pleasant day good Sir
@@damienpeladan481 ironic that they had no thought on ppl invading through Belgium
I mean they have been doing it for centuries. I thought this is mabey a Napolianic wars video until i saw the ships.
I hope you just playing the idiot on purpose, and that you realize the difference between sinking ships in a naval battle and "this".
It's nothing more than the proverbial English perfidy. They fled to Dunkirk like cowards, but they still managed to sink the fleet of their (former) ally (!!)
@@xenotypos not really, the ships could have joined vichy France. They were given a reasonable ultimatum that would have benefited them and had no consequences (all they had to do was sail to a British port) and they refused. If they didn't to go to an allied port that seems rather suspicious even if the French later proved their honesty to Britain
@@justinbeath5169 Literally no power in the world would have agreed to any of those deamnds and Churchill knew that when he gave the order, similar deamnds are exactly what started WW1 and ofcourse the british would ahve said no if the situation was turned on its head.
Letting your millitary be commanded by anyone else Is jsut the biggest NO GO you can have, when you are letting someone else command your forces then you are already beyond the point of surrendring to them and there is no point in your further existence.
The consequence of accepting any of the demands would clearly be that nobody would ever take the french navy seriously.
There is nothing suspicious about a sovereign nations millitary not taking orders from a different nations governement , if they did take orders from that other nation then that would truly be suspicious.
@@freedomfighter22222 there are many instances of armies being commanded by other nations, it even happened at Alexandria at the same time and early in the war with the polish navy. It would have been better to continue the fight than to capitulate like the rest of France
Britain: Can you maybe, like, move your fleet to friendly ports?
France: ...No.
Britain: Please?
France: No.
Britain: I will be forced to open fire on you
France: Still no.
Britain: (Opens fire)
France: (Surprised Pikachu Face)
*opens fire on ally, killing nearly 1300 of them. After they would already scuttle their ships if the Germans attempted to seize them
@@jeanhunter3538 no they wouldnt
@@jeanhunter3538 Benefit of hindsight, how can the British be sure that the French fleet is actually gonna scuttle their own fleet? Its not like that has ever happened before.
@@averagenewbie2968 they did en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scuttling_of_the_French_fleet_at_Toulon
How would Germans even reach French fleet in Africa?... Only reason it was moved to Toulon was exactly due to British attack...
With Mers El Kebir British only proved theirs' paranoia which was enough for them to justify attacking theirs' former allies. That attack is to this day arguably the biggest stain on British account.
This has recently been featured in Azur Lane, in a special event, in all its tragic splendour. Royal Navy ships unwilling and remorseful, French ships determined to stand their ground whether against German or British guns, and a new hope arising with Richelieu organizing the Free French Fleet.
fk porn azure lane shit
This is no battle, it's just a reenactment of their historic naval battles in the 18th & 19th century
French Navy: Damn, we just lost the war. We have no use for our ships really.
British Navy: *Attacks Mers El Kebir*
French Navy: *a h s h i t h e r e w e g o a g a i n*
People have died please respect them
@@luqman_md I can't; They're dead.
@@EstonianShark Shame on you! If you are really Estonian it like I did a joke on the brave people who resisted Germany and the URSS occupation of your country.
"When Britian Blew up the French Fleet"
Think they have done that more than once...
Lol you have to have the French Navy in your port to destroy it, remember the battle of Cheasepeake where the French Navy shot you in the ass because yes they did that more than once.
@@sayzen4588
The most famous ones of England/Britain beating french navy are:
Sluys, Quiberon bay, Nile, Basque Roads & Trafalgar
@@archivesoffantasy5560 Je vais te la faire plus court moi, L'invasion de Normandie en (1202-1204), en (1213-1214), Saintonge, Anglo VS Français (1294-1303), 1557-1559, French religion (1562-1628), Bataille au Québec de 1627-1628, Guerre de Cent Ans 1337 - 1453, Guerre de succession d'Autriche 1743, Guerre d'indépendance Américaine, je pourrais continuer longtemps comme ça. Vous avez le don de tout remettre à vos batailles les plus connu, je n'ai pas fait les conquêtes napoléoniennes où il a fallut des coalition de votre armée avec l'Europe pour nous arrêter. Et ce coup de le dos a été le coup de grâce, Dunkerque quand pourtant on vous a sauvé le cul parce que à l'heure actuelle tu serais entrain de pleurer sur ton sort de ne pas avoir d'armée. Arrêtez de vous référez aux batailles "Les plus connus" parce qu'elles ne veulent rien dire tout simplement, parce que à l'heure actuelle notamment en niveau maritime permet moi de douter de la supériorité britannique. Avec les salutations Françaises !
@@sayzen4588 I don’t speak French but I know France has a powerful military history.
