page_title: Free France
section_title: Normandy and Provence landings
hierarchical_section_title: Free France / Liberation of France / Normandy and Provence landings
caption_attribution_description: English: General Charles de Gaulle, President of the French Committee of National Liberation, speaks to the people of Cherbourg from the balcony of the City Hall during his visit to the French port city on August 20, 1944. (OWI) NARA FILE #: 208-MFI-5H-1 WAR &amp; CONFLICT BOOK #: 1056
context_page_description: Free France and its Free French Forces was the government-in-exile led by Charles de Gaulle during the Second World War, and its military forces, that continued to fight against the Axis powers as an Allied nation, following the Fall of France. Set up in London in June 1940, it organised and supported the Resistance in Occupied France, and established a foothold within several French colonies in Africa.
  Charles de Gaulle, a French general and government minister, rejected the armistice being negotiated by Marshal Philippe Pétain and fled to Britain. There he exhorted the French to resist in his BBC broadcast "Appeal of 18 June".
  On 27 October 1940, the Empire Defense Council was constituted to organise the rule of the territories in central Africa, Asia, and Oceania that had heeded the 18 June call. It was replaced on 24 September 1941 by the French National Committee. On 13 July 1942, "Free France" was officially renamed Fighting France to mark that the struggle against the Axis was conducted both externally by the FFF and internally by the French Forces of the Interior.
context_section_description: Opening a "Second Front" was a top priority for the Allies, and especially for the Soviets to relieve their burden on the Eastern Front. While Italy had been knocked out of the war in the Italian campaign in September 1943, the easily defensible terrain of the narrow peninsula required only a relatively limited number of German troops to protect and occupy their new puppet state in northern Italy. However, as the Dieppe raid had shown, assaulting the Atlantic Wall was not an endeavour to be taken lightly. It required extensive preparations such as the construction of artificial ports (Operation Mulberry) and an underwater pipeline across the English Channel (Operation Pluto), intensive bombardment of railways and German logistics in France (the Transportation Plan), and the wide-ranging military deception such as creating entire dummy armies like FUSAG (Operation Bodyguard) to make the Germans believe the invasion would take place where the Channel was at its narrowest.
  By the time of the Normandy Invasion, the Free French forces numbered more than 400,000 strong. 900 Free French paratroopers landed as part of the British Special Air Service (SAS) Brigade; the 2e Division Blindée (2nd Armoured Division or 2e DB)—under General Leclerc—landed at Utah Beach in Normandy on 1 August 1944 together with other follow-on Free French forces, and eventually led the drive toward Paris.
  In the battle for Caen, bitter fighting led to the almost total destruction of the city, and stalemated the Allies. They had more success in the western American sector of the front, where after the Operation Cobra breakthrough in late July they caught 50,000 Germans in the Falaise pocket.
  The invasion was preceded by weeks of intense resistance activity. Coordinated with the massive bombardments of the Transportation Plan and supported by the SOE and the OSS, partisans systematically sabotaged railway lines, destroyed bridges, cut German supply lines, and provided general intelligence to the allied forces. The constant harassment took its toll on the German troops. Large remote areas were no-go zones for them and free zones for the maquisards so-called after the maquis shrubland that provided ideal terrain for guerrilla warfare. For instance, a large number of German units were required to clear the maquis du Vercors, which they eventually succeeded with, but this and numerous other actions behind German lines contributed to a much faster advance following the Provence landings than the Allied leadership had anticipated.
  The main part of French Expeditionary Corps in Italy which had been fighting there was withdrawn from the Italian front, and added to the French First Army—under General Jean de Lattre de Tassigny—and joined the US 7th Army to form the US 6th Army Group. That was the force that conducted Operation Dragoon (also known as Operation Anvil), the Allied invasion of southern France. The objective of the French 2nd Corps was to capture ports at Toulon (France's largest naval port) and Marseilles (France's largest commercial port) in order to secure a vital supply line for the incoming troops. Most of the German troops there were second-line, consisting mainly of static and occupation units with a large number of Osttruppen volunteers, and with a single armoured division, the 11. Panzer-Division. The Allies sustained only relatively light casualties during the amphibious assault, and were soon in an all-out pursuit of a German army in full retreat along the Rhône valley and the Route Napoleon. Within 12 days the French forces were able to secure both ports, destroying two German Divisions in the process. Then on 12 September, French forces were able to connect to General George Patton's Third Army. Toulon and Marseille were soon providing supplies not only to the 6th Army Group but also to General Omar Bradley's 12th Army Group, which included Patton's Army. For its part, troops from de Lattre's French First Army were the first Allied troops to reach the Rhine.
  While on the right flank the French liberation army was covering Alsace-Lorraine 
caption: Charles de Gaulle speaks as president of interim government to the population of Cherbourg from the city hall's balcony on 20 August 1944
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