# Talk:Clipperton Island

So .. the US navy invaded this territory owned by France in 1944.
whitheout the agreement of Free France  .
The only government remaining and legitimately accepted by the USSR and the British Empire .
what is the legality of that incident 🤔 37.171.176.202 (talk) 19:32, 1 February 2025 (UTC)

As the article notes, it caused a minor diplomatic incident. As an unpopulated island, the Free French and Vichy France would both have possible claims to the territory. The invasion in and of itself wasn't as much of an problem as that it was done without the knowledge of De Gaulle, leading to concerns that the U.S. laying claim to the island. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 20:12, 1 February 2025 (UTC)
Raymond Fenard had been alerted to the construction of the weather station in 1944.   A French officer was taken to the island in March 1945. And six months later the US left the island. By October of that year everyone was pretty chill about the whole thing and it appears that a large part of the issues that were raised were done by the French military and not it's civilian government. There were more important things going on in 1944 for France than a weather station on Clipperton. In addition to having to rebuild France after the war a majority of it's navy had been seized or destroyed to prevent Germany from taking hold of it. In 1940 France had the fourth largest navy in the world, this was not true by 1944.
This isn't nationalist chest thumping this period of history is amazing and looking at the effects that the war had on the European allies vs the United States gives insight into the harsh conditions the Europeans faced and the work that was put into rebuilding Europe after the war. It also shows the shift in power from the European powers to the start of the cold war and the USA and USSR start to work to establish spheres of influence.
This was much longer than I expected I just had a lot of fun working on this article and translating spanish and french sources on the topic. I wish I could go to the archives in Paris to translate some of the materials from this time, at this rate I should enroll in a masters program because I've done such a deep dive on this topic! If you ever get a chance I've been looking for the weather data the French government collected at Clipperton and would love to put it in the article but my French is really bad so I've never been able to find it. The American weather data is also really hard to find, but at least there's an excuse seeing that it's 80 years old at this point. Dr vulpes (Talk) 02:07, 2 February 2025 (UTC)

Detailed and interesting history perspective regarding Ham visit to Clipperton Island from July 1954 QST Magazine.  Includes period perspectives on island geopolitical claims, influence on choices and brief observations of island flora and fauna. Useful reference for further reading.  See PDF link: https://www.worldradiohistory.com/Archive-DX/QST/50s/QST-1954-07.pdf 2600:8800:5008:9DF0:8D9E:5097:8E67:AC75 (talk) 20:36, 26 October 2025 (UTC)