Britain has names like Nelson, Cochrane, Wellington, Marlborough, Henry V, Edward III, Richard O Connor etc
France has named like Napoleon, Turrene, Villars, Grand Conde, Saxe, Davout, La Hire etc
Like I say, got no problem admitting France has powerful and important history because it’s the truth.
I feel that Franco Prussian and WW2 is what damaged the reputation, but people forget the eras of dominance of bourbon France.
British Admiral Nelson left the chat, blew up by a canon
I can see the British side of this but I can also understand the French side you can never tell what's going to happen in the future or how people truly react British did what they had to do remember hindsight is always 20/20 you have to look at things from the lens of today and what has happened in the past because you can never see the future and it is certainly a sad thing with a British had no choice and their opinions Sapphire was it the right thing sadly I think it was considering the nature of Germany at that time
Germany nature doesn't change whatsoever that French still could just as much simply scuttle theirs' warships in situation in which Axis actually tried to seize them. If Germans managed to do that in Scapa Flow 20 years earlier, it's only ignorant to say that far better manned French warships couldn't.
@@ReichLife and how were they supposed to know if the French navy's loyalty lied with Britain or vichy France
Ignoring the fact that Vichy France was THE France in 1940, 1941 and 1942 without any doubt, it's delusional to expect that one's military will be more loyal to other state than it's own.
@@ReichLife hence why they needed to be destroyed
@@ReichLife and it is not delusional to think than they would join the side in favor of liberating their country rather than the puppet state of the country that invaded France
I've heard from some naval historians that the French Admiral transmitted to his superiors that the only options were scuttle themselves or surrender themselves to the British so they responded with basically piss off instead of choosing another option that they were unaware of.
Though that's often pointed out the 3rd possibility of the french Caribbean was impossible. There was no base there able to receive a fleet that size, nor the ressources to sustent them. And the proposition was not only that but also disarm them under us control. Gensoul did not mention it because he knew it was not an option.
Magical fuel didn't exist in real life and Gensoul didn't had enought fuel !
Because refueling didn't exist....
Well ...Mers el Khébir was still under construction and fuel was low .
He barelly had enought for return to Toulon .
@@Pentagon6519
Thinking the Battle of Trafalgar was the last naval battle between Britain and France, I found this. As I tell friends, the more I learn of history, the more I realize how little I know.
This wasn’t a battle it was a massacre.
More than half as many deaths as in Pearl Harbour. What a tragedy.
From an ally, no less.
@@DeeJaysterity Not an ally.
2 weeks before they where.
But yes quite an unfortunate series of events.
That French admiral was so damn annoying and stubborn. Like wtf was he thinking? Why would they be fucking bluffing 😂
@@madman10340 He can't give a fleet like that to the first one threatening him. France was now at peace, helping the british could have meant war with germany again. That's funny how people are joking about the french saying they surrendered, but they don't understand why Gensoul didn't surrender his ships.
@@Madhattersinjeans Well yeah, but whether it was 2 weeks or 2 months ago they still considered the brits trustworthy
Just gotta say, these videos are sublime. You are doing some great work and it is extremely appreciated.
And some people don't understand why Charles De Gaulle didn't fully trust the allies
@@brothergrimaldus3836 Yeah... A foreign country ask kindly to leave his ship and he say no, yeah he sure was an idiot... Everyone would have agree to this term, for sure...
@@Theo2lag French ship , french officer , french government and french shore .
what is your problem ?
@@Theo2lag i kindly ask you to leave that app, will you?
@@Theo2lag foreign friendly country. not ur enemy.
What an absolutely brilliant video.
That french gun boat is a kindred spirit of the USS Johnston
even the british commadner wasn't proud of that.
As a Brit I’m saddened that we had to do it
But if Britain was ever knocked out in a war I’d expect our allies to do the same to our navy
Never let the ship fall into enemy hands
It's not enough to be sad of the death of thousands of French sailors, neither apologies
Jacob Zondag it’s not about the ships. It’s about the men who were ruthlessly murderers in a blatant war crime
Josh lower although they didn’t swing the sword, French leadership is just as responsible for the deaths of those men- additionally their arrogance prevented the war itself from
Being over in a matter of weeks.
@JZ's Best Friend When fighting the likes of Hitler...might is always right
Is this incident the reason why vichy-french soldiers kept fighting the Allies in Madagascar, syria and on the landing of the American and British troops in North-Africa?
@@ozzmanzz thanks for the reply. I was searching for that for a long time. Weirdly, they must have known, that Germany would occupy them anyhow and -on the long run- they would be better off fighting with the Allies, not against them.
