Ordinary Sailors: The French Navy, Vichy and the Second World War

After the debacle of the Fall of France in 1940, the one organization that managed to maintain its discipline and functionality virtually intact was the French Navy. This is the story of how subsequently that navy was able to exert a disproportionate influence on the Vichy regime of Marshal Petain. Such influence achieved its apogee between February 1941 and April 1942 when the navy's Commander-in-Chief Admiral Darlan served simultaneously in several of the regime's highest offices. During this period France continued to flirt with the possibility of actively engaging Great Britain in war on the side of Nazi Germany. It was also the period when Vichy introduced some of its most repressive measures against its own citizens and entered upon policies that led ultimately to active collaboration in the deportation of Jews to Auschwitz.