MrUnseen
The French tried to maintain some pride by thinking they were still in control, albeit in just the Vichy south. Sadly the Allies paid a heavy price for this. An Australian soldier who later became the Governor of New South Wales, Sir Roden Cutler, was awarded a Victoria Cross and lost a leg fighting not the Germans but the French in Syria during ww2. What a mad time it was.
Vichy was built on proto-fascist tendencies already existent in France.
Gee, how dare the French defend their own colonies.
@@generalzyklon3913 Defending their colonies my ass...the allied troops were not fighting to take france's colonies, they were fighting for France to be FREE!
WOW THIS VIDEO AND YOUR CHANNEL ARE AMAZING KEEP UP WITH THIS YOU ARE VERY VERY GOOD IN ALL ASPECTS 💪💪🤩🤩🤘
This is definitely a “COWABUNGA IT IS!” moment.
Sommervile: Here is our ultimatum.
The French admiral :um...No, we have a 4-
Somerville: *COWABANGA IT IS*
That's a really inappropriate thing to say.
Strasbourg was having a police chase from the Hood, but escaped
It's the same french fleet under vice admiral Arial that save the british at dunkirk a month earlier.....
No it didn't.... there was FAR more British ships rescuing over 100,000 French troops from within the Dunkirk perimeter.
@@walterkronkitesleftshoe6684 Abrial Commanded the French navy and land forces, the land forces sacrificed themselves to allow as many allies as possible to flee, the British navy refused (during a good half of the evacuation) the evacuation of the French forces, the French navy who was sunk participated in the evacuation, I worded it badly I should have said, "who participated in" or "who saved English soldiers". In any case, the French land forces not only saved the English at Dunkirk but this evacuation should not have taken place.
@@Bracus.Reghusk The numbers evacuated from the Dunkirk pocket were.
205,000 British troops,
110,000 French troops
23,000 Belgian troops.
The BEF suffered 66,426 casualties, that was 11,014 killed or died of wounds, 14,074 wounded and 41,338 men missing or taken prisoner
The BEF lost one seventh of its personnel killed and captured, because the TEN BEF divisions on the Belgian border were left isolated by the unannounced withdrawal of the French first army on their right flank, and collapse of the Belgian forces on their left.
The Perimeter of the Dunkirk pocket was manned by British, French and Belgian troops, which fought to allow British French and Belgian troops be evacuated MOSTLY by the RN and British "little ships".
Don't try to blame the DREADFUL performance of the >140 divisions of the French home army on the 10 BEF divisions. They were seconded to the PISS POOR French high Command, and it was THEY who lost the battle.
Luckily We Brits fought on and saved you from the 1000 year nazi reich, while the majority of the French population quietly acquiesced and collaborated with nazi rule.
2nd Battle of Guadalcanal, which had one of the few BB on BB engagements of the war (USS Washington Vs. IJN Kirishima).
The French Admiral was entirely to blame for this. The French could have gone to the West Indies.
Could of had a nice holiday
I guess it would depend on the terms of surrender between france and germany . I could see how it could violate these terms , especially considering that the u.s is about to get involved
when i first came upon this video i had expected more than 100k view. you should get more credit for the great videos you make. keep up the good work
The entire French fleet should have sailed out to continue the fight after the surrender. This is why I respect De Gaulle, Petain and the rest of the leadership betrayed France.
The French fleet would have clearly broken the armistice by joining the Allies
@@KatyushaLauncher Other brave countries did. Poland for a start.
This ^
Seems rediculous that the French Navy at Mers El Kebir didn't see the writing on the wall with the fascists. They were not going to stop at France or Britain.
@@404Dannyboy Look at what happened to Poland and Warsaw. Do you blame the French for not wanting Paris to be annihilated and millions of people dying?
Yeah, it's kinda foolish considering the country is being held hostage... There is little choice here
Interesting fact is that Roosevelt said in private that he would have done the same thing in the British position.
" said in private "
What is important is what a politican said in public .
Reporter: "What do you think of British civilization?"
Gandhi: "I think it would be a good idea."
After the skinny little fanatic had studied law in London.
Thank you for this video. Thank you a lot. All I want more is a video on Gernan ships crossing of the Channel and that is it.
Was this battle forgivable? Yes
But was it regrettable? Yes, in my opinion yes
My Dad was a Royal marine during Ww2. And was Nauseatd at this Action.
But he knew only to well, if those French ships were taken by Germany or even Italy at that time.
England would have been in 'Do Do' up to their Necks.
And the 'Do Do' was already waist Deep, after Dunkirk.
It was a Sadly Needed Action..!
He was always bothered by the Fact that, on the Ships coming back from Dunkirk were a lot of French fighting men.
To Fire on them in Port felt Wrong.
After the War he Never Voted for Churchill in any Election..!
Such were his feelings over that Action..!
Sad but Required..!
Not every Frenchman was Against Germany.
"Lest we Forget..!"
Great Video. Thanks.
Cheers All. 😎
France and the British Empire started two world wars they could not win.
@@MarkHarrison733 But we DID win..... As you well know, when you cry yourself to sleep every night because there are NO nazi death camps on British soil for you to stand guard at.
@@walterkronkitesleftshoe6684 No such camps ever existed in Europe.
Rest in peace French sailors :(
Uk had to do what they had to do.
@@DoubleAAce no
@@selimgokalp2805 shut up
@@DoubleAAce no
@@selimgokalp2805 shush
The perfect example of testing to see if friendly is on
french navy : France have lost, so our ship will stay neutral . And if the german try to take them, we will scuttle them . Are we good ?
England : Well yes, but actually no
lol
Total war, with us or against us...anyone who can't see the need for ruthlessness in WW2 is infantile
@@angloirishcad Adults can handle nuance. Children see the world in black and white.
@@gaohkai9441 There is no nuance in a death struggle
@Cpl. Rook just because, the fleet at Toulon scuttled their ships, doesn't mean the one at mers el kebir would have.
Also the british werent exactly in a trusting mood at the time, as the french had recently betrayed them by surrendering to the germans, even though a previous agreement made it so they could not surrender without british consent. Which would make the british eye french promises with suspicion.
It was also far more likely for the fleet at mers el kebir to turn over to the germans for the following reasons.
2 years had passed after the surrender and vichy france was becoming more hostile to the germans, as to why they would have been eager for a chance to resist. The fleet at toulon was also a fair bit smaller as to why the germans had not thought to sieze those ships earlier.
The vichy france at mers el kebir was more eager to please as they had just recently surrendered. And the germans would have been far more interested in these ships than the ones at toulon as they were planning to invade britain at this time and the fleet at mers el kebir was more powerful.
Britain were left with no choice had Italy or Germany taken control of the French fleet which they definitely would’ve we likely would’ve lost the war in the Mediterranean
And yet, in 1942, when the Germans invaded Vichy France, they tried to get their
hands on the French fleet at Toulon, but the French managed to scuttle their
fleet before they arrived. They didn't just let the Germans get it.
For all of those that are saying that UK had no choice well...it was a shitty Idea, the British shot themselves in the foot and Churchill later on declared that this operation was a bad idea and a tragedy. The British did way more harm than good to both France and UK. Vichy gained legibility and power following the attack, UK lost thousands and thousands of volunteers for the FFF as well as giving a motive for the African army to resist. "France negotiated a peace with the Germans thus betraying the British" do you want to talk about the times previous to the armistice where UK betrayed France. Before Dunkirk the French were planning a counter attack with the British. Prior to the said attack the British felt like not doing so and they left without telling the French. At Dunkirk the BEF was supposed to hold the city with the French and Belgians but a counter order was given and the BEF sat back on the beach without, again, telling the French that had to desperately fill the holes in the defence by launching furious counter attacks to repel the Germans. The British left France alone and now France is the traitor for wanting the good of their citizens? You people thinking that this attack was deserved are really dipshit just wanting to protect the British treason and blaming the French yet again
You’re missing the big picture. This attack cemented belief that Britain wasn’t defeated, and she would carry on with the war. At a time when it looked like Britain would be defeated, Churchill needed to show the world (and the US in particular) that Britain meant to carry on no matter what.
Yes it was a tragedy, but it’s not like it was a sneak attack. The British gave the French plenty of choices and time.
And also, thousands of French soldiers were evacuated along with the BEF at Dunkirk. It’s not like it was just the British who escaped.
@@muttley8818 Pleased that someone wants to disagree with me so I can correct you. You say they had plenty of choices and that It wasn't a sneak attack ? Well the French couldn't comply to ANY of the options the British gave them so it was basically a death sentence for the fleet or for the French at home. Secondly, while this attack was not sneaky, the British choose to open fire when they heard French vessels were heading their way. It means they attacked with both ships and planes, a fleet of French vessels almost unable to move and to deemed themselves in a Harbour. If this attack was a surprise attack (Like pearl harbour) then it would have been a total massacre and the few ships that fled would have been sunk too. Thirdly, "this attack showed that UK would still fight" well it showed that they were more than eager to attack their former ally less than a month after their armistice while leaving the Germans alone. A great act of heroism and bravery. It would have been better if they didn't TARGET THEIR FUCKING ALLY THAT WAS NOW NEUTRAL. Fourthly I don't know why you mention Dunkirk saying "Not only French were evacuated" well of course otherwise the brits would have been pretty horrific allies. But you know what happened to these french soldiers that got evacuated ? They were all sent back to France. They all returned to desperately fight for France. They lived to fight another day, without the brits this time.
@@parodyclip36 1- The French Navy knew how to scuttle their fleet. It’s not rocket science. Darlan refused to sail to a neutral port. And Vichy France could not be trusted.
2 -As above. Vichy France could not be trusted. British couldn’t take the risk of the Navy falling into German hands. They gave plenty of warning to Darlan.
3 - You imply the British escaped Dunkirk to leave the French fend for themselves. I just corrected you by saying French troops also evacuated. And I won’t even bother telling you how many British troops were left behind in France and became POW’s. Do your own research.
4 - French soldiers were NOT sent back. They became part of the Free French, led by De Gaulle. Some went to fight in Africa, some took part in SOE ops to support French resistance. Most remained in the UK until they took part in D-Day (along with British and other Allied forces, making your last sentence false).
@@parodyclip36 Oh. Your third point makes no sense.
Excellent quality as always!
you should do a video of when the us fleet rekt the spanish one in manilla 1898
Us had a bad navy compared to other countries at the time
This video makes the French look way more innocent than they really were in this matter! Drachnifel's video on this is much more detailed and outlines how Gensoul was in complete dereliction of duty.
Attacking neutral ships anchored in their port, tipically british.
As a british said to surcouf, a french navy captain: "Us british we fight for honour whereas you french fight for money"
And Surcouf to answer: "Well, we all fight for what we lack of"
Total war is like that, necessity becomes everything.
Though yeah not the first time GB destroyed a fleet preemptively, the Dutch and Danish for example.
@@tomorbataar5922you snooze you lose. Get to sea quicker next time
Yess he finally did a video on the sinking of the French fleet
the sinking of Bretagne
There needs to be a little more information on the French perspective of these events. This battle had an important effect on French morale and subsequent dealings between free France and Vichy colonies. It’s important to remember that this battle is (one of) the reasons why France was unable and unwilling to participate in more actions during WW2
Nahh, the new French government was fairly pro-Nazi.
They wouldn't have been completely independent in defeat anyways.
French soldiers and citizens might have been, but alas, organizing a revolution was not in the British power/possibilities....
i know this is 3 years old but
no??? it's not? most of these ships were repaired, multiple of them defected after case anton, and those that didn't were scuttled
the very fact that they didn't immediately defect en masse to the uk or a neutral port was what made them incapable of doing more, even had this not happened, they still would have gone to toulon and been scuttled because germany would never have not tried to take them, we have all the hindsight in the world, and we know for an absolute fact that the literal only possible way they could have done more was if the french, either just before armistice, or during the parlay at mers, had defected, remaining loyal to the occupation government was an unavoidable, naive death sentence.
it was delusional, even at the time, to presume hitler, known oathbreaker, was going to be nice to his new chia pet in vichy and not throw it away when he needed the desk space. there is no circumstance, barring what many ships did, i.e. defect, where the bulk of the navy doesn't get scuttled, they were always going to attempt seizure, because they were always going to invade vichy. this means france was always going to be irreparably crippled and lack most of the military bulk to be more active, that navy was the last remnant of capability, and the french naval brass, and collaboration government, squandered most of it and only showed an iota of awareness of what they had done by bringing the fleet right to the hungry hungry hitler's doorstep, when they chose to blow it up, and i can only imagine how angry many of the crews were at the brass for absolutely dropping the ball and allowing themselves to be forced to sink their last surviving force by cornering themselves.
those that defected became active, voracious participants, and the battleships that defected quite literally became some of the highest performing ships of the war.
mers was basically only symbolically successful, i mean, it meant a lot of the ships at toulon were under repairs, but that scarcely matters, even fully competent and undamaged ships were scuttled. it was, at the time, effectively the only option, and it's tragic how in hindsight, it was probably not something that was really, materially, necessary, since in the end, the french really were serious that they would rather annihilate their own navy than let the germans have it, but at the time, the british had no way of knowing that, or that even if france resisted, they would be able to scuttle the ships, it might literally even be said that if the ships at toulon that were under repairs were better served by being damaged, as it made them easier to scuttle, helping to deprive germany of making nascent plan z more tangible.
@@MrNicoJac not necessarily pro nazi but anti 3rd republic unlike germany at that point catholic conservatism was more the mainstream culture of the vichy ppl.
@@MrNicoJac No, that's false, it was only days old and didn't even have any constitution, it was neutral. Probably most of French people wanted to stay with the Allies, why do you think resistance was at such a large scale in France? But no, the British shot entirely disarmed ships, basically saying "Hey guys you either come with us or we kill you, but dont worry we're the good guys!"
@@charakiga
"Entirely disarmed ships"
Bro..... 🤣
You have really intresting and well made content.
a tragic loss of French sailors, sacrificed for the arrogance of a French Admiral
it was british arrogance as well.........what nation is going to accept terms like that unless there ships come under an active threat of actually being seized.
They wouldn't have done that to the Irish Navy. Hood would've opened one supersized can of whoopass! 🇮🇪
Great post btw. I always love these little-known side-operations, (Minced Meat, Paperclip Etc). I'm on board. 👊☘
Im curious how the remaining french fleet with numerous other battleships were sunk.
Scuttled by the French at Toulon in 1942 following the German occupation of "unoccupied" France
must of been what happenend then
@@michaelwang1524 yes battleships Dunkerque, Strasbourd and Provence along most of the ships from Mers el Kébir where brought to Toulon to be safe from british attacks but as the germans tried to take the ships the french scuttled them. But the most powerful battleship of the french navy : Richelieu joined the allies after operation Torch as she was still in Africa.
Perfect topic for the video, good job.
One thing is often forgotten about the aftermatch of this attack : it was a complete failure.
The french fleet at Mers el Kebir was :
- 2 modern Battlecruisers (Dunkerque and Strasbourg) which were the main targets being real threats
- 2 old battleships (Bretagne and Provence)
- 1 seaplane carrier (Commandant Teste)
- 6 large destroyers (Mogador, Volta, Le Terrible, Kersaint, Tigre and Lynx)
- 10 light destroyers (Casque, Corsaire, Bordelais, Boulonnais, Brestois, Tornade, Tramontane, Trombe, Typhon and La Poursuivante)
- 4 submarines (Ariane, Danae, Diane and Euridyce)
- 7 other smaller ships (Rigault de Genouilly, Chamois, Séoise, Toulonnaise, Terre Neuve, Armen and Estérel)
Athough ships like Dunkerque and Magador were damaged only the old Bretagne and small ships like Rigault de Genouilly were sunk.
In africa those ships were far from Germany but because of this attack the french choose to place most of them in a safer place : Toulon. Which could easily be taken by germany there. Plus after an attack like this, the logical reaction of France would have been to declare war on the UK, giving that fleet to the AXIS, at least Pétain choose not to declare war on Britain.
But as now those ships were in Toulon Germany tried to take them and the french scuttled most of them (Dunkerque, Strasbourg, Provence, Commandant Teste, Mogador, Volta, Kersaint, Lynx, Casque, Corsaire, Bordelais, Trombe, Typhon, La Poursuivante and Euridyce)
Tigre wasn't scuttled and was taken by the italians, they also started to repair some of the ships.
Le Terrible had more luck she came back to Africa (Dakar) after escorting Strasbourg to Toulon. She joined the allies after operation Torch like most of the french ships in Africa including the most powerful ship of the french navy : battleship Richelieu.
If the fleet had stayed at Mers el Kebir more ships would have joined the ally after operation Torch. Some would have been destroyed like Boulonnais, Brestois, Tornade, Tramontane, Ariane, Danae and Diane were.
It was far from a failure. It negated the threat of the French capital ships in the space of ten minutes. The point was not to destroy the Marine Nationale in Mers El Kebir, it was to neutralise its capital ships so they did not tie down British capital ships from the British battle-line and hand the Italians the strategic initiative as well as the material initiative. Naval power is a balance and the tipping point at in the Med in June 1940 came when time ran out and Gensoul refused to act logically- Mers El Kebir was a tragedy and a failure by both sides to co-operate, but the RN achieved their objectives; Dunkerque and Provence as well as many of the Destroyers were only superficially saved by their shallow harbour, they would never be a threat to the RN again thanks to serious damage, Bretagne was totally destroyed, Strasbourg was routed and displaced also becoming useless.
I understand your sentiments, but the rest of the French fleet was simply not a threat worth betraying an ally over, that's why Somerville ceased firing so soon. *The attack on the capital ships at Mers El Kebir was a disgusting betrayal, but characterised by its necessity and effectiveness.*
@@oliver8928 Strasbourg was the most powerful french ship at Mers el Kebir and was not even seriously damaged => it was a failure
After an attack like this France could have joined the war on germany's side and all those ships would have fallen in axis hands.
Dunkerque was damaged yes but with the support of Germany the ship would be back in action quickly.
And the most powerful french battleship was Richelieu which wasn't even at Mers el Kebir.
According to legend, when the British opened fire, "For the Damaged Coda" started playing.
The difference between Mers-el-Kébir and Alexandria was Gensoul. While he may not have been outright nazi sympathizer, he was certainly a diehard anglophobe. Churchill knew Gensoul and didn't trust his loyalty to the allied cause against Germany. If Sommerville had the good sense to send another admiral to handle negotiations rather than a captain, Gensoul would probably have shown him the secret orders from Darlan to scuttle the remaining ships of the fleet if Germany moved against them. That may have changed the outcome of the operation. However, the persistent rumour is Churchill wanted the "battle" as a way to show Roosevelt Britain was serious about doing whatever it took to stay in the war and defeat nazi Germany. Whatever the real story, Roosevelt was impressed enough to conclude the ships for bases negotiations less than two weeks later, giving Britain 50 overage but still useful destroyers to the British for bases it turned out we'd need once the US got into the war with Germany.
Exactly. Gensoul was the problem here. He decided not to take the decision himself but to pass the ultimatum up the chain of command to Admiral Darlan in France. Darlan was " at home on 3 July and could not be contacted" according to French records (dubious in my opinion) so Gensoul's request for orders went to the new, barely formed ,Vichy Government. But Gensoul *deliberately* omitted the key phrase in option 3} of the British ultimatum " or perhaps be entrusted to the United States and remain safe until the end of the war, the crews being repatriated. ". Which was *exactly* the secret order that Admiral Darlan (convieniently not contactable) had already given to the French Navy in the event of such an ultimatum.
@@WgCdrLuddite it's my opinion that the French fleet should have sailed against Germany like the Greeks, Dutch, Poles, etc. but they didn't. I would point out to say what if they didn't scuttle in time and there ships were seized then it would disastrous and we would be saying that the British should have tried to stop it
Gensoul did share the order of Darlan to scuttle ships with Holland. At Alexandria french and british admirals knew each other very well (I think they were brother in law). So they decided to make an agreement, the french could keep their ships but they had to stay in alexandria.
@@volcanares9620 I've never read of any family relationship between Cunningham and Godfroy. I've also never seen anything that said Gensoul actually showed a copy of Darlan's order to Holland. All the negotiations were carried out by his lieutenant, Bernard Dufay, and there's no evidence he even had access to the original order.
Gensoul deliberately left out the option of his ships sailing to the French West Indies for interment by the US Navy in his cables to the French government, only saying the terms were surrender or fight. Darlan's order even included sailing the fleet to US waters for interment if a foreign power attempted to seize the ships, an option the British would have taken if they had seen the original order. Gensoul was spoiling for a fight, and he got one. Godfroy had heard of the results at Mers-el-Kébir before negotiations began at Alexandria. He had a much weaker squadron than the one at Mers-el-Kébir and wisely decided that neutralizing the ships was the wisest course.
@@sarjim4381 th-cam.com/video/EpUjiVr3ias/w-d-xo.html 27:34
Not gonna say I called it but I did say it was gonna be Mers El Kebir on your last video when you gave the hint
I watched a video of survivors. They were so shocked and cursed churchill and Britan. They felt betrayed.
They were betrayed by theyre admiral
Cullen Moseley They were offered a choice to join the British or alternatively move to a British port or be fired upon. So their Admiral betrayed them with his decision.
I just picture French men drowning and burning. It was murderous treachery.
People harp on the admiral a bit too much. He said he would scuttle the ships if it came to it. But he wasn’t simply going to sink them in a safe port to the request of an ally.
Cullen Moseley Murderous treachery yet they were made aware hours before said ‘treachery’ took place of what would happen if the terms were rejected. The British are not proud of this hence why they offered terms to avoid it in the first place, but they should not have to rely on an Admirals word that the ships would be scuttled especially considering the threat said ships would pose to Britain if the Admiral failed to scuttle the ships and the Germans/Italians captured them.
Really interesting! I didn't;t know this. Thank you.
This is why France and UK had a “kind of maybe nah chief” alliance
It was a temporary ceasefire thing.
Amazing how complicated history and the people who live it are when we see facts. Great history especially after the publishing of Eric Larson’s “THE SPLENDID AND THE VILE”. Thank you!
They should have sent someone with the same rank as the french admiral at the port because sending a captain was a disrespect. Also sending an ultimatum means no negotiations, you either pick one option or get war. Doing these mistakes and then expecting french to cooperate in a very short time period is just stupid. Whole this mess could have been avoided imo.
I think they sent the captain, because he was a fluent french speaker, and had a lot of experience interacting with French commanders, from his previous posting in Paris. Of course, the captain could have been accompanied by admiral Sommerville.
@@mariusdufour9186 The captain had been the British Military Attache and was well known to the French Gensoul was a pompous ass
It could have been avoided if the fire had chosen to sail with the allied fleet or to be repatriated but they chose not to. It was the French admiral's fault and no one else's
@@justinbeath5169 you're like John snow you know nothing. French fleet sailing under british command ? British would have done the same. They knew it, everybody knew it. They came with their guns out, proposing shitty ideas knowing damn well no Man in their right sense would accept. Yeah Gensoul was probably an asshole but he wasn't there by accident. He did as much as he could the right thing. Much more, he was unable to contact the Grand admiral Darlan to be backed up and that's something that could have made a difference. Then again, knowing that Darlan's great grandfather was killed in Trafalgar by brits i doubt he would have surrendered his pride to them. You just don't know what you're talking about so stop talking
When are new videos coming up? Just love them so much! Keep up the great work man
Britain betrayed so many of their allies during WW2. There's also the Polish in 1939 and postwar, the Chinese in Burma campaign, the Egyptians and Indians whom they had made various promises to and then trampled all over, etc.
You forgot the biggest betrayal of all of them, the betrayal of Czechoslovakia and the Munich Agreement.
the British are pretty crappy allies tbh
@@micahistory crappy allies who fought 2, no 3 wars to keep mainland Europe free from domination by any central power, and won them all, yeah, really crappy allies
they were crappy until 1941@@lemuelhobbs6139
@@micahistory you should have said were crappy allies not are crappy allies then, to be pedantic :)
no way. i can't believe I just learned this. this is crazy.
Royal Navy: "Hey buddy, how about you come fight the war with us? We'll avenge the German invasion together, it'll be fun!"
French Navy: "Non."
Royal Navy: "Okay... well, how about you just sail back with us and we'll keep your ships safe for the rest of the war? You won't have to do any fighting so you won't get in trouble with the Germans."
French Navy: "Non!"
Royal Navy: Look, France, buddy, we're really worried about the Germans taking your ships, if you don't want us to look after your ships, then just take them to one of your ports on the other side of the Atlantic where they'll be safe."
French Navy: "NON!"
Royal Navy: "SERIOUSLY? Dude, I gotta' be honest, we can't risk just leaving your ships here for the Germans or Italians to try to take. If you don't want to move them, then you'll have to scuttle them.
French Navy: "Non, now go away!"
Royal Navy: "Please buddy... We're not leaving till though ships are out of of the way, sorry to have to do this but you're leaving us no option, scuttle them now or get off because at 3pm, we'll sink them for you..."
French Navy: "Don't let the door hit you on the way out!"
Royal Navy: "We're back... It's 3pm already... And your still floating... We really don't want to do this but you're kind of leaving us no option... Leave the Med, scuttle, or get the hell off... We'll give you till 5:30 but no more, Churchill is texting me every 5 mins, he says we have to sort this now!"
French Navy: Not listening...
Royal navy: "It's 5:30 already and we don't see any fireworks... Time's up! You've got 24 mins to evacuate before we start shooting. We don't want to hurt anyone so make sure you get everyone get off your ships NOW!"
French Navy: "Everyone stay right where you are! The English are bluffing, they would never... What's that noise? Sounds like thunder in the distance..."
BOOM!
French Navy: "Traitors!"
Royal Navy: "We warned you... many times... What exactly did you think was going to happen? Why on earth did you choose this ONE time to NOT surrender?"
british logic and totally and completely wrong.......
Reposez en paix courageux marins français morts pour la France 🇨🇵🇨🇵🇨🇵
Ur navy got rekt
As an American I’ll always be thankful to the French for their support in fighting against the British for our Independence. We owe the French a lot.
They didn’t fight for your support they. They couldn’t care less about the American people, they just wanted to get one over the British because we had beet them in war a few years earlier and they were still mad
As a 🇬🇧 🇫🇷 never really had a choice but still respect 🇫🇷 from 🇬🇧
Believe it or not, bad seating at a Royal Wedding played a significant role in the lead up to this battle
Good work Churchill 🇬🇧🇬🇧
Not the entire French Fleet. In 1940 the main part of it was in Toulon harbour.
I am from Brittany, the land most of the 1300 dead sailors came from .
This event is still well present in our memory.
god rest their souls but we had to do it
I agree, we shouldn't have needed to do it. We didn't want to do it but we had no choice. The actions of the royal navy were entirely justified
@@nathancorfield2609 I can understand the worries of the British authorities of this time. But can you tell me what had been the good results of such an action?
These events had been well exploited by the Vichy's and German's propaganda. I would remember to you that, when the Germans invaded the so-called Free-Zone in 1942 , the French Navy present in Toulon preferred to scuttle or join the Allies instead of falling into the hands of the nazies. So the French sailors kept their word , proving, a posteriori, that the worries of the British authorities were out of purpose.
@@eryximaque6310 it was done based on the knowledge of the German track record of keeping promises not to mention that if you remember our two countries for hundreds of years were sworn enemies. There was still a distrust between the two. Especially towards the French, whether it was justified or not. Surely that played a factor. I regret that it resulted in the deaths of so many of your countrymen but it was a difficult decision that had to be made
@@Cheese_Boi1986 no you not